Since Sony Ericsson first delivered its Walkman cell smartphone line last 12 months, track-pleasant telephones have had mixed success inside the United States. Though they’re lauded by way of customers and critics alike, together with us, U.S. Carriers have not clamored to include the handsets in their lineups. Sure, Cingular gives the W600i. However, that’s the exception in preference to the guideline. Sony Ericsson no question has taken note of this discrepancy, which can be a reason at the back of the Sony Ericsson W300i. While preceding Walkman telephones had been packed with the most costly capabilities, the W300i objectives to be a low-stop Walkman telephone. Although you continue to get Bluetooth, a VGA camera, and the total variety of Walkman music compatibility, the complete effect is a step down from models just like the Sony Ericsson W810i. We weren’t loopy approximately a few layout elements, but call quality was good, and we commend Sony Ericsson for bringing mobile music to the masses. Unfortunately, no provider changed into the set at the time of this evaluation, so the GSM handset will run you $299.

Living Tired

So some distance, Sony Ericsson has caught swivel and candy bar designs for its Walkman telephones, so we had been happy to look at the corporation roll out a flip telephone within the series. From the outdoors, it’s quite elegant; our model came in black, but You can get it in white too. It does not undergo much of a resemblance to the business enterprise’s few different flip phones; we just like the clean lines, the looped antenna, and the textured overlay on the bottom of the front flap. The phone is fairly compact at 3.5 by 1.8 via 1.0 inches, so it’s without difficulty installed in most wallets. It’s additionally pretty light for its size at 3.Three oz. However, the charge-off is that the all-spherical creation feels just a piece flimsy. We did not have any issues whilst using the telephone. However, it felt almost too light in our arms.

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In the center of the front flap is the screen of the postage-stamp-size door. Although monochrome, it is quite vivid and presents the usual facts, now not to say the date, time, battery existence, signal energy, and caller ID (where accessible). Unfortunately, you cannot trade the backlighting time, but a quick flick of the volume rocker will prompt the display for inspection. Above the display screen are the VGA digital camera lens and a self-portrait mirror (but no flash), at the same time as the speaker is at the pinnacle of the rear face. The aforementioned quantity control is on the left spine at the side of a manipulate for activating the tune player and gambling and pausing music. The infrared port is at the right backbone, whilst the relationship port for the charger, the wired headset, and the USB cable is on the bottom of the handset. One layout flaw of the new Walkman smartphone connection port is that you can not join cables right now.

Inside the telephone, you may discover the 1. Seventy-five-inch (128×160) interior display. Sony Ericsson constantly does an excellent job with its shows, and the W300i isn’t any exception. Radiant and vibrant, it shows all 262 forty-four colors fantastically and is best for viewing photographs and videos, gambling video games, and scrolling through the person-friendly menus. You can change the brightness, however, now, not the font length or backlighting time.

On the alternative hand, Sony Ericsson does not have an exceptional music document with navigation controls and keypad buttons. While it made positive strides with the W810i, the W300i suggests a slip back to horrific conduct. The five-way toggle is big and doubles as a shortcut to 4 consumer-described functions. However, it’s flush with the surface of the telephone and, as a result, takes time to get used to. The flat gentle keys, clean button, and lower back manage are spaced a long way from the toggle. However, they’re pretty small given the cell phone’s length. Also, whilst this is not an awful thing, maintain in thoughts that most Sony Ericsson phones do now not have committed Talk and End keys.

The keypad buttons are worse, then again. Designed just like overlapping circles, they’re flat with the phone’s surface and slippery, which made for some misdials. Even more, they do not lend themselves to brief texting. On the upside, they have a vibrant orange backlight. Below them are a dedicated strength manager and a button for activating the Walkman participant, but those are a lot too little. The Memory Stick Micro slot is underneath the plastic battery cowl, but fortunately, you don’t should cast off the battery to get at it.

The W300i has a 1,000-touch cellphone e-book with room in each entry for 5 phone numbers, e-mail and Web addresses, commercial enterprise and domestic street addresses, a birth date, and notes (the SIM card holds an extra 250 names). You can classify contacts into organizations, pair them with a photograph for caller ID, or attach them to one of 28 (40-chord) polyphonic ring tones. Support for MP3 ring tones is the gift as properly, but be knowledgeable that caller ID pix do now not appear on the outer display. Other functions include a vibrate mode, textual content, multimedia messaging, voice dialing, a calendar, a project list, a notepad, a calculator, a timer, a stopwatch, and a code memo for storing passwords different cozy records. There’s also a recorder for each voice memos and calls; the period is sparing via handy reminiscence. Although the W300i is considered an access-stage Walkman cellphone, it nonetheless comes with a pretty good quantity of commercial enterprise-friendly packages. Inside, you may find a speakerphone, PC syncing for contacts and calendar appointments, a newsreader for getting access to RSS feeds, USB cable aid, and full Bluetooth for no longer only connecting to a headset however also for wirelessly changing files and electronic enterprise playing cards. And like many other Sony Ericsson, You can use the smartphone as a modem and use the Bluetooth feature as a faraway manipulate to hook up with other Bluetooth devices.

