Click here to read our review of the Samsung Juke
Samsung has been flashing a rainbow collection of their X830 phone at events for the last year or so, with no indication of when the slight, switchblade phone might make its way to these shores. Well, Verizon Wireless has finally announced their own version of the slick, rotating flip, with some noteworthy improvements to the design and features. The Samsung Juke, as it is now called, is being positioned as a music phones for the younger set. Customers for whom a parental warning is a way of life, and not just a label. To that end, the phone lacks EV-DO, which should keep kids from downloading songs with dirty words, or surfing the nasty internet at a reasonable pace.
Still, the phone has a nice music player, a visual improvement over the V Cast player of which we were always already tired. Music can be sideloaded via the included USB cable. Yes, you heard us correctly, Verizon Wireless has broken with tradition on this phone and bundled a USB cable and a pair of wired headphones, though stereo Bluetooth should also work. Furthermore, instead of bundling a memory card, Samsung has filled the phone with 2GB of internal memory, an impressive capacity even for a small flash digital audio player, let alone a phone.
Even better, the phone has a GPS radio inside, so VZ Navigator will work for navigation. We got to spend some time with the phone, and were quite curious how a map and driving directions would look on the very small, very tall screen, but the device we tried was a beta version, and VZ Navigator was unavailable. For parents, the phone will also work with Verizon Wireless' Chaperon service, so you can track those kids by GPS to see where they've been getting that dirty music anyway.
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