FIRST TAKE: Samsung Omnia Pro

FIRST TAKE: Samsung Omnia Pro

Samsung slaps a keyboard onto the Windows Mobile Omnia and sends it to work. Check out our hands on look at the Samsung Omnia Pro.

At Samsung Mobile headquarters, we recently had the opportunity to get a hands-on look at some of the manufacturers newest high-end, touchscreen phones, including the Samsung Jet and the Samsung Omnia 2. Rounding out the bunch was the Samsung Omnia Pro, a phone we reported on last month when it was originally launched. In following with current smartphone naming traditions (a la HTC's Touch Pro), the Omnia Pro takes the basic Omnia design and adds a keyboard to it. But in our hands-on time with the Omnia Pro, we found changes far deeper than the simple full QWERTY keyboard.

The Samsung Omnia Pro uses an interface that is dramatically different from the fun and widget-happy TouchWIZ 2.0 interface on the Samsung Jet. The Pro's interface is all business. Underneath, the Samsung Omnia Pro is running Windows Mobile 6.1, and the company says buyers will be able to upgrade to Windows Mobile 6.5 when it becomes available, probably this September, if Microsoft hits their release target.

In our time with the Samsung Omnia Pro, we found the interface to be useful for business users. It sacrificed flash and fun for useful information, bringing new messages, appointments and more to the top level for easy viewing. In landscape mode, the phone starts by offering up a simple shortcut menu to key business applications. Samsung is still using a multi-page interface for a main menu, but these were more static than on the Samsung Jet, with less customization and more solid productivity options.

The star of the show will obviously be the slide-out keyboard. In our time with the Samsung Omnia Pro, we found the keyboard to be large and comfortable. The phone uses an ample 3.5-inch, AMOLED screen, at a WVGA resolution of 800 by 480 pixels, and that gives a large keyboard plenty of room to hide when it's not needed. Keys on the Samsung Omnia Pro were flat, contiguous squares, more reminiscent of older HTC Touch Pro designs than the discrete keys on other side-sliding Samsung phones like the ill-fated <>Samsung Glyde. Like the Nokia E71, the Samsung Omnia Pro has a dedicated switch for 'business' or 'pleasure' modes. Press the button and the phone will switch to a personal mode, giving more attention to apps, shortcuts and sound profiles befitting a day off, rather than a day's work. For serious business users, it's a nice feature, and it acknowledges that more business users are using their smartphones for multimedia and other fun capabilities, and not just scheduling appointments and editing Word documents.

To that end, the Samsung Omnia Pro comes with a 5-megapixel camera with auto focus and an LED flash. The phone will ship with 1GB of internal memory, which seems like just enough for saving attachments in business mode, so music lovers will probably want to spring for an external card. The Omnia Pro can handle microSD cards up to 32GB. The phone will be able to integrate with a DLNA living room, and will have TV output capabilities for showing movies and pictures on a larger screen.

Pricing and availability for the Samsung Omnia Pro has yet to be determined. Rumors suggest the phone will be available late this summer for about 500 Euros. American versions of this phone haven't been announced, which is too bad, since Samsung has already made official the Samsung Omnia 2 on Verizon Wireless. Of course, like the HTC Touch Diamond and HTC Touch Pro, the Omnia and Omnia Pro would make a logical pair, but we're not ones to divine the will of the U.S. carriers.