The W300i’s Walkman music participant would not vary a good deal from the preceding handsets inside the series. It supports many codecs, such as MP3, MP4, 3GP, AAC, and WAV documents. Opening the participant takes you immediately to the primary menu, wherein You can prepare music via artist, song call, or playlist. Settings include album/song shuffle and loop, Sony’s Mega Bass, and an equalizer. Toggling between the cell smartphone and the tune participant is seamless, as the tune automatically stops when you receive a call. Hang up and mash the dedicated music key, and your song picks up from the factor you left off. There’s an airplane mode that lets you listen to your tunes in flight with the mobile telephone powered off, and You can minimize the participant even with the use of different capabilities. There are stereo speakers also but still no stereo Bluetooth profile.

Music ability is sparing by using the on-hand reminiscence. Internal space is relatively tiny–simply 20MB–and have in mind that because it is shared with different applications, your real storage space may be much less. We promote making an investment in a Memory Stick Micro for additional space; our take a look at cellphone came with a 512MB card. Getting tune at the smartphone is quite clean. As properly as using the included USB cable and Disc2Phone software, you can send tunes through email, a multimedia message, Bluetooth, or infrared port. You additionally get an FM radio with 20 presets, While you ought to use it with a headset, which acts as an antenna. You can set it to robotically test and program Radio Data System info from stations that digitally broadcast their names and call letters. You are capable of using the radio as an alarm clock.

Since the W300i is supposed for a greater or less average mobile cellphone user, Sony Ericsson covered a VGA shooter instead of a megapixel model. You are capable of taking photos in three resolutions (640×480, 320×240, 160×120) and choose from the diffusion of modifying options, together with four color results, a nighttime mode, two high-quality settings, a self-timer, 19 laugh frames, and a brightness manage. There’s also a digital zoom, which varies through the size of the photo–at the lowest resolution, it’s 4X. However, it is no longer handy at the best resolution. Other unique photo effects consist of a burst mode for taking 4 photographs in speedy order and a nifty panorama choice. For audio outcomes, You are capable of pick from 4 shutter sounds. However, there’s no silent choice. The camcorder takes MPEG-4 motion pictures in resolutions (176×144 and 128×96) with sound and gives a similar set of enhancing options. The clip period is capped at mins for multimedia messages; otherwise, the duration is sparing through the available reminiscence.

Although we recognize the camera is a VGA, picture quality became instead insufficient. Shots were blurry and grainy, and hues washed out. Likewise, video quality became run-of-the-mill. Still, the W300i does offer some creative applications for the newbie photographer. With Photo DJ, You can certainly add one of six amusing frames; inverse the shot’s orientation; and use diverse image results inclusive of brightness, contrast, tint management, and image marking. There’s additionally a Video DJ. If that isn’t fulfilling, greater pictures, video, and multimedia-editing options are at the software program CD, alongside QuickTime, Adobe Photoshop Album Starter Edition, and a multimedia message composer. Moving photos and movies of the telephone are painless. You can ship them in a multimedia message, import them via Bluetooth or the infrared port, or use the included USB cable and software program.

You can customize the W300i with an array of subject matters, wallpaper, and screensavers. You can always buy extra picks, and ring tones from Sony Ericsson via the WAP 2.Zero wi-fi Web browser. Alternatively, the cellphone comes with a Music DJ utility for making your own ring tones and an unusual software known as Music Match that performs guitar chords and piano notes. Though it turned into fun, it wasn’t extraordinarily gifted. Gamers can experience three Java (J2ME) titles, Neopets, QuadraPop, and PuzzleSlider, with extra titles on hand for buy.

We examined the quad-band, dual-mode (GSM 850/900/1800/1900; EDGE) Sony Ericsson W300i world phone in San Francisco, the usage of Cingular’s provider. Call great changed into pretty exact with terrific clarity and quantity. We had no trouble getting a sign and infrequently had been met with static or interference. Callers mentioned the identical situations, and they may make out is below maximum situations. Speakerphone quality was slightly worse–voices sounded hollow, but it turned into truthful as a whole. We connected to the Plantronics Explorer 320 Bluetooth headset and became met with admirable call quality too. The EDGE connection became sufficiently speedy for transferring small files.

Using the blanketed Disc2Phone software and USB cable, which also charges the phone, we tried loading tune onto our W300i. Switch time turned into exceptionally slow at 30 seconds for 5MG music, so you’ll need to be affected a person for a massive import. As an entire, alternatively, the software program is easy to put in and exhibited a few of the quirks we discovered on previous fashions. And some other component, the phone didn’t transfer off robotically whilst we disconnected the USB cable. Music satisfactory turned into par with different Walkman phones: clean and crisp, Though one transferred track had a few very minor hiccups. The W300i might not replace a stand-on, my own MP3 player. However, it does the activity admirably for brief stints.

Our one real disapproval became that the telephone had an inclination to freeze during regular operation, consisting of whilst we had been going through a menu or using the USB connection. More than one time, we needed to restart, however extra often, the cell phone unfroze after a pair of seconds.

The W300i has a rated peak time of 9 hours and a presumed standby time of 16.5 days. Our speak-time test result came in touch short at 8 hours. However, that’s nonetheless decent. According to FCC radiation checks, the Sony Ericsson W300i has a digital SAR rating of one.42 watts in keeping with kilogram.