Samsung Beat for T-Mobile Cell Phone Review - Software

Mark Brezinski
Published on February 21, 2008 Comment on this

OS (3.0)

The Beat runs T-Mobile's proprietary operating system, specifically the one they use on their lower-range handsets. As such, you can expect a responsive, fairly stable operating system. Unfortunately, as seems to be a trend with this class of T-Mobile handsets, the menu structure is just bad. Menus contain superfluous items and are poorly organized. There were several instances of menus with two or three items, only one of which was pertinent (at which point it should really be a soft key shortcut and not a menu). This disorganization applies to applications as well: voice commands and voice notes are in the Fun & Apps folder, while the stopwatch and tip calculator somehow landed in the Organizer folder.

Again, as an entry-level handset, many of these issues can be merely classified as annoyances as opposed to real problems. In spite of the Beat's poor layout, it's still very easy to pick up and use.

Home Screen Score (4.0)

Since the Beat is a T-Mobile phone, the home screen is dedicated to the "Fav Five" interface. While the "Fav Five" is an interesting feature for a carrier to offer, it doesn't help the home screen much. The carousel of contacts marches around slowly, so it's probably more efficient to simply assign these people to a speed dial. Also, since left and right shuffle through your Five, they can't be assigned as a shortcut key -- a standard feature on entry-level phones. Up and down will still open up valuable programs, however: call records and the contact list specifically.

Extensibility (3.0)
The extensibility of the Beat is about as good as other entry-level handsets. You can install basic Java applications -- such as Opera Mini, which we strongly suggest getting -- but that's the extent of the Beat's flexibility.

Customizability (3.0)
The Beat does allow you to spruce it up somewhat. Basic options, like wallpaper and ringtone changes are a plus. There are also two themes. We liked that you could preview the themes by highlighting them; many phones take a while to load and implement the theme, so if you don't like it you'll have to wait again while the phone reverts to its old setting. Though not free, you can download additional themes and wallpapers from the T-Mobile store. Other than these options, however, the Beat doesn't offer anything. One feature we really would've liked to see was a global font setting.

OS Responsivness (7.5)
The Beat seems to be a pretty responsive OS, though we did somehow manage to crash it once. That instance aside the Beat will respond very quickly to input. The only times we felt as though the Beat was bogging us down was when dealing with video files. This is a common bottleneck for phones, however. Overall, the Beat was quick.

Browser Features (4.0)
The Beat doesn't have much in the way of features; those it does have are offset by strange omissions elsewhere. WAP pages display appropriately. HTML pages will become ugly columns of shrunken graphics and weird spacing. Changing the view won't help with HTML either; it just turns them into vast landscapes, many screens wide, that are too bothersome to traverse. Java and Flash applications won't work, but you can enable JavaScript. RSS feeds aren't supported and neither are tables. You will be able to view encrypted pages, however, which is nice. Also, while you can change the text size, there is only one notch smaller than the default setting, and the larger sizes will only let a few words fit on screen at a time.

Browsing Interface (3.0)
The browser interface on the Beat is simple, mainly because the user isn't privy to many options. The right soft key will bring up the home page. Select will click. The left soft key will open up a short list of menu items. Most of these items will initially appear to do the same thing, since they're all derivitives of "Go". You are allowed to save a web page, and there are a few further options, though none of them are terribly important.

There is one view option, though it's virtually useless. Desktop view on the Beat is much like trying to read through a keyhole six inches away from you. Perhaps this view would increase the viewability of HTML pages -- which the Beat does not handle particularly well -- but the screen is so tiny that you'll have to scroll four to eight times to get through a single line. We'd recommend this view only as a last resort.

Besides the back button, there is no way to recount your internet adventure. We searched, but there was no history folder, and there was no way to check out your cookies. There are Cache and Cookie options, but you can only dictate a few basic rules for what's allowed, or to empty/delete. You can't actually check out what you've accumulated before blindly destroying it.

You can add bookmarks either from the appropriate item in the options list or via the Go to URL screen.

Due to the sluggish speeds, we really can't recommend the Beat for heavy browsers. It has a few annoying quirks, such as necessitating a press of the select key before entering text into a field. If you must use the internet, we'd recommend installing Opera Mini, preferrably on a phone with a faster data connection.

