If you follow the handset market at all, you will have heard that T-Mobile recently unveiled its flagship device, the HTC/Google G1, to coincide with the official roll-out of the network’s 3G high-speed data network. What you might have missed is that the G1 isn’t T-Mobile’s only touch-screen phone now, and the Behold has been quietly gathering a following outside of the G1’s limelight.

Samsung has a touchscreen handset on just about every carrier now, and each handset, aside from slight design differences, boasts the new TouchWIZ touchscreen graphical user interface. Simple to use and complimented with haptic feedback, the interface is quite responsive. It isn’t quite as quick on the pickup as the iPhone, but the discrepancy is so minimal that you won’t be disappointed.

The Behold has a 5-megapixel Kodak camera, and it is impressive. Easy to use, the camera boasts an internal stabilizer and a brilliant flash, both necessities in what I would consider to be one of the first legitimate camera-phone creations. I’ve always disdained phones that claim the camera-phone title but don’t deliver adequate pictures. This phone is the real deal. The photo-editing suite is excellent and can drastically improve your photos by simply performing an auto-adjust of levels.

The Behold has 3G data connectivity, and it truly is high-speed. In fact, after using the data on a friend’s iPhone 3G, I’m convinced that the T-Mobile 3G network is speedier than that of AT&T. The browser is far from “true” web browsing, but the speed certainly makes up for a quirky browser in a lot of ways. As one who once used a Blackberry, I would take the browser of the Behold any day.

What I find to be the best advantage the Behold has over the iPhone or other competitors is that it offers text entry in both standard and qwerty layouts. Being able to use T9 text entry in standard mode while driving (yes, I know it isn’t ideal) beats out a real qwerty keyboard or the cramped qwerty keyboard of the iPhone, and having the option of a full keyboard for those long words that aren’t included in the T9 dictionary compliments the standard mode nicely.

The battery life is pretty good. If I had to estimate daily usage, if you are a power texter like me, you can get a full day’s use out of the phone for mixed texting and calls and still have a couple bars of battery power left. I certainly wouldn’t try to go a full two days, though.

One very irritating thing I’ve noticed is that when I try to save photos to the MicroSD expansion card, the phone insists on restarting itself…each and every time. I’ll have to figure out exactly what that is about. I’ve also encountered issues with answering the phone, such as the phone will freeze, continue to ring, but not let you do anything until you pull out the battery. Hopefully that’s an update soon-to-come.

On the whole, I’d have to agree for the most part with big reviews of this little handset. If you aren’t willing to spring for the G1, the Behold is a nice mid to upper-range touchscreen handset with an impressive camera. It isn’t amazing in every way, but gets the job done in a simple, attractive, and easy to understand manner. $150 bucks ain’t too bad of a price, either.

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Entry was posted on Monday, November 24th, 2008 at 3:58 am under Cell phones, Opinion.

Read more entries by Triston McIntyre.
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