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Preview of GSM/UMTS-handset Samsung Wave (S8500)

Live images of the Samsung Wave

Sales package:

Handset
1500 mAh Li-Ion battery
USB data cable
Wired stereo-headset
User Guide
Software CD

Attention. This is not our final take on the S8500, as we only managed to get our hands on a prototype with unstable software, plus a couple of features were missing, including a dedicated camera button on the side. However even in its current condition the Wave can give you just enough food for thought.

Positioning

The Wave is Samsung's first Bada-based phone, their mobile platform, as they tag Bada inside the company. We'll take a closer look at this definition, as well as Bada's future in a separate article, so for now we're just going to examine the Wave's positioning as Samsung's very first flagship phone powered by Bada.

Bada's roots stem from Samsung's previous phones, as it hasn't gone too far from them in terms of both philosophy and hardware. Their new S8500 (codenamed "Wave"), for one, has evolved from the Samsung S8000 Jet, as they are based on pretty much the same hardware platform (although there is something to be said for the 1GHz CPU, a tad more memory and new cellular module). Software-wise, though, the Wave is as close to the Jet as it gets. Even its positioning is not much different from the original S8000 - both target people who are looking for a balanced touchscreen-enabled phone that can do all the tricks out of the box. In a word, it's Samsung's vision of the "all in one" concept, and it's worth noting that it has turned out to be extremely appealing.

As far as the life cycle of Samsung's flagship devices is concerned, it's shrinking all the time - the S8500 will stay around up until this autumn and then it'll be replaced by a new and improved model. Make no mistake about it, that Samsung are planning to push Bada through all the stages of OS evolution pretty fast. However, a good chunk of Bada's functionality can already be seen in their brand-new S8500 and I have to say it's quite a powerhouse.

All elaborate press-release wordings aside, the Wave is one of the most capable solution among all smartphones and feature phones around, a true milestone in its class, with no other offering being even close to it in terms of price/quality ratio and feature pack. Now let us show you why.

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Design, Size, Controls

Design-wise, the Wave is the epitome of a classic touchscreen-enabled phone - its front fascia is dominated by a gigantic display with a handful of mechanical buttons sitting right underneath. The central button is shaped like a rhombus, which isn't the design many have warm feelings towards, but since it's responsively only for one action, you won't find it a hassle to use. Both Call and End buttons are pretty comfortable to use.

The phone measures up at 118x56x10.9 mm and tips our scales at just 102 g, which makes it a very svelte phone, much smaller than Google's Nexus One. Although, I must admit that both of them are palm-friendly, and the Nexus's larger footprint is due to its display diagonal.

Samsung Wave Google Nexus:

As of today the Wave is available only in one color, but it's not out of the question that Samsung will beef up the color scheme pool some time down the line. As it is, though, the Wave leaves an impression of an unfussy phone with a very casual, even conservative design, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Topping the display is the forward-facing camera for video calls, along with the ambient light sensor and proximity sensor. On top of that, the S8500 also comes armed with a digital compass.

Perched on the top is the microUSB socket that accepts both data cables and chargers. Also here is the standard 3.5 mm audio jack; interestingly, the Wave is featured with a dedicated DNSe chip, similar to the one used in Samsung's stand-alone music players, that takes care of the phone's music department.

Housed on the right-hand side is the display lock slider, the dedicated camera button will be positioned more towards the bottom of the right spine, although you wont' see it on our prototype.

The phone's display sits under a thin glass layer. As far as build quality is concerned, the Wave is nearly flawless.

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Display

About a year ago, at MWC 2009, Samsung rolled out their first phones featured with AMOLED screens and back then it seemed that their quality was as high as any mobile display could ever produce. Mid July 2009 saw the announcement of the Samsung Jet, armed with the latest-gen AMOLED 3.1-inch matrix and a resolution of 480x800 pixels.

