AT&T 8125

Summary: All and All, this is a great peice of equipment. Will do almost anything you want to, but only at its own pace. I googled about the performance about this baby and came accross a few registry edits that should do the job. But I have seen that connecting a GPS via Bluetooth has been a pain (for me). I use the pharos GPS with microsoft streets and trips. I tried I-guidance but do not have enough memory. Expect a second review when I get my memory card (1 GB mini SD/ SD) on the 23rd.

The response times got really painful when i finally connected the device and started i-guidance. MS Streets was pretty light on the procesor/memory. I guess the downside of Cingular's/HTC's decision to put a 200 Mhz processor is showing here.

Coming to the Wireless LAN, i was able to connect to a WEP 80.11b network at work, but not the WPA 80.11g network at my home (yes, i tried mixed mode as well, and the registry hack). I did not see a performance degradation with this.

Coming to the true function, the phone !!! The Signal reception is beautiful. It almost matches my previous nokia 6230. I'd say its about 95% as good as a Nokia. Need I say more ?

I did not like the bluetooth menu a lot compared to my nokia. there was a way in nokia that would allow me to see a history of all devices and then give me the "Connect" option when i selected one of the devices. I do not see this feature and do not know how to keep track of the devices i am currently connected to. Hope microsoft updates this.

Synchronizing is absolutely smooth, no troubles at all, and I mean it. However, Linux users may not find it as attractive due to the microsoft affiliation of this product. I am yet to try it out on linux.

People complaining abt the keyboard, SHUT UP !!!!!!! If you got fingers the size of a coke can, you wouldn't be comfortable with any phone. I have used the keyboard and the stylus based soft key board, they are a beauty.

The sliding function needs no introduction, its breathtaking. however, i have seen performance issues on more than one occassion when it takes too long for the screen to switch to landscape mode. I found out later that this was because of the i_guidance GPS taking too many resorces. I will have to revisit the GPS thing later though.

Camera is good. I have taken pictures with the flash and it makes a difference in picture quality for upto 4 feet in dark conditions. I personally enjoyed the burst mode and ability to delete the whole set at once or file by file.

Volume Control is cool. the slider button on the left makes me wonder why it took so long for someone to come up with this idea. Nice job HTC.

Screen brightness is way too good. think it was about 5 different brightness levels. Clear font was cool too.

Voice Dial: I used this feature only twice and it was wrong on both occasions. However, to judge its quality based on two occassions would be a serious offense against the law of probability by sampling. I will give a full recap in my next review. The direct button for voice dial is placed appropriately.

Still need to figure out what the Push to Talk feature is all about. And its too soon to comment about the batterylife, expect this in the next review too.

I am yet to use it as a walkman, GPS, video camera and a sound recorder.

See ya soon,
Ciao.