Samsung i640 / i640V (SGH-i640)
Discontinued 26th February 2008
A follow-up device to the recent i620,
the Samsung i640 (also sold on the Vodafone network
as the i640V) is an HSDPA capable 3.5G slider phone
with an unusual 320 x 240 pixel display.
So, what has changed since the i620?
Well the truth is, not much. In almost all regards,
the i620 and i640 are completely identical. The one
significant difference between the two devices is that
the i640 boosts the speed of HSDPA downloads to 3.6
Mbps from the rather slow 1.8 Mbps on the previous
model.
A quick tour around the specifications
on the SGH-i640 show that this is a capable enough device,
but it is very much just a rehash of last year's model
and the competition has moved on. The 2.4" wide
aspect QVGA display is pretty good, but it is much smaller
than the panel on the Nokia
N95 8GB. Surprisingly the i640 lacks WiFi, and unlike
much of the competition, the i640 also suffers from
a pretty basic camera, lacks GPS and it doesn't come
with a touchscreen.
On
the other hand, there is a practical QWERTY keyboard
and the Samsung i640 runs Windows Mobile 6. So, it seems
obvious that Samsung are pitching the SGH-i640 against
BlackBerry handhelds and other messaging devices, rather
than aiming this at the consumer market.
Internal memory is stated to be 141MB
and this is expandable with microSD cards. As with many
Samsung devices, the i640 is tri-band GSM only with
2100 MHz WCDMA for 3G and 3.5G support. Physically,
the i640 measures 95 x 61 x 16mm and weighs 126 grams.
The SGHi-i640's battery life has been
quoted as a maximum of 6 hours with up to 15 days standby,
although it's not clear if that is on 3G or GSM. The
1200 mAH battery should be sufficiently beefy to keep
the i640 running for quite a while.
Vodafone have the i640 available right
now for contract customers in several different countries.
In the UK it is free on a £30/month one year contract.
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Samsung
i640 / i640V (SGH-i640)
at a glance
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Available:
|
Q1
2008
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Network:
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GSM
900 / 1800 / 1900 + UMTS
2100
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Data:
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GPRS
+ EDGE + UMTS (3G) + HSDPA
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Screen:
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240
x 320 pixels, 65k colours
|
Camera:
|
2
megapixels
|
Size:
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Wide
slider 97 x 61 x 17mm
/ 128 grams
|
Bluetooth:
|
Yes
|
Memory
card:
|
microSD
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Infra-red:
|
No
|
Polyphonic:
|
Yes
|
Java:
|
Limited
|
GPS:
|
No
|
Battery
life:
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6 hours talk / 15 days standby
|
|
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