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Small office / Home office
Samsung Smartphone a remedy for multitaskers

By Deborah Porterfield
Gannett News Service

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This model looks and works more like a cellphone than an unwieldy PDA. Its compact silver body weighs 5 ounces. The flip-style body has a small liquid crystal display (LCD) screen on the outside and a larger color screen on the inside. It also has a backlit keypad, an easy-to-use navigation control pad and shortcut keys to the phone's home page and address book.

The SCH-i600 costs $500 with a two-year contract from Verizon Wireless, or $550 with a one-year contract. That's a decent price for a combination device with a 200-megahertz processor, 32 megabytes of RAM, a slot for a Secure Digital memory card and Microsoft applications, such as Pocket Outlook and Pocket Internet Explorer.

The phone ships with a hands-free headset, a combination desktop charger and synchronization cradle for the PC and a leather case. Microsoft Outlook 2000 and Microsoft ActiveSync 3.6 software for the PC are included.

During several months of testing, the dual-band code division multiple access (CDMA) provided reliable phone service but didn't do as well recognizing voice commands and accessing preset Web favorites.

The phone's keypad was fine for dialing but wasn't the best choice for typing.

The home menu is easy to navigate. The menu displays to-do tasks and upcoming appointments at a glance and shows the number of voice, text and e-mail messages you've received.

Once you decide what to tackle first, you can use the menu and keypad to quickly jump from one task to the next.

If the tasks start to overwhelm, you can always click on a game and play solitaire instead.

PrimeFilm 3650u Pacific Image Electronics, 310-618-8100, www.scanace.com, $360

Photo enthusiasts are always looking for the best way to digitize film without spending big bucks. The PrimeFilm 3650u produces wonderful results for those who don't have an expensive slide/negative scanner at their disposal.
 
I like some of the scans I've gotten from flatbeds that can perform the same service on slides, but almost nothing in the price range compares with a dedicated slide/negative scanner.

The PrimeFilm 3650u, which is about 11 inches long and weighs a little more than 2 pounds, fits right in on my computer workstation desktop. It connects to Macs and PCs using Universal Serial Bus 2.0 connections.

A professional version also connects through FireWire interfaces.

Images were crisp and colorful.

I was really pleased with the software bundle, which includes Adobe PhotoShop Elements 2.0 and Digital ICE3, the secret weapon for scanning old slides and negatives, cleaning and correction technology developed by Kodak.

You can manage the grain in your images, reconstruct color and remove dust and scratches — a real headache to do in PhotoShop to get good results.

— Kevin Washington, The Baltimore Sun