Samsung Glyde Cell Phone Review - Audio Quality
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Alfredo Padilla Published on May 28, 2008 Comment on this |
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The Samsung Glyde's audio performance was a mixed bag. Although the audio received by the phone was quite good we saw significant problems with the audio sent. You may also have problems with speaking too loudly while on the Glyde as the side tone, which you use to judge how loudly you are speaking, is too low.
General Audio
The quality of the audio you get from your phone is probably the most important feature and we acknowledge this importance by using professional hardware and software to test it. To simulate the human head we use a Head and Torso Simulator (HATS) and to analyze the audio itself we use Listen Inc's SoundCheck software. This is the same combination of hardware and software that many manufacturers and carriers use. For more information on how we do our audio testing see this article
Sound Receive Frequency Response (6.56)
This test looks at the quality of sound received by the phone, so this is how others will sound to you during a call. The chart below indicates the frequency response of the Samsung Glyde in blue with the two red lines indicating the limits against which we test.
audio quality received was a little... off
You can see that the Glyde's performance fell outside our limits in a couple of places in the low and mid frequencies. You can see that the audio rises too quickly at the beginning, cutting off the lower limit and then rising above the upper limit. At higher frequencies it falls back within our frequencies. The practical impact on users is that lower voices will vaccilate between being too quite and too loud. The Glyde's score in this test was below average and amongst our comparison phones only the Palm Centro performed worse than the Glyde.
| Cell Phone | Samsung Glyde | Palm Centro (on Sprint) | LG enV2 (on Verizon) |
| Score | 6.56 | 6.24 | 7.63 |
| Received Sound Frequency Response Graph |  |
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| Cell Phone | Sidekick LX (on T-Mobile) | LG Voyager (on Verizon) | Apple iPhone (on AT&T) |
| Score | 6.74 | 7.84 | 9.17 |
| Received Sound Frequency Response Graph |  |
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Sound Send Frequency Response (8.23)
In this test we consider the quality of audio sent by the Samsung Glyde, so this is how you will sound to those on the other end of a call. Like the chart from our previous test the chart below indicates the Glyde's performance in blue with our limits in red.
the audio quality sent by the Glyde fell within our limits
You can see that the Glyde performed better in this test than in our Receive test. The Glyde's performance stayed within our limits across frequencies, although it got pretty close to our limits at the higher frequencies. This shouldn't have a major impact on the audio quality, however. The Glyde's performance in this test was above average and amongst our comparison phones only the LG Voyager performed better in this test.
| Cell Phone | Samsung Glyde | Palm Centro (on Sprint) | LG enV2 (on Verizon) |
| Score | 8.23 | 7.82 | 7.47 |
| Sound Sent Frequency Response Graph |  |
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| Cell Phone | Sidekick LX (on T-Mobile) | LG Voyager (on Verizon) | Apple iPhone (on AT&T) |
| Score | 5.35 | 8.51 | 7.58 |
| Sound Sent Frequency Response Graph |  |
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Handset Side Tone (6.88)
Side tone is the small amount of your own voice that is piped back into your ear while you speak so you can judge how loudly you are speaking. Below you can see a chart of the Samsung Glyde's side tone across frequencies.
average side tone was on the low side
The Glyde's average side tone was -21.12 decibels. This is significantly lower than the -18 decibel ideal against which we score. You can see that amongst our comparison phones only the LG enV2 performed worse in this test while the Glyde's performance was significantly below average. What this means in practice is that your voice is going to sound more quite than it actually is, which could lead you to speak louder than you should. If people on the other end of the line complain that you're shouting while talking on the Glyde this is probably the reason.
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