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Look, Design, Feel (7/10)
Samsung Corby S3650 has a unique, eye catching design. It fits perfectly inside the palm of your hand with its small size (103mm x 56.5mm dimensions). Light weight (92 grams), somewhat oval, 12mm girth, and uncomplicated, the Corby is one fantastic plastic. The screen is smooth with very few hardware functions. The shape is perfect for a tight grip and its lack of edges allows it to slip smoothly into a side pocket.
The front side is filled with 2.8″ of screen. There is no hardware keypad nor QWERTY. At the bottom the Call key is on the left and the End Call on the right. The middle features the Back button. The mouthpiece is small and positioned at the bottom.
The top side of the Corby is slick bare. The bottom is the same except for a small slit indentation for opening the battery panel. The right side of the phone has the lock button for the touchscreen and the shutter button. The left side is where the volume controls are, and a cover strip for the headset/data cable plug-in port, and the charger port. On the top left side, there is a lanyard eyelet for strings or chains. The back side features the camera lens and loud speaker. A distinctive semi-circular design all over the back panel adds a subtle modern touch.
Features (8/10)
Corby has a 2 megapixel camera with smile detection, and fixed focus, but no autofocus or flash. Other features include video recording at 15fps, FM radio, 90MB storage, Quad-band GSM/EDGE, and a microSD card slot up to 8GB. Some Corby phones are WiFi ready (Corby S3650W) but come with no free storage, which must be purchased separately. Corby S3650W has no WiFi connection but does include storage. This compromise keeps the price relatively the same. Corby offers three home screens that can be filled with widgets and java apps located at the right side tray of the screen.
To access a widget, one must simply drag the icons and position them anywhere on the home screen. A cool feature will automatically align the widgets when the Corby is shaken. All manipulations are done by the thumb, as there are no other hardware keys for specific functions.
The phone book can store up to 2000 contacts. The Photo Contacts are designed as a fun way of retrieving the phone list. Stacks of photos can each be assigned a number, URL, email, and call / send message functions. Corby has a separate editor for emails, and a shared one for SMS and MMS. Office document attachments up to 5MB can be accommodated and viewed.. This comfort is brought upon by the built-in office document viewer which supports Excel, PowerPoint, PDF and Word files.
One of the highlights of the Corby is the inclusion of popular networking widgets, such as Facebook, MySpace, Friendster, Flickr, and Twitter. This allows checking messages in real-time, chatting or adding friends, poking a friend, tweeting, reading your friends’ posts, and adding a photo. It is enough to cover social networking needs, mobile style. Login details can also be saved for easy access.
A widget caters solely to the music player. This allows the user to sort out songs by author, genre, or album, and to have the option to stop, pause, play, fast forward, rewind, or shuffle tracks. The video player supports MP4 files.
Samsung concocted their own Delfin web browser, perfect for Samsung handsets. It supports Flash and Java sites, including YouTube videos. Usual phone features like clock, calculator, notes, alarm, and calendar are on board. Games are limited. Corby has a few trial installations like Pyramid, Diamond, Brain Challenge, Asphalt 4, Monopoly, and Crazy Penguin Catapult. The games vary depending on the manufacturer location.
Connectivity (7/10)
Corby boasts great call reception, crisp voice quality, and no call drops. Talk time record is up to approximately 3 hours or 200 minutes. Although Corby claims up to 2.4Mbs data speed, the internet connection which runs on EDGE or WiFi (Corby S3650W) proves only moderate, but suitable.
Performance (7/10)
The 2 megapixel camera has a maxed out 1600 x 1200 pixels image resolution. Depending on the light (natural or indoor), photos or videos taken can be unsatisfactory, like an obvious amateur shot, but good enough to upload directly to YouTube or Picasa. Accessing files from the memory card is swift. In less than 20 seconds, photos or files stored in the card, up to 16GB MicroSD, are recognized by the handset. The radio widget has a solid feel and has complete functions that can easily replace an mp3 player. The Corby loudspeaker functions well. Whether the unit is supported with EDGE or WiFi, surfing the net will run in moderate speed, but adequate nonetheless.
Value for Money (9/10)
A low priced touchscreen is always a gem. Opt for the WiFi enabled Corby (Corby S3650W) and buy separate storage to complete the package. It’s a sure powerhouse unit for uncomplicated users. Simple, small, fun, and easy to use, not to mention the 2 extra Fashion Jackets (casing) included in the box. Corby is definitely worth the price, and will surely put a smile on your face.
