Sony Ericsson W910

Sony Walkman series has a new member in its family: The Sony Ericsson W910. The Walkman series takes music in cellphones to a new level and sets benchmarks for other phone manufacturers to follow.W910 brings in lot of hardware and software front along with gorgeous looks that also won it the handset of the year award from the Mobile World Congress at the Global Mobile Awards.

Sony Ericsson W910 specifications:

• Dimensions: 99 x 50 x 12.5 mm
• Weight: 86g
• Display: 2.4″ QVGA resolution
• GRPS,EDGE,3G
• Bluetooth with A2DP
• 2 MP camera
• FM radio with RDS
• Motion Sensor
• Approx. price: 400$

The large display combined with sexy looks makes this mobile a strong competitor against Nokia slider phones which are not so popular among users.Sony Ericsson it seems like as if it has got most things right in this mobile.The packaging includes the standard accessories like charger,USB data cable,2GB M2 Memory Stick,installation CD and manuals.A new accessories included in the package is a M2 card reader which does come in handy as it works without the need to install the PC suite.

Design,Display and Keypad

The phone has been made from a highly refined material which shows naturally when you hold it in your hands.Although it is a slider phone but it is surprisingly thin at 12.5 mm.The phone fits perfectly into the hand and has a nice grip.Below the huge display are the dedicated call and end keys along with other navigation keys.Light sensor has strangely been placed besides the right soft key.The slide open reveals the alphanumeric keypad which is very ergonomic and a boon for SMS junkies.The keypad lighting looks spectacular at night.The weight of the phone at just 86g makes it light on your pocket.

The large 2.4″ display is an improvement both in size and clarity over previous Sony Ericsson phone like Sony Ercisson K850.The display has ample brightness and contrast.Also it has fair amount of visibility in sunlight though it does not come close to Nokia phones in this matter.

The keypad as I already mentioned is top-notch and is almost flawless.The surface of keypad is absolutely flat but that in no ways affects your typing speed.The keypad has high responsiveness and gentle tapping of keys is enough to make them respond.

Interface,Loudspeaker and Shake Control

The interface on the phone is a mix of old and new.Though the basic navigation system remains the same, SE has made it more refreshing.Flash themes are also supported now on the device.We get to see the brand new Walkman 3.0 music player.Also features like auto rotate are slowly making way onto SE phones.The interface is still as fast as has been the case with other SE phones always.

The loudspeaker has very high level of volume and you won’t miss a call even on a busy trafficway! We will get to sound quality of the music files later.The speaker has taken the competition to a new level.

An amazing new feature developed by SE is Shake Control. Shake Control detects the movement of your hand is a particular direction and responds to it in an appropriate manner.For example in music player flicking your hand either left or right will make the phone go back to previous track or next track respectively.Shake Control can also be used during gaming and hence you can experience the “Wii” fun!!

Camera and Music Player

The camera is a downpoint of this phone.Lack of autofocus and flash is a major disappointment.Also 2 MP camera and 15fps video recording mar the experience further. The camera is controlled by the Cyber-shot SE v2.0 application which is excellent and has immense options to play around with but unfortunately you would not make much out of it through this camera.The photo quality is poor and has very less details.Lack of flash makes the camera useless in low lights.The video recording isn’t any better at 15fps.The secondary camera is good when compared with other secondary cameras.

The phone supports the MP3, AAC, AAC+, E-AAC +, WAV, WMA, M4A and MIDI file formats.The player has preset equalisers including the MegaBass equaliser.Thats for the usual part.But another new application that makes it debut is SenseMe.What this application does it basically sort your music tracks based on your mood that is directly related to tempo of the tracks.But for this to work you have to make use of Media manager which is much slower compared to direct transfers.The audio quality of the phone is breathtaking and it justifies the Walkman tag that has been bestowed upon it.

Browsing and Organiser

Browsing on a 2.4″ screen is brilliant.The sites turn out very well but you will not have much options to play around with as the bundled browser ie. NetFront 3.4 can not be compared to likes of Opera Mini.

The organiser has almost all the standard functions such as ,Alarms, Applications, File manager,Video call, Tasks, Notes, Synchronization, Calendar,Timer, Stopwatch, Calculator, and Code memo.The Alarm has good customization options and you can also play around with Calendar with adding tasks and scheduling them.MusicDJ, VideoDJ, TrackID and voice recorder sum up some of the other applications under the organiser.

Pros:

• Large Display
• Good Keypad
• Extremely thin
• High volume speaker
• Shake Control and ShakeMe
• Walkman 3.0
• M2 USB card reader bundled

Cons:

• Bad Camera
• Overpriced
• Shaky Sliding mechanism
• Non-Symbian

Final Thoughts

SE W910 offers exceptional music playing capability.The large screen and great keypad combined with gorgeous looks make it a deadly combination.The bad camera is a big disappointment and this will seriously hamper the sales of this otherwise brilliant phone. ShakeControl and ShakeMe features are excellent additions to the device.M2 card reader was a good addition to the package.Buying this phone if you don’t use cellphones for imaging tasks else looks out for other options.

My rating: 3.5/5