When the first Samsung Omnia appeared on the UK mobile scene over a year ago, we called it one of the most powerful smartphones available – and it was at the time, but very quickly it was overtaken by smartphones from other manufacturers. We had high hopes that the Samsung Omnia II would have more staying power than its predecessor.

 

Style and handling for the Samsung Omnia II

The first Omnia was good looking enough, but its successor manages to upstage it completely. It’s large enough to accommodate that large screen but not at all bulky, and it fits well in your hand and pocket. The 3.7-inch AMOLED screen is set off by the jet-black finish, giving the handset a modern, minimalist look. Below the screen are the call and call end keys; between them, the cube-like menu key. The back key sits not on the front of the phone but on the right-hand side, next to the dedicated key for the five-megapixel camera. It certainly takes some getting used to.

Next to the back key is the lock button, which annoyingly is the only key you can press to take the phone out of standby mode.  More irritatingly, it’s not very responsive, and we found ourselves pressing it repeatedly to get it to work.

 

Touch-screen on the Samsung Omnia II

The Samsung Omnia II features a resistive touch-screen, but there’s no included stylus for tapping those intricate icons that Windows Mobile devices have. It’s fairly responsive when swiping it with your fingers, but there is a bit of a delay when you fire up an application.

It runs on Windows Mobile 6.5, but uses the Samsung TouchWiz user interface, with its familiar multiple home-screen pages and widget and shortcuts bar. The icons can be drag and dropped to customise each page, but only one page per icon. So Facebook, for example, can only go on one of your home screens. It’s all easy to pick up and use, as we’ve become used to from Samsung handsets.

You can view the menu in the traditional grid format or in a cube, which is fun but requires spinning the cube round 360º and offers less choice for accessing your apps.

 

Web browsing on the Samsung Omnia II

The Samsung Omnia II offers Wi-Fi connectivity and HSDPA internet speeds, and the Opera browser usually ensures smooth web browsing. But it was slow to react to scrolling around data-heavy sites, which was frustrating.

 

The verdict on the Samsung Omnia II

The Samsung Omnia II has a lot going for it: Windows Mobile, and the useful Microsoft Office applications for a start. It’s certainly full of high-end features, including a decent five-megapixel camera, accurate GPS mapping and access to the Windows Marketplace donsloads store. It’s not that we don’t like the Omnia, just that we expected a lot more

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