Posted by ehamiter
My ideal cell phone is basically a very good point and shoot camera that conveniently doubles as a cell phone. I don't listen to music on it, I don't watch videos, and I rarely surf the mobile web. I do like to take photos but never have a camera on me-- so if I have a device that takes good photos and has the ability to email them to Flickr, for example, then I'm sold.
I originally bought a Sony Ericsson C901 which I really liked. Unfortunately mine was a lemon and malfunctioned about a week into ownership. SE said they couldn't replace my phone, because the C901 was never officially available in North America. Oops. So they were nice and said they would replace it with a similar model. I ended up getting a W995, which is a really nice phone, but its greatest features are the ones I have the least interest in and vice versa.
So, I ended up going with a Samsung Pixon12 and I am so far very pleased with it. First, some sample pics:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ehamiter/tags/pixon/
The build is great. It's gorgreous, aesthetically. A good heft and weight, but easily skinny enough to put in a pants pocket. The camera press button is very nice and there's no strain involved. A half press focuses, a full press snaps a picture. The zoom / volume rocker is also very large and easy to adjust. This was a pet peeve of mine on the W995-- the volume was impossible for me to adjust comfortably.
There is a glass plate covering the lens, which I'm not sure I'm a fan of. If it gets scratched, all of your pictures will have a crack in it. You also have to remember to wipe it clean before taking photos. It has a lens cover, so I'm not sure why this is there. Added security at an inconvenience, I guess.
The settings are easy enough to configure for taking photos, but I wish you could change focus modes to macro easier than going through the settings menu. The focusing on a moving target seemed to work pretty well. I have a pic of my son that uses that and it looks like a tracking shot. Here:
So, I love the camera. This is the reason why I bought the phone, and it's great.
The phone itself is good, but there are a few things that could be improved. Setting up email accounts manually is absurdly difficult. I did it in my SE phones in a few minutes time. This system took me at least half an hour to wade through different menus, settings, accounts, profiles, and the like to figure out what I needed to do exactly.
There's also no fall-back when using wifi. My W995 let me use my home's internet connection, and then when I left, it would automatically let me use the cell phone's reception. The Pixon12 forces you to choose one or the other. If you want the other, it's a manual change. Pretty inconvenient.
IMAP for Gmail also doesn't work*, which is very inconvenient for me personally. I can use POP but I prefer not to, so my e-mail on my phone is non-existant right now. Strangely, though, I'm okay with that.
*Google says: "We're aware of an issue affecting IMAP access in the mail client on Samsung mobile devices. We are currently investigating the situation, but please note that the Samsung mail clients are not officially supported for Gmail IMAP access at this time."
Messaging works well. This is my first touch screen, and I type at a relatively normal speed.
The display is absolutely gorgeous. 16 million colors and AMOLED are nice together.
Overall very happy with this phone, and I'm optimistic it will last me a while.
[ This Message was edited by: ehamiter on 2010-03-07 19:05 ]