Though there are several different types of touch screen technologies that make up the inner workings of touch screen phones, gadgets, point of sale terminals and others, there are some types of technology that are in higher demand over others.

There are approximately eight different types of touch screen technologies used in commercial devices:

• Resistive
• Surface acoustic wave
• Infrared
• Bending wave
• Active digitizer
• Optical imaging
• Surface capacitive
• Projected capacitive

Capacitive touch technology is the hot technology right now even though resistive touch technology is by far the most widely used. Resistive technology doesn’t always deliver when it comes to picking up responsiveness to fingers or other instruments used for touch technology, like a stylus pen. The price of resistive touch technology and it’s durability have made it the most popular type.

With the onset of touch screen products and new advancements in those products and their overnight popularity brought other types of technologies perhaps not overly considered before due to cost or size or for what ever reason. Capacitive touch, although more expensive is on it’s way to surpassing resistive touch is a more durable and offers a better transmittance than the resistive touch technology. As previous touch screens on phones all had resistive touch inside them, beginning in 2007, a considerable amount of cell phones were created with capacitive touch. Cell phones are not the only gizmos with capacitive touch technology.

Other Uses of Capacitive Touch

• Public Signage
• E-books
• Medical applications
• Touch screen monitors
• Touch pad keyboards

Capacitive touch has been around for a long time, but not until the Apple iphone created the dramatic demand for all things “touch” has the capacitive touch technology been given such a stage for opportunity. Now that capacitive touch is being seen as a better product over resistive touch technology, and becoming a more affordable option, we will see capacitive touch in ways never dreamt before.

The Nokia N82 handset has a technologically well equipped camera function that could click photos of high quality. The integrated 5 megapixel digital camera with Carl Zeiss optics and Tessar lens gives a professional touch to the pictures taken. The auto focus camera with xenon flash helps the users in clicking high quality photos at any part of the day without any difficulty. The 20 x digital zoom brings the desired object closer making it much comfortable for the user to record images. The video recordings can be edited and shared among the friends. The N82 handset from Nokia has a built-in music player that plays latest music formats assuring high entertainment. Capable of playing latest hit charts, this handset provides full satisfaction to the music lovers.

The Nokia N82 mobile phone comes with advanced technological features including Bluetooth wireless technology, EDGE technology and USB connection. The 3G HSDPA technology allows easy and effective internet experience on the mobile phone reducing the tension of checking and sending emails when they are away from the PC. With a fully charged battery, the N82 handset could provide approximately 3 hours of talk time or u to 4.3 hours of GSM talk time.

by Martin Fortus

Almost a year ago, we wrote a review of Nokia 7500 Prism, one of Nokia's entries into "phone as fashion statement". Now, "phone as fashion gear" is as at least as old as the Motorola ROKR and RAZR models, but the field has gotten more complex and higher end with phones from Prada, Ferrari and Armani that cost upwards of a thousand sterling for the right to carry around a phone with gems embedded in it, or a particular brand name.

Fortunately for your pocketbook, the 7900 Prism isn't as expensive as an Armani, but at a couple hundred, it's still a noticeable dent on the budget. What are you getting for it? You're mostly paying a premium for triangular buttons that are awkward and hard to use, with glossy covers that make them eye catching.

The phone has a nice, rich OLED display - it's big enough, though we found the resolution high enough to make the text hard to read. It's got the usual array of buttons, and while in theory, triangles wouldn't be an issue, in practice, they're cramped and squished together. It's difficult to hit just one key at a time. On the other hand, it's 11 millimeters thin, which means it slips nicely into a pocket.

In terms of features, it has the obligatory music player function and the 2 megapixel camera that every phone seems to come with these days. The menu system to get at the features is Nokia's standard menu set up. It conspicuously lacks a microSD slot, so you're stuck with storing your photos and music on the onboard 1 GB memory; we expect this to change, as it's barely an upgrade from the 7500 model.

One notable change from the 7500 is the removal of the feature my daughter loved the most - the ability to change the colour of the decorative face plate by swapping out a small plastic ring. Now that she's older, she's less concerned about how a phone looks than how it works, but it was the feature of the 7500 she raved about the most.

That being said, the backlights on the phone's keypad can be changed; you can assign different flash and color patterns for different incoming phone numbers. To me it seemed like a gimmick, to my daughter, it seemed cool, but in a dorky way. She could see some of her schoolmates - guys mostly - having fun setting that up.

The 2 megapixel camera isn't the greatest camera in the world, but it's serviceable. To be fair, I remember when we'd all be raving about 2 megapixels in a phone to begin with. It doesn't have much in the way of optics, and only has an LED flash, but it's more than suitable for quick snaps.

The headphone jack is a proprietary one, which is also disappointing. Sound quality on the phone as a phone is good, with no distortion. Reception quality is also good, but we've come to expect that from Nokia, which consistently scores well in this regard.

Overall, I confess I'm not in the demographic for this mobile, and thankfully, my daughter seems to be getting out of that demographic as well. I'd spend a fair bit less and get a phone with the same features and less fashion.