The Mossberg Solution » megapixel

Palm Pixi Needs a Dusting of Speed

Katherine Boehret — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 00:52:55 +0000

Since the debut of the Palm Pre in June, Palm has talked about the value of the device’s webOS operating system, which offers fast responsiveness, multitasking, universal search and smart synchronization. These features are accessed using delightful multitouch gestures like swiping with a fingertip. So it makes perfect sense that Palm would want to expand its family of products running this great mobile operating system.

[ See post to watch video ]

This week, Palm (PALM) introduced a second device with webOS: the Palm Pixi (palm.com/pixi). This is a stripped-down version of the Pre and it costs $100 (after a $50 instant rebate and a $100 mail-in rebate and with a two-year service contract) compared with the $150 Pre. Walmart.com is currently selling the Pixi for even less—$50 (http://3.ly/oSE). Both the Pixi and the Pre run on Sprint’s (S) network.

I’ve been testing the Pixi and I’ve found that the physical differences from the Pre are acceptable variations that most people won’t mind and may not even detect. These include a smaller, lower-resolution screen, a two-megapixel camera rather than the Pre’s three-megapixel camera and stationary keyboard instead of one that slides out. The Pixi isn’t as pebble-shaped as the Pre, but its back cover is rounded to fit comfortably in a hand. And like the Pre, it has an eight-gigabyte storage capacity and it’s thin and light enough to forget in a jeans pocket or to comfortably hold up to your ear during phone calls.

The Pixi’s internal changes are much tougher to accept. It lacks Wi-Fi capability and so must rely solely on Sprint’s 3G network for its connection, which I found to be frustratingly slow at times. This littler phone also runs on a weaker processor than the Pre, a decision that Palm says helped cut costs and make the Pixi small. But this processor’s speed is slow enough to notice immediately and it robs webOS of its lightning-fast speed. The Pixi’s progress indicator—a spinning, white circle—appeared on my screen too often.

The $100 Palm Pixi is like a mini version of the Pre. A $70 Touchstone accessory (right) magnetically holds the Pixi as it charges.

Like its super-smartphone competitors, including Apple’s (AAPL) iPhone, Research in Motion’s (RIMM) newer BlackBerrys and Google’s (GOOG) Android phones, the Palm Pixi taps into a virtual store from which users can download apps for the device. But Palm’s App Catalog currently holds fewer than 400 apps and roughly 80 of those aren’t yet configured for the Pixi. This means that people who buy the $100 Pixi can choose from just around 300 apps for download, compared with the 100,000 apps available for Apple’s $100 iPhone 3G.

Some apps come preloaded on the Pixi, like Facebook and NFL Mobile Live. I downloaded others, including Pandora radio, Tweed for Twitter and a game called Word Whirl Lite. I logged into my Pandora account and played songs from one of my personalized radio stations while reading through email. A tiny “P” icon at the bottom of the Pixi’s screen notified me that Pandora was running. Other notifiers, like new emails or instant messages, appear at the bottom as well.

If you aren’t familiar with webOS, it’s easy to learn. Functions are designed to be more people-centric rather than program-centric. For example, I can look at a name in Contacts and see how I’m linked to that person—like through Facebook or Google Talk. If I want to start an instant-messaging conversation with that person, I can do so right there rather than opening AIM or Google Talk first to find a person’s name and then initiate conversation. I logged onto the Pixi with a Google account and the device was smart enough to also synchronize data from my Google Talk, Google Calendar and Gmail contacts.

The Card View, a display of all the programs that are simultaneously running at any given time, can be exposed with a simple, upward finger swipe starting below the screen. To close a program, simply touch it with a finger and toss it upward, as if throwing it away. This is one of the most satisfying gestures in webOS. And it’s a good thing, too, because Pixi users will need to use it more often than they did with the Pre. Palm suggests running only seven programs at once for the best performance, rather than the 10 you can leave opened on the Pre.

But my Pixi stuttered with just five programs—sometimes fewer—opened. Simple tasks like opening an email or searching for an app in the App Catalog were painfully slow. I received an email containing one digital photo, and the process of opening just the email—not even the photo—took about 10 seconds. When I finally opened the email and its photo, I saved it to my Pixi and tapped on a menu option to upload it to Facebook. But five minutes later, the spinning progress indicator was still on my Pixi’s screen and I gave up. I tried again and the same thing happened. Finally, on the third try, my photo posted to Facebook.

As was the case for the Palm Pre, the Pixi can be charged by plugging into a normal AC adaptor or by resting it on the Touchstone, a $70 accessory that, with the help of a special back cover that snaps onto the Pixi, magnetically holds this device as it charges. A handful of stylish “Artist Series” back covers will sell on Palm.com for $50 each and will ship in early December.

The Pixi’s 2.6-inch screen has a 320×400 resolution, which is a step down from the Pre’s 3.1-inch, 320×480-resolution screen. Palm estimates the Pixi’s battery lasts for five hours of talk time, the same as the Pre, but for 350 hours of standby time—or 50 more hours than the Pre.

The Palm Pixi’s keyboard is tiny but sufficient. People who are used to BlackBerry or even iPhone keyboards might be irked that the Pixi keyboard doesn’t have built-in shortcuts like holding down a key to capitalize it or pressing the space bar twice to add a period to the end of a sentence.

Like its predecessor, the Pixi has a designated Gesture Area just beneath its screen where users can swipe a fingertip for quickly navigating through screens, like swiping right-to-left to go back a screen. Unlike the Pre, the Pixi doesn’t have a silver button below its screen that immediately takes users to Card View, but I didn’t miss this button.

Though the Palm Pixi is $50 less than the Palm Pre, its downgraded performance doesn’t make that dollar savings worth it.

Write to Katherine Boehret at mossbergsolution@wsj.com

A Downsized BlackBerry Bold With Oomph

Katherine Boehret — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 23:16:08 +0000

Almost exactly one year ago, Research In Motion introduced what I then called the Buick of BlackBerrys: the BlackBerry Bold. It was bulky, heavy and seemed made for the holster-wearing set. But what it lacked in style it made up for in comfort. It had a generously sized keyboard, bright screen and even a leatherette back to accent its luxurious side. The Bold was RIM’s first BlackBerry to run on the fast 3G network, and AT&T was asking $300 for it—$100 more than the least expensive Apple iPhone at the time.

Much has changed in a year, most notably the growing number of serious competitors vying to steal customers from RIM (RIMM) and Apple (AAPL), and the surge of applications (“apps” for short) available for these super smart phones.

[ See post to watch video ]

This week, I tested RIM’s new BlackBerry Bold 9700 (na.blackberry.com), which will be available on Nov. 27 for $200 with a two-year T-Mobile contract. Like the original Bold, the Bold 9700 has a leatherette back. But that’s where the similarities end. This new version reminds me of the original Bold after a diet: smaller in every dimension—width, height, depth and weight—and, physically, it’s a lot like the newer BlackBerry Curve models. (I use the Curve 8900 every day, and after using the two together for a week I still mistook them for one another at a glance.)

