Mobile Phone Blog:

Overview

As one of the first handset-makers to toy with the idea of cameras combined with phones (back in the days before Sony came along, and Ericsson built a clip-on camera for the T39), Sony Ericsson have a reputation as one of the guiding lights of the camera phone world. That reputation was cemented even further with the release of their first phone to carry the Cyber-shot branding, the K800i. That was the first phone that combined a phone with the high-end features of a Cyber-shot digital camera.

But now there’s a new kid on the block, a new Cyber-shot phone taking the brand to a whole new level. It’s the first 5 megapixel Cyber-shot camera phone to be released, and it goes by the name of “Sony Ericsson K850i”.

Expectations were very high for this phone, upon release, and as Sony Ericsson’s first 5 megapixel phone, it was always going to be very much in the spotlight. But the big question is: can the K850i live up to the hype, and actually be as good as everyone hoped it would be?

Design & Construction

The anticipation as I opened this phone was heightened by the exquisite box the Sony Ericsson K850i comes in, mimicking the gloss black body of the phone, complete with green detailing.

As for the phone itself, it is definitely a descendant of the early Cyber-shot phones. You can see that just in the layout of the phone’s body, the chunky, solid feel of the handset and the smooth lines. And then, of course, the Cyber-shot logo itself is a big clue.

The Sony Ericsson K850i I’m reviewing here is the green variant, which differs from the blue version in 2 key ways:

1. The green insert round the sides of the phone, as well as the green nav-key on this phone, are rendered in blue on the other variant.
2. The surround on the sides of the phone, around the coloured strip (here in gloss black) are silver on the blue variant.

How aesthetically pleasing you’ll find the phone will depend on what your taste is, and for sure, the gloss black won’t appeal to everyone, nor will the single, smooth surface covering the back of the Sony Ericsson K850i. However, it does sit very nicely alongside the beautiful screen, and the body as a whole, to my mind, is visually stunning.

However, it’s not without issues. The gloss black body is very shiny, to the point that it shows every single smudge and fingerprint, which the surface of the K850i picks up all too easily. A more immediate and noticeable issue, though, is the nav-key. Unlike previous Sony Ericsson phones, this stretches around the 2 and 5 keys, which in itself takes some getting used to. Combine that with the touch-sensitive pads just below the screen (instead of hardware-based softkeys), and it makes the middle touchpad a little too easy to accidentally catch when you actually meant to press up on the nav-key. It’s not a huge problem, but it does take a little bit of patience (not to mention a lighter touch, when using the phone.) Now, personally, I like the touch-keys, as I’ve used a touchscreen phone for the last 5 years, but I can see how a lot of people wouldn’t get on with them.

First Thoughts On Using The Phone

Once you get past the annoying little issue with the nav-key, the Sony Ericsson K850i comes into its own as a very well put-together, very intuitive phone. The menu system is very reminiscent of earlier Cyber-shot phones, and crucially, is very easy to navigate. Not only that, but unlike some other phones I’ve used, everything is laid out in a logical way in the menu system. Not only that, but you can change the whole look of the menus, using different Themes, of which several come preloaded on the K850i.

The only issue I would mention is that the lack of hardware softkeys has meant a change in layout of the onscreen softkeys, and what each one does. Actually, that’s not strictly true, as the softkeys still work the same, despite being touch-based, so I’m not entirely sure why the onscreen softkeys have changed.

That’s made it slightly harder to find what you’re looking for (hint: press the Shortcuts button, next to the CALL key, if you can’t easily find what you’re looking for… 90% of the time, you’ll find it there), and that, I have to admit, loses the K850i a few points. And I have to make you aware, if you’re going to be spending any time using the features on the K850i, they’re very power-intensive, so be prepared to charge it frequently!

Camera

Now we come to the Sony Ericsson K850i’s pièce de résistance, thevery reason for its existence: the 5 megapixel Cyber-shot camera. And make no mistake, there are NO issues here…

As a long time fan of camera phones, I tend to be very harsh when it comes to judging them. We’ve seen so many good ones over the years, and such advances, that any new one which wants to catch my attention has to be truly breathtaking. Anything below 2 megapixels, nowadays, and I’m not interested… and any new camera phone I see, even if the resolution is way above anything else on the market, had better be good, or I will pick it apart to find faults.

