Samsung launches rotating camera phone
Published: 05 Jun 2003 08:07 BST
Samsung has launched what it claims to be the world's first mobile phone to feature a 180-degree swivelling camera lens.
Unlike most current camera phones, which sport fixed lenses, the lens of Samsung's SGH-V200 can rotate 180 degrees, the firm said in a statement.
However, while this feature may be new to users in South-East Asia and elsewhere, a few phones in Japan and Korea from various makers also feature cameras with lenses that can be pointed in various directions.
For example, Sony Ericsson recently announced the shipment of the A1301S, a handset featuring a 290-degree rotating camera lens, to Japanese mobile operators KDDI and Okinawa Cellular Telephone Company.
To boost the SGH-V200's camera function, the phone comes with a high-resolution screen capable of displaying up to 65,536-colours. It is also equipped with a 20-level digital zoom and a 10-level digital brightness control.
Besides the camera, the new gadget also breaks new ground in one of the few areas the company has been slow to catch up in -- MMS (Multimedia Messaging Service). The tri-band handset is one of Samsung's first few regional offerings to support MMS.
Sticking to the firm's traditional clamshell design, the SGH-V200 sports the usual features found in Samsung's recent product introductions. These include support for polyphonic ring tones and connectivity options such as infra-red, WAP (Wireless Access Protocol) and GPRS (General Packet Radio Service).
The product is available in Singapore from today at a price of $463 (about £280) with a two-year mobile subscription plan. A Samsung spokeswoman said the phone will also be launched in other parts of the world at varying timeframes.
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