RIM has long been proud of its diverse selection and the fact that it doesn’t force a “one size fits all” theory on its users. Instead, it offers BlackBerrys in all shapes and sizes, ranging from the Pearl Flip, a flip phone with a built-in BlackBerry, to the Storm 2, a touch-screen device without a physical keyboard, and several models in between.

Now, the Bold has dropped its distinguished characteristics. The Buick of BlackBerrys has become as common as the Toyota Camry. Is there nothing left for the user who likes a large, luxurious BlackBerry?

In a side-by-side comparison between this new Bold 9700, the Curve 8900 ($150 after a $100 mail-in rebate) and the Tour 9630 ($150 after Verizon’s $100 online discount), the physical differences are almost imperceptible. And these models don’t look all that different from the Curve 8520, which costs $50 with a two-year T-Mobile contract when bought at Wal-Mart (WMT).

The new Bold’s smaller size means its keyboard also is slightly smaller than its predecessor: It measures about 5.5 centimeters across rather than 5.9 centimeters. I still found it relatively comfortable to use. But this keyboard is almost exactly the same as the keyboard on the BlackBerry Tour, except the new Bold’s bottom row of keys is slightly shorter. Unlike the keyboard found on the Curve 8900 and other less-expensive Curves, the keys on the Bold 9700 are positioned side by side with no spaces between them, and horizontal rows are divided by chrome frets.

Look familiar? The BlackBerry Bold 9700 now resembles existing BlackBerrys.

While the Bold 9700 looks rather undistinguished, it has a few less-obvious attributes that give it a little oomph. For starters, it uses a trackpad for scrolling the screen. Longtime Blackberry users will remember the original scroll wheel, which was on the right side of the device. In 2006, the scroll wheel was replaced with a trackball on the front of the device. This September, that trackball was replaced by a trackpad as first seen on the Curve 8520, and its appearance on this new Bold confirms RIM’s decision to use it as the navigational tool of choice.

This trackpad is a tiny, touch-sensitive square that works by sensing a finger’s directional movements. Pressing in on the trackpad, like pressing in on the trackball, selects something on the screen. At first, I missed the satisfying physical feel of scrolling with the trackball, and the trackpad felt fast and less controllable to my thumb. But I soon got used to the trackpad and appreciated that it does away with all moving parts that could possibly get stuck—a trackball hazard for many BlackBerry users. The trackpad also establishes a flat layer beneath the screen that looks sleek and smooth in line with the four navigational buttons.

Another advantage of the Bold 9700 is its battery life. If you take off this BlackBerry’s leatherette back, a battery that measures almost the size of the device itself lies beneath. This large battery supplies the Bold 9700 with enough juice to last up to 19 days in standby mode. By comparison, the BlackBerry Tour and Curve 8900 last for up to 14 days each in standby. The new Bold’s talk time is up to six hours, slightly better than the Curve 8900’s 5½ and an hour better than the Tour’s five-hour talk time.

This thinner, lighter, smaller Bold is more comfortable to use for phone calls than the original, which could make users feel like they were holding a small piece of toast up to their ear during calls. I made several calls with no problems. Emailing on this Bold 9700 was as simple as always, and I set up four email accounts for testing.

Despite its fancy new BlackBerrys, RIM needs to overhaul the way it handles apps. The Bold 9700 comes preloaded with a prominently positioned icon for RIM’s BlackBerry App World store. But apps downloaded from here still go right into the “Downloads” folder, sending users unfamiliar with this system into a frantic search for their newly downloaded app.

And not all apps go into that folder; the Facebook app goes straight to the “Apps” folder. Why not put every new app right on the home screen and let me put them into folders if I so choose?

Once apps are downloaded, RIM neglects to notify you when all apps need to be updated. On my personal Curve 8900, I recently dug into the settings of my TwitterBerry and Facebook apps and manually checked to see if updated versions were available for each. This was the case, and I downloaded the new versions, but most people would never think to check for this kind of thing. Instead, RIM should send notifications about available updates for all apps.

The Bold 9700 runs on T-Mobile’s 3G network, which isn’t nearly as established as the 3G networks that Verizon (VZ) and AT&T (T) offer. It also can connect to Wi-Fi and allows voice calls to be made over Wi-Fi. (The BlackBerry Tour connects to Verizon’s 3G network but doesn’t have Wi-Fi—a huge downside. The Curve 8900 connects to Wi-Fi but not to 3G.)

The other attributes of the Bold 9700 are like the BlackBerry Curve 8900 and Tour: They all have cameras with flashes that are capable of capturing 3.2-megapixel photographs, bright 480×360-pixel displays, built-in GPS and slots for microSD memory cards so as to expand their memory.

If you’re considering a BlackBerry upgrade, the Bold 9700 offers 3G and Wi-Fi, a combination not offered by another BlackBerry with a full physical keyboard—other than the original Bold. But since many of the Bold 9700’s features are about the same as less-expensive BlackBerrys, it’s worth considering the Tour and Curve 8900 before you spend $200 on a device that no longer lives up to its bold name.

Edited by Walter S. Mossberg

Write to Katherine Boehret at mossbergsolution@wsj.com

Digital Cameras With Room for New Views

Katherine Boehret — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 23:36:02 +0000

At a glance, the most obvious physical improvements on today’s digital cameras compared with those bought five years ago are slimmer size and larger LCD viewing screens. Other than that, they don’t look a whole lot different.

But this week, I tested two physical features that I’ve never seen on digital cameras.

[ See post to watch video ]

I used the $430 Nikon Coolpix S1000pj (nikonusa.com), which has a mini projector built right into the camera itself. This extra characteristic lets you take pictures and, by pressing a button on the camera, project them onto any nearby surface, in old-school slideshow style. The projected image can measure up to 40 inches, growing or shrinking as you walk away from or toward the surface onto which the images are projected.

I also tried the $350 Samsung DualView TL225, which had two LCD viewing screens—including one on the front side. This front screen lets the subjects of the photograph see how they look as the photo is being captured, raising the concept of instant gratification to a new level. The outward-facing LCD can also display a smiley face or cartoon animations to encourage children to smile. It also can be used to display a timer’s countdown clock so you know exactly when the photo will be taken.

Technical Advances

These two compact cameras also feature less obvious technical advances that aren’t quite as eye-catching as a built-in projector or dual LCD screens.

Each camera can capture photographs with over 12-megapixel resolutions, and the Nikon and Samsung have 5x and 4.6x wide-angle zoom lenses, respectively.

Both cameras have built-in automatic scene-detecting capability, meaning they can analyze a scene to determine which shooting mode would work best. And they allow the user to edit images directly on the camera like brightening an image or rotating a photo.

