With two stylish headsets supplied in the box (one of these the new Stereo Bluetooth Headset HBH-DS220) and a music listening time of up to 27 hours, you're free to dance much more... more
A review by jeaniecz on Sony Ericsson W960i March 10th, 2008
Author's product rating:
Look & Feel
Good
Durability & Robustness
Strong
Battery standby time
Excellent
Value for money
Excellent
Range of features
Large selection
Advantages:
touchscreen, walkman player, adjustability
Disadvantages:
I've listed a few
Recommend to potential buyers:
yes
Full review
Sony Ericsson W960i
One of the newest Sony Ericsson cell phones on the market, a great promise, but what's inside for real - can SE live up to its promise, can't they or do they give even more? I've upgraded to W960i after years of using W800i and a brief Nokia E51 experience.
Quick summary
The phone takes about a minute to start and you can select among switching on the phone or a flight mode - safe to use the device on board or in hospitals as a music player only. It plays music and video files, allows you to listen to radio and browse the internet, take photos and videos as well as record sounds and keep all your important notes and agenda in one place. It runs on the UIQ 3 system, which is a big change from Symbian, as it's not so intuitive and actually it's rather like a little computer than a cellphone. It's an open system, which means you can move files and folders, create new ones and delete, too. I won't lie - smsing and calling is easier and also faster on cellphones without an operating system, but W960i has a lot more to offer, it's like a little office and entertainment device in your pocket and under such advantageous circumstances I'm willing to lower my demands on its speed. Actually who cares if I spend a minute typing an sms or if it takes me two? Connection to computer is possible via USB cable or bluetooth, the USB cable can be set to recharge the battery. The battery lasts about 3 days, of course depending on how much you play with Walkman, camera and if you let a lot of applications run at the same time, but still for this class of a cellphone I think 3 days are quite fine.
Full review
Package contents (might probably vary) W960i Battery 2 styluses USB cable Wired handsfree headset with earplugs Black suede case CD Manual and commercial leaflets Warranty file
Construction and looks The phone has a plastic body, its back has a soft rubberish feel which makes it feel home in your hand and doesn't slide away from you. The screen attracts fingerprints but how could it not, the back side is pretty fingerprint-proof.
It's kinda big, but its weight seems less than 119g, anyway it's not a baby, you can't expect slim shape considering what's inside, however, the phone's compact and robust. All parts fit perfectly, to squeaking or rattling. Removing the back cover needs a big press and push and it slides back to its place like a sword into a scabbard. SIM card slot is bit troublesome for me, I find it hard to get the SIM card out without using a pinzette.
There's only one colour option - Vinyl Black, a black body with white sides, a simple almost elegant appearance that wouldn't compromit even a businessperson in a meeting.
Top: power button Bottom: SE charger/headset socket. (N.B.: The charger's plug has identical socket on its back, so you can plug the headset into it, while chargin the phone you still can listen to music!) Left side: Jog dial wheel - scroll to select and push to run/apply. Above it is a strap hanger. Right side: Camera shooter button and volume control/sound settings arrows.
Navigation The 2 inch touchscreen, the main navi tool, takes about 75% of the surface, beneath is a classical 0-9 keyboard with extra button for return, walkman player, erase. For more comfort while browsing the web or playing movies, the content can be displayed horizontally.
The Jog Dial wheel is one of special navigation tools, but the phone was constructed to be handled via touchscreen and actually it's not possible to use all functions without using the touchscreen. At least I haven't found a way to, not that I mind since the touchscreen is perfectly responsive especially when using the stylus. I haven't had any experience with a jog dial or touchscreen cellphone before, so I don't feel the position or placement of buttons weird, like ppl who have used e.g. SE P1i might feel. Feels like I could control the phone with jog dial plus keypad better if I were left-handed :p
Walkman buttons are on the bottom of the screen and they're inactive unless you start the walkman player, then you can use them for scrolling, play/pause.
There's an extra quick-menu bar under a little arrow in the screen's top left corner. Basically, you can click anything on the screen and see what it will do.