It took Samsung less than a year to come up with a new technology called Super AMOLED. Its key difference from the original AMOLED lies not only in the way it's positioned, but also the design of displays itself. While standard AMOLED screens make use of several layers with a bit of air between them, Super AMOLED displays boast one touch-sensitive layer and no layers of air whatsoever. This enhancement allows reaching much higher brightness (roughly 20% more) and exceptional sharpness (since the thickness of the main layer is measly 0.001 mm), while keeping the screen's power consumption on the same level. Furthermore, the technology underlying AMOLED displays is called on-cell, meaning that all the elements essential for the display's operation are mounted right inside.

As far as the screen's behavior under direct sunlight goes, the Wave is a top performer, being almost as good as displays featured with mirror layers. First Super AMOLED matrices sport a diagonal of 3.3 inches and resolution of 800x480 pixels with 16 million colors - that's exactly what the S8500 has to offer. At this point in time Samsung will be the exclusive provider of Super AMOLED displays, while their competitors will have to make do with previous-gen screens, similar to the one found in the Google Nexus One.

The new type of capacitive displays also comes with a handful of advantages:

even a light press will suffice (previously, the Apple iPhone was the boss in this department, now Samsung is about to take over);
top-notch readability under direct sunlight;
screen brightness - absolutely unbelievable colors (AMOLED topped TFT, Super AMOLED will best everything);
display's lifetime has increased immensely thanks to the absence of layers of air;

Actually, no words can describe how marvelous these screen look in real life - extremely bright and crisp. In fact, it won't be an exaggeration to say that I haven't seen anything like that in portable devices, ever. After the S8500, the displays found in the Nexus and other phones seem bleak and lifeless.

Samsung Wave vs Google Nexus:

Samsung Wave vs Nokia X6:

Samsung Wave vs Samsung S8000:

But not only the Samsung Wave's display is a marvel from a technological standpoint, it's also very convenient to use with its automatic brightness adjustment.

Samsung-branded offerings also employ the VibeZ feature so as to make the casing vibrate a little, confirming your actions, and we do mean "actions", since it gives you a comforting buzz whenever you tap some action-related keys.

The display accommodates up to 16 text and 3 service lines, but you can cram as many as 24 lines into it when reading a message, depending on the font size you have picked. The volume rocker lets change the font size, from large to miniscule. It's quite another matter, though, that that unlike most other offerings, the S8500 sports huge-ish font sizes, which are very readable from almost any distance.

The phone comes armed with a motion sensor that allows rotating the screen and also scrolling through your galleries by tilting the handset in various directions. Another notable feature found in the S8500 is Smart UnLock, allowing the user to draw a specific letter while at the standby screen that serves as a shortcut to a phone number or an application (up to 9 programmable shortcuts).

You think that's about all the Wave has to offer? Wait, there is more. The S8500 is Samsung's first phone to feature an adapted version of a pretty old technology - DNIe (Digital Natural Image engine). It's pretty versatile and has been employed in various TV sets produced by Samsung since 2003. In 2010 we'll see its mobile version, dubbed as "mDNIe". The gist of the technology is that it enhances picture contrast and level of detail, along with color reproduction, reduces noise. Video is analyzed and processed by 4 filters - first, it analyzes all movements, so as to eliminate all blurred parts, then contrast (it processes up to 70.000 pieces of a picture), then go details - the Wave makes the most important pieces sharper and thus more prominent. Finally, it adjusts color saturation and brightness.

Unfortunately, there is no way to disable mDNIe on the S8500, which means that we'll be able to evaluate its contribution to the brilliant picture quality of the Wave only as soon as other manufacturers start embedding similar matrices. I bet it does make the difference - we'll talk about why in our write-up on the technologies rolled out by Samsung at MWC.

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Battery

The handset utilizes a 1500 mAh Li-Ion battery, rated for 450 hours of standby and 8.5 hours of talk time. In Europe the S8500's battery time averaged around 2 days (a bit over one hour of calls, a couple of messages a day, scheduled email checks every two hours and up to two hours of radio). Those who are into mail and web, will be able to squeeze around a day of life time from the S8500. But in general, this handset can stay up and running for a day hands down. It takes the phone around 2 hours to charge up.

