Samsung G810 review: Zoom on Symbian

The phonebook is great

Typical Symbian device, Samsung G810 offers a phonebook with practically unlimited capabilities. The number of entries is only limited by the available memory, which means that you will have no problems even with thousands of contacts.

The contacts can be ordered by first or last name, depending on the user preferences. Naturally, they can also be searched by gradual typing of the desired name. The phone will search in both first and last name fields, as well as additional names in those fields. This means that even if a contact has a really complicated name, you will have no problem finding it provided you remember at least a part of it.

Symbian phonebooks know no boundaries

While editing a contact, you can select from a huge number of preset fields, which you can repeat as many times as you like. There is no way any information about the contact will have to be left out. You can attach as many numbers as you like to each contact as well. Finally, if by some very rare coincidence, you happen to need a field that doesn't exist, you can always use one of the existing ones and simply rename it.

Viewing and editing a contact

The Call log department has always been a strong side of Symbian smartphones too. The Samsung G810 makes no exception, offering detailed information of all your communications for the past 30 days. It stores all the calls, messages and even data transfers for that period. You can also reduce the amount of saved data but it doesn't use up that much space so such a choice is unlikely.

The Call log application is simply great, offering information for all your communications for the past 30 days

There is also a more convenient way to access your latest calls. In standby you can press the call key and three tabs appear on the screen. Each of them holds up to 20 missed or received calls or dialed numbers.

Messaging: all but the keypad

If you are a heavy texter, the S60 user interface might just be your best friend. The messaging menu is really well organized and generally a pleasure to work with. However, with a keypad like the one on Samsung G810, texting is hardly something to look forward to.

The SMS editor is a very intuitive and easy to use application. It has a counter of the characters left to the limit of 160. There is also an indicator in brackets showing the number of separate parts the message will be divided into for sending if that limit is exceeded. If you are exiting the message editor without having sent the message, the editor offers to either save it to the drafts folder or delete it.

SMS editor shows the number of characters remaining to the 160 limit

Naturally, a delivery report can be activated if the user prefers. The reports pop up on the standby screen, and are consequently saved in a separate folder in the messaging sub-menu. This is one of the best ways to deal with the reports we have come to know.

The MMS editor is almost identical to the one just described. It has an added line for subject and of course the option for inserting multimedia content in it.

Finally, there is also an audio message editor. If, by any rare chance, you want to create an audio message you might find this editor interesting. The editor can either record the message right away or use a previously recorded sound clip. Still, the last time we checked audio messages were simply a type of MMS so it isn't actually that much of a help.

"...Typical Symbian device, Samsung G810 offers a phonebook with practically unlimited capabilities. The number of entries is only limited by the available memory, which means that you will have no problems even with thousands of contacts..."

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The great email client won't surprise anyone who has ever used a Symbian-powered phone. It has support for POP3 and IMAP protocols and can download headers only, as well as the whole messages. There is also support for attachments, so with Samsung G810 you will have no trouble meeting almost any emailing requirement.

The email client looks and functionality are among the niceties of Symbian-powered devices

Our overall impression is that despite the good software part, the Samsung G810 isn't fit to be a texting-friendly device at this stage. We may only hope that the keypad will be somewhat improved but the revolutionary change that is needed seems unlikely. So all in all, future owners better not put their trust in Samsung G810 for the quickest typo-free messages.

Music player lacks the looks but does the job

Samsung G810's music player looks exactly like on other Symbian 3rd edition devices. It can either be accessed from the menu or from the dedicated key on the right of the D-pad.

It is surely not the most attractive application in terms of looks but it is as capable as any other music player out there. As usual, there is support for a huge number of audio formats including MP3, AAC, eAAC+ and WMA. M3U playlists are also managed flawlessly and files are automatically added to the music library once downloaded to the phone.

Music player looks rather basic, but is definitely up to the task

Tracks can easily be transferred to the phone via Bluetooth, USB or by simply downloading them from the internet. Upon completing a USB transfer, the phone automatically prompts scanning for new music tracks and, if allowed to do so, adds the new ones to the music library. You can sort tracks based on their artist, album, genre and composer.

Another thing to mention is that Samsung G810 also supports the A2DP Bluetooth profile. Not that we can remember the last phone reviewed here that doesn't. This means that you are able to play your favorite tracks on stereo Bluetooth headphones. We had no problem pairing Samsung G810 with a third party headset.

Samsung G810 comes with Real player and Flash player preinstalled. The videos can be displayed in both portrait and landscape mode according to the user's preferences. You can also switch to full screen to make better use of the ample display. In fullscreen, the Softkey labels are hidden, so they don't stand in the way, and only pop up when a key is pressed. The great picture quality is also benefiting the video watching experience greatly.

As for the Flash player - there is nothing special to note. It plays them flash files, no bangs and whistles.

If you get bored with the preinstalled content on your Samsung G810 you can always turn the radio on. The FM radio can automatically scan and save the available stations in your area. If it wasn't for the missing RDS, it might have just been as good as it gets.

FM radio user interface