Confession they say, is good for the soul, so here is ours: We have been counting down the hours waiting for the release of the O2 XDA Atom. This is because we have been big fans of O2 products in the past and we were so impressed with the O2 XDA Mini that we nearly ended up buying one.O2 has upped the memory on the Atom to 128MB ROM (from 64MB on the Mini) and 64MB RAM. This should be more than sufficient for most users and a mini-SD slot is provided for extra memory. We were a little disappointed by this, as many people use SD cards rather than their smaller and more expensive mini-SD counterparts. If you do end up buying this unit, you will have to factor in the purchase of a new mini-SD card into your price considerations. As with the Hewlett-Packard iPAQ hx2190, the Atom runs on Windows Mobile 5.0, meaning user files are stored on non-volatile memory, so data won’t be lost in the event of a dead battery.Physical features are pretty much as per O2′s standard take on smartphones, which means that you’ve got a small five way selector at the base of the phone, surrounded by call accept and decline buttons and dedicated buttons for the program Start function and the integrated O2 Media Plus application. The small stylus slots neatly into the top right of the phone, which also houses a MiniSD memory card slot and the phone’s power button. The rear of the phone houses the Atom’s 2-megapixel CMOS camera, as well as a strobe flash. The Atom’s display is a 2.7″ TFT LCD touchscreen with a top resolution of 240 x 320 pixels.

O2′s Xda II Mini has been one of the most popular phones reviewed, so we were especially keen to get our hands on its successor, the O2 Xda Atom. At first, visually speaking, it’s hard to obviously tell the two apart, save for the obvious switch from a silver style scheme to an all-black one. The Atom is marginally smaller than the Xda II Mini at 102 x 58 x 18.5mm versus the Mini’s 108 x 58 x 18.1mm, but that’s more of a paper measurement — we’d challenge anyone picking up both phones to intuitively feel the size difference without putting them side to side.At first, visually speaking, it’s hard to obviously tell the two apart, save for the obvious switch from a silver style scheme to an all-black one. The Atom is marginally smaller than the Xda II Mini at 102 x 58 x 18.5mm versus the Mini’s 108 x 58 x 18.1mm, but that’s more of a paper measurement — we’d challenge anyone picking up both phones to intuitively feel the size difference without putting them side to side.