Playing non-converted video will drain the phone's battery in 5.5 hours, as for the phone's music time, the Jet's battery will last only 30 hours. The Wave's larger battery has given it a considerable boost in terms of life time in most departments, although we'll reserve our judgment until we get our hands on a commercial unit.

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Connectivity

Bluetooth. The Wave is one of the first phones to boast support for Bluetooth 3.0 that's also called High Speed. It employs WiFi 802.11 n for transferring files to other devices supporting this technology, while its theoretical speed limit reaches 24 Mbit/s. However in our tests the S8500's data transfer speed topped out at 12 Mbit/s within 3 meter range.

The model supports various profiles, such as Headset, Handsfree, Serial Port, Dial Up Networking, File Transfer, Object Push, Basic Printing, SIM Access, A2DP. Wireless headsets are handled by the S8500 with ease.

USB-connection. In the menu you may select one of three modes: Media, Mass Storage, Samsung PC Studio. When connected to a PC via USB, the S8500 automatically recharges itself. While there is no Modem mode, you can easily turn the S8050 into a wireless modem with the help of PC Studio.

While in the USB Mass Storage mode, the S8500 shows up on the desktop without requiring you to install any additional drivers, so right after plugging in it's ready to work. Data connection speeds top out 4.5 Mb /s.

You won't be able to use the S8500's Bluetooth connectivity along with USB - it will require you to disable Bluetooth regardless of its status (connected and transferring data or not), which is very awkward.

There is also EDGE class 12 connectivity for GSM networks.

WiFi. The phone supports 802x11 b/g standard and features a setup wizard similar to that used for Bluetooth connections. The Jets allows for storing selected networks and tapping into them on request. The only downside we've come across over our quality time with the phone is that some public networks require authentication, and without a SIM card the Jet fails to pass this procedure.

The S8500 also introduces another feature - one-click setup for connection to a router (WPA SecureEasySetup).

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Memory, Memory cards

The phone ships with 2 Gb of onboard memory (they're also planning to release an 8Gb version) and 1.5 Gb, give or take, will be available to the user right out of the box. The memory card is displayed as a separate section, but you can also view both memory card and internal storage at the same time. The S8500 also comes with a file manager, enabling you to copy files to/from the memory card. During our tests the handset experienced no problems with a 32 Gb microSD memory card (no hot-swap support, though)

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Camera

While in our unit the camera wasn't finished, and therefore refused to start up, as far as we know, the Wave utilizes the same module as the Samsung Jet.

The S8500 comes equipped with a bog-standard 5 Mpix autofocus camera module. The phone enjoys a landscape camera interface and allows the user to tweak all settings and change options on the fly by simply tapping on thumbnails you need right on the screen. Needless to say, this makes the phone's camera app a breeze to work with.


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(+) enlarge, 2560x1920, JPEG	(+) enlarge, 2560x1920, JPEG

The only difference is that it now features HD video recording capability, as well as new image filters (Lomo, Vintage etc). We'll give the Wave's camera a run-through as soon as we get a commercial version of the device.

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Motion Gate

The Wave is one of Samsung's first phones to feature a full-fledged motion recognition engine, activated by tapping the side-mounted key. Basically, it allows the user to move around the phone, scroll through tracks in playlists and pause playback by tapping, flipping and shaking the phone. Furthermore, the engine works in a variety of applications, including the FM radio, music player, camera app (tap on the casing to take a picture), games and speed dialing; also the motion recognition engine is contextual, meaning that the roster of movements it can read depends on the application you are currently using. For example while at the standby screen it allows you to launch two different applications by tilting the phone left or right respectively.

Etiquette – if you're receiving a call, or an alarm has just triggered off, all you need to do to mute the sound is turn the phone face down, and doing so won't alter the Wave's current profile.

Speakerphone mode - you can program the Jet in a way that as soon as you put it on a flat surface it'll switch to the speakerphone mode (provided that you're in a call).

You can also assign an application or a phone number to a double-tap on the phone's casing

On top of that the Jet comes with a multimedia guide on how to control thephone with gestures - they are extremely easy to learn and after a couple of hours even a child will master all of them.

