Thin is clearly in at Samsung. The company's new BlackJack i607 from Cingular is the spitting image of Verizon's Motorola Q, also black, and one of the thinnest phones you can buy. Though the two PDA phones look alike, the BlackJack features a lighter, narrower design and more-robust multimedia capabilities (such as streaming music and video).
Samsung Samsung BlackJack i607 PDA Phone

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- Spec Navigator
- Processor
- Display
- Operating System
- Camera
- Form Factor
- Battery
- Storage
- Dimensions
- Carrier
- Cellular Frequency Technology
- Features
- Audio
- Connectivity
- Included Hardware
- Included Software
- Media
- Messaging
- Sync
- User Interface
- Video
Display
| Diagonal Display Size | 2.2 inches |
| Display Resolution | 320 x 240 inches |
| Display Type | Color |
| Number of Displays | One |
Cellular Frequency Technology
| Cellular Technology (Voice + Data) |
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Included Hardware
| Included Hardware |
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- Lab Tested
- How We Test Phones »
Pros
Light and compact design
Includes an extra battery
Cons
Lacks Wi-Fi support
Bottom Line
This lightweight phone features a slick design and excels at streaming via Cingular's high-speed 3G network.
Samsung BlackJack i607
Samsung BlackJack i607 PDA Phone Review, by Grace Aquino February 2, 2007
The BlackJack is 4.4 inches tall, 2.3 inches wide, and 0.5 inches thick (the Q measures 4.6 by 2.6 by 0.45 inches). It's also incredibly light at 3.5 ounces, compared with the Q's 4.1-ounce weight. While I like the BlackJack's compact size, thumb-typing on its QWERTY keyboard feels cramped. (The Q's keyboard has blank space at the bottom where I can rest my thumbs, making typing easier.) The BlackJack's tactile keys are a pleasure to use, though.
The thumbwheel on the right side moves swiftly and makes navigation manageable; pressing and holding it brings up the Quick Launcher window, which lets you jump to your calendar, to music, or to a Web page. (You can change which apps appear in the window.)
Among the BlackJack's major selling points are multimedia features that other PDA phones in this class lack. Through Cingular Music, it will stream 25 channels of XM satellite radio (for $9 a month), and it supports subscription music services such as eMusic, Napster, and Yahoo. It will also stream video content from CNN, HBO, and others (fees vary). One disappointment, though: Cingular doesn't offer an over-the-air music download service. You can transfer songs from your PC and then store them in the BlackJack's meager 64MB of RAM, but you're better off buying a microSD card for music, video, photo, and other file storage.
This model also offers stellar messaging capabilities. Running the Windows Mobile 5 Smartphone Edition OS, the handset includes Internet Explorer, syncs Outlook e-mail, and supports push-based e-mail delivery via Microsoft Direct Push, Good Mobile Messaging, or Cingular XpressMail. You can also sync POP3, IMAP, and SMTP e-mail clients. You can stay in touch through instant messaging (AIM, MSN, and Yahoo) as well. Though you don't get a mobile version of Microsoft Office with the operating system, you can view Word documents, PDFs, Excel sheets, and PowerPoint presentations through the included Picsel Viewer program. And like many PDA phones, the BlackJack includes a calendar, a notepad, voice notes, and a metric and currency converter. In my experience, though, opening and closing some apps, backtracking to a previous Web page, and using the 1.3-megapixel camera were sluggish operations, the phone typically requiring 1 to 2 seconds to process the commands.
In my trials, call quality generally sounded fine on both ends. The speakerphone worked okay, too. On my end the phone's speakers produced fairly crisp audio, but a few of my callers had a hard time hearing me and said they noticed an echo. Talking around noisy or windy environments isn't advisable, either, as the phone picks up a lot of background sounds.
Its battery life in our lab test was good: It lasted 6 hours, 21 minutes--more than 40 minutes longer than the Motorola Q, but far short of front-runners like Cingular's 8125, T-Mobile's Dash, and RIM's BlackBerry 8700g. The package comes with a spare battery and an external charger. You can also charge the battery while the phone is plugged into a PC via the included USB cable.
A minor quibble: In all applications except streaming-video mode, you have to use the thumbwheel instead of the volume control on the left side to adjust volume. (What finally tipped me off was a little speaker icon on the screen with a percentage number next to it--100 percent means it's at the maximum level.) Dialing a number on the BlackJack was a little challenging. The numbers are inconveniently placed between nonnumeric keys, so I often pressed a letter by mistake when I should have pressed the adjacent number. I later discovered that when I pressed the letter to the right of a number, it entered that number. For example, pressing the letter R (which is located to the right of the number 1) enters the number 1.
Signal strength and data performance varied quite a bit in my test area of San Francisco and a few surrounding suburbs. Within range of Cingular's HSDPA 3G network, streaming video from HBO, for example, was smooth. On the EDGE network, though, the graphics often looked blocky, like a David Hockney photograph. Web pages usually loaded within 15 to 20 seconds, though they sometimes took longer. Cingular's HSDPA network is available in many cities where the carrier does business; in these spots, having Wi-Fi would have been nice, but alas, the BlackJack doesn't provide it.
At $300 (with a two-year contract from Cingular), the BlackJack costs $100 more than the Motorola Q. For that extra amount, you get streaming-media capability, a second battery, and a very light and compact design. The lack of Wi-Fi may be a deal breaker for some users, but if you're in the market for a PDA phone, the BlackJack is a winning hand.
Grace Aquino
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- Rating Breakdown
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71
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81
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83
- See Complete Lab Results »
Performance Comparison with Similar Phones
71
100
84
57
Performance
| Battery Life Average (hh:mm) | 6:21 |
| Battery Life Word Score | Good |
Average User Reviews for Samsung Samsung BlackJack i607 PDA Phone
- Latest User Reviews 1 review
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Reviewed by: jayphil
Duration of ownership: 2 Months
Strengths: Nice size display, good color. Good response to e-mail, internet requests. Light weight, comfortable to hold and use. Key board small, but easy to use. Has expansion card port.
