Five top phones at Mobile World Congress 2009

MWC 2009: What caught our eye at the show

Five top phones at Mobile World Congress 2009

20 February 2009 10:17 GMT / By Stuart Miles

The dust has now settled at this year's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, so which were the handsets that caught our eye the most?

Here, in no particular order, are our top five:

Nokia N86
So you like taking pictures? Well Nokia hopes that you'll forget that Samsung, LG, and Sony Ericsson already have 8-megapixel camera phones and opt for their new N86. Judging by what we saw, both using the camera phone and seeing the results up close (in A3 no less), it looks pretty impressive with Carl Zeiss claiming the camera is good enough for 95% of the average consumer's needs. A low f-stop, mechanical shutter and dual LED flash are just some of the features designed to woo photographers.

HTC Magic
Okay so it wasn't called the G2 in the end, but at least HTC has managed to create something that looks a lot better than the G1 for the second commercially available Android handset. Landing in the UK in "spring", the handset will be available exclusively on Vodafone and come with an on-screen keyboard. It is by no means a HTC Touch HD, but it's considerably better looking than T-Mobile's efforts first time around. At least with the Magic you'll be able to get it in your pocket.

LG Arena
It's like the iPhone, but 3D. LG's Arena handset sports a good looking screen, great responsiveness to touch and an interface that not only looks good, but is quick to respond (there is hardware chip just for that). A full feature set like HSDPA, Wi-Fi, GPS and even DivX support means this isn't a slouch in bed either.

i-mate 810-F
This is one for the tough bunch. BlackBerrys might be good for messaging, but build quality has never been one of their strong points. So take Windows Mobile 6.1 (upgradeable to 6.5) add it to a handset that looks like it could withstand being dropped in a puddle and you've got the 810-F. For the surveyor out on location this looks like it could be just the ticket. Better still if you do manage to break it, it comes with a lifetime guarantee.

Samsung Omnia HD
So you like watching video? Well the large screen of the Omnia HD is probably for you. What we really like is the ability to stream high-def footage to a DLNA enabled television, wirelessly turning the phone into a media jukebox for when you rock up to other peoples houses (well as long as they have a DLNA enabled TV themselves). Oh and the fact that you can record in 720p so you don't have to bother with a pocket camcorder.
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Comment, Phones, Mobile phones, Nokia, LG, Samsung, HTC, i-mate, MWC2009, Features

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