Hands-on with Samsung's BlackJack II

Announced this morning at the fall CTIA wireless conference in San Francisco, this update to the popular BlackJack smartphone adds a bigger screen, GPS, and the latest version of Microsoft's mobile OS. I just got a quick hands-on look here on the show floor; read on for my first impressions.

Set to arrive later this year on AT&T, the BlackJack II boasts glossier navigation keys than its predecessor, although it's slightly thicker to accommodate a higher-capacity, 1,700mAh battery (no word on exactly how much battery life we should expect from the II, however). Replacing the standard four-way navigational control is a jog wheel; it makes for faster scrolling around the BlackJack II's menus, although I often had to click rather than spin when trying to navigate horizontally, which was a bit annoying. Meanwhile, the keys on the QWERTY keypad were packed in a little too tightly for my taste; that said, the numeric dialing keys are now all grouped together, rather than arranged in an awkward "W" shape as they were on the original BlackJack.

The BlackJack II now runs on Windows Mobile 6, allowing for Office document editing, HTML e-mail support, and tighter integration with Exchange servers; the phone will also boast Microsoft's new System Center Mobile Device Manager for corporate device management and security. Good stuff, but like other slim smartphones I've tried running on Windows Mobile 6, the BlackJack II on the show floor suffered from sluggish performance; menu screens often took a few seconds to redraw, and I found myself staring at the spinning beach ball of "wait" more than once.

Still, the specs on the BlackJack II look pretty impressive: support for AT&T's speedy HSDPA network, built-in GPS (nice), a 2.4-inch QVGA display (slightly larger than on the original BlackJack), stereo Bluetooth, streaming video, an RSS reader, and a two-megapixel camera. The phone also boasts AT&T's new Video Share service for one-way video conferencing.

Look for the BlackJack II to arrive before the end of 2007; pricing is set at a reasonable $150 with a two-year contract.

Update: A Samsung rep informed me that the BlackJack II handsets on the show floor aren't final versions; hopefully, the sluggish performance I saw will be ironed out once the phone finally ships.

Related:
Press release [AT&T]