Samsung has launched two phones, the Chat 322 and Chat 335, which the company hailed as the “smart Messaging phones”.
These phones come with QWERTY keypads, mail, instant messenger and native SNS (social networking services) clients like Facebook and Twitter.
The handsets also features optical track pad, Active Sync (Push Mail App) and Smart Homescreen, which enables the user to create shortcuts, buddy lists and live ticker feeds from Facebook and Twitter.
Announcing the launch, Ranjit Yadav, country head, mobile and IT, Samsung India Electronics said, “Consumers increasingly want to stay connected with friends and family through SNS, IM (instant messenger) and messaging while being on the move. “
He further added, “These new Qwerty phones from Samsung meet their needs through convenient messaging features and at the same time offer differentiated features like Optical track pad, ActiveSync or the Dual SIM standby feature (Chat 322) that make them stand out from other messaging phones. ”
Samsung Chat 322 is the first Samsung messaging phone to offer a Qwerty keypad with Dual SIM. The phone comes with a dedicated SIM switch key which allows the users to block one of the SIMs if required. This feature will be quite handy for those users who while Roaming do not want to use a particular SIM or want to switch of the SIM they use during the office hours.
The integration of social networking features in the home screen is a smart move. It offer customisable shortcut toolbar that allows quick access to favourite apps, a buddy list that displays photo IDs of best friends to call, mail or SMS and a Personal Info Management (PIM) tracker that gives information on calendar based schedules, events etc.
The Smart Homescreen also supports live ticker feeds from the native Facebook and Twitter clients for instant updates from friends.
Samsung Chat 322 offers users direct access to SNS links to 6 popular Social Networking portals MySpace, Orkut, Flicker etc. Moreover, the mobile is equipped with ActiveSync (Push Mail for Google), easy email set up for other popular mail IDs and popular Instant Messengers like Yahoo, MSN and GTalk.
It comes with a 3.5mm audio jack, 1.3 MP camera, 2.2″ LCD display and FM radio. The phone has a 1000mAH battery offering a long talk time of upto 12 hours and 49 minutes, and standby time upto 588 hours, a 45 MB user memory which is expandable upto 8GB. The Samsung Chat 322 is priced at Rs 4,990, this price is the MRP so expect it to be less when you go to buy it.
Samsung Chat 335, on the other hand, is slightly advanced version of the 322, with a bigger 2.4″ LQVGA (320 x 240 pixel) TFT LCD display, WiFi, Bluetooth 2.1 and USB 2.
Other enhancements include multi-media features like a 3.5 mm audio jack, a 2 MP camera and Find Music feature that helps in identifying music playing from any source for the artist or song name.
Rest of the features remains the same as the Chat 322. The Samsung Chat is competitively priced at Rs 5,800.