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Menu, User Interface

As we already know, Samsung have made their TouchWiz a cross-platform interface, meaning that it can be found both on the phones running Samsung's proprietary OS, and Symbian, Windows Mobile, Android based handsets. However originally TouchWiz was designed for their own OS, hence its vast functionality on this platform, as well as the speed at which all new features get to it. Much like the Jet, where Samsung first employed the second version of the UI, the brand-new Wave boasts TouchWiz 3D, third and the most power version of the OS to date.

The user is allowed to unlock the screen with a simple gesture.

While at the standby screen, you'll see a desktop filled with widgets - by default the Wave allows for up to 3 desktops. However as soon as you turn the phone, it'll let you add extra panels, up to 10 total. Given that you'll get this much space, you'll probably be able to find a place for pretty much any widget. Speaking of which, there are 20 of them preinstalled in the Wave, but nothing stops you from uploading new ones. The widget toolbar is now located at the foot of the screen - it's a more intuitive layout and makes the interface look cleaner.

You can enter the main menu by pressing the icon at the bottom of the screen. The main menu is displayed as a 3x4 grid. The touch-sensitive display is easy to handle - you tap the item you need, then bring up a data input field by double-pressing it, since the first one will select it, and the next one will enabled the on-screen keypad. Much like it's the case with desktops, the user can add up to 10 pages to the menu. But since the Wave doesn't allow adding custom icons and links, this feature seems pretty much useless. You could sort all your shortcuts on various desktops, but then again, scrolling through all of them would take forever. The only hardwired icon here is the Menu, all others are fully customizable - you'll be able to re-arrange them however you please.

All texting is done via the on-screen keyboard, which is almost identical to that of conventional looking handsets - it houses twelve buttons with a batch of symbols attached to each (plus the Jet sports handwriting recognition), so in order to type some particular letter you will need to tap one of these buttons sequentially. On top of that it packs in a QWERTY-keyboard, which is a breeze to use even singlehandedly.

Another thing that has gone through a major revamp is the predictive input system T9. You can enable it both for the numberpad in one touch. The good thing about the S8500 is that it tries to predict what letters or words you will punch in next and therefore makes it a lot easier to pick word endings by simply tapping on them.

All applications feature a context-sensitive tool bar at the foot of the screen.

Another area where the S8500 improves over its predecessors is scrolling - sliding your finger down on the left will make lists scroll through much faster than if you were doing that on the right. In case the list you are browsing features names, you can always opt to jump straight to some particular letter, like in the gallery.

The menu now features a pop-up status bar with 4 icons: GPS, WiFi, Bluetooth and sound status. All notifications, such as missed SMS, email, calls and so on will also end up in this bar. All in all, this setup is very similar to what you get in Anrdoid.

Multitasking. The way multitasking functionality is implemented in the Wave is nothing out of the ordinary - pressing and holding the central button will call up the list of all currently running apps, allowing you to switch between them (they can be viewed as thumbnails or a 3D menu - it's your call). Plus it lets you close all applications or only some. The only limitation we've come across on this front is that the Wave's browser and camera can't work simultaneously.

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Phonebook

You can call up the phonebook by tapping the shortcut at the standby screen; you will see a list that contains all entries from both the SIM-card and phone's memory. On the left there is a magnifier-shaped shortcut that allows scrolling all the way down to the letter you need. There are several tabs too - General List, Groups and Favorties.

The Wave shows only names in the list with contact images placed on the left (details are available in the extended view).

You can assign any image, photo or video clips as caller ID. Each entry can have up to 5 phone numbers of different types (mobile, office, home, fax, and other), one of them will be the main number (by default it is the first one you entered). All fields are customizable.

There are two lines for First Name and Last Name (search is performed only by the former), these fields get merged when displayed in the general list, and First Name comes first. For example Eldar Murtazin will be shown only in this order. The length of each field is 20 characters for any supported input language. You can also switch languages on the fly when entering a name.

