Samsung galaxy 3-part 2

Features

TheI5800 has no lack of connectivity options. It comes with HSDPA, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and even A-GPS for satellite navigation. All these put it in good stead to take full advantage of the Android operating system (OS) as applications such as the browser and Google Maps are best used with fast connections and location awareness.

The version of Android found in the I5800 is 2.1 (Eclair). This is good because more new applications are requiring phones to have at least version 2.1 of Google's mobile OS. Samsung was unable to confirm if there would be a firmware update that will bring Android 2.2 (Froyo) to the Galaxy 3. We are not too hopeful of this happening as low-end products generally do not enjoy sustained attention from manufacturers' research and development teams.

The interface has been modified with Samsung's custom software, TouchWiz 3.0. This gives a different home and menu layout from vanilla Android, as well as custom Samsung apps. Though we don't mind having TouchWiz, its inclusion didn't greatly improve the experience--standard Android 2.1 is already very competent. Samsung does need to put more work into making TouchWiz less finicky. One annoyance was that the text message notifications refused to go away even after reading the message. This was discussed in greater detail in the Galaxy s review.

Text input is done using onscreen keyboards. Aside from the Samsung virtual keypad, the third-party Swype, which lets you trace words using one hand, is also included. We found the latter text input method more suited for the Galaxy 3 compared with the Galaxy S, as this budget phone's screen is smaller, which makes tapping on tiny keys with the thumbs more difficult.

Music and video playback are supported. We tried playing some DivX files and they played fine without any conversion. Those who like music from the airwaves will be glad to know that an FM tuner is built into the I5801.