Weaknesses: No clear cut directions on how to save to storage card, uses lots of juice, hence the two batteries (I got two standard batteries with mine).
Overall: I love the phone, and am glad to have it. Just wish it was easier to use the storage card. I can load it from my computer, but saving to it while using the phone is unknown to me as of yet!! Although it uses alot of power, the charger that doubles as a caring case for the spare battery is GREAT!! I would recommend it to anyone wanting more, for less.
Review Now! Already own it? Tell us What You Think
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Reviewed by: johndoe11111
Strengths: easy to use
Weaknesses: to fragile
Overall: had to raplace this phone twice. it is very fragile. if you just drop it from two feet it will work but all you will see is a white screen. att told me i could have insurance on the phone, but when i called the insurance company they said they don't usually insure these phone but they would honor me one time. since the first problem , the phone has a white screen again and i cannot get a replacement. don't buy this phone and just get a blackberry or a palm if you want a smartphone.
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Reviewed by: dravimd
Strengths: slim, two batteries, 3g speeds, windows platform
Weaknesses: you need two batteries, lolz; no pre-loaded office software
Overall: I love this phone. I used to have the HTC 8125 and it felt like a VCR. I got this one, and it feld like a DVD player, lolz.Very reliable. Great phone use. The keyboard is right there for you to type. Slim, is a A+++++.
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Reviewed by: AngelicBeing
Strengths: Small, thin, and light with impressive multimedia functions for a cellular/PDA phone.
Weaknesses: No 3.5mm headphone jack to play your audio files.
Overall: The Samsung BlackJack SGH i607 phone is an impressive PDA/mobile phone; it being the latest mobile phone that Samsung has to offer with Cingular being the first cellular carrier to offer this exclusively. What is promising in the horizon is the Apple iPhone that will be available sometime in June -- a formidable player to contend with the Samsung BlackJack SGH i607. The BlackJack comes with two batteries (a standard and an extended battery). The extended battery can last you for nearly 2 weeks (probably more depending on usage) without needing recharging on average when using nearly most of the multimedia features: mp3, camera, Bluetooth, etc. The QWERTY keyboard is easily intuitive. The two batteries as mentioned earlier are standard and extended batteries. For those who would prefer the slimmer and lighter aesthetic look and feel may be comfortable with the standard battery and the standard battery cover. Removing the battery cover of the BlackJack was very difficult to remove. I had to use significant force to slide the battery cover almost causing my thumb to become sore!!! Samsung should look into this matter carefully. I bought two BlackJacks and both exhibit similar problems and difficulties removing the battery cover. The BlackJack comes with the basic travel adapter, battery charger, and a data cable. It would not be a bad idea for a $500.00 cellular phone for Samsung to throw in a car charger for free. You would think that a high-priced phone would include a car charger. One of the main drawbacks to the BlackJack is Samsung decision not to include a 3.5mm standard jack. The consumer is forced to utilize headsets with Bluetooth enabled capability if you want to listen to your mp3s in private. On average, the cost of a Bluetooth enabled headset will run you about $70.00 with better sounding headsets costing about $125.00 and more. As to why Samsung decided that a 3.5mm jack was not needed that would allow customers the choice of selecting hundreds of headphones is beyond my comprehension. There is a 25-pin USB/data cable/headset/power jack located on the left side of the BlackJack. Currently, there is no 25-pin conversion to a 3.5mm jack for the BlackJack. The display on the BlackJack only provides a 2.2 inch TFT active matrix, 16-bit viewing with only 240x320 maximum resolution. Taking pictures with its 1.3 megapixel built-in camera is very decent and sharp for its limitation. I was impress with the color depth of the camera. With the expansion slot for a MicroSD, you can increase you memory capacity to 1 GB or more to save your mp3s, WMAs, or videos for playback. The second problem I have with the BlackJack (at least with my model) is that I had to return the BlackJack for replacement due to synchronization problems. After spending nearly an hour on the phone with a technician from Samsung, and after engaging in several diagnostic procedures, it was determined that the 25-pin USB port was defective. To further determine that is was indeed defective, I grabbed the other BlackJack and it synched perfectly with Windows Vista and Windows XP, so it was obvious that the internal 25-pin USB was defective. The company from which I received the two BlackJacks was pro-customer and they did not waste any time giving me a RMA. Unfortunately, it cost me $23.00 to ship the BlackJack back (via USPS Express Mail and insured). In a few days (48 hrs.) I should be expecting my replacement to arrive shortly. I will subsequently update this review. I have read reviews that the sound quality is not that great regarding saving audio files and playback. As an audio/video-phile, I understand there could be many factors affecting the quality of your saved audio files (audio compression sampling rate, quality of your headphones, and the quality of the original audio source). I currently subscribe to online music offering 192k using WMAs. Knowing that 192k is far better than 128k, I personally prefer WMAs @ 256k which gives you far better close-to CD quality. For now (grudgingly) I have to settle with 192k compression. I will provide update information as to the quality of audio files playback ability of the BlackJack until my replacement arrives. Functionality-wise, I find the keypad a bit too narrow and small, but I anticipate this will take some time getting use to. I like the 4-way navigational key and the side thumbwheel. Reception is an improvement over the RAZR, but it is not perfect. I noticed there are some dropped signals while talking and some cutting in and out. In all, the BlackJack is a good contender in the cellular/PDA market. No technology is perfect, but the BlackJack has its major weaknesses and major strengths. Despite some of its problems, I will rate it, respectively a 7.5 out of 10
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