All entries, regardless of language, are sorted out in the following way - all contacts with headings made in a local language (Russian, for example) go first and then those with names in English. This is a rather convenient and handy list sorting system. Taking into account fast language switch option during the search, it's clear that no language will spoil the experience of working with this phone. The list can be sorted by first or last name.

But let us return to the information entered for a contact. Apart from phone numbers, e-mail address (there may be several of them), a little text memo can be submitted on top of all that. Any music file (including MP3) can be picked as a ring tone for a contact. Three caller groups are provided by default with the possibility for creating any number of additional groups, setting a personal melody and image for each (by default there are three groups). SMS alerts are not customizable.

The phonebook is capable of holding up to 2000 contacts with filled in data fields. Even if all the available blanks are not used, the cap won't get any bigger and will still make two thousands. It is possible to specify in the settings where all new numbers should be kept by default. There is also an option for moving entries from the SIM-card, although the reverse action is denied. According to the developers, PC (MS Outlook in particular) is best for data synchronization with the S8500. Any contact in the form of SMS/MMS, mail message or other text file can be quickly sent through Bluetooth to another device. There are no problems with sending, and the phonebook entry gets beamed to another device, where it is read without any trouble.

The phonebook may contain a business card as well, though its structure copies all the fields found in a regular contact in the phone book.

There can be up to twelve numbers in the fast dial list; separate numbers tied up with a single contact may appear on this list as well.

You can create any number of caller groups, assign up to 20 contacts and customize them with a picture and tune.

On an incoming call, the caller ID picture occupies half of the screen, but that doesn't make indiscernible.

The main thing that separates the Wave from its predecessors is that when viewing contact info, you'll see 4 tabs - the first one will give you general information on a contact, the second is called History (features all messages, calls etc). Then Activities (all social services this contact is registered in - his account and feed in Twitter/Facebook, for example).

The last tab , Media, sports all contact's files from Flickr and other social networks. If you remember, similar functionality is available in HTC's Sense user interface, however the Wave offers superior ergonomics.

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Call log

Every list contains up to 30 phone numbers, plus there is a combined list of last calls, SMS messages (up to 90 entries total) with corresponding icons indicating event types. Each event now has got its own list - for example, you can view only SMS or only outgoing calls, which is very convenient.

You can quickly switch between the lists. The date and time of any call can be seen in the extended view. Calls from/to one number are grouped up, so that the number standing next to the call specifies the total number of calls made. As always, the overall time of the calls and their cost can be viewed in this menu (if this service is enabled, that is).

For certain numbers you can arrange a black list that will reject all calls coming from these contacts.

Also there is a separate list for sent messages.

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Messaging

Much like other makers, over at Samsung they have forgone that artificial division into SMS-MMS types - you just start composing a message, and only then, depending on the contents, it is attributed to SMS or MMS. The menu still holds an option for switching message into MMS mode (for example when you need to send only text, but to an e-mail address, without calling up the bundled client).

You can opt to view your messages either in the default setup or as a chat.

The phone memory can hold up to as many as 1000 messages; the handset supports EMS standard compatible with Nokia Smart Messaging. While choosing recipient, you can either select a telephone number from your contacts, or pick one from the call lists or groups. All messages are manageable, this means you are at liberty to move a certain number to your black list, in order to make sure all messages coming from that phone number will be deleted automatically; possibility for moving messages to any folder of your own is also at your disposal. For e-mail, you can move not only addresses to the blacklist, but unwanted subjects as well.

There are no size restrictions as far as received messages go, though an outgoing message's size is limited to 295 KB. As for additional services available with the S8500, message rejection and message retrieval type options are onboard. All messages are stored in general dynamic memory, the same goes for e-mails.

Also there is a useful function for sending SOS-messages - when activated, should you find yourself in an emergency, after pressing the volume key four times, the message "I am in emergency. Please help me" will be sent to contacts submitted earlier, all incoming calls from these numbers upon sending the emergency message will be picked up automatically. Recipients (not more than 5), as well as the number of Repeats may be set up manually, while the text of the SOS-message is not customizable.