The Nikon sticks to one traditional 2.7-inch LCD screen with separate buttons that control functions like menu, timer, deleting and playback. And, like many digicams, it accepts a SecureDigital (SD) memory card.

Getting your good side: Samsung’s DualView TL225’s front LCD shows people how they’ll look in photos.

In somewhat unusual fashion, the Samsung requires a tiny microSD memory card. The viewing screen on the back of the Samsung is a generous 3.5-inch touch LCD that covers close to an entire side of the camera; the front-side LCD is 1.5 inches.

I focused my testing on the unique physical features of each camera: the Nikon’s built-in projector and the Samsung’s two LCD screens. I tried them out over the course of a week and used them in real-life situations including at a birthday party and at the Army 10-Miler, an annual run in Washington, D.C.

When the Nikon’s projector isn’t in use, it functions like a regular camera—albeit an expensive one at $430. Nikon says this price is largely due to the cost of its built-in projector. Until now, most people who wanted portable, mini projectors bought them as standalone products; for example, the Pico Pocket Projector from Optoma Technology Inc. is listed for $230 online at Best Buy (BBY).

Subway Show

I took the Nikon Coolpix S1000pj along to the Army 10-Miler, capturing photos of runners as they ran near the National Mall. Later on, while I waited with hundreds of people to get on the D.C. Metro subway system, a friend and I looked through photos from the day by projecting the camera’s images onto a concrete wall.

At first, passersby thought the slideshow images were put there by the race organizers, and they commented about how neat it was that the race images already were posted for everyone to see.

The D.C. Metro was an ideal spot to use the Nikon’s projector because of its low light and white concrete walls. Outdoors, the projected images weren’t quite as easy to see.

I also used the projector in a house and in my office, setting it on a table and turning off the lights for the best view. A tiny remote comes with the camera if you want to sit back and give your friends and family a slideshow. Videos taken with the camera also will play in video format.

To start the projector, I pressed a button on the top ledge of the camera, which immediately covered the lens and turned on the projector’s bright light. A slider button adjusts focus. The image size can be as small as five inches and as large as 40 inches, and it will project from about six feet away. Nikon says the camera’s projector will work for an hour before its battery runs out.

Nikon’s S1000pj displays images and videos with its brightly lit projector—just right for a subway slideshow.

Surprise, Surprise

The $350 Samsung DualView TL225 is black with an accent color that comes in purple or orange. Its front-side LCD screen isn’t visible when the camera is turned off, making for a surprising experience when you take pictures of friends who can suddenly see themselves.

A similar but slightly lower-quality and less-expensive version of this camera is available in the $300 Samsung DualView TL220. This camera’s back LCD screen is a half-inch smaller than the TL225’s and not nearly as bright. Other notable differences include the TL220’s plastic casing compared with the TL225’s aluminum.

Clowns in Action

This front LCD performs various functions in addition to showing people what they look like. A scene called Children puts animated cartoon clowns on the outer LCD in hopes of making a child smile for the camera. Another setting puts a large, yellow smiley face on this LCD when the shutter button is pressed down halfway. And when the camera’s timer is set, the outer display counts down, showing “3, 2, 1″ until the image is captured.

I used this Samsung camera with two LCD screens to take pictures of friends who were all surprised and delighted when they saw themselves on the camera before the photo was taken. At a birthday party, the clown animations made even a group of people in their 20s laugh.

Some Downsides

The downside to this display screen is that it’s to the left of the camera’s lens, so if you’re taking a close-up shot of someone, they will appear in the photo like they’re glancing away slightly.

Another negative of this display is that it blacks out a split second before the photo is taken, so as long as you can hold the pose you saw of yourself on the screen, you’ll look fine.

It’s too early to know whether the innovations in these cameras will catch on, or be viewed over time as expensive gimmicks.

If these features become more common, hopefully the prices will come down and more consumers will be able to enjoy them.

Edited by Walter S. Mossberg

Write to Katherine Boehret at mossbergsolution@wsj.com

A BlackBerry Priced Right For Newcomers

Katherine Boehret — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 07:52:03 +0000

Web browsing and email have comfortably migrated to mobile handhelds like the iPhone, BlackBerry and Palm (PALM) Pre. But many of these gadgets still cost a lot compared with cellphones that come free with renewed two-year contracts.

This week, I tested a new BlackBerry that costs less than any other BlackBerry did at launch—that is, if you buy it at the right place. Research in Motion’s (RIMM) BlackBerry Curve 8520 costs just $49 at Wal-Mart (WMT)—or $130 if you buy it at T-Mobile. Both prices are with two-year T-Mobile contracts.

[ See post to watch video ]

The BlackBerry Curve has been one of the company’s most popular models. All iterations of the Curve combine a full QWERTY keyboard with a sleeker, more stylish look than bigger BlackBerry models like the Bold. And Curves typically cost less than their larger counterparts. In February, RIM refreshed its Curve brand for the first time in over two years with the 8900. This model was a real upgrade for Curve users, thanks to a brighter screen, faster performance and flatter keys that were easier to press. But six months later, it still costs as much as $199 (after rebate)—a steep asking price considering how some older 8300-series Curves are offered for around $50 with two-year contracts.

This newest $49 Curve 8520 lowers that price barrier. Its monthly T-Mobile service plans are also relatively inexpensive, starting at $55 for voice and data (not including MMS or SMS messaging).

It has two features never before seen on a BlackBerry. First, in place of a trackball or scroll wheel, this Curve uses a trackpad—a mini version of those used for mouse navigation on laptops.

Second, it has designated physical buttons for playing, pausing and skipping ahead or back within media like videos and music. These rubbery buttons are built into the top edge of the BlackBerry.

I like the look of the Curve 8520—especially how the surface covering its screen extends down to the trackpad and its four surrounding buttons, giving it a smooth facade. It comes in two colors, black and frost (I used the black). Its low price, alone, will be enough to draw customers.

But something about the way its keyboard and navigational keys worked felt cheap. Letter keys felt light and hollow while the Send, Menu, Escape and End keys around the trackpad clicked as I touched them.

The specifications of this BlackBerry tell the tale more specifically. Its 320×240 pixel screen looks faded next to that of the Curve 8900, which is 480×360. The blinking red indicator light at the top front corner of all BlackBerrys is a barely noticeable dot on this device.

And its camera is only two megapixels, not 3.2 megapixels like on the 8900, and is the first on a BlackBerry not to have a built-in flash. Also, it doesn’t run on the fast 3G network, though it uses Wi-Fi and automatically connects to trusted networks when in range of them.

First-time smartphone owners may not notice or care about these small details, but veteran BlackBerry users will pick up on them right away.

The Curve 8520 incorporates useful physical features found on previous models like right- and left-side convenience keys that work as handy shortcuts. It comes with a 1-gigabyte microSD memory card so users don’t have to buy their own before loading this device with photos, music and videos.

