Is it a phone, trying to be a camera? ..... or a camera, trying to be a phone? Actually it does a great job at both. These are some photos taken with the new Verizon Samsung a990 wireless telephone. The phone has a 3.2 megapixel camera and is the best phone camera I have ever owned. Noise levels, even at ISO 800, are unbelievably low. I have made many 8 x 10" prints that are amazing. When I show them to friends, they don't believe the photos were made by a phone!

The colors are gorgeous and even pastels are vibrant. The auto white balance is better than most of the consumer-level digital cameras I have owned. The phone accepts mini-SD memory cards up to 2GB. The mini cards may be read by a standard card reader, using an SD card adaptor. You can also print directly to most newer printers. The phone/camera also comes with a sound/video cord to show your photos or videos directly from the camera to a television.

The photos here were mildly enhanced in PhotoShop Elements (unsharp mask and enhancing shadow detail), but no noise reduction was applied.

The inside phone display swivels and becomes a viewfinder for the camera. Many camera settings can be changed, including flash, white balance, ISO, macro, metering (spot, center and averaging), etc. In addition, with the optional memory card, you can take up to a full hour of video. It will not replace your regular digital camera, but now you can have a real camera with you all the time!

Oh, and it is also a supurb telephone and an MP3 music/video player, internet capable and GPS turn-by-turn directions capable! The sound quality is outstanding and the phone does an excellent job of minimizing or eliminating background noise.

I paired the phone/camera with a Samsung WEP200 Bluetooth Headset. It also provides outstanding sound and is VERY small (only 1.1" x 1.4" x .8", about 1/4 the size of most of the currently available Bluetooth headsets) and weighs less than 2 ounces.

One minor glitch I have noticed is that the EXIF data is incorrect. It always indicates that flash was used, even if it was not, and the only shutter speed ever shown is 1/125 sec. With the outstanding photo quality offered by this unit, that's not even worth complaining about! It would also be nice to have a tripod mount, but I'm not sure where they could put it, given the size of the unit.

UPDATE: Some folks in another forum wanted to see some full-size file images. I have posted full-size files of 5 images, located near the bottom of this gallery. Following those 5 images, are 3 straight-out-of-the-camera, unmodified files. Be sure to enlarge the images by clicking on "original", below the EXIF data box.