Finally, a handset from Siemens that competes on the cutting edge: Jørgen Sundgot has poked and prodded the new S65, boasting a 1.3 megapixel camera and huge colour display.
Despite offering up handsets of good build quality and with solid feature sets, it's been a while since Siemens competed on the cutting edge with its handsets. Thankfully, the S65 puts that comment to shame, as the newly unveiled tri-band handset offers up a combination of a large colour display, 1.3 megapixel camera and 32 MB of bundled memory to store pictures on.
Capable of shooting both stills and video at a resolution of up to 15 FPS, the Siemens S65 has the largest display of any Siemens handset to date - with the exception of its SX1 smartphone. The display is both clear and quite bright, and is far more enjoyable in use than those found in previous handsets as it redraws quickly. The camera viewfinder could use a small boost however as it doesn't have the best of frame rates, but is still quite comfortable.
 | | Siemens S65 |
Equally uplifting is the quality of its keypad, which is oh-so-comfortable when compared to certain other Siemens models. This also rings true for its joystick, which enables users to navigate the pleasantly designed user interface - in which users can alternate between small and large icons; a nifty addition. On a purely aesthetic note, the design of the handset is light years ahead of the remainder of Siemens' portfolio, which will certainly help attract potential buyers.
One drawback of the S65 was however the speed with which text input was processed. This was as slow as - if not slower - than other current Siemens handsets, which was something of a disappointment. It was however not entirely unexpected, as Siemens uses a platform from Sony Ericsson for its handsets - and as we've mentioned in numerous reviews, this is one of the more persistent and noticeable problems with Sony Ericsson handsets.
Due to the early state of the firmware present in the S65, we were unable to test other advanced functions, however it's worth mentioning that the handset will be duly equipped with integrated Bluetooth and an MMC Card expansion slot. Provided Siemens' estimate holds true, the S56 will be launched in Europe, Asia Pacific and Latin America in the third quarter of 2004, however no information concerning its expected pricing is available as of yet.
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