A strip of rubber runs around the Curve’s edge, covering up and smoothing over its convenience keys and volume buttons. This rugged addition isn’t visible from the front of the BlackBerry and it will probably go a long way in preventing nicks and dings. The word “Curve” is imprinted on the back of the BlackBerry, proudly branding this model.

The navigational trackpad is a cinch to use and moves the cursor up, down, right and left with very little effort. To select, one needs only to press in on the trackpad just as with the trackball. Unlike the trackball, which rolls in place and can get stuck once in a great while, the trackpad doesn’t have any moving parts.

The physical media keys on the Curve 8520’s top edge work to instantly start playing media from any screen, like a music video that I watched. If you were to use your BlackBerry as your sole portable media player, these would be more valuable. And their position on the top of the Curve makes them easy to reach if the device is in a pocket or purse.

In my everyday usage scenarios, I usually forgot about these shortcut buttons and just used the trackpad to find and select a track or video for playing.

BlackBerry’s App World store for applications that users can load onto the device still only offers 2,000 apps, compared to Apple’s (AAPL) 65,000. This means that for now, this new Curve can’t be enhanced with as many outside programs, which is a real downside. And if you do download a lot of apps, or music or videos or photos, you may have to get a bigger memory card.

The Curve 8520 isn’t made for BlackBerry fanatics. But it’s a good entry-level BlackBerry for users who still haven’t let go of their basic cellphones. At Wal-Mart’s $49 price, it’s hard to beat.

Edited by Walter S. Mossberg

Write to Katherine Boehret at mossbergsolution@wsj.com

Second Chances: T-Mobile Tries Again

Katherine Boehret — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 00:08:02 +0000

As the saying goes, you never get a second chance to make a first impression. But it never hurts to try. This week, I tested the T-Mobile myTouch 3G with Google (GOOG), which is the company’s second chance at introducing a “Google phone” to the masses.

Google’s first device, called the T-Mobile G1, came out in October and was less than a sensation. The phone had a touch screen and a handy slide-out physical keyboard, but it was bulky and unattractive. It came with just one gigabyte of memory and lacked important features like compatibility with Microsoft Exchange for use with work email. Its app store, called the Android Market, offered only about 50 applications. The G1 launched with surprisingly few accessories.

[ See post to watch video ]

The $200 (with two-year contract) T-Mobile myTouch 3G (t-mobilemytouch.com) available Aug. 5, has fixed many of these problems. Its new design uses an on-screen keyboard, which gives it a thinner, more stylish build that feels great in the hand. It now comes with four gigabytes of memory, works with Microsoft Exchange and can record and play back video footage. The Android Market has increased its number of apps to about 6,300, and the myTouch will hit stores with accessories like designer shells and docking stations. Its combined voice and data plans are at least $25 less per month than what AT&T’s (T) plans cost for users of Apple’s competing iPhone.

But while using it, I couldn’t help thinking that the myTouch felt less like a new device and more like what the G1 should have been in the first place.

The myTouch, which is built by HTC of Taiwan, runs on an improved version of Google’s operating system, that performs tasks faster has a more streamlined look and supports stereo Bluetooth connections. But it carries on many traits of its predecessor. It still synchronizes over the air with Google account information including email, calendar and contacts. Swiping a finger to the left or right on the myTouch’s home screen will still open other screens, with space for icons representing apps. And its handy window-shade-like Notifications menu can still be pulled down onto the screen at any time to show a list of new messages.

The most dramatic difference on the myTouch is its on-screen keyboard, which may frustrate some people who liked the G1 for its because it had a physical keyboard and a touch screen. Like on Apple’s (AAPL) iPhone, the myTouch keyboard corrects words as you type, recognizing you’ll make more mistakes on it than you would on a physical keyboard. The keyboard suggests words in a horizontal bar that appears above the keyboard and below the text area. You need only type “Washi” and the word “Washington” appears in this bar for you to select. These shortcuts speed up the otherwise frustrating process of on-screen typing.

Unlike on the iPhone, the myTouch keyboard’s keys don’t get larger as your finger hovers over them so as to help you touch the right key. Nor does a word become magnified when you’re trying to place the cursor at a certain spot. The myTouch’s trackball can be used to pinpoint a specific letter but I usually forgot all about the trackball, opting to use the responsive touch screen for navigation.

T-Mobile offers much less expensive monthly plans for the myTouch than AT&T offers for the iPhone. The cheapest voice and data plan from T-Mobile costs $55 compared with AT&T’s $70. Unlimited data and messaging plus minimum voice plans total $65 for T-Mobile and $90 for AT&T. And AT&T’s messaging is currently limited to text, while T-Mobile messaging includes text, picture and video.

On the other hand, T-Mobile offers 3G coverage in far fewer cities than AT&T. The myTouch comes with only a fourth of the built-in memory of the same-priced the 3GS iPhone, and half the memory of the 3G iPhone model, which is costs half the price. And myTouch offers only about a tenth of the apps the iPhone offers, and has a smaller screen.

T-Mobile wants myTouch users to understand apps and download them, starting with the AppPack: a package of eight to 10 apps that T-Mobile will send to myTouch customers via an SMS with a link. Customers can peruse this list of apps and download just the ones they choose. While some people may not appreciate receiving apps suggestions, it could also introduce apps to people who didn’t know how they worked.

The Android Market, where all apps for Google’s phones can be found and purchased,still isn’t as well organized as it should be. It separates games from other applications and organizes them by popularity and date, but doesn’t separate those that are free and those that must be bought. I downloaded several free apps including WordGame, Facebook, Twitter, Sketch-a-Etch and Sherpa. But I was especially irked by the way some of the apps I downloaded kept trying to get me to download additional apps every time I opened them. The Twitter app, which was listed as one of the most popular, displayed prompts to download browsers and RSS readers—even six days after I first used the app. An on-screen message gave me the option to “Ignore Forever,” but this apparently didn’t include prompts to download other programs. Any user would be confused and irritated by these unsolicited messages. Google said that was what the developer chose to do—a major downside to the Android’s open model.

The myTouch’s 3.2-megapixel camera and video camera worked well and started up quickly. An icon labeled Gallery neatly holds still images and videos. And the myTouch has simple ways to upload photos to Picasa or videos to YouTube.

A built-in tool for Google Web searches using voice commands worked remarkably well, even when I tried to trip it up by saying four words at once. It didn’t recognize my last name, but I’ll let it off the hook since it’s spelled differently than it sounds.

The T-Mobile myTouch 3G costs $50 more than the G1, but its extra features are worthwhile. Be ready for a frustrating first-time experience with the on-screen keyboard and try to read user comments in the Android Market to figure out which apps prompt you to download additional programs.

The myTouch is what we expected from Google the first time around. Time will tell if people are ready to give it a second chance.

—Edited by Walter S. Mossberg.