The stylus is a new thing to me and so far I've got used to it fine, the screen hasn't got any scratches even if I don't use a protective foil some ppl would recommend using. Everything you can do with the stylus can also be done with a finger except for typing on the screen qwerty keyboard - unless you have baby fingers. The stylus isn't handy to be used e.g. on bus or when walking, coz it needs quite a precision in use. Its socket's located on left top corner and hadn't you known it was there, you might not notice soon, as also the colour of phone helps to conceal it perfectly. If you get used to it, typing an sms on the screen qwerty keyboard can be really fast. There's also handwriting recognition option, but then you have to "handwrite" the letters according to the manual and it's just not much close to the way I normally write, so I haven't really used this and I don't think I would. It's rather just for fun than being really useful.
Software Sony Ericsson PC Suite on the CD allows you to synchronize phone with your computer, create backups and transfer files. The file transfer can however be also used in simple USB mass storage device mode, where the speed is amazing - 6 to 8MB per second!! That allows you to transfer your music library into the phone quite quickly, especially since there's 8GB of flash memory to fill, plus 160MB phone/media memory. When making backups (before firmware update, e.g.) I recommend to save your music, video and other large files to your computer and then use the PC suite to backup contact list, settings etc, else the backup will take ages.
Firmware update - a new option exclusively for some of the newest SE cellphones for home use! Check your firmware version on SE website and then you can update your FW yourself. However, here comes a warning: The FW update process is lengthy and if interrupted, it can't be resumed or refreshed and your phone will be left not working unless you have it fixed at an SE service point, so be careful and don't run too many applications risking your comp getting stuck. I've just finished my FW update successfully, altogether with first installing the PC Suite and backuping contacts+settings+smses it took about 40 mins, which isn't that bad considering the phone rebooted like 5 times during the process.
Office and organizer Quickoffice version 3.6.62.1. - reads, creates and edits .xls, .doc files, this is awesome if you wanna keep/edit the files for work, school or just keep large lists or even books in electronic form and have it always with you.
PDF reader Business card scanner Clock + alarm, calendar, notes, tasks, anniversaries, timer, stopwatch...advanced version of all the standard things you might wanna use sometime and that come really handy, so you hardly need an agenda book or anything else.
Today's entries and 15 menu shortcut icons of your choice (you can even select whatever picture to use for a shortcut icon) can be displayed on the desktop but can also be completely hidden - that's the only option how to display big clock on the desktop. I like to keep the notes and quickmenu on, coz that makes you really not forget stuff you're supposed to do.
Internet The phone has an internet setup wizard, however that didnt work with me, so i had to set the connection manually, which was pretty easy. W960i works in GPRS, UMTS (3G) and wireless LAN networks. Some might miss EDGE and HSPDA.
It's possible to use it as a modem to get internet into your computer, but I don't see what's so useful about this, when everybody has internet already and it's the cellphone I wanna get the internet into now, to be really mobile and not have to carry my laptop with me all the time. The screen's 2 inch and that's quite comfy for web browsing, especially if you switch into horizontal view. This is where the stylus comes really handy. You can set the preferred way of internet connection (WLAN, WAP, GPRS/UMTS), so you always know how do you get connected.
Fun
Games - only golf and quadrapop installed on phone, with the newest firmware you will get a snowboard action game, too. I don't care much about games, but loads can be downloaded and installed, as the phone supports both IUQ3 and Java stuff.
Camera 3.15 Mpix resolution with 2 flash LEDs grants good picture quality and of course I prefer to carry my big camera with me if I know I'll wanna take pics, but the pics I've taken with W960i so far really satisfied me. Just like all applications, the camera takes like 5secs to start, so it's not so superfast if you wanna take a pic instantly. Of course you can also record videos with sound, up to 8 hours! You can shoot normal pics, burst mode, macros, select the resolution and pic quality, white balance, night mode, effects like sepia, black+white, negative; self-timer, shutter sound, where to save files to. I've done a fair amount of pic shooting with my old W800i when I haven't had my big Sony camera and its only function I miss in W960i is the panorama pictures. Second camera for videocalls purpose is in the top left corner.
Walkman music player - Music in its perfection Beautiful and amazing. Very user-friendly and cute looking interface, fast to browse. Visualisation can be activated and that makes music even more enjoyable, even when the applicatin runs only on the background. You can create playlists or use those made on computer, rate songs and add moods to visualization which changes colour and speed. Megabass is the best of preset equalizers (normal, rock, pop, party, dance, jazz, classical, spoken word, loudness, treble boost) and the sound is clear and I just love the earplug headset! You won't hear anything but the music with full basses and depth on, just look around carefully if out, might be dangerous walking the streets deaf. Some people might be disappointed there's not the 3.5mm jack to connect any headphones, but: 1) the SE factory connector needs to be pulled and tilted at the same time to be unplugged, so it won't happen by mistake or simple pulling while in your pocket. This has saved my phone from hitting a tile floor, which would have been painful, I reckon. 2) I can't imagine what better earplugs could you wanna use! Ok, if you don't like the earplug, that might be the case, but otherwise I don't think there's an earplug set to compete with SE's HPM-70.
