Tough as nails: Ten years of rugged Samsung Phones

As smartphones have progressed they seem to have become more and more fragile, with the highly advanced iPhone X being dubbed "the most breakable phone ever". But not everyone wants a device that will break every time it is dropped, and for ten years Samsung have been catering to that market.
Although they're not the only maker of rugged smartphones, Samsung have been in that business longer than most with a variety of devices that you can actually use, starting with the Samsung M110 ten years ago.

Samsung M110 (January 2008)

People were still happy with 2G feature phones back in 2008, and the Samsung M110 (also known as the Samsung Solid) was just that. A 128 x 128 pixel 1.5" display with a VGA resolution camera with a flash that doubled as a torch, an FM radio and Bluetooth, the M110 had just enough technical features to be useful. And as with most phones of that generation, you could talk for hours on it and the battery would last for days.

However, the IP54 rated toughened body meant that it was splash-proof and resistant to being dropped, and the chunky black or olive green casing was rather nice to look at. Weighing just 90 grams, it was a lot lighter than the rival Sonim XP1.

The M110 was successful enough for Samsung to follow it up with several other products, evolving over time. Five years and several handsets later, this led to the..

Samsung Xcover 2 (January 2013)

The Xcover 2 was Samsung's second toughened Android smartphone, and the thick rubber casing shares many features with the M110 from almost exactly half a decade earlier. Rated IP67, the Xcover 2 was fully waterproof and dust-proof but this time the 4" WVGA display and 5 megapixel primary camera, 3.5G support, WiFi, GPS and all the usual Android smartphone features meant that this could be used in the real world plus it retained the FM radio.

It wasn't the world's most advanced smartphone, with features near the bottom of the Samsung range, and all the toughening made it quite big and heavy. But very few smartphones at the time could compete in terms of ruggedness, and the hardware and software would prove familiar to anyone who already had a Samsung Galaxy. The Xcover 2 was successful enough to spawn a couple more sequels.

Samsung M110 (2008), Xcover 2 (2013), Xcover 4 (2017)

Samsung Xcover 4 (March 2017)

Never really cutting-edge, Samsung has been coming out with a new Xcover every couple of years leading to the current Xcover 4 announced in March 2017. Now sporting a 5" 720p display, a 13 megapixel primary camera, 4G support plus al the typical features of a contemporary lower-end smartphone while still retaining that FM radio that has always featured in these devices.

Bigger and even heavier than its predecessors, the Xcover 4 is even more water resistant with an IP68 rating. Although certainly not unbreakable (big screens are always vulnerable to being dropped on pointy things) it would certainly last a lot long that an iPhone X in any demanding environment.
So feel free to raise a glass to ten years of rugged Samsungs. And if you own one, it won't matter if you spill some drink on your phone either.

Image credits: Samsung Mobile

Nokia 3310 (2000) vs Nokia 3310 (2017)

There has been some excitement in recent weeks with a leak that Nokia was re-releasing the classic 3310 handset from 2000. But would a company really be brave enough to try to punt something nearly two decades old to consumers? Well, the answer was.. no.

The original 3310 was a simple monochrome phone, but it had a reputation for being tough, having a long battery life, swappable covers and also some simple games including the legendary Nokia snake. And that really was about it - no mobile data, no Bluetooth, no music playback and it didn't even have polyphonic ringtones.

Nokia 3310 (2000)

Superficially with a similar shape and footprint, the new Nokia 3310 tries to relive some of the magic of the old one. The most obvious immediate change is the much larger 2.4" QVGA display on the front and the 2 megapixel camera on the back. Despite efforts, it's clear that the keypad reflects that this is a Series 30+ device as are all contemporary Nokia feature phones.. in fact, the specification is very similar to devices such as the Nokia 222 but in a rather different case.
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Nokia 3310 (2017)

Nokia 3310 (2000) vs 3310 (2017)

Other features include a music player, FM radio, expandable memory, Bluetooth and some rudimentary 2.5G data support. The 1200 mAh battery is rated as giving up to 31 days standby time and 22 hours talktime on the single-SIM model, and there's also a dual-SIM variant available. And yes.. Snake is still there. The covers don't seem to be changeable, but are available in a choice of red, yellow, blue or grey.

HMD (who make the phones under licence) say that the retail price will be approximately €49. In truth of course this isn't really a relaunch of anything - it is just one of those feature phones that Nokia never stopped making in a different case. But it's still a striking and friendly but somewhat odd-looking device that should appeal to certain types of customer. Retro in some ways, but not in others.. it does at least serve as a reminder as to why we all used to own Nokias in the early days of mobile phones.

Image sources: Nokia and HMD Global