Write to
Katherine Boehret at mossbergsolution@wsj.com

Organizing Your Online Shopping

Katherine Boehret — Wed, 13 May 2009 00:20:03 +0000

Last winter, I spent a good hour shopping online for the perfect black leather boots. I used tabbed browsing to open at least 25 Web pages, comparing each pair’s cost, heel height, zipper, leather and toe style. I emailed a friend with links to a few sites so I could get her opinion. And when I finally decided on the right pair, I dug through my email inbox to find a coupon code for 20% off.

This week I tested a solution that might have made my quest for boots a little simpler. Snipi, which became available as a free download from Snipi.com on Monday, helps you organize your online-shopping results by gathering, or “snipping,” product information from Web pages and saving the information to lists.

These lists are stored on your personalized Snipi page, where you can access them later. Snipi also can save photos and videos to lists. And it has a coordinating iPhone app that shows up-to-date versions of the lists created on the computer, so you can have them with you on the go.

The Snipi Toolbar collects and displays the user’s online research.

To do all this, you use the Snipi Toolbar, a horizontal window that pops up within your browser so you never have to navigate away from the site where you’re shopping. If you see an item you like, simply drag and drop an image of it into the toolbar, where details about the item — including its title, price and image — are automatically filled in. If the item was previously snipped by another Snipi user, a description box will be filled with whatever that person wrote or pasted in from the product page; you can fill in the box yourself, too.

Snipi has a partnership with Shopzilla Inc., so the Snipi Toolbar also has comparison shopping built in: It displays links to Web sites where your snipped product, or products like it, can be found at lower prices.

One of the big drawbacks to Snipi is that it currently works only as a browser plug-in with Mozilla’s Firefox, not Microsoft’s (MSFT) Internet Explorer or Apple’s (AAPL) Safari. Snipi says it plans to introduce versions of its toolbar — though less functional ones — for IE and Safari by early to mid-June. Even so, downloading and installing a browser plug-in isn’t yet a routine thing for most people. And often, people who use plug-ins forget to keep them up-to-date.

Another downside to Snipi is that its comparison-pricing feature failed with apparel. The feature only really worked when used with “hard goods” like electronics, which are sold at retailers that participate in price-comparison networks. Yet Snipi still makes pricing suggestions for clothing and shoes, however irrelevant. For example, when I snipped a $150 Banana Republic dress, a link to $16 eye shadow sold at Sephora.com appeared in the Price Compare column. To reduce confusion, Snipi shouldn’t make such suggestions for apparel.

A handy feature built into the Snipi Toolbar lets you immediately share items via email or post them on Facebook, Twitter or Wordpress blogs. This would have been useful while I was shopping online for boots because I could have more quickly shared my finds with friends, rather than copying and pasting URLs into emails.

While browsing on BestBuy.com (BBY), I found a Sony (SNE) Cybershot DSC-W220 with 12 megapixels and a 4x zoom lens for $199. Selecting a small icon in the Firefox browser’s bottom right corner, I opened the Snipi Toolbar and created a “Digicams” list, including the Sony. Snipi suggested alternative prices for this camera, including $159 for the same thing on Amazon.com (AMZN).

I got an early start on bathing-suit shopping by browsing Web sites for J. Crew, Victoria’s Secret and Macy’s. As expected, the price-comparison suggestions didn’t make sense. For one $58 Victoria’s Secret bathing suit, Snipi suggested a list of alternatives, including a $170 Kohler shower door, $203 Giorgio Armani glasses and an $82 corded telephone. I assure you that the bathing suit looked nothing like any of those items.

Confusing alternatives aside, I liked using the Snipi Toolbar as a place to gather my online research. It displayed images of items neatly lined up in a row, and when I selected an item, the description appeared. Someone like my sister, who is planning a wedding, might enjoy using the Snipi Toolbar for saving photos of various locations in a list she could call “Wedding Venues.” She could then share the entire list with me in one step. Or she could go visit some of the places and bring an iPhone with the Snipi app to see her list.

I tried the iPhone app, and it was a cinch to tap My Lists to see the online research I’d gathered. Here, as on the browser toolbar, visuals make it easy to glance through many products.

The toolbar can save various lists that you name and categorize into Shop, Photos or Videos, and these can be kept private, shared with friends or made public. Public lists are seen by all other users on Snipi.com, which is also a social-networking site. I wouldn’t use it as such, because I already rely on other social-networking outlets, but some people might.

Snipi, which uses a guessing algorithm to fill in details like a product’s price, says its toolbar will improve as more people use it. If you do a lot of research or online shopping or you simply want an online tool for saving images and videos from the Web, Snipi will work well for you. Its price-comparison suggestions need some improvement, but I felt more organized after using the Snipi Toolbar for a week’s worth of browsing.

Edited By Walter S. Mossberg

Email us at mossbergsolution@wsj.com. Find this and other columns and videos online free at the All Things Digital Web site: http://solution.allthingsd.com

A Kick Start to the Sidekick's Social Side

Katherine Boehret — Wed, 06 May 2009 00:14:02 +0000

If you’re tired of the basic BlackBerry design (small keyboard with a small screen) or the iPhone design (a virtual keyboard on a large touch screen) you might prefer a device with a roomy physical keyboard that stays out of your way, hiding under a large screen until you need it. Over six years ago, a small company called Danger introduced just such a device, called the Sidekick.

Since then, Danger has been acquired by Microsoft Corp. (MSFT), and there have been many iterations of the Sidekick. This Monday, yet another version of the Sidekick will be released: the Sidekick LX. Its swing-out screen design hasn’t changed much over the years, but competitors have since produced several other devices that also have screens that move to reveal QWERTY keyboards — including the Google (GOOG) Android G1 phone, whose chief designer also helped create the Sidekick.

[ See post to watch video ]

This week, I tested the T-Mobile Sidekick LX to see how this old chestnut fared with some new polishing inside and out. It still bears the flashy, hip features that distinguished older Sidekicks, and newly integrated social-networking apps for Facebook, MySpace and Twitter enhance these traits. A Download Catalog works like Apple’s (AAPL) popular App Store by bringing games, apps, themes and sounds directly to the device.

But this Sidekick’s pricing doesn’t make much sense in our current recession: It will cost $250 after a mail-in rebate for new T-Mobile customers who sign up for a two-year contract; current T-Mobile customers who are eligible for an upgrade will pay $200 after the same discounts.

For $200, you could buy Apple’s iPhone or Research In Motion’s (RIMM) BlackBerry Storm, which both have touch screens and come with Microsoft Exchange support that synchronizes the device with corporate email accounts. (T-Mobile says the Sidekick LX should be able to get Exchange support from the device’s Download Catalog “in the coming months,” but wouldn’t be more specific.) The Sidekick also lacks Wi-Fi capability, which is also true for the BlackBerry Storm but not so for the iPhone, which works with 3G or Wi-Fi networks.

