And the beat goes on...

Now, phones aren't usually my forte, but when Samsung asked if I wanted to review their new MP3 spouting mini-boom box of a phone, I couldn't really say no. The real clincher was the Bang & Olufsen speakers embedded in the phone, which appealed to the audiophile in me.

Unpacking it from its box, we can see that what the customer demands from a phone manufacturer these days is EVERYTHING. You get much more than just a charger and a little headset; with this phone we get a beefy looking set of headphones with in-line mic, data cable, software and a 1GB MicroSD card to boot.

But enough waffle, here are the specs for the phone:

Screen:

2.2 Inch TFT 262k Colour Screen (240 x 320 Pixels)

Imaging:

3 Megapixel Camera with Flash

Video Player + Recorder

Screensavers and Wallpaper

Messaging:

SMS, EMS, MMS

Email

Sound:

Music Player + FM Radio RDS

Bang & Olufsen ICE Power

Polyphonic Ringtones and MP3 Ringtones

Entertainment:

Java™

Organiser:

Phonebook, Calendar, Organiser

To Do List, Clock, Alarm

Converter, Calculator, Handsfree Speaker

Connectivity:

3G HSDPA

Bluetooth® with A2DP

USB

GPRS, EDGE

Network:

Tri Band (GSM 900, GSM 1800 & GSM 1900)

HSDPA 2100

Internet:

WAP 2.0

XHTML

Memory & Talk Time:

24 Mbytes plus MicroSD™ Memory Card Option

4.5 Hours Talk Time

620 Hours Standby

Weight & Size:

105 g

103 x 48 x 16.9 mm

Taking a page from their Finnish competitors' product, we can see this phone slides both ways. Flip it up for an extended 15 button keypad, adding some extra buttons atop your standard 12 key pad to enhance the phone functionality and provide the user with more shortcuts.

Slide it down and you reveal the two Bang & Olufsen driver units that pump out your tunes for all to hear. But thanks to some clever software jiggery pokery, you are presented with some menu options to launch the music/radio/video players, so there is less time spent fiddling around in the menu system.