Cell Phones / Expert Reviews

Behind the lights and glamor of being the first Nokia smartphone to arrive in the US with Windows Phone on board, there’s some expectations riding with its release. However, we’re simply not convinced that the Nokia Lumia 710 is going to be THAT device to bring Nokia from the ashes, but rather,... More

The Nokia Lumia 710 isn't a cutting-edge phone in terms of specs, but so far it's a solid device with a nice design. Although my hands-on time is cursory compared with the kind of deep testing we employ for a full-on review, I'd say I got a good snapshot of the phone's look and feel. I didn't have a... More

There's a lot to like in Nokia's first US Windows Phone. The bargain price belies a solid set of features; quick performance and an elegant though not thin design. Call quality is excellent, the camera takes good photos and the phone is fast. Gaming is fluid and fun, the Zune music experience is as ever... More

The Lumia 710 comes at an awkward time for the consumer electronics industry. It launches quite literally during CES, the tradeshow where every major smartphone manufacturer announces its US lineup for the weeks and months to follow. Nokia will be there, too — rumors suggest it’ll unveil... More

When you stack the 710 up side-by-side with its sexier sibling the 800, you'll be hard pressed to find exactly what keeps this particular Lumia 90 points lower on the Nokia totem pole. It's certainly not the specs, as both handsets are nearly identical in that respect -- powered by a 1.4GHz MSM8255 processor,... More

The way the Lumia series is launching in the US is a bit puzzling to me. For all intents and purposes, the 710 is the first Nokia WP7 arriving on US soil, not its higher end brethren, the Lumia 800. Just like I noted with the HP Veer, it’s a daring move to put the midrange product out first, a... More

The Nokia Lumia 710 is a very solid smartphone with a pleasing operating system and it represents incredible value for the price. I'm not fully in love with some of the design choices, the camera or the lack of some key apps but if you're willing to give Windows Phone a chance, the Lumia 710 is a great... More

Given that you can get the Lumia 710 for free (at select retailers like Wirefly, for example) with a new contract, this phone does what exactly what Nokia designed it for: deliver a great basic smartphone user experience, in an affordable package. And don’t forget that T-Mobile is usually very... More

The Nokia 303 Asha is not a particularly hard one to recommend. In fact, if you want a full-featured messenger without the complications of a smartphone, the Asha 303 should be among the first things on you list to check out.
It’s the combination of a touchscreen and a QWERTY keyboard in a feature... More

While the Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket has a few flaws that could potentially be attributed to network issues, namely OK voice quality and spotty coverage at the mall, it gets just about everything else right. It has a great screen, excellent performance, a good speaker, a great camera, and very good... More

It has one of the fastest brains on the market combined with a very high resolution screen. With a 4.3in display and 960x540 pixels, the picture quality is superb and the 1.2GHz dual core processor ensures fast browsing. It has 16GB of inbuilt memory, and comes with an added 16GB on a microSD card.
The... More

My biggest complaint about this phone is that the dual-stage camera shutter button doesn’t offer too much tactile feedback. To use the hardware button to focus, you have to press really gently–any harder of a press than that and the phone will go to image capture mode and snap your picture.... More

The Samsung Galaxy Wonder very much surprised me when I began using it; for my conclusion I am going to use the quotation I used to describe it to my brother: "it's like the Galaxy Note is the powerful dad, the S2 is the athletic son and the Wonder is the hench baby." This phone is a VERY good phone... More

Google didn’t disappoint with the execution of Android Ice Cream Sandwich and Samsung did an excellent job with the hardware of the Galaxy Nexus.

It's probably only the second Nexus phone (after the Nexus One) that is really attractive to customers at large, rather than mostly to developers.

A... More

Accordingly, we're giving the Curve 9380 a middling score not because it's a bad phone, but because it's currently sitting in an awkward price position where it's not the best value for money. Consider it if you're looking for the smallest BlackBerry you can get or the cheapest touch model. If you're... More

The new Curve 9380 is not something we haven’t seen so far, it's a downgrade on an already familiar phone. But surprisingly, this actually works. While the Torch 9860 was big and not every RIM user's choice, the new Curve is smaller and lighter, but still equally capable and running the OS 7 as... More

Despite its weak screen and camera, the Samsung Repp is a decent entry-level Android phone for U.S. Cellular. But you can do a lot better without having to spend any money. Our previous Editors' Choice, the Samsung Mesmerize, is now free, too. It runs the same major version of Android as the Repp does,... More

I’d recommend the Admiral over any BlackBerry handset on the market, simply because it runs Android. But there’s nothing admirable about the Admiral; it’s just a good messaging phone with a good keyboard, though not necessarily a good phone phone. I wish it were more like the Dell Venue... More

We want companies to be creative and innovative. We often find ourselves rooting for the little guys that are willing to go out on a limb and try something new and clever, even if there's little chance of succeeding. After all, you never know if something's going to be a hit until you give it a shot.... More

There's nothing inherently wrong with the Samsung DoubleTime. It's a fine phone in most respects. It's also completely boring. For a device that is obviously aimed at helping bridge the gap between quick messaging devices and mid-range smartphones, the DoubleTime offers few unique or interesting features.
It... More