The bundled mail client is standard in all its components - 5 accounts and the maximum of 100 incoming messages; attachments are also handled by the phone, though there are also several caps - there's no way you can receive a file more than 1 Mb big, or send one with size exceeding 5 Mb. Received files can be viewed via the bundled browser. The S8500 doesn't support HTML in e-mails, which breaks formatting of most letters you receive, so they become really awkward to read. As far as HTML goes, Samsung promise to add this feature before the Wave goes on sale.

Also, the S8500 features a setup wizard for the mail application that will walk you through all essential options and settings.

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Organizer

The phone's memory can store as many as 500 events of one type - meeting. Also there can be up to 100 "Anniversaries". Day and time as well as end time of an event are indicated for each entry. Alert signal and its duration can be adjusted to your liking; repeatable events are available for setting up (repeat time is also manageable as well as the exceptions). The week and the month calendar views are very convenient with each type of the event having its own color.

Unfortunately, you can't start setting up an even by tapping on some day in the Calendar; plus the S8500 doesn't show three upcoming events for any selected day in the Month view.

Memo – standard text notes.

Tasks – a to-do list allowing you to set different priorities and adjust alarms for up to 100 tasks.

Time. They've thrown in a couple of features in here, including World Time. The latter is displayed for two chosen cities. Plus three are alarm clocks, countdown timer and stopwatch.

Calculator – It divides, multiplies, subtracts and adds and does several more things - quite enough for a mobile calculator.

With the Converter – you can operate with different units of measurements as well as with a number of currencies.

Voice recorder.. You can record up to several hours of voice memos with the number of files being unlimited. Basically, limitations on recording duration are set by the user himself, though length of a single recording cannot exceed 1 hour. All the files are stored in a separate folder in the memory bank. The recorder performs well during lectures, conferences and presentations - I could even say that it is a partial substitute for a digital tape recorder. The good news is that the Wave's voice recorder works during calls as well.

Bluetooth. As far as this app's outfit goes, it has definitely been reworked thoroughly in the S8500 - now you can view the device map (like in some wireless managers on desktops) or opt to browser the standard version of device list. In terms of Bluetooth, the S8500 is a full-spec solution that won't let you down.

Games. The S8500 can multitask with Java applications, meaning that you can fire up a couple of programs, minimize them and bring them back to the top whenever you please. The games pool may vary by market.

Communities – this utility will soon become a part of the default feature pack in many Samsung-branded phones. It allows setting up an account with one of image-sharing services, so as to make the phone tag and send all your images there without your help. However, when there is no WiFi network to tap into, the S8500 will use your carrier's data connection, which will result in quite hefty bills should you leave this feature enabled.

Google. This menu features Google search, Gmail and Google Maps applications (although its commercial release might not feature it, since it'll come preinstalled with Route 66 navigation). Let's start with the latter - there are no bells and whistles in the S8500's version of these maps, however its 3.3-inch diagonal does make scrolling through them a much more gratifying experience. On top of that you can jump between satellite and street views, although the satellite images seemed somewhat rough to me, compared to other phones with this feature onboard. But probably it's more due to the fact that the S8500 boasts a sizable diagonal, but lacks in the way of resolution. The phone pinpointed our location via cellular networks without any problems, so all in all, we have no gripes with this department.

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Browser. The Wave's browser picks up right where the Jet left off - it's based on webkit, although it's been updated to version 2.0 (codenamed Dolfin). And the differences from the old NetFront are vast - having kept the basics intact, Samsung have added a handful of unique features. For example, now it allows the user to adjust the display brightness without leaving the application (which is a wonderful ability to have when browsing on the street). On top of that it supports Flash, meaning that you will never run into any problems with pretty much any web page, and since it also have a banner filter, it'll make sure that your browsing experience won't be interrupted by flamboyant ads. By the way, we have checked this feature on a couple of sites and I can say that it's quite efficient.

