Multimedia Phone Reviews

The I-mate Jaq smartphone runs Windows Mobile 5 Pocket PC Edition with the full Office Mobile suite and features a full QWERTY keyboard and Bluetooth. 'The JAQ feels far too large in the hand, measuring 4.8 x 2.7 x 0.8 inches and weighing 5.6 ounces. The large touchscreen is nice (2.8 inches, 320 x 240 pixels), and we like the size of the QWERTY keyboard, but the number keys are the same color as the rest, making basic dialing a chore. The battery compartment juts out the back, ruining any chance of sleekness, and the buttons and keyboard feel cheap. The touchscreen requires an extra firm touch, which is tiring, and the stylus inconveniently pulls out from the bottom left corner.'

The sleek i-Mate SPL lightweight smartphone has been reviewed at Mobile Burn. 'The SPL is a very solid feeling device, and apart from the cover for the miniUSB port, it is very well designed. The miniUSB port is the sole port on the handset, handling both charging and connectivity - this is great for business users, allowing them to charge the handset with, for example, a laptop computer (which I did on several occasions). The cover for this port is frustratingly hard to get out of the way when you are trying to plug the handset in though; the small rubber link between cover and handset needs to be about twice its current length to be usable.

PC Magazine have published their review of the i-Mate JAQ smartphone. 't's not often you find a smartphone that makes a Treo look svelte, but the i-mate JAQ manages it. The JAQ is large enough to be difficult to hold with your hand. When viewed straight on, it's a dead ringer for a misshapen Nokia E62. The JAQ's round keys and softer lines contrast with the E62's straight cuts and knife-edged profile, but both of them have almost the exact same, largish length and width.

CNET have published their review of the I-mate Jaq3 Windows Mobile smartphone. 'Much to our relief, the I-mate Jaq3 looks nothing like its bulky, plasticky predecessor, but that doesn't mean we're in love with the design either. At 4.9x2.6x0.5 inches and 5.6 ounces, the Jaq3 is definitely sleeker and sexier with its black casing. In fact, it pretty much looks like all the other slim, black QWERTY smart phones in the market today--the Samsung BlackJack, the Motorola Q, or the RIM BlackBerry 8800, take your pick. Like the rest of these devices, the Jaq3 is on the wider side, so holding it up to your ear as a phone will take some getting used to if you're new to this type of handset. To make things a bit easier, the Jaq3 features a soft-touch finish to give the exterior a rubber-like texture and make it easier to grip.

IT Reviews have published a review of the lightweight I-mate JAMA Windows Mobile Pocket PC. 'If you want a handheld with Wi-Fi or 3G then look elsewhere as neither is here. In fact, the JAMA is just dual-band. We can't remember the last time we saw a phone of any kind that wasn't at least tri-band. Of course there is a camera - a 2-megapixel one - and there is around 45MB of free storage space for applications and data, including photos and music to play through the JAMA's copy of Windows Media Player, and more. A microSD card slot is on the left edge of the casing for more memory to be added.'

InfoSyncWorld have published their "Hands-on" review of the i-mate 6150 touch screen smartphone. 'The Ultimate 6150 may lack a keyboard, but it is still a complete smartphone. You might expect it to be more like a PDA, without much connectivity, but instead you get tri-band HSDPA, EDGE and GSM for world-traveling 3G that will actually work on AT&T's network, though don't expect to see it in stores, as the phone will be sold direct and unlocked. You also might expect some pared-down hardware, since this will be the lowest-end phone in i-mate's American Ultimate line-up. Though we would definitely miss the hardware keyboard, the phone still packs a video card for XGA output, a beautiful VGA screen, a 2-megapixel camera with auto-focus and a front-facing VGA camera for eventual videoconferencing capabilties, if AT&T gives the okay.'

Trusted Reviews have published a review of the i-Mate Jama 201 smartphone. 'The 201 is also a very tactile device. The whole chassis is coated in that lovely rubbery, soft-touch plastic which, as well as feeling soft and smooth under your fingertips, also means when you're typing away on its QWERTY keyboard it feels secure in your hands, unlike a number of soap-bar phones I could mention. The keyboard is absolutely tiny and smaller than that on a BlackBerry 8800, for instance, and, if you've got big, builder's thumbs, likely to be rather difficult to use. But I found that, once I'd got used to the size of the keys, typing short email messages and texts was surprisingly easy. The square keys have just enough space between them to prevent you accidentally striking neighbouring characters, and they have a positive click to them that means you know exactly when you've pressed or not pressed a key successfully.'

A review of the i-mate JAMA 101 PDA phone has been posted over at IT Reviews. 'There is no 3G support, just tri-band GSM, and while this is fine for you today, in the future you may want the faster data speeds and video calling that 3G offers. Then there is the built-in camera. At 2-megapxiels it is best described as average. There could be memory issues too, as there is just 128MB of RAM, and you may find you need a microSD card to give this a bit of a boost, especially if you want to add a lot of applications to those that are built in. On the plus side, though, you get Windows Mobile 6 Professional in a very small PDA indeed - just 105 x 52.5 x 15.5mm and 110g. These dimensions are barely greater than those of many mobile phones. And the screen, while necessarily quite small to fit into this casing at just 2.4 inches corner to corner, is very sharp, clear and bright.'

IT Reviews have publsihed a review of the I-mate Ultimate 9502 Windows Mobile device. 'The Ultimate 9502 supports 3G with HSDPA and has a front-facing camera for two-way video calling. It has Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and GPS built in. There is 128MB of RAM and 256MB of flash memory, with a microSD card for adding more. The headset connector is 2.5mm in size, which is a disappointment as you can't use your favourite headphones without an adaptor to 3.5mm, and the processor struggled a little to do everything we asked of it.