This phone is one of the minority of not being made in China. It is made in Korea and the build standard is excellent, feels like a jewel-like high quality device. If not dragging a separate camera around is the priority for you, then this phone performs great as both a camera and a touch phone.

The phone software is basically your Samsung Jet but with a much better camera attached. So, on the downside the same is applicable as per other Samsung touch phones running their own TouchWiz 2 OS: there is a lack of applications and while the screen is great for viewing images or video, it requires a harder push compared to the capasitive screens of likes of iPhone. (Posted on 22/12/09)

Specifications at a glance
• 2 and 3 G compatible
• 3.1 inches resistive AMOLED touch screen (Satio is 3.5 inches)
• 120 g (Satio is 126g)
• 12 MP camera, 4000x3000 pixels, wide 28mm lens, autofocus, xenon flash, LED flash
• OS: TouchWiz v2.0 UI - CPU: Qualcomm MSM6246, 800Mhz processor (Same as Jet, but not described in manual)
• Wi-Fi (Previous pixon8 did not have one).
• Battery life ~ 2 ½ days
• Full charge ~ 30 min
• GPS with Google Maps
• No headphone plugs!

Physical Aspect
The pixon12 is a great two-face gadget. On one side, the pixon12 is a slim and light digital camera and in the other side it is a modern looking touch screen mobile phone.

As a camera, the size is perfect, portable and easy to hold if you are shooting in both automatic and manual functions. It has separate buttons for camera-on and shutter, and a cool retractable 28mm lens. It also has a thin plastic grip in the aluminum cover to hold the camera. The down side, for the camera fanatics, is that it misses a screw-in fitting to mount this unit into a tripod, for macro, night or timer shots. Or a wrist strap fitting…

As a phone, the pixon12 has a large screen to view TXT, emails or other media. It also has sleek buttons for the On, Menu, Receive and End calls functions. This unit has also a secondary camera (video calls) and a microphone/speaker. The size and weight of the pixon12 are comfy enough to fit this unit in your pockets or hand bangs, without having to wear belts or leave behind your favourite lipstick.

This two-face gadget has a release button for the back cover, which allows easy access to battery and SIM. There is a card slut for the external memory and USB port, but not headphone socket. This is perhaps a trade between sound and good lenses.

The pixon12 looks like what it is; a camera with a phone.


Good points
• Obviously the 12 MP digital camera with a good lens and funky camera settings: panorama shots, tracking touch autofocus, geo-tagging, ISO control, image stabilization and many others; and the photo editing tools, such as colour, brightness and backgrounds
• The xenon flash, which means you can take indoor photographs without everyone having to stand about a meter away
• Higher resolution display, great colors, sharp and crisp
• The video editor (sound and image) with basic sound dobbing options, so you can finally use your voice recorder in something else than your answering machine message
• The Pixon12 OS, 3 panels/desktops with a dock that looks like the pretty Mac interface and it is all customisable!
• Fast processing power, to navigate between large media applications or large photos files
• It supports Java, so you can download heaps of games.
• Resistive touch screen allows good control over camera and video settings.
• No need of a stylus!
• Cool case.
• Decent speakers to play music and videos
• Wi-Fi
• Great dynamic canvas and communities application
• Great toy to become the next youtube and facebook super star!

Bad points
• When SIM is entered in the handset you have to input setting for MMS and GPRS settings (and pretty much everything).
• The pixon12 is not really user friendly, you have to scroll among menus to find things, and unless you have some idea how to use a computer, you might get lost in this phone.
• The camera sound is permanent, so no silent nature shots, this camera is for loud venues.
• No HD video option and sound recording is poor in video mode.
• As an instinct to protect the lens in your unit, you’ll have to flip your phone to check updates. (Good for selling accessories)
• No 3.5mm headphone socket
• With the resistive screen you have to press hard!!

Conclusion
Samsung knows a thing or two about providing decent photography, and the Pixon12 is not the exception, and it may look any other recent touch screen Samsung phones from the front, but a look on the side and rear shows this to be far from the case. From dedicated camera controls, to the fantastic 12-megapixel sensor and Xenon flash, the Pixon12 promises high quality results - along with widescreen video capture (but sadly not HD).

The Pixon12 also gets Wi-Fi and a much crisper OLED display. So I’d be putting the Pixon12 high up on the shopping list of any wannabe photographers/graphic designers/creative minds and tourists that have no desire to carry around a separate camera. (Posted on 23/11/09)