The absence of a touch screen is glaring on such an expensive device, especially one with a screen this large. It’s easy to imagine using a finger to flick and spin the Sidekick’s on-screen menu wheel, tapping on one to open it. Instead, you’re stuck using a trackball to repeatedly scroll through a crowded, 15-menu wheel.

The T-Mobile Sidekick LX has the device’s traditional swing-out screen but is the thinnest Sidekick yet.

The LX is the thinnest Sidekick yet, but it still looked rather large lying next to my BlackBerry Curve 8300 and an iPhone; it measures 1.3 and 2.16 cubic inches larger than each, respectively. Compared with past Sidekicks, this one has a design that feels flatter thanks to a thin flip-out screen that smoothly blends into the device in its closed position. You have to lift up the nestled-in screen before it turns to flip out, and I found it a little harder to open with just a push of my left thumb.

The Sidekick LX, however, has some hearty extras including a generous 3.2-inch display, a 3G connection that makes it easy to use for quickly browsing the Web, built-in GPS and a 3.2-megapixel camera (like the BlackBerry Storm and new BlackBerry Curve 8900 cameras). It comes with a 1-gigabyte microSD card, but this memory card can be accessed only by pulling off the device’s back panel instead of via a card slot on the side.

I brought the Sidekick LX with me for a weekend in Boston and its good-quality camera came in handy as I wandered Copley Square and snapped photos of still-blooming tulips in bright colors. I signed into my Facebook and Twitter accounts, and updates from these networks flashed across the top of the screen in banner-like news flashes.

The Sidekick LX can play YouTube videos, and can record its own videos for uploading and sharing to Web sites. Its colorful screen has over twice the resolution of its predecessor and is 0.6-inch larger.

But a few awkward software designs left me scratching my head. After I uploaded a photo from the Sidekick LX to Facebook, I was left in the Facebook app, rather than my device’s photo album, where I started and wanted to be. MySpace updates are pushed to the Sidekick LX as they happen, but Facebook automatically updates only once an hour. Twitter can be set to check tweets as often as every five minutes, but, by default, it’s set to check only every 30 minutes — a glacial pace for Twitter fans.

I used the Download Catalog to buy a few apps, games and ringtones for my Sidekick, including a $6.99 game of “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire 2009″; a $2.99 flashlight app; and a $2.49 ringtone that played 15 seconds of Katy Perry’s song “Thinking of You.” T-Mobile says there are thousands of items in this catalog.

Calls placed and received on the Sidekick were remarkably clear-sounding to me and the friends I spoke with. Dialing numbers could be a little frustrating because, as was the case with former Sidekicks, you’ll need to open the flip-out screen to dial the number and then close it so you can hold the phone up to your ear. But most people will call friends in their address books and won’t need to use the number keypad.

The Sidekick’s 15 menus are simply too many to scroll through. I would prefer it if several categories were combined into one, such as Phone, myFaves (T-Mobile’s list of five friends you call), Phone Messaging and Address Book. Currently, these are listed as four separate menus. Simultaneously pressing the Sidekick’s Jump and Cancel buttons brings up a Quick Access view of recently opened menus and unread messages, and this eases navigation.

For its price, the Sidekick LX should be shipped with Microsoft Exchange already working, and all of its social-networking apps should have better updating capabilities. But most of all, the Sidekick’s big screen is just begging for multitouch in place of a trackball. If these features were part of the Sidekick LX 2009, it might be worth its price.

Edited By Walter S. Mossberg

Email us at mossbergsolution@wsj.com. Find this and other columns and videos online free at the All Things Digital Web site: http://solution.allthingsd.com

Nintendo Freshens a Game Player

Katherine Boehret — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 00:46:02 +0000

Nintendo Co.’s strategy of creating videogames with simple graphics that anyone can play has worked well on its Wii and portable DS. Earlier this month, the company released the $170 Nintendo DSi in an attempt to spruce up its three-year-old DS Lite and 5 1/2-year-old DS. At first glance, this plain, rectangular clamshell with dual screens appears to be the same as its predecessors.

[ See post to watch video ]

But a deeper dive into the DSi reveals its improvements. It now has two cameras: one facing the user and another facing out; its earlier iterations had none. It also now has a SecureDigital memory-card slot, so you can plug in an SD card and listen to AAC music files from iTunes on your DSi, which now works as a portable music player, or expand the DSi’s storage capacity.

The DSi is also Wi-Fi enabled in a more secure way than previous models and can be used to buy and download games and applications directly from Nintendo’s DSi Shop online marketplace. This solves the problem of carrying around multiple game cartridges or losing them, but might bother people who like swapping games with one another. The DSi’s Web browser is also faster than its predecessors.

These physical changes affect the way the DSi works in good and bad ways. For example, its two cameras can be used for photo-related games like WarioWare: Snapped!, a clever photo-booth-like game that tricks you into making funny faces while secretly taking your picture.

But while the DSi’s newly added SD card slot expands the device’s memory and brings music on to the DSi, this replaces another slot that was used for playing GameBoy Advance games on the older DS and DS Lite. The physical slot for DS games remains.

Overall, the Nintendo DSi is a fun little portable gaming device. I’ve been fooling around with it for a few weeks, testing games and applications since they became available on April 5. My DSi tapped into various Wi-Fi networks with no trouble and its browser was straightforward and zippy. The DSi speakers sounded great for a tiny device. On the downside, the DSi Shop is still in its infancy so only 10 games and apps are available there. The DSi retains an aging, boxy look — a design that could have been freshened up.

Until Oct. 5, Nintendo is running a promotion for its DSi Shop, which accepts points to buy games and applications; $1 is equal to about 100 points. People who buy the DSi will receive 1,000 free points for the DSi Shop. New content is added to the shop each Monday. This content ranges in price from free to 800 points or more. I bought and downloaded a variety of things, ranging from the free Web browser to a 200-point magic-trick game called Master of Illusion Express: Funny Face. I also downloaded WarioWare: Snapped! for 500 points.

Points for the DSi Shop can be purchased online or at retail stores and they’re sold in increments of 2,000 for $20. Before purchasing and downloading, a notification with each game and app tells you how many “blocks,” or memory, it will take up on your DSi. WarioWare: Snapped!, for example, took up 61 blocks. This information really doesn’t mean anything unless you go to your system settings to see how many blocks you’ve used and how many remain. By default, each DSi is shipped with 256 megabytes of flash memory or 1,024 blocks.

The DSi cameras are only .3 megapixel each and don’t use a zoom or flash, but photos taken with them looked colorful and clear on the DSi’s two 3.25-inch, 256×192-pixel-resolution screens. Instead of sending photos to friends directly from the DSi, you have to save them to the SD card and transfer them to a computer to share them.

The Nintendo DSi is a spruced-up successor to two of the company’s earlier game players.