Browser Access (8.00)
It takes five steps to browse to a web page, which is a step faster than what we normally see. First you have to hit the T-Zones shortcut, which will open up the browser. Once everything is loaded and "Options" shows up in the lower left, hit the left soft key to open up that menu. Next you should hit 3, which will automatically choose "Go to URL". Finally, type in the address of the site and hit the left soft key once more to aim the browser in the right direction.

We use steps instead of time for our browser access test because browser access speed is dependent on many variables. We could get vastly different results from arbitrary things such as geography or even the current weather. We therefore use the number of steps, as it's a much more accurate portrayal of the complexity of the process.

Cell Phone	Steps	Score
Samsung Beat	5	8.00
Razr2 V8	6	6.67
Samsung Blast	6	6.67
Samsung SLM	6	6.67
Motorola W385	12	3.33
Samsung Juke	N/A	0.0

Gaming (7.0)

The Beat actually has quite a selection of built-in, Java-based games. In total, you'll find three full-version games and one demo -- a library whose size is unrivaled amongst other entry-level devices. Beyond this, most of these games are at least mediocre, if not outright good. As a basic, non-gaming-oriented handset, the Beat controls well enough. Overall, the Beat was a much better gaming device than we would've initially would've pegged it.

The first game is Bobby Carrot. This is essentially a mobile version of Chip's Challenge white-washed with a bunny theme. Given its cutesy appearance, we were surprised when stage 2 introduced spikes that shot out of the floor.

Next on down is AirShip Racing. ASR is basically what Balloon Kid would've been if all the graphics were replaced by incomprehensible shapes. Another difference is that your AirShip requires fuel, but there's so many shapes flying at you it's hard to tell what pixel-blobs are beneficial and which ones kill. As an added bonus, whenever you touch an obstacle your character screams in terror as he plummets to the ground.

Third up is Arch Angel. The mysterious, titular, "land-sea-air-space" vehicle has quite the history behind it: "Due to the fact that this unit looks like a fire-spitting angel its code name is 'Arch Angel'." Wonderful. Once you wrap your head around the backstory, you'll be left with a crappy Top Gun knockoff. Hitting enemy planes is virtually impossible due to the stiff controls.

The final game offered is a demo of Bubble Bash. This is another needless storyline game. In the beginning you can choose between Kale and Malia, but it doesn't matter since you technically drag both characters around with you. According to the demo, "you've decided to go on a quest to bubble island to find the treasure you've heard about. But beware, bubble island is full of puzzles and dangerous creatures! You'll have to do your best to find the treasure. Good luck!" With this intro you'd expect a variety puzzler. What you get instead is a crappy Bust-a-Move ripoff, or, for the unschooled, an slightly-less-crappy Snood rip-off. If you're only familiar with the latter, then Bubble Bash is really just one of the many later generations in a family tree of uninspired knock-offs.

Calculator (5.0)

The Beat's calculators come in three flavors: plain, tip, and currency. The plain calculator is very basic. You can perform the four basic operations with the d-pad, and you can also insert parenthesis. Exponents or other advanced functions were absent. The tip and currency calculators perform their namesake duties, and are very simple to use thanks to their basic capabilities.

Alarm (6.5)

The Beat has good alarm software. You can essentially set three different alarms at once; they're labeled wake-up alarm, alarm 1, and alarm 2, but their customization options are the same. There is a fourth item on the main menu, "Auto power-up," but this just affects the amount of fuss the phone makes while booting up.

Though the limit of three alarms limits the Beat's functionality, it does feature a great recurrence setup. When you set recurrence you're given a list of days in the week with checkboxes. Simply check the boxes of days you want an alarm for. Another interesting feature is snooze. Snooze itself is ho-hum at best, but the Beat allows you to change the length of the snooze. You can also change the number of times the phone will let you snooze, which is a very interesting option.

Document Software (0.0)
The Beat has no document software.

Other Software (1.5)

The Beat has a few other applications, such as a timer and stopwatch, but none of these are worth any points. We did give a half point to the MegaSearch program. Using this you can search through calls, contacts, calendar events, tasks, messages, and files via multi-tap. There is also a file browser on the phone, which lets you manage multiple files simultaneously with relative ease.

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