Although there are some design quirks, the Samsung Omnia promises to be a solid alternative to Apple's iPhone.
Along with RIM's BlackBerry Bold and the Sony Ericsson Xperia X1, the Samsung Omnia is one of the most requested and sought-after smartphones of 2008. Why all the buzz? It's not so much the Omnia's touch-screen that's drawing attention (after all, we've seen it in the Samsung Instinct), but rather Samsung's TouchWiz interface. It brings drag-and-drop widgets for the Today screen and provides an extra level of device customisation. Truthfully, it's not as slick as the Apple iPhone, but it does wonders to make the notoriously unintuitive Windows Mobile easier to use. Plus, the smartphone is loaded with productivity and multimedia features that truly make it an all-in-one device that will satisfy both consumers and mobile professionals.
The Omnia is currently not available in Australia, although we have heard the local release date is November 1. Australian pricing is currently unknown, although it retails for 440 pounds in the UK while the US pay around $700 in their currency. We expect it to cost roughly AU$1000 when released locally.
Design
The Samsung Omnia is an eye-catching smartphone, but in an understated way. It's simultaneously simple and elegant, with an attractive black-and-slate silver chassis and slim candy bar design that measures 112mm tall by 56.9mm wide by 12.5mm deep and weighs 125g. Although light and compact, it has a nice solid construction and feels comfortable to hold and use as a phone.
The handset isn't adorned with many external controls: rather, like its sibling, the Samsung Instinct, and the Apple iPhone, the Omnia is all about the touch-screen. The Omnia features a 3.2in. TFT screen that delivers a 240-by-400-pixel image in 16-bit colour (65,536 colours). The display isn't as large as the iPhone's (3.5in.), nor is it as sharp. Sure, we could use more colours and more screen space, especially for viewing web pages and video, but it's sufficient for most tasks, and it is easy to read and vibrant.
As for text entry, there are several methods you can use in both portrait and landscape mode, including a full QWERTY keyboard, Block Recognizer and Transcriber. The full QWERTY in portrait mode is pretty cramped, so we made a number of mistakes when composing text messages and emails. Also, like the HTC Touch Diamond, when opened, the keyboard takes up half the screen, so if you need to enter text in any fields below the top half, you have to scroll down to access that portion of the page, which is annoying.
Like the HTC Touch Diamond (right), the Samsung Omnia features a unique touch-screen user interface on top of Windows Mobile 6.1.
The touch-screen is mostly responsive and offers haptic tactile feedback that lets you know that your touch has registered with vibrations. You can adjust the intensity of the feedback as well as choose from various vibration rhythms under the VibeTonz folder in the Settings menu. In addition, the Omnia's display has a built-in accelerometer so the screen will rotate from portrait to landscape mode when you turn the phone. Again, there are options for you to adjust the sensitivity of the motion sensor under Settings. Here, you'll also find something called Etiquette mode, which will silence any tones when the Omnia is placed display-side down.
What makes the Omnia unique, however, is Samsung's TouchWiz user interface. TouchWiz allows for an extra level of personalization on your Home screen. There is a tray located on the left side with various applications, such as the clock, music player, photo gallery, games and notepad. You can then drag and drop these 'widgets' to the main screen so they're easily accessible to you every time you fire up your phone. Once you've customised the phone to your liking, you can collapse and hide the tray by tapping the arrow button. Beyond the Home screen, there's also the Main Menu page that organises the major applications in a nice user-friendly view &mdsash; very non-Windows Mobile.
All that said, we had a couple of complaints about the touch screen and TouchWiz user interface. First, the Omnia didn't register our touch when we tried to use the scroll bar (to the right of the screen) when trying to navigate longer pages, so we had to use the directional pad or virtual mouse. Also, you can't add applications to the TouchWiz interface. You're limited to the preloaded widgets, which is a big downfall, in our opinion. As of now, you get widgets for photos, the media player, FM radio, calendar, profiles, games, several clocks, new notifications and the notepad. It's a decent list, but at the very least we'd like the addition of a web widget. If you find you're not a fan of TouchWiz, or a you're a traditionalist, you can switch back to the standard Windows Today screen back or choose the 'Samsung Theme 2', which presents a more simplified home screen, similar to that on HTC's Touch Diamond.
The Omnia is largely about the touch-screen, but you do get a couple of physical buttons. Below the display, there are Talk and End keys, and a four-way directional pad. The latter can be turned into a virtual mouse; just go to Settings > System > Finger Mouse and enable the functionality. We appreciate the inclusion of this feature but didn't use it that often and stuck with the directional keypad.
The Omnia's four-way directional pad can also be used as a virtual mouse.
On the right side, you'll find a shortcut to the main menu page, a volume rocker and a camera activation key, while the left side holds the headphone/power connector port. Unfortunately, Samsung uses a proprietary port for the latter, so be sure to keep track of the included cables and accessories. Also, there's no built-in stylus. One is provided in the box, but you have to attach it with the included lanyard, so it dangles off the left side; we definitely would have preferred it built into the device. Finally, the camera lens and flash are located on the back, and there's a microSD slot — but you have to remove the back cover and battery to properly insert the card, which is a bit of a pain.
The Samsung Omnia comes packaged with two power adapters, a USB cable, a wired headset with extra eartips, a 3.5mm headphone audio adapter, a stylus, a software CD and reference material.
Features
Although it doesn't look like a traditional Windows Mobile device, the Samsung Omnia does run Windows Mobile 6.1 with all the usual trimmings, including the Microsoft Office Mobile suite and support for Microsoft's Direct Push Technology for real-time message delivery and automatic synchronisation with your Outlook calendar, tasks and contacts via Exchange Server. The Omnia can also be configured to access your POP3 and IMAP email accounts; we simply entered our Yahoo Mail login ID and password and were able to receive and send messages within a couple of minutes. There are plenty of other PIM tools to keep you on task and organised, including a task list, a task manager and switcher, a smart converter, a calculator and a PDF reader, among other things.
For web browsing, you could use Internet Explorer Mobile, but the Omnia also ships with Opera Mobile, which many find to be a superior browser. There's also Windows Live integration and a Google Launcher that gives you quick access to search, Google Mail, and Google Maps. Unfortunately, there's no Flash support out of the box. As far as connecting to the web, you can use Wi-Fi or your network operator's mobile signal — the Omnia supports 3G/HSDPA and GPRS/EDGE.
Turn over to see the rest of the review.
5%
8%
Pros: Excellent camera with a flash (illuminates well, also works as a flashlight) - equivilant to a good digital camera, good music player, very aesthetically pleasing, multiple keyboard options to suit the user's preference, most suited to those looking for great performance, above average features.
Cons: Can lag alot, music player may not perform to the standards of cheaper phones, hard for those with big fingers, some parts are not user friendly, runs on windows mobile not like a normal phone, hard to understand due to capabilities, GPS is not that loud...
Final Comments: The Samsung SGHi900 is definitely more sophisticated than the iPhone, it's competitior. It's features far outweigh those in the same price range.
I would personally recommend this phone - if you like style, business and pleasure in one.