Great phones, shame there's only Windows on them

Products X800 and X600 PDA phones
Website www.glofiish.com

MOST TAIWANESE mobile phone firms tend to use their mobile PC prowess to create hardware-rich PDA++ phone devices. In many cases, these border on being ultra-mobile PCs.

Here we have a look at two such recent units from E-Ten: Glofiish (yeah, double "i" supposedly to attract curiosity) X600 and X800.

Looks
Both GPS-enabled units share similar PDA-like size of 113x60x16mm, 147grammes, for the X800, and slightly more sleek 107x58x15 mm at 136g for the X600.

Both use Samsung SC3 2442 processor wih 64MB free RAM - 400MHz in X600, and 500MHz in the X800. The 2.8-inch touchscreen display diagonals are the same, too - as well as the Windows Mobile 6 Professional platform. WiFi b/g and MicroSD card support are there on both models, as well as common charger type.

That's where the most similarities end. Looks-wise, the higher-end X800's silver-black design makes it feel more 'serious' and classy, but the X600 actually feels sleeker and handier.

Features
The X800's screen is full VGA 640x480 resolution. With this screen, yeah a nearly-whole web page is visible on a free wireless service here in Singapore, instead of overlapped frames on the QVGA 320x240 screen of the X600.

Also, the quadrupled resolution let's you view the Word, Excel and PPT documents - or MP4-compressed DVD movies from the microSD - with reasonable clarity for a cellphone if your eyes are still young.

Both phones have 2Mpixel flash-photo cameras, with the X800 also boasting an additional small front video-conferencing cam - just like with most phones, the lack of image stabilising coupled with our old shaky hands results in mostly blurred photos.

The X800 also has 3.5G HSDPA on top of the usual quad-band GSM/EGPRS. Reception-wise, we had little problems here in Singapore, as the 3-G coverage is near total - in the Wi-Fi mode, the battery usage went up rapidly though. We had to recharge the phone after half a day of Wi-Fi turned on, on top of the usual calls. The X600 has the same problem - as do most cellphones when used in WiFi mode.

The touchscreen on both phones works fine, either with pen or with nailtips, if you have some - fingertips won't do, unless you go for "easy keyboard" option with big keys on the touchscreen.

As for the user experience - well, it's Windows Mobile, that says it all. Our suggestion is - not just for E-Ten, but all cellphone vendors withour their own OS platform - to give a choice. Some users may prefer Windoze, (many) others would want Symbian instead. Symbian is more phone user-oriented, while Win Mobile looks too much like a shrunken PC.

At the end of the day, the phone is there primarily to make and receive phone calls, then for the messages and, maybe, video talk. Only then come things like Net browsing, WiFi Skyping (although that one may go up in importance), photo taking and media playback.

The phone
Both these phones have decent loudspeakers for speakerphone mode chat, and the 2.8-inch big screen results in touchpad phone "keys" big enough even for fat fingers. The Motorola Bluetooth headset worked fine too.

SMS addicts are likley to prefer the M800 model. It has a full QWERTY keyboard at the cost of extra few millimetres of thickness. SMS typing on the X800 or X600 with a pen and small keyboard touchscreen setting was really a pain, while nailtip SMSing using "easy keyboard" was just a tad slower than the "open butterfly" keyboard of the Nokia E70.

Summary
E-Tech may not have the visibility of HTC yet, but these phones are a good move in that direction. The X600 should also get 3.5 G, while X800 and M800 get better 5 Mpixel optical zoom photo cameras like those SonyEricsson or Samsung units.

Finally, providing a choice of Windows or Symbian would, in my mind, be a very good differentating move against the local competition. OK, Windoze Mobile is usable, but offering a choice would - at the cost of some extra support costs - vastly expand the customer base.

The Good Sleek designs with big displays; VGA and dual cameras on X800
The Bad No 3G on X600; battery usage needs improvement
The Ugly For Symbian users, this is Windows only stuff - for now