The king is dead; long live the king. The Samsung D600 arrived in late 2005 to replace the already legendary D500, and it has done so by taking everything that was good about its predecessor and turning the technical volume up to eleven. If you thought the slide on the D500 was smooth, the D600 feels like it’s been lubricated with liquid silk. It’s slightly thinner, slightly more refined, and finished in a ‘Deep Black’ that makes it the most handsome slider on the UK high street. For the business professional or the gadget-hound, this is currently the only phone that matters.nnTechnically, the upgrade is massive. The camera has been bumped up to 2.0 megapixels (1600 x 1200), and unlike the previous model, it now supports a dedicated macro mode for taking close-up shots of documents or your own fingerprints. The screen is a 2.0-inch QVGA TFT masterpiece with 262,144 colours and a 240 x 320 resolution. This is a significant jump in pixel density, making the interface look incredibly sharp and the video playback remarkably fluid. But the real ‘killer app’ for the D600 is the TV-Out function. Samsung has included a cable in the box that lets you plug your phone directly into a television to show off your photos or, more impressively, view Word, Excel, and PDF documents on the big screen. It’s a technical showpiece that makes you feel like a secret agent during every presentation.nnSamsung has also finally listened to the masses and included a microSD (TransFlash) expansion slot, solving the ‘memory wall’ that plagued their earlier high-end handsets. You can now load up a 512MB card with MP3s and use the D600 as a legitimate music player, complete with surprisingly loud built-in ‘3D’ stereo speakers. Connectivity is top-notch with Bluetooth 1.2 (supporting printing and stereo headsets) and quad-band GSM support for global roaming. The battery life is respectable for such a high-spec device, though that glorious QVGA screen is a thirsty beast that will demand a daily charge if you’re using the multimedia features heavily. The D600 isn’t just a sequel; it’s a refinement of the sliding form factor to its absolute peak. It is sophisticated, powerful, and utterly desirable—the definitive ‘alpha’ phone of 2005.