Nintendo says the “i” in DSi is meant to represent the personal aspect of the device since it has built-in tools to let you create your own content. For example, a game called DSi Sound lets you sing or hum into a built-in microphone, then rearrange your recording to change its pitch, speed and sound — or even to add harmony. AAC music files pulled on to the device via SD card can be changed in various ways, though they can’t be saved. Photos taken with the cameras can be morphed in nine different ways including cutting different photos and piecing them together on the screen.

The DSi has parental controls, which the DS and DS Lite didn’t have. These controls let parents turn off Web browsing completely. A better compromise might have been to let parents limit kids to certain sites. The parental controls can also put restrictions on the DSi so it can’t play games with certain ratings. For instance, if a child goes to school and tries to play a friend’s M-rated game in his DSi, it won’t work.

The DSi works well as a music player, albeit a lot chunkier than an iPod. A high-capacity SD memory card could potentially add hundreds of songs to the device, and you can press buttons to play on-screen instruments in the background while listening to your tunes. If you’re using headphones (not included with the device) and you close the DSi, music will keep playing through the headphones so you can put the DSi in a bag and go. In past versions, the DSi went to sleep when closed. It plays only AAC files, not MP3s.

I used the DSi’s Web browser to read some news on WSJ.com and to check my Web-based email, plugging letters and symbols into the touch-screen keyboard. A stylus can be used for precise lettering, but I got by with my fingernails.

The DSi games are approachable for all types of people, and are obviously not geared toward the graphics-rich visuals that hard-core gamers adore. I liked the way they incorporated the device’s touch screen for drawings and its cameras for photo games.

The Nintendo DSi is $20 more than the price of the original DS, and $40 more than the DS Lite. But its two cameras, snappy Web browser and music-player capabilities make it a likable and well-rounded device that any family member could use.

Edited By Walter S. Mossberg

Email us at mossbergsolution@wsj.com. Find this and other columns and videos online free at the All Things Digital Web site: http://solution.allthingsd.com

Corrections & Amplifications

Photos taken on the Nintendo DSi can be sent to other DSis. Due to inaccurate information provided by Nintendo, yesterday’s Mossberg Solution erroneously stated photos couldn’t be shared between DSis.

A BlackBerry That's Easy on Your Thumbs

Katherine Boehret — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 01:04:04 +0000

People who use smart phones with physical keyboards are well aware that they don’t look as cool as someone who touches glass to type and flicks a finger to scroll through emails, Web pages and photos. But for many, physical keyboards are easier to use than touch screens, and this fact, alone, cures even the worst case of touch-screen envy.

In two weeks, Research in Motion Inc. (RIMM) and T-Mobile will make available the latest version of the BlackBerry: the Curve 8900. This device works as a basic BlackBerry and doesn’t have a sleek touch screen or completely overhauled operating system, nor is it meant to compete with the likes of Apple’s iPhone. But it has a physical keyboard and still manages to look stylish — and that’s no small feat.

[ See post to watch video ]

The Curve 8900 costs $200 after a $100 mail-in rebate and with a two-year T-Mobile contract. In the BlackBerry family, this model falls into the Goldilocks category of not too big, not too small — just right. RIM’s $300 BlackBerry Bold came out in November, but its large size and high price were turn-offs for some. The BlackBerry Pearl and Pearl Flip are tiny and portable, but use condensed keyboards with multiple letters on each key, which can hinder fast typing.

After using the new Curve for a week, I found it offers a satisfying combination of high-end features, ideal size and good looks. Best of all, its physical keyboard is a dream for thumbs. Unfortunately, its $200 price comes with very little memory — only 256 megabytes built in and a memory card that adds another 256 megabytes. To expand this memory, users must buy microSD cards.

The new Curve is lighter, thinner and not as wide compared with its predecessor. Its surface, including the keyboard, is glossy black with a striking silver frame. The device’s top edge slopes off in a smooth diagonal that cleverly disguises the Lock and Mute/Standby buttons beneath that top-edge piece of black plastic. Number keys are labeled in red so they stand out on the black keyboard and are easy to see when making phone calls. Right and left convenience keys on each side of the BlackBerry can be assigned to open your favorite functions.

The $200 Curve 8900

Unlike older BlackBerrys that all use the same USB cables and chargers, the Curve 8900 has a micro USB port, which is slightly smaller than those on older cables and won’t work with them.

Photo Opportunity

The Curve 8900 shares two features with the touch screen BlackBerry Storm: Both use the same 3.2-megapixel camera with auto focus, image stabilization, 2x digital zoom and flash; and both have the same 480×360 pixel bright screen resolution. I used the camera on my Curve 8900 to capture some photos of Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C., a few days after the inaugural parade, and friends couldn’t believe I took them using a BlackBerry. This camera can also capture video clips.

I really enjoyed using the Curve 8900’s newly designed keyboard. Its keys are flatter than those of the old Curve, which felt like typing on plastic bubbles when I switched back. The flatter design of the new Curve’s keys made them feel less resistant, and allowed my fingers to more quickly move from one key to the next. The larger Send, Menu, Escape and End keys that surround the trackball also are flatter and are on the same plane as the screen, giving the surface a smoother look.

This BlackBerry uses T-Mobile’s Quad-band EDGE, not a 3G connection like the BlackBerry Bold or Apple iPhone. For an extra $10 a month in addition to a monthly plan, users may opt for T-Mobile’s Unlimited HotSpot Calling.

Wi-Fi Detector

This feature works so that the Curve automatically detects when it’s near a pre-set Wi-Fi network and uses that network for voice calling or data instead of T-Mobile’s connection. Phone calls that are started in Wi-Fi networks will seamlessly be handed over to the T-Mobile network and the minutes won’t be docked from your data plan; calls started in the cellular network will switch over to Wi-Fi but will continue to dock minutes from your voice plan.

I made a handful of phone calls on the Curve, and the connection sounded clear on both ends. According to RIM, the battery life of the Curve 8900 beats that of the old Curve 8300 in talk time — 5.5 hours compared with four hours — but is a little weaker than the old Curve’s standby battery life, lasting just 15 days between charges, compared with 17 days. I didn’t run an exact battery test, but I noticed that I didn’t have to change my charging schedule from what I regularly do with the old Curve 8300.

I downloaded a few apps, including Facebook, Google Maps and TwitterBerry, and these worked as they do on my older Curve, though a bit faster. Compared with the iPhone’s selection, BlackBerry apps look rather primitive. RIM plans to open an app store in March that will sell apps that will work with this new Curve and other BlackBerrys. Apple (AAPL) and Google (GOOG) have already established app stores that users can access from their devices.

Too Little Memory

This is where the 8900’s relatively minuscule memory becomes a problem. It’s easy to use up the 512 megabytes of total memory by downloading apps like these and taking large-sized photos or video clips with the built-in camera. Comparatively, the $199 iPhone comes with 8 gigabytes of built-in memory. But memory cards are fairly inexpensive today; a quick search on BestBuy.com (BBY) found 2-gigabyte microSD cards for $15.