Sleep is a cool function that allows you to set in what time th eplayer would be turned off, in case you wanna fall asleep listening to music/radio.
FM radio has the RDS, you can save 20 stations by both manual and automatic search.
Supported video formats are: .3gp, .mp4, .ram, .rm.
Task manager Something unknown to me to the point of buying W960i. If you close an application/menu folder, they will still run on the background until you exit them in the file manager. Like this you can switch through them and they load faster, but you can end up having loads of applications running and using up the RAM, when the RAM's overloaded, the phone will reboot itself and you can't stop this. The only way is to keep in mind to shut applications in task manager.
Minus points - W960i doesn't have classical profiles - sound profile (SMS tone, ringtone, email tone etc) are included in themes but you can override them with tone of your own choice. The sole sound profile is silent mode. - opening applications takes time - impossible to control the phone fully using only keyboard
Conclusion
Wonderful device that contains all you might need from a phone, in a nice body. I was disappointed in Nokia and I'm a minion of Sony Ericsson now and for good, since I've learnt that what they do they do for a reason and for the user. I would absolutely recommend SE W960i to everybody who wants to have more than a cellphone, to ppl who have been using SE phones and are happy with them but look for an upgrade, to anyone who wanna be both organized and have fun as well as to those who like to explore and play, since this toy gives a lot of ground. Besides lots of useful functions the interface is very much editable to your liking, which makes you feel like the phone's really personalized and yours the way you want it.
Advantages: Excellent sound quality, fully featured Disadvantages: nothing
Sony Ericsson W960i
After the releasing of Apple iphone Sony has encountered tough competition with its walkman series phone. Before iphone Sony Ericsson was the king of music phones, but now the real competition starts and fully featured phone has been released. Nokia is also struggling to get status in music category phones. So in this competition period we have seen some good models of music phones in recent years. Sony Ericsson has launched ... ...sound quality and I think Sony Ericsson provides best sound quality in phones and I am fond of Walkman series phone due to its superb music player. The equalizer facility also available in handsfree with Bass or mega bass feature. And the megabass ofwalkman player provides excellent experience of sound in phones. Phone also has a dedicated walkman key for instant access to music player.
And the most compulsory feature in any phone called FM radio ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Brilliant media player, great camera, PDA and MS office support, infinitely expandable with UIQ Disadvantages: poor battery life if too many applications used, lack of HSDPA
...primary digital camera, and because Sony have been making cameras for years, the lenses are all top-quality optics (Sony's economy of scale means they're so cheap). I am constantly disappointed by Nokia's camera/lens offerings (my girlfriend's Nokia 6300's 2 megapixel camera is an abomination, seemingly barely worthy of status as VGA)
The Walkman media player is STUNNING! It's a massive leap on Walkman player in the W810, and the clunky player on ... ...twice a week. In spite of these minor oversights, Sony has created a demon here.
In conclusion, this is a really great phone that somehow bridges the gap between media manager, phone, office PDA and camera with ease. A brilliant release Sony, keep up the good work! ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Good all-rounder, an excellent alternative to a seperate phone, MP3 and camera, outstanding reception Disadvantages: Few: poor software, slow camera shutter speed
...the product when it arrived. Sony Ericsson scored an ace in that respect. The free pouch it came with certainly help keep the phone in good condition.
The appearance of the phone is smart. The white strip provides a good contrast with the black of the rest of the phone, but despite being a nice stylistic device, it doesn't really hide the fact that the phone is quite large. Not unexpected, given the type of phone, but a fact nevertheless.
The phone ... ...where it should be, making navigation of the lists easy. Just as well, because it is quite dificult to scroll down the lists using the stylus and touch screen. The touch screen works much better when clean, I find that grime can acccumulate on it quite quickly. Unfortunately, it is quite prone to being scratched. Again, this can be minimised by keeping the phone in the pouch supplied, but this is not always practical for short periods of time. The ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: has large memory capacity for music with bright picture. Disadvantages: music runs down battery and price too high.
