The heir-apparent to Samsung's popular E100, the SGH-E715 builds on a solid heritage. Larry Garfield takes a shot with Samsung's camera clamshell, and finds most things done well.
Exterior
Samsung's SGH-E715 is a typical clamshell design with full internal antenna. It measures a comfortable 90 x 45 x 24 mm and weighs 95 grams, and is also well-balanced, not feeling too top heavy.
 | The SGH-E715 is a good phone, with both hits and misses
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The external display is a basic OLED display measuring 80 x 64 pixels, while the interior is graced with an attractive 16-bit TFT screen measuring 128 x 160 pixels. The lower half of the phone includes the keypad and directional pad, with the "C" button placed center between the call and hangup buttons. A volume rocker and headphone jack sit on on the left side, as does the small IR port, while the multi-colored signal/service light sits above the external display on the front, next to the camera lens. A camera button on the right side rounds out the interface.
Ergonomics
While the SGH-E715 feels very good in the hand, we're somewhat disappointed with the buttons. Although nice and large, they are separated only by slivers of plastic that move with the buttons themselves, making it virtually impossible to tell on what button the thumb is resting and eliminating no-eyes dialing. Also, the center button on the directional pad does not work as a select button as one would expect, but activates the included browser. We kept hitting it and expecting it to work as a select, even after several days experience with it, simply because it seemed so obvious. The directional pad itself is also very flat, making it a bit harder to use.
Features
The E715 is a dual-band GSM device, running 900 / 1900 MHz and supporting GPRS for data transfer. Data is transferable via the included WAP 2.0 browser. It also supports SMS, EMS, and MMS, the latter integrating well with the included camera. The 0.3 Megapixel camera lens is backed by a bright LED camera light, and the camera integrates well with the rest of the device's features. The phone supports polyphonic ring tones and comes with several out of the box.
Although the phone has support for photo caller ID, it does not support voice dialing.
3rd party applications are supported via the included JAME Java VM, and a few games are included as teasers. There is also a small set of PIM applications, as usual.
Performance
The SGH-E715 uses the same menu system as most other Samsung phones, and we found it both attractive and straightforward. Text entry is via multi-tap, which can be slow at times, or predictive T9.
The SGH-E715's camera is its strongest feature, not surprisingly, due primarily to its good integration and good camera light. The camera can take up to 0.3 Megapixel (VGA) images, and with the camera light we had no trouble taking pictures in otherwise poor lighting conditions. It also supports a number of built-in effects as well as multi-shot capability.
Audio quality proved to be overall good, as was reception, with little to none interference during use. The battery is rated for 4 hours talk time and 7 days standby, and in our experience was only just shy of that.
Availability
The Samsung SGH-E715 is available now in North America. Price without service agreement is $299.99 USD. Price with service agreement will vary with the carrier.
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