Samsung SGH-F480

...be honest with you; the Samsung Tocco (F480) was not my first choice mobile; I really wanted an iPhone. Sadly however, you can only acquire one of the Apple-esq wonders if you sell your soul and empty your wallet to O2. Don't get me wrong, I love O2; they have been my one and only network provider and the service has always been faultless. But whereas now I am paying £15 a month for a decent amount of texts and minutes, the lowest tariff for the ...
...been a big fan of Samsung units; progressing from an F400 to a D900 via the D600 - all decent, intuitive and user friendly phones which had served me well. A quick browse of the January sale on the O2 website threw up the offer of a free Tocco on a £15 a month tariff, I thought this was too good an offer to pass up, and so the Tocco was ordered, and would become my new mobile telecommunication and gadget solution.

== What's in the ... more

I'll be honest with you; the Samsung Tocco (F480) was not my first choice mobile; I really wanted an iPhone. Sadly however, you can only acquire one of the Apple-esq wonders if you sell your soul and empty your wallet to O2. Don't get me wrong, I love O2; they have been my one and only network provider and the service has always been faultless. But whereas now I am paying £15 a month for a decent amount of texts and minutes, the lowest tariff for the iPhone is double that - and for your £30 a month you get a derisory 75 minutes and 125 texts. Oh, and you have to fork out the best part of £160 for the iPhone itself! Sad as it made me the decision was made to look elsewhere for my new phone. I had always been a big fan of Samsung units; progressing from an F400 to a D900 via the D600 - all decent, intuitive and user friendly phones which had served me well. A quick browse of the January sale on the O2 website threw up the offer of a free Tocco on a £15 a month tariff, I thought this was too good an offer to pass up, and so the Tocco was ordered, and would become my new mobile telecommunication and gadget solution.

What's in the box?

Firstly, and of course most importantly, you get the Tocco itself. A glorious piece of engineering wrapped up in shiny black and silver styling - roughly the size of a credit card in all but thickness, it weighs in at a svelt one hundred and six grams. Next out of the box comes the mains charger, which - along with the USB cable - connects to the phone via the multifunction jack, as does the rather snazzy looking in ear headphones. A cleverly designed cover is next; this is an integrated battery cover which flips round to the front of the phone to protect that shiny screen from grubby paw prints and scrapes. Personally I have elected not to use this, mainly because I use film screen protectors to keep the screen scratch and blemish free. A CD containing Samsung PC Studio can be installed on your computer; this natty piece of software enables the user to transfer pictures, MP3's or whatever from phone to PC, and vice-versa. It is also a nice backup solution for phonebook contacts, emails and text messages. Finally there is a selection of documents including a fifty page instruction booklet, details of the two year warranty and selected fliers informing you your life will be incomplete unless you download the latest ringtones, games and wallpapers from the Samsung website.

Key features

5 Megapixel Camera - Beneath the skin of the Tocco beats the heart of an intuitive and feature rich camera. Autofocus and shot stabilization make picture taking easy, while switching on the face detection feature makes the camera search for a face in a picture and focus on it accordingly - a great idea if the majority of your pictures are of the human variety. Better still is the smile shot mode; this determines when a person is smiling and automatically takes the shot. Having tested both of these features I can confirm that they work like a charm, just don't ask me how! 4x digital zoom, LED flash and features such as singleshot, multishot, mosaicshot, frames and panorama mode round up the specs nicely. The Tocco is also a very capable video recorder, able to record as much video footage as the internal or added MicroSD memory can hold. And thanks to the built in Shozu application, pictures, videos and voice recordings can be uploaded directly to blogs or file sharing sites such as Flickr and Youtube.

Full Touch Screen - The 2.8" TFT touch screen is bright in looks as well as design. Pictures and video are displayed in an impressive 256 thousand colours. The touch screen is operated by finger rather than a stylus, which makes the whole experience a lot more portable (Who wants to pull out a stylus to write a text while strolling down the street!) Menus are cleverly laid out so that a couple of finger taps open the camera, MP3 player, or whatever application or function you require.

MP3 Player and FM Radio - The music player has benefitted from the technical knowhow of melodic heavyweights Bang & Olufsen. This offers a crisp, loud sound which belies such a small phone. The Player also supports AAC, WMA and SP-Midi music files amongst others; basically if it's a music file the chances are the Tocco will be able to play it. The FM radio allows you to store pre-tuned stations, and gives a clear, static free broadcast. By far the best feature music wise though is the music recognition application. If you happen to hear a piece of music that has you wondering "what's this tune called?" a simple finger tap can start the application, which then records the tune before analysing and sending the information. What makes this feature so amazing is that it doesn't have to be music being played on the phones Music player or radio. So, if you find yourself in the pub and hear a really catchy tune you simply start the music recognition feature and in less than 20 seconds it will tell you artist and song and even give you the option to purchase the tune in MP3 form. Being a little sceptical of this feature I've tested it half a dozen times thus far, and on every occasion it has delivered the correct results. The music doesn't even have to be clear, the application still seems to pick out the tune and correctly identify it. The music recognition application is powered by Shazam, which has over 6 million tunes in their library, making recognition all but certain, a great application which really sets apart the Tocco from other phones. Finally, the cherry on the melodious cake is the ability to upload Podcasts, great when you want something different to listen too.

Widgets - Widgets are what give the Tocco its individuality. Users of Windows Vista will be familiar with the sidebar; well Samsung's Widgets are a smaller, touch sensitive version. Tapping the widget bar slides it from its hiding place and shows a selection of useful Widgets. It is then simply a matter of dragging and dropping them onto the screen using your finger, this enlarges the Widget and makes it ready for further use. Once finished you simply drag and drop the Widget back onto the sidebar where it nestles with its ilk. There are eight Widgets in total - including a digital and analogue clock, calendar, birthday reminder, Radio and Music player and picture viewer. Widgets can be added or removed from the sidebar via the phone display settings in the menu.