Sony Erickson has shown how good they are in making good camera and Walkman phones. To me, I prefer them to Nokia in making good Walkman phones. It has good and nice black shining colour with good features. With nice earpiece that produces good quality sound system. The battery last long even when playing music but I am still looking up to conducting a battery test.
It has nice and fantastic pictures. In my own case, I prefer Sony Eriksson camera ... ...the games.
The Sony Eriksson is capable of navigating and browsing media files with a soft touch.
The touch screen is quite easy to use and can to input text through the stylus which is the new features and some thing to enjoy.
In my own case, normally run my batteries down do to the mp3 player and the game when tired with my psp and my ps2 console. Thanks to the Eriksson efficient phone charger because most of the time, it is either in use or ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Touchscreen & massive memory Disadvantages: Can sometimes be slow
I have owned the Sony Ericsson "W960i" for a while now and thought I would write a review about it. TouchScreen
I like the touchscreen on this phone; it saves having to scroll through different menus to access what you want as you can just directly touch the button needed. From the desktop, you have two options; the main menu and a shortcut menu where you can add your own icons for things that you use most often. I think that this type of usage ... ...also just makes it seem more advanced than phones without touchscreens.
Music
The music function on this phone is very good in my opinion. You can have music stored on your phone in many different locations and in any named folders and the music software saves you from having to remember where you've saved things. You can select an option to search for music and it will scan the whole of your phone to find every music track available and then allows ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: Simple yet good for the basics Disadvantages: to listen to music or take pictures, this isnt the phone for you
...I am using this phone whilst mine is being fixed. This phone belonged to my mum for years before i inherited it. Its been kicked around, dropped, left in bags, splashed with water. Everything you could do to brake it has probably been done and it is still alive to this day, and i'll tell you what, its better than my brand new sonyericssonw960i. Everything is easy to find and use, and ok it may not have these up to date walkmans or a huge memory or a high mega pixel camera, but as phones go its still pretty damn good. I havent even had the problem of it falling open in my bag and ringing people like some flip phones do. The only problem i am having is that the batery life isnt lasting as long as it used to, but that could probably fixed with a new battery. I love this phone!...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average somewhat helpful
...SonyEricsson XPERIA X1, Smartphone the most-awaited-waiting presence. SonyEricsson's first mobile phone that uses Windows Mobile Operating System and promising features of our wealth, connectivity and new experiences in the input to any posts with a QWERTY keyboard that is different from previous SonyEricsson mobile phone (M600i, W960i, P1i)
SonyEricsson early pace using the windows mobile operating system appear to wash a positive response. Far day waiting series SonyEricsson Xperia X1 parable awaits first child was born. We already do, and how the physical construction. Not only pure but sleding curve shape. Call the manufacturer of this design is Arc sliding design. Able to guess this kind of construction so that we deliberately made us more comfortable to enjoy all the Is. This happens because the screen is not prevented in...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average not helpful
Advantages: cellphone with ipod, camera and internet all in one and in your pocket, loads of apps to download Disadvantages: battery life, syncing with iTunes, rubbish default earphones
...among ppl who only used PCs and mp3 players, no Mac computers or iPods etc. Apple is also considered somewhat pricey around here, so I never had a reason to go explore.
The iPhone made a change for me as it caught my attention while the first generation was brought to the market but back then I had just bought a new cellphone, so couldn?t afford another one and I kinda ignored the iPhone.
As the second generation came, I was tempted again and after I had a chance to play a little with my friend?s iPhone 3G, I knew I was getting one sooner or later. I owned a SonyEricssonW960i (see my review, if interested) and I WAS happy with it, but now having the iPhone I know there?s no way back.
The iPhone gives freedom I didn?t know of before. The touchscreen is awesome and responsivity of the device is really high, generally it?s way faster...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Messaging / Data Features: XHTML Browser, RSS feeds, VoIP client
JAVA applications: Built-in
Internet Browser: Built-in
Mobile Email Client: Built-in
Multimedia features
Playback Digital Video Formats: RealVideo and RealAudio (RealMedia), 3gp, H.263 video and AMR audio
Downloadable Content: Audio files, video files, games, ring tones, screensavers, wallpapers
Manufacturer's product description
With two stylish headsets supplied in the box (one of these the new Stereo Bluetooth Headset HBH-DS220) and a music listening time of up to 27 hours, you're free to dance much more than the night away. Album arts, TV shows and games. You can navigate the
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