Samsung Corby S3650, Source: Samsung

Samsung Corby S3650 is a new cell phone for users of mobile internet and social networking services such as Twitter, Facebook, MaySpace, Flickr, Picasa or Youtube. Supposedly, it is younger people who use such online services and often they want to do this on the road and they are short for money. With the Samsung Corby S3650, there is a cell phone for these young people for a comparatively small price. In Germany, the Samsung Corby S3650 will be available at stores for less than 200 euros. The mobile phone providers Vodafone, E-Plus and o2 Germany will offer the smartphone in their shops, as well. At IFA 2009 in Berlin I had the chance to put my hands on the Samsung Corby S3650, here is a first review of the mobile phone and a short comparison to the Nokia 6760 slide that Nokia announced recently for the German market.

Samsung will deliver the Corby S3650 in a package with three different backplates in different colors, one of them is always black, the others can be yellow, orange, pink or white. It is made of plastic, is a lightweight and equals in size the Samsung SGH-F480, however, it is solidly built and the body of the Samsung Corby S3650 shows almost no clearances. The Samsung Corby S3650 is equipped with the TouchWiz 2.0 user interface with widgets for quick access to online services such as Twitter, Facebook, MaySpace, Flickr, Picasa and Youtube. The small touch screen likes more finger pressure than a lot of other smartphones, for example the cell phones of the Samsung Omnia series. There is no real keyboard, just three

For data transfers, the Samsung Corby S3650 only supports GPRS or EDGE speeds, there is neither UMTS nor WiFi. Especially WiFi would have been suited to younger users because it could allow internet access for free at friends’ houses, in cafes or in bars. For this reason, users of the Samsung Corby S3650 need an appropriate price plan for mobile internet access, when they want to make the most form the opportunities the phone offers.

Nokia Surge, Source: Nokia

On the other hand, really high data transfer speeds are not necessary because snapshots with the integrated 2-megapixel camera of the cell phone, that are to be uploaded to the social networks, are very limited in size. Many updates in social networking services are carried out in text form anyways. Further features of the Samsung Corby S3650 are a media player, a FM radio, an USB port and Bluetooth 2.1 with A2DP support for stereo sound on the bluetooth headset. There is also a memory card slot underneath the backplate for microSD cards with up to 8 GB, however, it is not necessary to switch off the phone and to remove the battery in order to replace the microSD card.

The Samsung Corby S3650 offers less features than the Nokia Surge 6760 slide as announced by Nokia. The Nokia Surge 6760 slide, which also addresses young people and social networkers, will come to Europe with a real QWERTZ keyboard, UMTS with HSDPA 3.6 mbps support as well as Quickoffice software and will probably cost a comparable price in stores. In the United States the Nokia 6760 slide is available at AT&T as Nokia Surge 6790.

Product Summary of the Samsung Corby S3650:
Operating System: Samsung OS with TouchWiz 2.0
GSM networks: 850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz
Data transfer: GPRS, EDGE
Connectivity: bluetooth, USB
Screen: Touch Screen, 2.8″, 240 x 320 pixels, 262144 colors
Keyboard: virtual QWERTZ
Camera: 1600 x 1200 pixels, autofocus
Storage: MB (+ 8 GB microSD)
Size: 103 x 57 x 12 mm
Speaking Time: ?

Read more about the Samsung Corby S3650 on www.teltarif.de.