Also known as the i600, the Samsung Blackjack is one of the most popular smartphones available today and for good reason. It has a highly fashionable slim form factor, a svelte black casing, and a highly useful QWERTY keyboard for all your text entry needs. After all, cell phones are much more than just simple voice communication devices these days. People want their mobile phones to do more, like taking pictures, blasting out MP3s, and playing games. For business users, though, having a great portable e-mail solution is of even greater importance. Here are a few similar smartphones to the Samsung Blackjack that you may want to consider as your next company cell phone.
Samsung Blackjack
Before we get started on alternatives, perhaps we should first discuss the Samsung i600 Blackjack itself. Like other similar PDA-style smartphones, the Blackjack does not come with a fold-out or slide-out keyboard. Instead, the QWERTY keys are located just below the full color display, just beneath the rest of the important buttons like the five-way navigator, call/end, and so on. The Samsung Blackjack is currently available from Cingular Wireless, which is currently undergoing a transition to become the new AT&T.
Features
Motorola Q
The Motorola Q made it to the North American market ahead of the Samsung Blackjack. Because it had a head start, however, it in some ways is not as powerful as the Samsung offering. That said, it too comes with a nice full color display, a complete QWERTY keyboard on the face of the cell phone, and a super slim profile not unlike the RAZR, SLVR, and RIZR. Motorola hopes to capture the same segment of the market with the Q as they did with the ubiquitous MOTORAZR. The CDMA Motorola Q is available from Sprint, Verizon, Alltel, Bell Mobility and Telus Mobility.Features
- 1.3 megapixel camera with video and flash
- Built-in multimedia player
- Full QWERTY keyboard
- Microsoft Windows 5.0 Smartphone
- miniSD memory card slot
- 1x EV-DO
- No WiFi
- Advanced speech recognition
T-Mobile Dash
Targeted directly at the same customers as lovers of the Motorola Q and Samsung i600 Blackjack, the T-Mobile Dash was originally developed as the HTC Excalibur, and is also known in some markets as the HTC S620. Like the others, the Dash is pretty darn slim at just 12.8mm of thickness. It is a quad-band GSM phone with a full QWERTY keyboard, large color display, and a unique "JOGGR" touch-sensitive navigation bar. Naturally, the T-Mobile Dash is available exclusively from T-Mobile.Features
- Polyphonic and MP3 ringtones
- microSD expansion slot
- 1.3 megapixel camera with video
- Windows Media Player
- Stereo Bluetooth wireless technology
- Windows Mobile 5.0
- "Real web browsing"
- Yahoo!, MSN, and AOL Instant Messengers
- Built-in WiFi connectivity
Palm Treo 700
Palm was probably one of, if not the best known name in the PDA (personal digital assistant) industry for years, until the idea of combining a PDA with a cell phone came along. Fewer people started to purchase standalone PDAs, and more people demanded "smartphones" that offered more and more functionality in addition to exceptional call quality. Palm answered the call by released the Treo, currently available in a few different models, but one of the most popular is the Palm Treo 700. While the 700p and 700w are aesthetically identical, they run on two different operating systems. The 700p is powered by a more traditional Palm system (similar to what you would have used on the company's traditional PDAs), whereas the 700w is equipped with Windows Mobile. Various versions of the Palm Treo are available from just about every mobile operator out there.Features
- Choice of either Palm OS or Windows Mobile
- QWERTY keyboard with round buttons
- Large stubby antenna
- 320 x 320 (square) TFT touchscreen display with 65k colors
- High-speed CDMA2000 EV-DO
- Bluetooth 1.2
- Personal speakerphone and handsfree headset jack
- Intel XScale 312MHz processor
- 1.3 megapixel camera with video, 2x digital zoom, automatic light balance
- Polyphonic MIDI and WAV ringtones
- Memory card slot for MMC, SD, and SDIO cards
