Microsoft Kin One deals & review

In a word or two

The Kin One has a unique and compact design, complemented by a whole range of social networking features as well as the Microsoft Kin service.

The Design

Compact and square in shape, the Kin One is an appealing little device. Its corners are rounded and it sits comfortably in the palm of your hand. To access the QWERTY keyboard, simply slide the screen up – the keyboard has been well designed too. The keys are nicely spaced out and there are dedicated keys for search and making a phone call.

The unusually square-shaped 2.6 inch screen on the Kin One is capacitive and responds well to swipes and presses. The only physical key on the front is the back key which enhances navigation. It allows you to exit a feature like the Kin Loop – a social networking function similar to Motorola’s MOTOBLUR found on the QUENCH and Milestone handsets – by simply pressing and holding the key.

Specifications

Together with the phone’s big brother, the Kin Two, the Kin One represents Microsoft’s first venture into the world of mobile phones. Similar to Google’s Nexus One device which was manufactured by HTC, the Kin One and Kin Two have been manufactured by Sharp – but with a Microsoft interior.

As the Kin mobiles have social networking at heart, one of the main highlights of both is the Kin service. This service will be offered on all future Kin handsets too and includes the Kin Spot, Kin Studio and Kin Loop.

The Kin Spot is a great feature of the Kin One, letting you effortlessly share your experiences, photos and thoughts with friends. Whenever you find a web page you want to show friends, simply drag it into the spot – this spot sits at the bottom of the screen – or you like someone’s tweet, drag it into the spot. Then click and drag the contacts you want to share the information with into the spot, and choose how to share – for example, text or email.

Building on this social experience is the Kin Loop which pulls details from your favourite websites and social networking sites and displays them on your home screen. You can reply to messages directly from this screen as well as update your own status on Facebook or announce something on Twitter.

And when it comes to friends, the contacts screen on the Kin One lets you select your favourite friends. When you click on each of these contacts, all the information related to them will be shown including their Facebook, Twitter and MySpace profiles. Again, you can reply to them directly from here, or go to the individual sites to see more.

The Kin Studio really completes this whole experience by backing it all up. So should you ever lose your Kin One, all your data will be safely stored online and available for you to download onto a new handset. One of the other good features of the Studio is that it stores all your images, texts and calls in real time – so when you login to the site you see the equivalent of your own online diary.

The internal storage is 4GB and although this can’t be increased, this shouldn’t be a problem. Every picture you capture on the Kin One’s decent 5-megapixel camera is automatically added to the Studio. And when you want to listen to music as you interact online, the music player comes with Zune giving an interactive display and access to music for streaming or downloading tracks. There is also an FM radio onboard the Kin One.

Considerations

For all the impressive social networking features on the Kin One, there is no app store or pre-installed games so the functions are fairly limited.

Verdict

The Kin One looks good and lets you make the most of your social world through its Kin services. Provided the price is reasonable, this should be popular with all mobile social networking fans. A full review is coming soon.