A 512-megahertz processor gives this new Curve some zip, and I had no trouble quickly surfing the Web, opening Web links embedded in emails or attached photos and Word documents. Videos, including a John Mayer music video and various YouTube clips, played without any jerky skips. Sound was emitted from a small but mighty speaker on the back of the Curve.

Some people simply won’t abandon their physical keyboards for touch screen, no matter what. For them, the BlackBerry Curve 8900 blends the comfortable size, attractive keyboard and stylish design necessary to make a winning device.

Edited By Walter S. Mossberg

Email us at mossbergsolution@wsj.com. Find this and other columns and videos online free at the All Things Digital Web site: http://walt.allthingsd.com

HTC Can't Disguise Windows Mobile Flaws

Katherine Boehret — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 22:20:02 +0000

New iPhone competitors continue to crop up, though most are mobile devices from companies that simply slap on a touch screen in hopes of fooling consumers. The real key to the iPhone’s success is its software, and finally, signs indicate that other companies are starting to pay more attention to making good software to go along with their hardware.

One welcome sign is an effort by companies trying to improve Microsoft Corp.’s (MSFT) Windows Mobile operating system, which has a reputation for confusing navigation and hasn’t had a major update recently. Kinoma Inc., for example, recently released an application called Kinoma Play that runs on Windows Mobile devices and gives users a markedly better way of handling photos, videos, music and Web browsing.

The HTC Touch Diamond, due out this month from Sprint, tries to hide Windows Mobile software.

This week, I tried yet another software program that is designed to run on top of Windows Mobile software. But this time, the software is at the heart of a device designed by the same company: HTC Inc. I tested the HTC Touch Diamond, due out from Sprint (S) sometime this month for $250 (after a $100 mail-in rebate) with a two-year contract.

Taiwan-based HTC started out in 1998 as a maker and designer of mobile devices for other companies. A year ago, HTC launched the first device under its own name in the U.S., and now, Sprint, AT&T (T) and T-Mobile (DT) sell HTC-branded devices. The Diamond incorporates HTC software, as well as software from Sprint, MobiTV, TeleNav and others. But it isn’t a stretch to imagine HTC trying to create a fully end-to-end model (hardware and all software) in the future.

The Diamond has a touch screen, but it’s smaller than Apple’s (AAPL) iPhone — 2.8 versus 3.5 inches. This screen lacks the iPhone’s multitouch functionality, and its smaller size robs space used for touch gestures like flicking or scrolling with a finger. Yet like the iPhone, it relies solely on an on-screen keyboard for all text entries. Even with the Diamond’s stylus, the keyboard felt small and cramped. Using just your fingertips was next to impossible.

After using the Diamond for a week, I can say that despite its handsome TouchFLO 3D software and animated icons like photos that flip from one to the next with a flick of finger, this device failed to disguise the frustrating interface of Windows Mobile often enough for my taste.

It reminded me of the brown paper bag book covers my Dad helped me make for schoolbooks when I was a kid: They looked great on the outside, felt sturdy and clean and created a blank canvas for homemade doodles that were often more interesting to me than the books they covered. But my book covers couldn’t change what was underneath; pages of frustrating algebra were just a flip away.

HTC’s sleek software tries to hide Windows Mobile, but menus from the Microsoft operating system are constantly popping up. HTC’s email program, for example, is represented by an animated envelope icon that, when selected, cleverly flips twice before sliding an email message half-way out and giving you a three-line peek at what’s inside. If only reading and responding to email were half as entertaining. Selecting the animated envelope opens the old, cumbersome Windows Mobile email program.

Also, the touch capabilities of the Diamond’s screen didn’t work as well as they should. Finger flicks that should have scrolled through lists instead seemed to select individual items in a list, as if they were sticky.

The Diamond isn’t all bad, of course. Plenty of people will like its smaller size because the iPhone and RIM’s (RIM) BlackBerrys seem too large and brick-like to hold up to an ear for phone calls. Next to my BlackBerry Curve, the Diamond was of comparable thickness but measured smaller in width and length.

Despite its size, the Diamond is packed with features. It has a 3.2-megapixel camera with autofocus that doubles as a camcorder, and comes with four gigabytes of internal memory and a removable battery. I taped short videos — something the iPhone can’t do — and found the sound and video footage to be adequate.

HTC touts the Diamond’s browser, which is based on the Opera browsing engine but is designed for HTC. It opens Web pages in views that fit the screen and text is automatically resized as users zoom in or out, though this resizing was sometimes slow.

Unlike the iPhone, Web sites that are opened on the Diamond’s browser don’t resemble the actual site as you would see it on your computer. I opened CNN.com (TWX) and WSJ.com (NWS), two sites that are packed with text and graphics on a regular browser. On the Diamond, they quickly were rendered in list format with mostly text-only. I easily touched the screen to follow links to full stories.

Like the iPhone, the Diamond has an accelerometer, though it’s called the “G-Sensor.” When it worked, this feature flipped the screen to match the horizontal or vertical direction in which the device was being held. Photos flipped instantly, but the Diamond’s G-Sensor took almost three full seconds to respond as I flipped from vertical to horizontal while using the browser. And some Web sites didn’t respond to the G-Sensor flips at all.

A special YouTube application developed by HTC was easy to find on the device and worked quickly. My videos were organized into categories for All, History, Bookmarks and Search, though this last category required using the finger-fumbling keyboard. In one step, I emailed a link from a YouTube video to a friend using the device, with a still shot from the video included in the message.

Overall navigation on the Diamond isn’t as intuitive as on the iPhone or iPod Touch, nor was it as easy as on a touch-screen Windows Mobile device running the Kinoma Play application. The iPhone and iPod Touch use quick double-taps on touch screens to zoom in or out, and multitouch capabilities resize images with pinching gestures; Kinoma Play uses a long touch to zoom in. The Diamond used double tapping on some screens, but not enough for me to grow comfortably reliant on it. A small, circular pad beneath the device’s touch screen provided a more dependable method for zooming in or out of screens: tracing the perimeter of this circle clockwise with a finger zoomed in; counterclockwise zoomed out.

The HTC’s software animation is put to good use on its Weather screen. Here, animated illustrations of each day’s weather appear on the screen: suns spin, clouds move in, rain appears to fall. Even moons appear on the device at night to accurately reflect the weather in a city at a specific time.

It is exciting to think about other mobile-phone companies giving better software a real try, especially those that attempt to improve Windows Mobile. But HTC’s Touch Diamond doesn’t hide the outdated operating system well enough or often enough for a user to want to buy a whole new mobile device.

Edited by Walter S. Mossberg

Email us at mossbergsolution@wsj.com. Find this and other columns and videos online free at the All Things Digital Web site: http://walt.allthingsd.com