There are some products that are launched with lots of noise pathos and advertising but there are such as Samsung SGH-X600 appearing silently and softly. So who is this mysterious stranger? Absence of powerful adveryising campaign means that Samsung does not counts on it seriously. It seems that the handset is known to us already: it has recognizable design and menu.

As we expected there is nothing conceptually new about the phone however it does not mean that Samsung-X600 is uninteresting for it is one of the best solutions among middle-price clamshells. Now let's plunge into details.

The design presents no pioneering though it is not demanded here. Samsung SGH-X600 is a good example of a functional, long serving handset the owner of which is not keen of paying extra money for superfluous pathos or ultra modern functions. This is the phone doing its work thoroughly without any extra noise not attracting the attention of the people who surround you. On seeing it in your hands no one will say WOW though with this handset one can bravely appear in public for its status allows the owner feel quite comfortable even at parties or business meetings about it.

The dimensions of the handset make 89x45x21mm with the weight of 78 gram. The handset is monotonously black with the exception of the gray trim going along the front panel perimeter in a continuous line. Though it may seem strange but this not very happy black-gray color has a number of advantages: It is calm and it does not irritate your eyes and the neutral design does not allow to accuse the owner of bad taste which is especially actual for those who finds bright and shiny things Philistine. At last black colors are in fashion again. Besides it is universal it will always suit the person and the situation.

The angle of the phone halves is far from being 180 degrees, though the phone easily performs splits once you press on it:

The opening of the handset can be accompanied by two preset sounds or be silent. As usual there is a rubber stop for the upper part.

Both in design and material Samsung kept foolproof groove: in X660 we see reliable material used in millions of manufactured handsets. The plastic does not feel cheap to touch though it can not be called expensive. The rear of the clamshell is pleasant to touch and mat for this part of the phone contacts your palm frequently. The front panel very rarely touched by an owner is glossy and looks nice though if you touch it with fingers fingerprints will be left.

The clamshell is handy to hold. It can be opened with one hand and on that it won't try to tumble out: the weight is distributed very well so that the upper part is much lighter then the lower one.

The quality of assembling is a good one nothing creaks there are no backlashes and the handset feels one monolith construction in the hand.

The main display is UFB with the resolution of 128x160 pixels supporting 65536 colors

To our subjective mind it is hardly different from TFT display, almost does not fade in the sun and color spectrum is quite worthy. So we had no problems with this part of the device.

The additional display is monochrome which is quite natural for the middle price category. To our mind a good monochrome is better than bad colorful one. Can we call the outer display a good one? Well, yes, at least it is harder to do better with monochrome. The backlight is of pleasant blue hue.

Another handy thing is that in standby mode the owner can see time, date and month even when the backlight is off. The display works in negative mode (white information against black background. The high quality of matrix and monochrome can be seen when the screen is used as a view finder. No, we made no mistake the monochrome screen can be also used as a view finder in camera mode (of course the quality is not so hot but the mere fact wonders: you can understand what it is about but you shouldn't count on anything more).

It seems that the keypad is made of the same material as the main part though it is not so. The keys are made of rather soft rubber material which to our subjective mind is better than the plastic analogues. All keys including OK are made of the same material and only 4-positioned navigation key is made of hard silvery material.

Though the keys are rubber and the numbers and letters are painted over them we couldn't scratch them away as hard as we could. So it is a high quality work.

The keys arrangement also brings no innovation only proofed ergonomics: there are no accidental pressings, keys are soft and handy so the fingers do not get tired of SMS typing. There are seven preset sounds for keys.

The backlight is bright, rather nice but all the keys are of the same color even receive/end call.

A good bonus is a programmable softkey. All four positions can be assigned one of 17 functions.

Both volume control on the left side and camera key on the right one do not differ from the case in color and material.

The keys are protruded and easy to press. The volume control can be programmed to one of two additional funcyions on incoming call either transferring the handset into silent mode or ending it. The function is programmed beforehand.

The handset is equipped with an integrated 0.3Mp VGA camera with the resolution of 640x480 pixels and video filming possibility (The maximum track size makes 95Kb).

The camera lens is in a sort of crater to protect the lens. The camera module is situated at the bottom of the case so that when the clamshell is opened the crater is set against the rubber stop so you should mind your fingers not to close the lens while shooting. The camera is a usual VGA one. The only thing that bothered us was actually not the camera itself but the way the pictures are to be transmitted to another phone: this can be done only by MMS disregarding the fact that the handset has IrDA port.

As to the menu the handset is similar to its siblings. So lets touch the main peculiarities of the novelty.

Messages are represented by SMS and MMS. There are 10 ringtones for incoming SMS so you can choose either one of them or just vibrating. The phone is capable of reminding you about the unread message every 2 minutes. The same goes to MMS. The most interesting thing is that there is one of the latest Samsung features you can input up to 20 numbers never to get SMS from. There is no such function for MMS though it is not that necessary. The thing that bothers is the restriction for MMS which makes 95Kb. The phone memory can store up to 200 SMS. The only restriction for MMS is theat their total size must not exceed 1433Kb.

Phonebook allows up to 500 entries. Each entry comprises Name, Surname, cell/home/office phone number, fax, note, e-mail, photo, ringtone, group. Provided photo is assigned it appears in a thumbnail in the left upper corner while looking through an entry. Unfortunately only photo and name are shown on incoming call and there is no indication from what number goes the call.

Entertainments consist of JAVA games and 3gp mediaplayer. There are two preset games Bobby Carrot and Airship Racing.

On demand other games can be installed but unfortunately they can be downloaded only through WAP.

Applications

The phone is equipped with Stopwatch (with 4 intermediate values), Timer (the maximum time makes 99 hours and 59 seconds), Unit/currency converter, Calculator, Alarm clock (separate for working days and week-ends), World time, Receiver (the maximum length s but 2 minutes, the call can not be recorded), Calendar-organizer.

The loudspeaker is quite good. It reproduces speech with high quality and without any distortions. The ringtones are loud enough. The official characteristics stated that an MP3 file can be assigned as a ringtone as this feature is few and far between the Samsung models that is why we decided to test it especially thoroughly. And well, it works.

Unfortunately there is no mode for simultaneous sound and vibrating you can choose only one of the two or firs vibrating and then sound.

The battery has a Samsung logo at the rear side

At the right side of the handset there is a headset slot with gag attached to the case.

The integrated memory counter showed us over 8Mb that can be used for pictures, video tracks, sound and other files. There are 2 more Mb for Java applications. The file manager is intended for multimedia only and has such folders as Pictures, Video, Sounds and Other files.

Connectivity

Unfortunately the material you've shot with the camera can not be shared otherwise than through MMS so you can not download it to a PC. Games and ringtones can be downloaded through WAP only. You may ask what IrDA is then for? The answer is as follows: the main function of the IR port is sharing contacts from phonebook and synchronizing data with PC.

• High quality well thought over interface (menu, navigation and the like)
• Handy keypad
• High quality assembling

• Downloading ringtones and games only through WAP, sharing multimedia only through MMS
• No mixed vibrating/ sound mode

Samsung SGH-X660 is a middle phone: middle quality, middle functionality, middle design (meaning the handset is unisex, it is nneither pathos nor run-of-the-mill). The phone suits people who do not like attracting extra attention to him/herself and does not want to waste money to be a rara avis. This phone is a good tool to be your invisible helper in every situation.