Pros
+ Cheap price compared to other touchscreen phones with similar features
+ Small, light, and it comes with 2 extra colourful casings
+ Efficiently reads and presents documents from Word, Excel, PDF files
+ Radio/music player is functional enough to replace an mp3 player
+ No fuss, simple, and curved handset
Cons
+ No smart dialing
+ No phone book integration from social networks
+ No hardware buttons for quick access to other functions
+ Low 2 megapixel camera
+ Acceptable, but not excellent, video performance
Kyles Humphreys writes about the latest mobile phones that are released on the market and gives comprehensive reviews, one of the favorites this month is the Samsung Corby
Actors, athletes and mass murderers – it takes all sorts to drive lorries. With brief details of their involvement in the trade and subsequent celebrity, here is a countdown of the top 10 stars who worked as lorry drivers before they were famous, with varying degrees of success.
# 10 Chris Tarrant:
This radio and television presenter, best known for hosting the TV game show ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?’, pursued a number of jobs before finding his feet in television. Tarrant’s former roles include long-distance lorry driver, security officer and schoolteacher.
# 9 Chris Eubank:
Chris Eubank is notable for being the only member of our list to have taken up lorry driving after he become famous. October 2003 saw a politically motivated Eubank descending on Whitehall in his personal HGV to protest against the war in Iraq. The former world middleweight champion boxer ended up being arrested for blocking the entrance gates to Downing Street, driving around Parliament Square sounding his horn, with a knife in his pocket, and reversing into a delivery van.
# 8 Rock Hudson:
Hudson was a popular American film and television actor and a romantic leading man in the 1950s and 1960s. During WW II, Hudson served as a Navy airplane mechanic and after the war he was a truck driver. His size and good looks got him into movies.
# 7 Chevy Chase:
Our number seven is an Emmy Award-winning American comedian, writer, and television and film actor. Before his breakthrough as a comedian, Chase worked as a truck driver, cab driver, motorcycle messenger, waiter, busboy, construction worker, audio engineer, produce manager in a supermarket, salesman in a wine store and theatre usher.
# 6 Long Distance Clara:
The only woman on our list and, unfortunately, fictional, juggernaut-driving Clara was the star of 80s children’s cartoon ‘Pigeon Street’. Some see Long Distance Clara as an unsung feminist icon – her marriage to chef Hugo demonstrated a refreshing reversal of gender stereotypes.
# 5 Charles Bronson:
Charles Bronson was an American actor of ‘tough guy’ roles who made his name starring in a number of major Hollywood flicks including ‘The Great Escape’ and ‘The Dirty Dozen’. Before becoming famous, Bronson was drafted into the army and was assigned to the Air Corps in 1943. He started as a truck driver and then trained as a pilot, winning awards for good service.
# 4 Richard Pryor:
Pryor was the first African American stand-up comedian to speak candidly to mixed audiences using the language and jokes of the black community. He worked in numerous jobs before finding fame, including truck driving and meatpacking.
# 3 Liam Neeson:
Liam Neeson is a movie star most well known for his role as Oskar Schindler in the 1993 blockbuster ‘Schindler’s List’. Irish-born Neeson once worked as a truck driver as well as a forklift operator for Guinness, an assistant architect and an amateur boxer.
# 2 Sean Connery:
This retired Scottish actor is best known for starring as James Bond in seven Bond films. Heart-throb Connery joined the Royal Navy after leaving school but was discharged on medical grounds. He went on to a succession of jobs, including lorry driver, labourer and lifeguard.
# 1 Elvis Presley:
The American singer, musician, actor and cultural icon took up truck driving as one of his jobs after graduation. The future ‘King’ drove a truck for the aptly named ‘Crown Electric Company’. Presley even took up wearing his hair longer with a ‘ducktail’ – the style of truck drivers at the time. A musician for whom a young Elvis Presley auditioned advised him to ‘Stick to driving a truck, because you’ll never make it as a singer’.
The Mass Murderer – Peter Sutcliffe:
Quite possibly the most evil and deranged presence in the history of lorry driving, the ‘Yorkshire Ripper’ is far too nasty to make it into our top 10. Between 1975 and 1984, this lorry driver and former gravedigger killed 13 women in a five-year reign of terror before being sentenced to a minimum of 30 years in jail. On his arrest, Sutcliffe claimed that God had told him to go out and kill prostitutes. A sad blemish on the good name of lorry driving.
Celebrities who were lorry drivers before they were famous – a heady mixture of the talented, the eccentric, the unpleasant and the downright brilliant. Who knows what magical creatures are sitting behind the wheels of our country’s lorries today?
Luke Humble is the Website manager for The Transport Exchange Group. Their two exchanges, Courier Exchange and Haulage Exchange, provide more backloads for their members and are two of the UK’s largest and fastest growing independent freight exchanges. The exchanges are neutral, actively managed and with strict quality control to ensure smooth running.
What's happening in Oroville Eighth annual Perry Mason Days Erle Stanley Gardner, author of the Perry Mason mystery books, once attended Oroville High School, was an avid bow hunter and is in the Bowhunters Hall of Fame.
