Helio Fin (Samsung SPH-a513) Cell Phone Review - Software

Alfredo Padilla
Published on August 29, 2007 Comment on this

OS (4.5)

The Fin runs Helio's proprietary operating system, which is found on all its devices regardless of manufacturer (which in this case is Samsung). Helio's OS generally does a good job of providing an intuitive and attractive interface. As with any phone there will be a learning curve, and some of the applications, like e-mail, are more complicated than many other phones. Despite the fact that we're not generally fans of carrier-wide user interfaces, we must admit we have few complaints about Helio's interface. Our score for proprietary operating systems is capped at 5; we reserve higher scores for standardized smart phone operating systems like Symbian, Windows Mobile, or BlackBerry OS.

Home Screen Score (6.0)

The Fin's home screen is clean and cool, as you would expect from a sea-themed device. The screen is dominated by the Helio logo in the center of the screen. Along a narrow band at the top are indicators for time, battery, signal strength, data connection, and other various items. The bottom of the screen shows the functions for the two soft keys, menu on the left and contacts on the right. Although there's no visual indication, the four directions of the directional pad can be used to launch four different applications. By default these are the Web browser, games, messaging, and video + music. You can change which applications are launched in the settings. You also have a wide variety of options for the home screen, which range from fun animated text to things like a calendar, your appointments, or tasks. This can approximate the kind of active home screens you see from some smart phones. We have to say we found the Fin's home screen to be attractive and functional; it almost makes it a pleasure to just open your phone up.

Extensibility (3.0)
The Helio Fin is not a very extensible platform. There are no native third party programs available to be installed, however like most phones it can handle third-party Java applications.

Customizability (6.0)
The Fin is an extremely customizable phone. You have a wide variety of settings and effects that can be turned on or off. You can set any image as your home screen background, and there are also a decent selection of built-in screens. Sounds can also be controlled in great detail, and we were happy to see that not only can you change text size, but also the font used throughout the phone. This level of customization is some of the best we've seen from any phone.

OS Responsivness (8.0)
One of the things that impressed us the most about the Fin was how responsive the interface is. With a couple of notable exceptions (sending SMS messages and the Web browser), most functions on the phone launch almost instantly, with no lag when browsing the menus. After suffering through the lagging interfaces on Nokia Series 60 phones like the N75 and LG Chocolate VX8550, we found the Helio's operating system to be blissfully responsive.

Browser Features (6.0)

The browser on the Fin is the same as that found on the Helio Ocean. HTML, Javascript, and images are supported, but once again we could not use mobile-focused WAP pages. This just seems silly, as such pages are perfect for viewing on small screens. Advanced features like Java and Flash are not supported. All in all, it's about what you would expect from a mobile browser, except for the inexplicable lack of support for WAP pages.

Browsing Interface (3.5)
The browser on the Helio Fin uses Google's mobile browsing service to shrink websites to fit on your screen. Although this is helpful, you can also lose some content on the page. Thankfully you can switch to a full HTML view, as well. The left soft key opens the menu system, of which there are four, that allow you to access bookmarks, view, search, and history. Bookmarks cannot be placed into folders, although you can edit existing bookmarks and reorder them. You can change the size of the font on pages, which is helpful for those who squint at the small print on the screen, and there is an auto-complete feature, as well. The right soft key allows you to enter an address. One annoying item we noticed is that important symbols like / and - are buried several screens deep in the symbol interface. The browser on the Fin does a reasonable job for light browsing, but it falls well short of more advanced browsers like those found on the iPhone or the Series 60 Web.

Browser Access (6.67)
To test how quickly we can browse to our own website, we count how many steps it takes to go from phone closed until we have our page showing. We count steps instead of using a timed test to take network issues out of the equation. Entering the Web address is counted as a single step. The Fin took six steps to browse to our page. This is relatively fast, helped by the fact that a push up on the directional pad on the home screen launches the browser. It should be noted, however, that the Web browser is one of the slower functions to launch. It's still faster than launching the Web browser on the Razr, though.

Cell Phone	Steps	Score
Helio Fin	6	6.67
Sanyo Katana DLX	8	5.00
LG Chocolate VX8550	12	3.33
Nokia N75	8	5.00
Nokia N73	5	8.00
Sprint Upstage	13	3.08

Gaming (2.0)

Gaming is one of the things Helio focuses on in its phones, which makes sense considering the carrier is targeting a younger audience. Unfortunately, however, the Fin shipped with only a single full version game, a pet simulation that's, frankly, not very fun. There are also three demos included, but you will need to purchase them if you want to get too far into the games. You also have a large selection of Java games you can purchase and add to the Fin, but there aren't any native games available. In addition, the controls on the Fin are not very good for gaming. The directional pad is small and prone to errors, which means any game that requires pinpoint control will probably become frustrating very quickly.

Calculator (3.0)

The calculator on the Fin is very simple, able to handle arithmetic (+, -, *, /), but not anything more advanced. The four directions of the directional pad are assigned to the four basic functions, while the center select key allows you to insert parentheses. The left soft key is assigned to clear, and the right soft key to equals. You an also use the start button to insert a decimal and the pound button to make a number negative. All in all it should be sufficient for figuring out a tip, but nothing more.

Alarm (6.0)


New Alarm Interface	New Wake-up Call Interface

Like the Helio Ocean, the Fin provides you with two different alarm options. One is called Wake-Up Call, which allows you to create a recurring alarm, ostensibly to wake you up. Your options for recurrence are decent, with several pre-set options but no way to edit the recurrence. You can also set how many times the alarm repeats and choose your own ringtone and background for the alarm. A separate Alarm program allows you to create multiple alarms, but without the recurrence options of a Wake-Up Call. This seems a little complicated to us. Why not simply provide recurrence options for all alarms rather than reserve this for a separate application?

Document Software (0.0)
The Fin does not include any software for viewing or editing office documents like Word and Excel files.

Other Software (0.0)
Like all Helio phones, the Fin has a couple of additional applications installed, including Google Maps and Buddy Beacon. Both use the phone's GPS capabilities, and we cover them in more detail in the Other Features section.

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