Windows Phone Thoughts: No Matter Where You Go, There You Are ... With The E-TEN G500

We've Seen the Form, Now to the Function

System Information:

Figure 15: System Information.


Figure 16: Memory Configuration.


Figure 17: Getting to know your Pocket PC.

I could spend a lot of text describing the layout of the controls, but a page from the Quick Start guide seems to do it justice.

Windows Mobile 5.0: Microsoft’s latest Windows Mobile version has been the subject of much debate. Is it progression or is it regression? My first experience with WM5.0 has been very favorable. The soft keys weren’t as intrusive as I had originally feared. In fact I took to them quickly when navigating the built-in applications.

I only had a few complaints. The first being I wish I could customize the default selections, especially on the today screen. While ‘Contacts’ for one key is perfect, the second key set to ‘Speed Dial’ is useless to me. I would much rather map it to ‘Call History’.

The second, being the missing ‘New’ button. Without it, creating new documents or PIM objects becomes dangerously close to being a hassle. There is no way to create anything without first opening the corresponding application. That’s however many clicks to open your application, then depending on the layout of the apps controls, however many steps to get to the ‘New’ option.

The third, being the Contacts search capabilities, which are woefully inadequate for a phone. It does provide an accelerated linear search while HTC is usually kind enough to provide text search capabilities in their devices. If you’re purchasing a device from another manufacturer, then you should consider 3rd party products like SBSH’s ContactBreeze.

Usability: The G500 was a perfect fit in my hand. No matter whether I was holding it in my right or left hand I was able to reach any button on the device. Score 1 for one-handed navigation. Score 2 is the fact that E-TEN has graciously provided two dedicated soft key buttons. In the words of Little Red Riding Hood, this guy was just right. Not too big to be awkward against the face, and not too small to render the touch screen unusable. Part of me wished for another pair of application buttons, but I know that would only add to the phone’s length. So I make do.

The buttons are quiet and recessed. E-TEN’s creative use of the blue piping provides a contour that guides the finger to the proper position for each button. Each button does give a satisfying tactile feedback when pressed.

The G500 is definitely pocketable, though whether it's shirt pocketable may depend on what you’re wearing. At a whopping 191g, its presence is noticeable in any shirt. In a dress shirt pocket, I found the phone thumped against my chest when I walked fast. And I always walk fast. Putting this phone in the pocket of a knit polo would surely result in a stretched pocket. However, any pants pocket was comfortable.

Performance: I didn’t run any fancy benchmarking software to see if the G500 performs well. Besides from what I’ve read in a few forums the opinion is the results of such benchmarking are subject to a lot of debate. But I did run it stock for a couple of weeks without any additional software or plug-ins and what I can say is that the Samsung processor performs well. Even coming from a WM 2003SE device with a 520mhz processor, I found the G500 very responsive. With the exception of the initial startup of any given application, I didn’t notice that much of a difference in speed.

Battery Life: With moderate to heavy usage (including synchronization set to every 30 minutes), I found the battery life to be decent. By the end of the day I would have two out of four bars remaining. That being said, not charging nightly would be risky. For extended travel, carry an extra battery or your charger.

Bluetooth: The G500 includes the Headset, ActiveSync, Exchange vCard, and FTP services. My biggest disappointment is the lack of the DUN profile. So there’s no tethering with another PDA or my laptop to provide Internet access. I was, however, able to use the FTP service to transfer files between my Toshiba e830 and the G500. Setting up a headset profile was easy enough.

Just one item of note, the Bluetooth always starts up in discoverable mode. Okay, there are two items of note. The Bluetooth manager uses the owner information for identification as opposed to the actual Device ID in the About settings.

Conversation: I did find that in conversations the volume was very low and some people consistently complained about echoing on their end. I spoke with representatives from E-TEN and they recommended adjusting the gain control under the microphone settings. Unfortunately, lowering this setting affected the echoing only slightly.