News · 25 Oct 2010 · MTW Editorial Team
I just wanted to give you the heads up on a couple in-depth reviews of the Samsung Focus, HTC Surround and Samsung Omnia 7 review posted by the good folks at PhoneArena (US) and GSMArena (EU). As it is usually the case with both website their reviews cover all the hardware and software features of the phones and a lots of media including photo & video samples and walkthrough videos. As I’ve said before you can’t go wrong with any of the currently announced Windows Phone 7 handset but Samsung’s hardware seems to be the best match for the OS thanks to the Super-AMOLED screen (that’s if you can live with the PenTile-Matrix sub-pixel arrangement). Unfortunately HTC seems to have messed up the camera software (or the sensors used aren’t really that good) especially in video mode.
The Samsung Focus and Samsung Omnia 7 (exactly the same hardware) have no problem shooting HD video if in low-light conditions (it never drops under 23fps) unlike HTC’s WP7 device which drop to single digit frame rates in the same lighting conditions. I shot a couple of videos with the LG Optimus 7 during my latest hands-on with the device on thursday night and like the Samsung it had no frame rate problems (image quality wasn’t has good as Samsung’s thought) so HTC really dropped the ball on this one. The HTC 7 Mozart with it’s bigger and higher quality lense also suffers from the same problem so I really hope that this is just a lack of software/driver optimization on HTC’s part and not a hardware issue that can’t be fixed in the near future. All Windows Phone 7 phones have the same chipset and amount of ram so there’s no reason why HTC’s devices are so much behind in video capture mode. Other than that you won’t see much difference between the handsets (HTC’s smaller batteries can be an issue if you are a heavy user). With its Micro-SD slot the Samsung Focus is definitely the best option now if you don’t mind the all-plastic body and live in the US. If you are in Europe you will have to choose between the LC Optimus 7′s pre-installed software (DLNA, ScanSearch etc..), HTC’s HD2..err HD7, the Mozart with the Xenon Flash, the Trophy or the Samsung Omnia 7. Based on all the reviews and my hands-on experience I would go for the Omnia 7 (even thought I find it the worst looking in terms of form-factor) but I’ll reserve my finally judgment until I finally review the handsets in the near future (hopefully..).
I would like to point out an error in PhoneArena’s reviews: Videos transferred to a WP7 device (via Zune) are always trans-coded/re-encoded to WVGA resolution. The only 720P videos played back on the device are the HD videos shot with the on-board camera. Read more about this subject here.
Don’t forget to check out my Windows Phone 7 devices hardware specifications chart here.
source: Samsung Focus, Samsung Omnia 7, HTC surround
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