In India, people in comparitively mature markets like the metros, are now upgrading their cellphones. So what are they buying ?     Apart from voice calls, cellphones have taken up the functions of many pleasure related functions like radio, music player and the camera. These are definately the sort after features while upgrading. The latest in the list are the smart phone features like the internet connectivity, e-mailing and messaging options, connectivity with other devices, storage capacity, efficient operating system, applications etc.  Companies are constantly innovating their products to give more power in the hand of consumers and thereby capturing a major market share.

The smart phone features available in these devices are:

Internet browsing:
You can browse internet through your cellphone if your handset is GPRS / WAP compatible and your service provider is also offering these services. In case of WAP and xHTML browser you get text only or a limited version of the website you want to visit while if your handset is equipped with HTML browser you can view the whole website as it is, along with graphics as you see on the PC. Only difference is that you may feel that the entire website has been squeezed into a bottle because the screen of cellphone is small.

EDGE enabled cellphones offer mobile broadband access with very high upload and  download speeds. The speed is at least three times faster than normal GPRS. But check whether your service provider is offering the same.

E-mail:
If you are able to browse internet, ie. you have activated GPRS on your cellphone, you can easily check your web-based mail boxes like that of rediff, yahoo, hotmail etc. To see your official mail account, if it is not web-based, and you generally see it using e-mail clients like outlook express etc., then you will have to use the e-mail client available on your handset, which should be compatible and have to be configured to be able to send and receive e-mails.

You can also receive emails with attachments, which can be opened in the phone itself. Many smart phones have the capability to open Office documents in the form of  Word, Worksheet, PowerPoint, PDF formats and even ZIP files along with the multimedia formats like JPEG, GIF, MP3, AAC or 3GP etc. The Email box supports SMTP, POP3 and IMAP4 protocols.

More:
Some advance handsets also offer features like
- Browsing over TCP/IP
- SyncML
- Smart content download - OMA DRM 1.0
- OTA provisioning
- Mobile wallet
 
Offline:
Many cellphones give you an option to work offline with GSM module turned-off.
 
Connectivity:
USB port, Infrared interface and Bluetooth are the common connectivity options available to communicate between cellphone to cellphone and cellphone to PC.

Bluetooth is a wireless technology that enables your bluetooth enabled cellphone to communicate with any other bluetooth enabled device, be it a TV, Refrigerator, washing machine or another bluetooth enabled cellphone.
- You can talk handsfree with a wireless Bluetooth headset enhancement
- You can play wireless multiplayer games over a Bluetooth connection
- It enables you to remotely control other bluetooth enabled devices

Push to Talk:
Many handsets today offer a dedicated key for Push to Talk over cellular network.
Push to Talk is a two-way communication service that works like a "walkie talkie".

Operating Systems:
The OS generally used in latest smart phones are Symbian OS version 7.0, Series 60 SE UI or the Microsoft Windows Mobile OS.

The common PIM functions include the Calendar, Task organizer, Notes, Calculator, Converter, Clock, Alarm and the wallet etc.

Memory:
Apart from having reasonably good internal storage memory, these handsets provide external memory card slot where you can insert a 32MB memory card and use as many of them as required. These are generally RS DV MMC type (Reduced Size Dual Voltage MultiMedia Card).
 
Messaging:
As far as messaging is concerned, most of the smart phones are laoded with T9 predictive text input for quick text insertion while writing SMS, MMS, emails or instant messaging. The size of the pictures inserted into the multimedia messages, can be automatically reduced to the one suitable for MMS. Suitable templates can be used to design your own MMS.
 
Check precisely the availability of the features that you want to use before purchasing your next handset.