Samsung i8510 INNOV8 User Forums

[msknight]

As an amateure photographer and a long time user of Samsung phones (since the black and white flip thingy at the end of the 90's) the i8510 was duty bound to be on my list. It was my first jump to a phone running the Symbian operating system and, as a career IT bod, I thought I'd get stuck in to the phone. I was, unfortunately, in for a dissapointment and many calls to OneStop, Orange and Samsung followed.

Among the obvious dissapointments was Samsung's continued nightmare of porting details from one phone to another. The U700 was only recognised by Studio 3 and Studio 7 only recognised the i8510. There ended up being only two ways to port the contacts; copying to the SIM (which loses all the extra detail and only ports one of the many numbers that can be registered) or exporting the VCF files (which Studio 7 - 7.1.34.8 - copyrighted to 2007?!?! - can't then edit) so ... that was the usual strike against Samsung.

Samsung are also maintaining a Windows only platform which is sure fire suicide. Vista is now history, Microsoft are pushing in to the cloud and seem to want to go down the route of pay-as-you-use PC's http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/30 ... atent_app/ - ignoring Apple and Linux could be judged to be a suicidal decision.

Studio 7 is an improvement on 3 but the backup utility is a big FAIL. The utility records its backup files in the Application Data folder of Windows. The user doesn't get a choice of where to put it, nor how many backups it retains. The net result is that as you backup your phone (which can be many gigs at a time) it is goodbye to your hard disk space. As it isn't in the "My Documents" folder, you can't change the location by changing the locaiton of your "My Documents," and to get at the Application Data folder to kill excess backups, you have to start unhiding system folders.

To come to the phone, it is in many cases a step back in terms of core functionality and operability. Samsung blame the changes on the Symbian apps and try and brush off the result. Wake up Samsung, it's you're product brought to market, baby ... smell the roses ... fast.

In terms of signal performance the phone seems to be lacking. It doesn't pick up a signal from Orange in my office despite a colleague with an old Nokia getting a good few bars. Ive tried reducing the phone to gsm only but that isn't a major improvement. The touch system from the U700 has gone, which is a mercy as I now no longer end up selecting options and putting people on hold when I put the phone up against my ear. The buttons on the edge and the handling of the function lock when the slide is closed is good form and works well.

To cut a long story short, when it comes to the hardware of the phone, the looks, the power and abilities ... with the exception of the poor signal strength, I like it. It's a very nice package. When it comes to the software, however, it is a dismal failure.

The alarm system on the U700 was beautifully flexible. On Monday, Wed and Friday I get up at 6am to go to the gym; on Tues and Thurs I get up at 7 and just go to work. The i8510 has lost all that ability and can't handle this kind of event any more. There also seems to be no volume setting for the alarm.

The shortcuts are a lifeline on this phone. It consists of so many applications that the number of button presses to turn Bluetooth on or off, which I do when I get in or out of the car, is dismal. Thanks to the shortcuts, it is reduced; but the number of shortcuts available are limited. Use them wisely.

The contacts, a major feature for me, have improved functionality that has turned it in to a mess. There is the option to flip the fore and surname on the display, but no option to restrict the search option. Now, when I type, "H" for Home, I get all the entries with surnames begining with H as well. The result is a much longer list. I then have to type at least another character or two to get the entry within visual range on the screen. It needs the user option to restrict the search to surname, forename or to let it loose as it is currently doing.

To the messaging, the extra abilities for e-mail and the like now add further keypresses to get at the various boxes. That's not too much of a problem in itself but the managing of networks for connection is severely wanting. I had hopes that once I had programmed the wi-fi access points, that once I enabled the automatic checking function for the e-mail, that the phone would recognise the networks in range and attach to them in my order of preference. Apparently not. Now, whenever I go from home, to work, to a friends house, I've got to go in to the messaging settings for the inbox and the outbox and manually change the wi-fi point I'm using. Not only that, but it won't automatically search for open wi-fi spots and use them; meaning I've got to program them in to the phone and then delete them when I'm done. This issue alone has taken perhaps the most life changing feature of the phone (for me) and make it a drag.

The operating system also seems to be a drag. A number of times I've both lost audio playback for the notification tunes (the keypress beeps work fine) and I've had to reboot the phone. Also, when going in to contacts I've just got the top bar and the contacts don't list; again a phone reset has been required.

The volume control is one slider for all notifications in the profile. I need to be able to control the volumes independently. When I'm in the office, SMS and e-mail lands quite frequently and a loud repeated tone gets on peoples nerves. When I get a call, however, I need to be able to hear it over the other side of the office. The only way around this is to record different versions of the notification tunes at different volumes, which is a real pain and messes up my sound library.

To come to the not so important software issues, Real Player doesn't have a memory of the last file position, so if you're part way through watching a movie on the train, when you next come back to it, you have to start from the beginning again, and there seems to be no easy way to jump through it. It would be ideal if the left/right buttons would jump forward or backwards a certain percentage of the media file, say 20% increments for really short files, 10% for medium files and 5% jumps for movie length files. But that doesn't seem to exist. The only way at the moment is to suspend the applicaiton but, if I lose the contacts or audio and have to reset the phone, I loose the position.

Powerful operation niggles come through in almost all of the applications. The amount of thought in to the user interface and application handling seems to be slapdash. And no, Samsung, I'm not letting you hold the Symbian community to blame for this.

The camera is, perhaps, the saving grace on this phone, but it isn't top of the range (nor should it be expected to be so.) The D500 has a wonderful system which produced crystal clear images. The D600 was a very poor attempt, but the U700 returned to form. The i8510's camera performs very well in good light and even the, "night mode," enables me to take a usable picture, hand held, in low light. The phone doesn't allow control over shutter or aperture but does at least give control over the ISO as well as the colour temperature; vital for turning out good photos. The video mode is a definate improvement also, having come on leaps and bounds from the U700. An example picture is here http://195.7.255.202/Photo069.jpg that shows what this camera can do in good light, even though the depth of field isn't the best.

Conclusion - I've got this phone on an 18 month contract. There is another firmware update expected any time (according to the Samsung technical support crew) and the ability to bring this phone forward like they have never had before; so if they don't sort these issues out by the end of the contract, this will be my last Samsung phone.

So much power ... so much opportunity ... such a shame that it comes to market in this poor state.

[p1errotee]

Seems like you must have bought one of the first phones on an early firmware version. I have had nothing but great experiences on this phone. See my review shortly.....

[msknight]

Well, the phone ended up being replaced and the replacement is just the same, despite being a considerable increase in serial number. In fact, there is a dubious whirring noise when I auto focus. I'll be very interested to read your review and see what you make of the points that I raised ... especially the volume controls, the alarm configuration and the experience of watching a movie when the place is forgotten. Also, how you manage to handle the backup software ... that is a classic.

I'll update the firmware shortly, but I'd like to give Samsung the chance to fix the bugs I've logged with them first, as well as consider the application issues I've raised.

[zurk]

alarm: YAlarm freeware

wifi: use access manager and save networks it will prompt you for network reqd. hit search (first entry) at prompt for searching automatically.

OS: use firmware Hi1 or later. disable gui effects in themes.

volume: use the battery debug menu hack if you need it.

player: Use divxplayer freeware. it saves positions in movies.

backup/restore: use pc studio for whole phone backup/restores.

hope this helps.