By Melvin Seah

TO ZING up its latest version of the Omnia phone, Samsung has given the Pro B7610 a dual personality - at least cosmetically.

One is a no-nonsense 'work' mode which has a functional but rather staid home screen with shortcuts lined up in neat rows.

The other, the Life mode, is for the fun stuff.

In this mode, you can customise the screen with fun widgets and shortcuts, such as a Google search bar, Facebook and music player. In fact, there are three fun screens that you can access with a quick swipe of the finger.

Pressing the button marked W&L - short for 'work and life' - switches the phone between the two modes.

To keep both personalities happy, the quad band handset, which runs on Windows Mobile 6.5 Professional, also comes with 3.5G, Wi-Fi and GPS.

Use the resistive 3.5-inch touchscreen for typing or slide out the Qwerty keyboard, which I used to write part of this review on.

For tools, there is Microsoft Office Mobile, Opera browser and Google Maps. An Agis NAVFone navigation software available on a 1GB microSD card is also part of the package.

When you want to be uninterrupted, put the phone face-down on the table and a motion sensor mutes the gizmo.

Multimedia goodies include a 5-megapixel autofocus camera, video recording of up to 720 x 480 resolution, Java games support, an FM radio and music player.

The camera has quick autofocus and low shutter lag for a mobile phone. It has extras like panorama mode, face detection and anti-shake too - camera stuff you normally do not find in a cellphone.

Its touchscreen - using Amoled or Active Matrix Organic light emitting diode know-how for brilliant video - is one up on the regular LCD screens found on most other phones today.

With my test clip, Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, images were sharp and vibrant. But I noticed a fair bit of ghosting and pixelation throughout the show, especially in fast-moving scenes. The same happened with my video recordings.

At times, the phone seemed sluggish. It did not open my SMS inbox or unlock instantly.

Final say

Packed with fun features but a tad underpowered.

This story was first published in The Straits Times Digital Life.

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