Customer Reviews
Good value. Best music-playing-camera-phone for the price.
I recently purchased this phone through Cingular and am very happy with it. It has a nice small size, bright display, and for the price I paid (free with a service plan) it has all the features I want. I would have preferred the same features in a flip-phone, but I can live with this one.
PROS:
Lots of nice features in one compact phone.
1.3 megapixel camera - among the best you'll see in a cell phone. If you want better, buy a digital camera! This is more than sufficient for the occasional photo without the need to lug around another piece of electronic equipment.
256MB of storage - some have complained this is not enough. I find it more than sufficient for the casual music listener. If you want more, get an iPod! Like the camera, the convenience of having this in a device you already carry with you is worth the "smaller" size.
music player - it plays almost all (unlocked) formats. If you're an iTunes buyer you can't directly move your songs to your phone but if you use available utilities like jHymn you can convert to mp3 and it works great. You can even use your mp3s/wavs/midi /etc. files for your ring tones, saving you from paying again for songs you already own.
Thumb Drive/Software - I had no problems installing the software to connect my phone to my computer via USB. Moving MP3s around is as easy as dragging-and-dropping in windows, since the phone simply becomes a "removable drive". You can also use it as a thumb drive to carry around those important business presentations, or backup files, etc. And 256MB should be enough for most of that.
FM radio - yes it works, but you're required to use the headphones as an antenna. I tested it, but really don't care much about this feature.
Instant Messenger clients built in - but you'll need to be a typing pro to keep up!
Comes with a nice black faceplate to replace the orange one for those of us who need a more professional look.
Nice long battery life. Full charge lasts over 100 hours with occasional use.
Good reception. More bars than other cell phones in the same location.
CONS:
First and foremost, the pesky "internet" button on the front that is easy to hit and (without any confirmation) connect to MediaNet and rack up charges. The charges are small (about 6 cents every time you accidentally hit the button) but still annoying. There appears to be no way to disable this feature or reprogram the button.
Second, and related to the above, when you select the "menu" the default choice is also to connect to the internet. I'm contemplating signing up for the MEdia Net (which looks neat, by the way) package just so I don't have to worry about it. That's probably Cingular's goal! If you're a mobile-internet user, this and the one-button internet are probably nice features. If you're a budget-conscious buyer, they are annoying.
Compounding the above, the key lock is easy to engage/disengage with a little button on the side of the phone, but the phone can inexplicably unlock itself with the right (or wrong) magnetic field in the presence of the faceplate (making my holster with the magnetic clip useless).
Synching with your computer isn't quite as easy as plug-and-play. The phone requires an extra keypress to tell it if you want the "file mode", and the phone shuts itself off when you remove it and you have to remember to turn it back on. This is okay for occasional use, but it's not as convenient as it could be.
Summary:
If you only casually listen to music and take photos, and are content with scaled-down capabilities for both in exchange for a scaled-down price, this phone is for you. If you like custom ringtones and graphics, the phone will save you a few pennies there, but you'll likely spend some of them with a few accidental connections to the MEdia Net.
Good phone, software may cause trouble
The phone is quite good but I still penalize it 2 stars for following 3 reasons:
1. Sony Ericcsson is playing a trick on the customers.. they have a 256 Mb card storage this model, however you can not insert and remove memory stick as you could do in a digital camera.. it is very possible to do so (see Nokia and Samsung phones). However, Sony Ericsson decided not to give us that feature and force us to upgrade in near future.
2. The File Managing and Disc2Phone software that come with this phone are filled with bugs. I have tried the program from their CD and from their support site. I have win XP home edition. I am able to connect to phone copy files but when I exit their programs and disconnect USB, Windows XP crashes giving a blue screen and saying No more IRP stack locations. Have tried uninstalling and reinstalling, it doesnt work for me.
3. The phone has a hot key (cingular icon) that connects you immediately to Internet. This is located on outer keypad and if pressed does not ask for any password or second confirmation. I use my mobile phone as alarm clock too. When I am trying to turn off the alarm in my sleep, I have hit this button few times by mistake causing some unnecessary internet billing.
I have no other problems with the phone. Signal, battery, volume are all good.
good for some...bad for others
This phone is packed with features...the mp3 player and FM radio are great, and you can adjust the equalizer. Comes with nice headphones that you can answer calls on. Excellent batery life. I have owned it for 1 month and have a bunch of problems however. I cracked the screen (its on the outside), I lost the cover to the input jack, if you forget to push the lock it will often sign on the internet..and charge you...and the phone likes to unlock itself...really easy to do. Good delicate phone.
