rated phones blog – Rating the newest mobile phones available in the world

Unique features never fail to make anything stand out.  Samsung know that well enough to come out with a smartphone that’s not only competently specified, but has the eco-friendly touch that makes it stand-out in the crowd.  First time we saw it at CTIA last April, it didn’t really capture our imagination until now.  This is not the first “green” handset form the South Korean mobile phone maverick. It has the Samsung Reclaim before and now, its Samsung Blue Earth inherits many of that eco-friendliness.

Earth Saving Features

Like Reclaim, the Blue Earth is made from recycled materials, like the plastic of discarded water bottles.  Samsung goes further stripping the plastic from harmful compounds like PVC and putting solar cells at the back cover so you can get a few hours of talk time as solar power charges its battery.  You still get a standard battery charger though and it’s green as well, with a 5-star efficiency power rating so it eats only 0.03 watts of power when idle.

Standard Smartphone Features

It is one of the smallest touchscreen handsets but at 4.2 ounces, it’s heavy enough to feel solid in your hands. It’s a GSM/UMTS phone so you benefit from its 3G/HSPA data connectivity for fast internet surfing.  Its 3” touchscreen display could have been better at 3.25” considering its three-page homescreen.  We wonder why Samsung omitted a virtual QWERTY on that display so you will have to contend with a virtual alphanumeric keypad to enter text. It has the usual WiFi and Bluetooth 2.0 with EDR as well as A2DP for wireless headphones. You also get a decent 3.2 megapixel camera with flash.  Internal memory is tops at 180 MB but you get microSD supports for up to 16 GB.

Verdict

The Samsung Blue Earth has had a lot of hands-on reviews elsewhere gut suffice it to say that it’s a very capable handset alright.  Performance on the AT&T service is decent and should be no different in Europe which is expected to carry a €300 SIM-free price tag. Not bad for a full-featured smartphone that may need some practice to use and eco-friendly besides.

I am not a fan of Samsung, but I do appreciate the phones they made for the Vodafone 360 and their Omnia is pretty impressive spec-wise. Still, most of their designs strike me as bland and their technological direction has always been more of the same thing that other companies have been doing. Their success mostly relies on doing what has been tried and tested instead of pushing the limits further.

Looking at their Genio series, you cannot help but think that they are taking too many cues from HTC and BlackBerry. Still, there are days when I see that Samsung can really make a great decision regarding a phone and push through with it. After all, they are the first company I know of that has developed a truly green mobile phone.

The Samsung Blue Earth will not save endangered animals nor will it cleanse oil spills, but it is a good step towards a better future by reducing both the carbon emission of its manufacturing process and by using recycled materials in the phone itself. The device even has a fully dedicated set of solar panels on the back for charging. Lay it out on the sun for 14 hours and you have got a full charge that is worth 4 hours of continuous talk time. If you are out in the sun while talking, you can probably extend the duration for about an hour more.

Right now, Blue Earth’s materials and production processes are still unique for this model. While others may convey their support by demanding more mobile devices like the Blue Earth, that is not what we should ask for. Instead, we should ask that all phone manufacturers follows the Blue Earth’s standards in design and production in order to  produce devices that are eco-friendly.

The Samsung Blue Earth is the first genuine stab by any company at creating an environmental friendly phone which has a good set of features as well. The phone is really cool in the fact that it has a solar panel at the back of the phone, meaning that you will never find yourself running low on battery as some time under the sun should do the trick as it will help you charge your battery and enable you to get back to talking or texting or whatever you were doing.

The phone has a TFT capacitive touchscreen which is 3 inches long. It has a WQVGA resolution, a 3 megapixel camera with fixed focus and geo – tagging and QVGA, A-GPS, Wi-Fi, FM radio with RDS, TouchWiz user interface, Bluetooth v2.1 with support for A2DP profiles, music recognition service (similar to the software Shazam that you generally get in Motorola phones) and a microUSB v2.0 port which can be used to charge your phone, connect it to a computer as well as to connect a headset. The charger which ships with the phone uses very less battery power.

The phone is capable of being used on all 2G and 3G networks, making it compatible for use worldwide. The phone has a very solid build quality to it and will not make you feel that you are using an inferior quality phone. The phone makes use of a 3 inch capacitive TFT touchscreen which has WQVGA resolution. The phone has internet connectivity options in the form of EDGE, HSDPA and Wi-Fi. The phone also has GPS facilities with support for A-GPS. A 3 megapixel camera comes with the phone, as does Bluetooth v2.1 and a document viewer.

The Samsung Blue Earth Reviews have been good so make sure you snap it up when it is released in the 4th quarter of this year on Samsung Blue Earth contracts.