SGH-D800, SGH-D820 slim Samsung sliders unveiled

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	SGH-D800, SGH-D820 slim Samsung sliders unveiled	By Jørgen Sundgot, 11 November 2005

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Bulk be gone; Samsung's SGH-D800 and SGH-D820 slider handsets offer high-resolution displays, 1.3 Megapixel cameras and audio players - and one even sports microSD expansion.

Landing squarely in between the 3G-enabled SGH-Z510 and SGH-Z540 handsets and the credit card-sized SGH-P300, Samsung's new slider handsets make few compromises with the exception of 3G. Hovering in the 15 mm range, the SGH-D800 and SGH-D820 represents two of Samsung's most capable handsets for the mainstream yet, boasting a smorgasboard of features.

Kicking off the party is the SGH-D800, a which at 92 x 52 x 14.9 mm and 98 g incorporates tri-band GSM 900/1800/1900 MHz connectivity along with support for GPRS and EDGE for data transfers. A back-mounted 1.3 Megapixel will let users record video and shoot stills in MPEG4/H.263 and JPEG formats, respectively, with the handset also capable of playing back content stored in these formats.

Allowing for visuals is a 2.12-inch QVGA display with 262K colour depth gracing the front half of the slider, also providing an interface to the handset's e-mail client and document viewer. Not content with visual prowess, the SGH-D800 also includes an audio player supporting MP3, WMA, AAC, AAC+ and eAAC+ formats for which 80 MB of internal memory is available.

Bluetooth and USB connectivity allow for transferring media back and forth, and the handset is also equipped with PictBridge support to allow direct-to-printer output as well as voice recognition.

The SGH-D820 cranks specifications up a slight notch, offering quad-band GSM as opposed to the tri-band support of the SGH-D800 along with dual stereo speakers and SyncML. A couple of features have also been subtracted, however, with the number of audio formats supported being reduced to MP3, AAC and AAC+ and internal memory shaved to 73 MB - although the latter is excellently mitigated through the inclusion of a microSD expansion slot.

Lastly, the SGH-D820 appears to be set to claim the title of Europe's first TV out-enabled handset - a feature popular in high-end Asian handsets which has yet to catch on in Western markets. In general, the development of devices with dedicated TV reception and connectivity in Western markets is lagging far behind the Asian market, with the only noteworthy exception as of late being Nokia's recently introduced N92 TV smartphone with DVB-H reception.

Slated for availabilty in the European market in the fourth quarter of 2005, Samsung did not provide any information concerning the expected pricing of the SGH-D800 and SGH-D820.