In recent times, Samsung unveiled several phones in the Indian market and the top-notch similarity between most of them is the price range. These phones are well priced just below the mid-range phones. One such device is the Samsung Metro S5200 which has reached the Indian soil recently. The Metro S5200 slides its way to our desks and here’s presenting an exclusive review of the handset.
The Metro exudes good looks in metallic black and red attire with a glossy finish. It is also available in Blue-Black combination but we received the Red-Black unit minus the headphones. On gripping the phone, it felt strong and sturdy. The built-quality seems good and the design further adds to the looks. Apart from its bold looks, one of its striking attribute is the extruding circular navigation pad imprinted with OK and aligned by a silver ring. Just above it lies the Samsung lettering and the 2.1-inch QVGA display screen.
Surrounding the circular navigation ring are the Menu and Contacts buttons which also serve to lock/unlock the phone. Just below these buttons are the Call answer and Call end buttons. The edges of the phone carry a dedicated camera button, dual purpose charging/headphone port, volume control and microSD card slot. The Samsung Metro S5200 smoothly slides open to reveal the alphanumeric keypad.
Apart from oozing style, the Samsung Metro S5200 is pretty sturdy and rugged, feels really strong in palms. The phone seems durable enough to survive a few low drops (of course we didn’t try it). This slider is definitely smooth as it easily opens up to sport an alphanumeric keypad built out of a single flat layer. There isn’t any distinct boundary between the keys but they are quite comfortable to use, we must say. We could easily key-in numbers, messages and other data. The circular navigation pad can be assigned with shortcuts while set your device to answer a call just by sliding it upwards.
The 2.1-inch QVGA screen offers splendid viewing. The screen quality is pretty good and we enjoyed watching the content. Though it did a great job even with the mere screen size, we wonder why Samsung didn’t rope in a larger display screen. The device is simple to use and puts aside all the complications of multiple homepages with a single-page Menu. The Menu is inclusive of Call Log, Phonebook, Music, Browser, Messages, My Files, Organizer, Camera, Google, Applications, Alarms and Settings. Well, we didn’t really expect a 5 MP or above camera with the price tag that the device carries. The integrated 3.2 megapixel sensor managed to take decent snapshots along with a single LED and autofocus. The QVGA video recording is decent as well.
Those wanting to put their daily errands in order will be gladdened with the Organizer function that bundles up several aspects like Calendar to mark events, Memo, Task, and also World Clock, Calculator and Converter. Another notable ability of the device is to provide options like Selected, Multiple or All when one tries to delete a particular file. The lazy bones like some of us can wake up from slumber with the included five alarms.
One can enable or disable a feature or simply tweak the capabilities of the phone under the Settings option. We could dress the homescreen in several themes and about 14 wallpapers, out of which an amazing hourglass formed of splashing water and leaves covered with water droplets caught our attention. The text display can be changed with shadows and outline while we could also dip it into the color of our choice. We could choose the menu transition form and also adjust the LCD’s brightness while setting backlit time is also possible. The keypad backlit can be switched off or set to be used only at night time, enabling to save the battery life. The Security functions include Phone, PIN, SIM and privacy locks. Mobile tracker has also been integrated.
The phone brings in lots of fun-filled features as well. The image editor is one such function which let us edit photos with varying effects. One can directly go to the image gallery or quickly take a snapshot to add the fun-filled effects, and also adjust the contrast and brightness levels. It includes options such as crop, resize, flip and even insert emoticons and clipart. Then on, users can directly set the image as a wallpaper or caller image. Similarly, a video editor has been integrated alongside a voice recorder and support for Bluetooth, Timer and Stopwatch. Gaming fiends can also get their hands (rather fingers) on several games like Millionaire from Glu, Gameloft’s Brain Challenge Vol2, and Tetris Mania from EA. However, only their trial versions have been included and one would have to shell out some money for the complete game, which is quite disappointing.
The main Menu also shows off the Google tool that includes shortcuts to Google Search and Google Mail. But, the included WAP browser maintains it really plain and simple. The browser let us mark Bookmarks and keep a track of the site history. The Music Player integrated ensures decent music. One can opt for Shuffle or Repeat even from the main Settings options. Be it music or videos, the audio quality is well managed. The Music Player is also well organized and the classification is apt too. The Metro comes with an FM Tuner, as aforesaid our bundle didn’t include the headphones so we couldn’t test that bit. The 50MB internal memory and 1GB memory card enable users to store ample of data. Those with a bigger collection of videos, music and images can expand the memory up to 8GB with the integrated memory slot. With an average usage, the battery life of the Metro stretched for almost more than a day.
With the likes of some of its recent handsets, Samsung has dished out yet another handset to suit the needs of most of the users looking for an affordable handset with decent features. A larger screen and a better browser would have been appreciated but Samsung has dished out a decent phone at a price that it carries. The Metro S5200 brings in a chic and stylish device in the good ‘ol slider form. It looks modish and is highly grippable, rather pocketable. It seems a fair deal for the features it bundles at a price of just Rs. 7000. Well, the Metro S5200 gets a rating of 8 on 10 from us.
