Samsung SGH-i450

One look and I was sure this is a Nokia phone with Samsung written on it! Obviously I was wrong, but the i450 seems less Samsung and more Nokia. Moreover, the phone runs on Symbian 60. But giving Samsung no credit for its own phone would be wrong. The phone does have Samsung's odd quirks. Let me explain...

Design
The design is truly a cross between the N81 and the N95. What with the dual slider design and a very Nokia-like form factor, you would say the same thing. Having said that, there's absolutely no reason why you should hate the phone.

The i450 possesses enviable looks, and it's not just jazzed up for its own sake; instead a subtle theme of cool blue runs along the sides of the phone, sandwiched between off-white. No unnecessary sparkle, no useless ridges; just a simple sports look that I like. With dimensions of 101 x 52 x 17.8 mm, the phone's not took bulky, and at 114g, it's not too heavy either.

The dual slide may not be original, but it works smoothly nevertheless, and appears quite sturdy too. Sliding the front reveals a navy blue keypad with evenly spaced and responsive keys. The keys are placed on a flat surface with arty ridges dividing them. Nice! The speakers are visible when you slide the phone down. A cool touch-sensitive navigation pad amidst the speakers means you can use it while surfing your music folder. It works fine, even if responsiveness is low.

Hot-swap for memory cards is a good thing. The volume keys are right above the memory slot on the left, while the camera key is on the right. Now to quirk number one: the 3.5mm earphone jack. It's nice to have a 3.5mm jack that lets you listen to music while the phone is charging. But you cannot use the jack to talk via headsets. It's purely for music and that's it! Which primarily means you will have juggle between the earphones (while listening to music) and the handsfree headset (for talking, of course) every time you get a call. Beats all logic!

The back houses the camera, without a lens cover, and the front is embellished by the 2.4-inch TFT. Right below are the function keys: Call, Cancel, Menu, Delete and two open keys. That's pretty much it, and despite the quirks I like the form factor.

Features and Performance
As I mentioned earlier, the i450 runs on Symbian 60 series version 3.1. It's remarkably like most Nokia phones (with the same OS), with minor personalization. The UI is non-complex, and the fact that the phone is fast helps considerably.

The 2.4-inch screen boasts 240 x 320 pixels and isn't very reflective. Of course, under bright sunshine you will be staring at yourself most of the times, so avoid doing it. The phone has 40MB of built-in memory, which can be extended using microSD cards.

There's very little to thrash the phone, as it does what it's meant to do. The i450 is a quad-band phone that supports 3G (no use here). I would have liked to see Wi-Fi, but had to settle for GPRS and EDGE. The inbuilt browser is cool, but no multiple pages. The phone supports many third party applications, courtesy S60.

The i450 comes loaded with Real Player for videos and also a Flash player, but what I like is that Samsung has also bundled support for Word, Excel and Powerpoint.

Now to quirk number two: the downward slide. It so happens that you can activate the music player by simply sliding down, but you cannot use the speakers while talking to someone. Every time I tried it the call got cut and the music player started instead!

Music and Camera

The external speakers provided with the phone certify that it's a music phone. I don't differ. Though not remarkable, the sound quality is pretty likeable. You won't get this baby to go very loud, but enough to make the music rightfully audible. Not having EQ sucks though! The music player supports wma, mp3, aac, ogg and asf formats. It supports A2DP profile.

The 3.5mm jack is a plus point, and getting a good set of earphones will only be a boon. The phone has FM radio, with a decent reception. But the built-in speakers (the reason for the dual slide) is absolutely useless. Assuming you live in a quiet neighborhood, you still wouldn't like the fact the music comes out garbled.

The 2MP camera is, in all honesty, very basic. To begin with there's very little tweaking with the kind of shots you can take; and secondly all the pictures have a certain fluorescent tinge. This is because there are issues with the white balance metering system it uses.

The sensor clearly does a bad job of getting the right hue. Night shots are facilitated by an onboard flash, which works only when the shutter release button is pressed. So in the relative safety of dark places you have to aim using only your wits.

Battery and Verdict 
The battery is decent if there's minimal usage. If you use the phone for browsing or even flash (for the camera) you will be left with very little battery for anything else. I used the phone to talk a lot, and I had to charge the phone twice.

The phone costs Rs 13,250 and for this price you can also go for an SE W580i or a Nokia 5610, both music phones. The camera is elementary and there's no Wi-Fi connectivity. On the other hand, I like the form factor, the phone is fast, and the music player decent. Apart from this, there's nothing much that sets it apart.