Haptic Feedback - Which is basically vibrate mode with added bells and whistles. When you tap the touch screen the phone vibrates slightly, which makes the whole experience just that little more engaging in that you get the sense that the phone is responding to your every caress - far better than hammering the screen and not gaining any sort of feedback.

Bluetooth Connectivity - And not just any old Bluetooth connectivity; the Tocco boasts Bluetooth Stereo version 2.0. A fast and easy way to link devices to the phone, this makes transferring pictures taken with the camera a doddle, It is also a great way to connect with other Bluetooth enabled phones, PDA's and computers to share files. For those who feel safer with wires the phone also offers a USB2 connection, with file transfer and data backup simply a matter of running the bundled Samsung PC studio.

Applications - The applications available on the Tocco are many and varied; A couple of pre-installed games allow you to while away some time; while the memo, task and voice recorder let you set reminders or dictate your thoughts for prosperity. World clock does exactly what it says, allowing you to have a widget that displays two time zones - handy if you call or visit overseas a lot. Converter will tell you everything from currency, weight, length, volume and temperature; while the calculator helps with those brain straining maths problems. The timer lets you count down from a predetermined time - handy if you have to have that boiled egg just right; while the stopwatch counts time in the opposite direction, from zero. Finally the video editor lets you manipulate those clips you've taken using the camera facility and the RSS feed keeps you up to date with whatever you desire.

The best of the rest - If I were to detail every facet of the Tocco we'd be here 'til next Thursday, so here are the features worthy of mention. HTML Internet connectivity comes via 3G or WAP 2; while email, SMS, MMS, conference and video calling are but a finger stroke away. The Tocco tri-band means you'll have to go a long way before you lose your signal, while a speaker phone option lets you chat without the hardship of having to hold the phone to your ear. The phonebook holds up to 1000 contacts, meaning even the most popular amongst us have room to spare. POP3, SMTP and IMAP4 email authentication brings your inbox into the mobile age and a document viewer allows you to store and view those important Word and PowerPoint files.

The good

Call clarity is first-class and the music player delivers a crisp sound belying the phones small size. The real boon of the Tocco though is that camera; the specs and features would not embarrass a standalone camera so to have it on a phone is great. The feel and feedback from the screen is spot on, it responds to your every touch in an assured way. And the sheer scale of features really push the value of the Tocco, it can transform effortlessly from a phone, to a stopwatch, currency converter, music player, alarm clock and web browser without breaking a sweat. It also looks good too; the screen is big and bright while the lack of physical buttons just adds to the mystique. Flip it over and it looks for all the world like a dedicated camera; complete with flash and lens.

The bad

The internal memory is low at 233MB; although this may sound a fair amount you have to realise that by the time you take a few photographs and upload an album or two to listen to the memory will quickly start to evaporate. This situation is easily remedied with the option of adding up to 8GB of storage via the MicroSD slot - but you have to wonder why Samsung, in their infinite wisdom, didn't make a good phone better by adding this amount of storage internally. There is also no GPS; I guess this is only a problem if you don't know where you are half the time, but in all honesty it doesn't bother me, If I need to find out where I am or where I'm going I'll buy a map! By far the biggest bugbear for me though is that you can only listen to the radio with earphones; this seems a curious state of affairs given that you are able to listen to MP3's without them. Finally, the Tocco comes without a QWERTY keypad, which is of little consequence unless you do a lot of mobile emailing. If you do use your mobile predominantly as a portable email device you are probably far more likely to go down the Blackberry route anyway.

Is the Tocco any good for making phone calls?

With the many and varied tricks and delights up the Tocco's sleeve it is easy to forget that this is a phone at heart. The many features are all well and good, but if the quality of making and receiving calls is compromised it really is a waste of time. Thankfully the Tocco delivers stirlingly on this front. The phonebook is easily to navigate to with just one button push, or if you prefer to dial manually the screen turns into a touch sensitive keypad. I found that the volume of callers was on the loud side, a welcome change as too often mobile calls can seem faint and distant. It is simple enough to alter the volume using the buttons on the side of the phone. You can also adjust the volume of the dial tone and the ferocity of the incoming call vibration in the same way. Typically the battery life is around three days with my moderate texting and call use; I guess this will be significantly shorter after a bout of heavy picture taking or music enjoyment. Charging times seem to be on the fast side as well, typically from the 'battery low' warning to a fully charged phone is three to four hours. Samsung boast an impressive 250 hour standby time, but I have yet to stop playing with the many features long enough to try and test this theory. The amount of pre-installed Polyphonic ringtones is nice, while the option to use any MP3 or music file for the same purpose even more so.

Conclusion

So does the Tocco excite me and stir my inner gadget freak? You bet it does. Comparisons to the iPhone are a little unhelpful as both have their strengths and weaknesses. Yes Samsung should have put 8GB of memory inside the phone rather than have it as a user upgrade, but at around ten pounds for an 8GB MicroSD card this really isn't a major problem. GPS would have been nice, but again it's possibly a gimmick that has been compromised to the benefit of the phones other strengths. One fear I had with the touch screen was whether it would be activated by my cheek or ear when I used the phone, happily a hold button ensures that the screen is locked and thus cannot be activated accidently. I am certainly glad I went for the Samsung Tocco, especially as a free upgrade - and let's be honest; there won't be any such offers for the iPhone anytime soon!

http://uk.samsungmobile.com/mobile-phone/Tocco-overview 

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