Test report and technical data Siemens S40
The futuristic Siemens S40 invades the mobile phone market with quite a convincing performance and quality!
Good: progressive design, Triple Band, nice technology and ease of use
Bad: price, no games
When I first saw the Siemens S40 I immediately knew it would once be all mine! I was right, after having saved enough money I went out and just got it, as simple as that! Not only am I the proud owner of this masterpiece, but also a very satisfied owner of the Siemens S40.
The most attractive thing about the Siemens S40 is its extremely chic and trendy design. I have to admit that I am a person that is easily influenced by nice looks, no wonder I totally fell for the Siemens S40. You should've seen all those envious looks when I showed up at my friend's place with the Siemens S40, even the person you would least expect to be envious gave me nasty looks!
Luckily the Siemens S40 has an already integrated antenna and the surface of the Siemens S40 is covered entirely in silver colour. Arranging the keys of the Siemens S40 in a longish drop-like way combined with the bluish glimmering screen make the Siemens S40 not only stylish, but even spacey. Seeing the Siemens S40 for the first time justifies thinking about some kind of alien origin of the Siemens S40.
The screen of the Siemens S40 has a very high resolution, over and above that a size of seven lines. The entire dimensions of the Siemens S40 are 11,2x4,4x2,2 cm, when merely weighing 97 g, very progressive!
Concluding from its dimensions, the Siemens S40 is very handy, hereby fulfilling even the last claim to a modern mobile phone. Before continuing, some more on the keypad of the Siemens S40. The keys of the Siemens S40 are arranged in a slightly swinging way, allowing the Siemens S40 to look quite dynamic. The quality of those keys meets average demands, they are not placed too close to another, making a precise activation of every key possible.
That was all I have to say to the design of the Siemens S40, ok, I could go on and on but I doubt that anybody would really appreciate that since simply taking a glance at the pic above shall tell you everything about the looks of the Siemens S40. What can not be immediately seen, however, is the ease of use of the Siemens S40. Despite of evoking a very progressive, high-tech impression due to its design, the Siemens S40 is of sensational ease of use. Surprising, huh?
The structure of the menu is logically outlined, over and above that easy to overview. Who does not want to read the user manual surely does not need to do so, one should definitely be able to do without that. Seriously, at absolutely no point was I neither confused nor uncertain about what has to be done. Assumptions about a complex design having to have a complex operation are definitely not warrantable.
Now something on the technology of the Siemens S40. It's certainly nice if a mobile phone has good looks, howsoever even I can say that some nice features and a good performance make a mobile with nice design twice as enjoyable. Well, the Siemens S40 does not only look super-duper modern, but its features and technology live up to that as well. Fulfiling almost any standard and combining this with state-of-the-art features make the Siemens S40 a true all-arounder.
The Siemens S40 has an enormous battery performance with a stand-by time of of 260 hours of an according talk time of six hours. Charging the vibratory alert of the Triple Band Siemens S40 won't even take two hours. Since the Siemens S40 is a Tri Band mobile it can be used all over the world!
Now, please remain calm, the telephone book of the Siemens S40 hold up to 1000 (!) entries. Nope, I didn't mistype anything, I am talking about a 'thousand' entries here! You really, really need to be popluar with many, many people in order to fill that telephone book! But that's not all, you can't only save name and number in the address book of the Siemens S40, but even extensive addresses and notes such as home address, e-mail address, url, birthday blablabla... In order to administer those entries you can of course sum them up in groups.
The messaging function of the Siemens S40 is handled slightly different than what we are used to. Therefore only ten messages can be saved in the inbox of the Siemens S40, yet there is the possibility of moving every single message to an archive, that can hold several hundred messages. For message editing the Siemens S40 is not only equipped with the common T9 software, but with two more softwares. But I have to admit that the other two softwares are not really feaseable, nothing topps the T9 text input software!
Further the Siemens S40 features a 'Multi Media Messaging' function, thus ringer tones and pictures can be sent with the Siemens S40. Speaking of ringer tones, the Siemens S40 has 42 installed ringer tones, however these can be extended by either adding self-composed melodies or by downloading melodies from the net.
For some pitiable, the Siemens S40 does not feature further gadgetries, thus no preinstalled games. They can be downloaded from the net though and later saved on the Siemens S40. As assumed, the Siemens S40 has an internet function, even a very good one. The tranfer rate of the Siemens S40 lies somewhere around 14,4 kbit/s, but horrendous prices still prevent from making extensive use of this feature.
Who wants to use the Siemens S40 as a Palm can try to do so, since the Siemens S40 has a quiet subtle built-in organizer. Not only e-mails can be sent/received with this organizer, but also many common organizer functions are included, guess I don't have to enlist those. An easy data transfer is also possible via infrared with the Siemens S40.
Those of you, who are still neither impressed nor convinced of the Siemens S40 can not be helped anymore. Only MP-3 Player and DigiCam can still be demanded!
The major duty of a mobile phone is making phone calls, that is of course very well possible with the Siemens S40. The reception with the Siemens 40 is brilliant, same with the sound quality, the connection is even clearer than my phone at home.
When the Siemens S40 was newly launched, there were rumours about a bad software, howsoever this software has been revised so as nobody has to worry anymore. My software is of a perfect quality, proof enough?
Not only can I enthuse myself so very much for the design of the Siemens S40, but as well for its functionality and incredible technical performance. The Siemens S40 is a perfect device with an absolute above-average memory capacity. With all my dearest respect, I couldn't be thinking about anything negative that could be said about the Siemens S40, except maybe its price. I can't be bothered by the missing games...
Speaking quite frank, I am willing to pay some more money for this kind of phone, it's definitely worth it!
Test-review:
Technical features: +++
Reception quality: ++++
Ease of use: +++
Battery stand-by time: ++++
Design: ++++
Instruction manual: +++
Value for money: +++
Overall rating: +++
++++/excellent, +++/good, ++/satisfactory, +/poor
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