Samsung Mysto: A Stylish Multimedia Phone
The Mysto is a CDMA version of the Samsung Ultra U600 designed for release in the United States. The Mysto is a slider phone that boasts of an excellent display screen and a sleek finish - at 12mm thick, this phone just exudes “style.”
Beneath the screen you’ll find a circular navigational pad that you can click in five directions – upwards, downwards, left, right and middle. If you are on the home screen, the five buttons each function as a shortcut key. Around the navigational pad are 4 other keys that are actually touch controls – the talk, back and 2 soft keys. The phone slides open to reveal a keypad with a smooth finish and raised ridges in between the key rows.
The main highlight of the phone is its multimedia capabilities. For starters, the phone’s 2 mega-pixel camera has a varied settings array and is capable of recording video at 14 frames per second. Its resolution is an impressive 320 x 240, and allows for image editing and geotagging. You can also upload images to MySpace and Flickr.
The phone is equipped with a sensor that protects the camera when the phone is shut. Surfing the Internet over the Mysto is also quite good with its built-in HTML browser. You can use the Mysto to access YouTube, stream audio and video and it lets you download a wide selection of content including songs, games, ring tones, videos and more from Helio’s online store.
What’s more, Mysto also supports Google Maps, Garmin Mobile, the voice-activated Tellme service from Microsoft and Helio’s friend locator service, Buddy Beacon.
One drawback to the Samsung Mysto is sound quality. Calls made over the phone yielded poor results as static could be heard and sometimes voices come in faint. The phone comes with a wired stereo headset but it cannot be used with other connectors, rather, the phone is compatible only with Samsung’s phone jack.
Voice calls over Bluetooth are also problematic and the speaker phone doesn’t work much better. Also, some users find the touch controls difficult to operate. The End key, which you can find on the right side of the phone, is also ill-placed as people tend to look for the key on the front once they are done with calls.
All in all though, the Samsung Mysto is still a good purchase especially if you take its multimedia features and locator services in consideration. Its web browsing capabilities also make it attractive to heavy Internet users.