When I had the chance to take a first glimpse at the new Samsung smartphone Omnia II I8000, I was excited about the phone: It offered all up-to-date functions, had a well responsive touchscreen and was easy on the eyes. Now that I had the opportunity to take a closer look at the Omnia II I8000 and after having found several weaknesses of the phone, I have to revise my first opinion. Please read this review in order to get to know more about the strong and the weak points of the new Samsung smartphone.

The Samsung Omnia II I8000 is a bit larger in size and heavier than the Samsung Jet S8000 and it doesn’t have this eye-catching backplate of the Jet S8000. But apart from that the two smartphones almost look the same, even the diamond-shaped menu key of the Jet can be found on the Omnia II I8000. The front of the well-built plastic body is taken mainly by a large 3.7-inch resistive AMOLED touchscreen with a resolution of 800 x 480 pixels (WVGA) which displays details sharply and colors vividly. On top of the case, Samsung placed a 3.5-millimeter jack for ordinary headsets and an micro-USB port. For storage, the Omnia II I8000 sports 8 GB of memory on the device and a microSDHC slot underneath the backplate which supports up to 32 GB cards.

On top of the Windows Mobile 6.5 operating system, which is not really suited for using the smartphone by finger input on the touchscreen, Samsung has put its own-developed user interface TouchWiz 2.0 with five different homescreens called “Organizer”, “Office”, “Multimedia”, “Internet” und “Others”, with widgets of several online services and the 3D cube system for multimedia . In the menu settings, the user of the Samsung Omnia II I8000 can activate the TouchWiz user interface, so that he or she hardly gets to see any of the classical Windows Mobile menu items. To some users the TouchWiz homescreens may seem overloaded, however, they enable the user to open or start applications with one click. It is possible to customize homescreens by adding or canceling icons or widgets. For fans of the Windows Mobile platform with its narrow scroll bars and small menu bars, Samsung provides a stylus in the package.

The 800 MHz processor ARM 1176 S3C6410 seems to be too weak or the 256 Mb of RAM too small for all the functions and features of the Samsung Omnia II I8000. It can happen that certain gallery views are not available at the moment when several applications are active on the phone. Also, certain parts of the interface and the position sensor slowed down at times. The 1,500 mAh battery leaves a strong mark.

The Samsung Omnia II I8000 can be used on GSM-networks of 850, 900, 1,800 and 1,900 MHz. Reception and voice quality is good. For mobile data transmissions the smartphone supports HSPA with a theoretical maximum download speed of 7.2 mbps and upload speed of 5.76 mbps. The user can actively determine whether HSPA or just UMTS should be used for mobile data transfers. The cell phone also supports WiFi for connecting to the internet at hotspots as well as Bluetooth for communicating with other devices and A-GPS for location based and navigation services.

Samsung Omnia II I8000, Pictures: GermanPhoneGuy

For surfing the internet the Samsung Omnia II I8000 comes with the two web browsers Internet Explorer and Opera Mobile 9.5. Setting up mobile email is easy because the client of the Omnia II I8000 pulls the necessary server data of email services such as GoogleMail und Yahoo automatically. The client can show HTMl emails and supports quasi-push. While testing the Omnia II I8000, A-GPS and navigation services only run smoothly with Google Maps.

The 5-megapixel camera with autofocus and LED on the back of the Omnia II I8000 is responsive and offers many settings, however, there is shutter lag and photo and video quality is poor. Because of DNLA pictures and videos can brought onto the Tv screen by a wireless connection. In addition to the Windows Media Player there is also a second media player developed by Samsung on the smartphone for MP3, AAC, AAC+ and WMA audio formats and an FM radio.

German online shops sell the Samsung Omnia II I8000 for prices of EUR 440.00 or more without contract.

Product Summary:
Operating System: Windows Mobile 6.5 with TouchWiz 2.0 interface
GSM Networks: 850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz
Data Transfer: GPRS, EDGE, UMTS, HSDPA 7.2 mbps, HSUPA 5.76 mbps, WiFi
Connectivity: Bluetooth, USB
Display: 3.7-inch resistive AMOLED touchscreen, 800 x 480 pixels, 65,536 colors
Keyboard: virtual QWERTZ
Camera: 2,592 x 1,944 pixels, autofocus, LED flash
Video Capture: 720 x 480 pixels and 30 frames per second
Storage: 8 GB (+ 32 GB microSD)
Size: 118 x 60 x 12,3 mm
Speaking Time: 11 hrs (GSM) or 6.5 hrs (UMTS)

Read more about the Samsung Omnia II I8000 at www.teltarif.de (in German).