14 DAY TRIAL // Samsung is about to release the next generation music phones, the new BEATb (M3410) in September followed by BEATs (M3200) in October. These handsets were especially designed for those who love listening to music all day long, anytime and anywhere, thus they have some specific characteristics.
Both models are equipped with "motion play" which basically allows you to control the music playing by simply moving your phone. If you shake it, it will jump to the next song, if you flip it, you mute the volume and if you tap it, you either play or pause the music. I can already picture crowds of people doing the new shake-tap-flip dance, can't you? The 'shake control' function has been included before by Sony Ericsson into its Walkman series handsets, so it shouldn't be something innovative.
Another interesting feature is DNS, which is short for Digital Natural Sound engine, one of Samsung's own audio technologies. What it actually does is provide natural sound effects, so that you don't feel that you’re listening to music in your headphones but rather that you're surrounded by it since it reproduces 3D sounds and also deep bass resonance. The music features don't stop here though. Both phones come with Auto EQ function, which turns on the equalizer automatically to fit the best setting according to the genre you’re listening to. Let's hope it can be turned off though, because some songs sound better without EQ control on. You also have Shazam's "find music" service so you can easily find any song and download it into your phone.
Let's talk about the differences between the B and the S models. Samsung BEATb is a bar type slim phone (only 9.9 mm) and of course has DNS technology, Auto EQ, and Motion Play. It has a 2 inch LCD screen, a 2 megapixel camera and camcorder, Bluetooth 2.0, built-in handsfree, 3.5mm jack input, FM radio with RDS and recording capabilities, MP3, AAC and WMA player, MPEG4/3GP player and it comes with a 1GB microSD memory card.
Samsung BEATs is a slider, a bit thicker than the BEATb model (16.9 mm), and it also comes with DNS technology, Auto EQ, and Motion Play. It is equipped with an amplifier (B&O ICEpower), a stereo speaker, the same 2 inch LCD screen and a 2 megapixel camera and camcorder, as well as all the other BEATb functions and specs. The phone can hold up to 8GB microSD cards, but doesn't come with any available like its 'b' brother. Another difference is the battery life: 400 hours in standby mode and 7 hours in talk-time mode for BEATs, and 250 in standby mode and 5 hours in talk-time mode for BEATb.
Unfortunately, Samsung hasn't disclosed any information regarding the prices of the handsets yet.
