Samsung T809 & Nokia Eseries
The E61 is clearly Nokia's "BlackBerry killer", just like the Q is Motorola's attempt to go after the same market. The E61 and the Q have striking similarities. In fact, one can't help but wonder what kind of corporate espionage might have gone on during the development of each product, and which one came first. It's not safe to assume that the E61 is copying the Q just because the Q was announced first; both should reach the market around the same time, so their development timeframes were likely neck-and-neck.
Both the E61 and the Q are very thin and have an internal antenna, landscape QVGA display, Bluetooth, and a QWERTY text keyboard. The Q has a camera and scroll wheel, but otherwise the two phones are eerily similar.
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But the Q is not the E61's only competition. In fact, the E61 will join what is quickly becoming an extremely crowded market of do-everything smartphones with slick form factors and QWERTY keyboards.
One such competitor will definitely be the new Palm Treo with Windows Mobile, as well as the existing Treo 650. Like the 650, the E61 has quad-band GSM and EDGE.
Treo 700 vs E61 |
Treo 700 vs E61 |
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The one big advantage of the E61 over the Q and the Treo is Wi-Fi. That could be the one thing that tips the scales in favor of the E61 for many buyers.
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The E61 keyboard looks pretty standard for a QWERTY smartphone. Unfortunately, it could use some more time in the user-testing lab. Despite the keyboard being larger overall, I found that the shape of the keys made it harder to type on than similar-sized and even smaller keyboards I've tried lately, including the Treo.
Related
Review: Samsung T809
CES 2006
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Samsung SGH-T809 / SGH-D820 specs & features
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