The browser supports RSS, recent history (as thumbnails) and tabs. You can use x10 zoom, arrange site contents into one column, plus there is image filter and search function, as well as Javascript and Flash support. All in all, the Wave comes packaged with a solid browser that can give even the Apple iPhone a run for its money.

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File Manager (My files)

That's the place to search for all files such as music, pictures, video and sounds. Any uploaded file gets stored here. The disadvantage is that files sometimes are not displayed in the list immediately - in that case you will need to leave the menu and enter it again.

Files and folders can be viewed either as a list or thumbnails. You can mark any number of files. The handset supports Move, Copy and Delete operations, as well as various types of sorting (by type, name or size).

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Settings

Traditionally this item boasts a standard set of options inside like password protection of selected sections. No special or quaint settings are available with the S8500. It only comes with an assortment of wallpapers and the ability to swap them randomly. The S8500 comes preloaded with profiles enabling the user to change the settings momentarily.

The font size, as well as its color and style are also adjustable.

The user can also modify vibration power for the VibeZ.

The Wave supports TV Out.

Mobile Tracker – submit a phone number, where notifications will be sent to in case SIM-card was changed - that message will contain number of the SIM-card being used with the handset. This section is protected with password, so that no one other than you or someone else who knows the password could disable the Tracker. Should your device have the SIM-card switched once, the specified number will receive one message instantly, and one more each time a new card is plugged in. A fetching feature which can prove to be of much help in case the handset is lost or stolen.

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Picsel Viewer

Putting it short, Picsel Viewer is an application that opens MS Office files (for instance, MS Word, Excel, PowerPoint), Adobe Acrobat (PDF), picture and video formats on the phone. The attraction of this technology is its speed, when a 20 MB PDF file takes a couple of seconds to open, then you can quickly page through it, zoom in/out and rotate pages. No editing abilities here, only viewing is available with the S8500, but that is pretty much enough already, especially considering there is no need in extra conversions.

Navigation. For this department the Wave employs Route 66's app, which is a standard turn-by-turn navigation application, featuring voice guided navigation and so on. While it has got the basics covered, it's not very interesting - I doubt many will be eager to shell out for the full version of the program, and on top of that most users of this phone won't view navigation as the primary focus of this handset.

My accounts. One place where all social network accounts are stored.

System Manager. This utility has definitely been nicked from Android, although at this point its functionality leaves much to be desired - you can view CPU load, current activities and battery charge, however there is no way to close running appliations through it right now.

Smart Search can find pretty much any file or application in your phone, plus there is a multitude of filters and options that make searching a lot easier. Many will claim that it's been adopted from S60 phones, but they should know that Samsung came up with this utility three years ago, but then for some reason, gave up on it.

Allshare. uPnP-based utility that allows streaming files from other devices over WiFi. For example, after installing the server-side app on my notebook, I managed to beam music, podcasts and video to my S8500.

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Impressions

The Wave is set to land on most markets in April, which isn't all that far off. Being a very speedy phone in general, it also happens to be the first device to feature: Bluetooth 3.0 and WiFi b/g/n connectivity, Super AMOLED display, dedicated graphics and sound processors, along with mDNIe technology. It's got a metal casing, and a glass display cover. Plenty of bundled memory, plus a memory card slot. Outstanding feature pack and a decent brower. Social Hub that brings together all your social activities together and… You know, I could go on and on, listing all the advantages of the S8500. Even considering the fact that there are no third-party apps for Bada, the Wave still looks like a mobile powerhouse. As far as its segment is concerned, it's one of the best offerings for the first half of 2010. The only question remains - how much will it go for? Fancy a guess? In Europe its price tag will be in the neighborhood of 450 Euro, which is more than adequate for Samsung's flagship with this much punch under the hood. We'll update this preview as soon as we get our hands on a retail unit. The bottom line? Samsung Wave will definitely become one of the milestones not only for Samsung, but also the whole industry, raising the bar for price/quality ratio.

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Eldar Murtazin (eldar@mobile-review.com)
Translated by Oleg Kononosov (oleg.kononosov@mobile-review.com)

Published — 14 February 2010

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