With the Sony Ericsson K850i, I’m very happy to report that the camera is simply phenomenal. Yes, it has 5 megapixels, but crucially, those megapixels are tied together with exceptional lenses, and Cyber-shot technology such as image stabiliser. Along with the xenon flash, it’s these features, the ones that people often overlook, that truly make a good camera. It’s all good having loads of megapixels, but if everything else about the camera is poor, you will get poor photos. It’s that simple.

To put that into the context of the K850i… with this phone, you’ll get breathtaking photos, far beyond what anyone thought camera phones were capable of even 6 months ago. In fact, the only thing it’s lacking is optical zoom, which is a hard thing to do without, but to make up for that, you have to factor in the fact that like a true digital camera, the K850i can accept two types of memory card: Sony’s Memory Stick Micro (M2) format, and microSD cards.

Media Player

Once you’ve taken photos with your Sony Ericsson K850i, they’re saved in the media folder, which is where the media management of this phone comes into play. Touted as being based on the media management system of Sony’s PSP and PS3, it is certainly very slick. Having never used a PSP or a PS3, I can’t compare how it looks next to them, but judged purely on its own merits, it is a very well handled, very smooth and very intuitive interface.

One click of the Media tab takes you through into the media front page, where you’ll find the categories listed (Photos, Music, Video, Settings). Then, it’s simply a case of pressing Select, or Right on the nav-key, and it goes through the menus in a wonderfully smooth way, with animated backgrounds and transitions between screens adding some visual variety.

A key part of the media management software is a little component in the phone called an accelerometer. This is a tiny bit of hardware that senses when the phone is upright or on its side, and sounds superfluous, until you realise that the whole screen reorients itself into landscape or portrait view, depending on what angle you hold the phone at. So, view a photo upright, it appears across the screen with black bars top and bottom. To view it on the full screen, simply turn the phone on its side.

That really is a very good feature, and makes up for nearly every one of the Sony Ericsson K850i’s shortcomings.

Telephony/Messaging/Email

Any mobile phone, no matter what extra features it has, will always be, at heart, a communications device. It’s no different with the Sony Ericsson K850i. Call quality is excellent, and the earpiece always provided very good sound, during this test. The addition of dedicated CALL and END keys (a first, for Sony Ericsson) is a bonus, and certainly makes answering or rejecting calls a good deal easier.

Moving onto that other staple of mobile communications, we come to the humble text message. Anyone who has ever used a Sony Ericsson K- or W-Series phone will feel right at home in the messaging menu, as to be honest, I can’t see any difference to previous models, other than animated transitions between menu screens. And that’s a good thing, because Sony Ericsson’s messaging layout was always amongst the better ones seen on phones.

In the messaging menu, you’ll find also find your email. This is the only speck on the excellence of the messaging menu, as I’ve always found email harder to set up on Sony Ericsson phones. This is one area where the K850i could’ve quite easily deviated from its predecessors, but alas, it hasn’t. It’s not impossible to set up your email. I just found it harder than it should be, and it loses a few more points for that.

Internet

One of the biggest growth areas in the world of mobile phones is internet access. This is one area where you would expect the Sony Ericsson K850i to excel, given that it can connect at speeds up to 3.6Mbps, via HSDPA (a faster, higher bandwidth form of 3G). Well, it certainly is fast, but don’t forget the network needs to support HSDPA to get the full speed. However, the level of HSDPA coverage is increasing across the country every day, so fortunately, that’s not a huge issue.

I’ve always had a bit of a problem with the internet on anything less than a big smartphone. I don’t feel it works properly; the screen is just too small to show you the page in any detail. Plus, there is an option to view the page in landscape mode, with the phone on its side, they’ve missed a huge trick by not using the accelerometer to automatically rotate the screen. That’s a missed opportunity, and a bit of a shame.

Applications & Games

Aside from the usual raft of applications, such as your Organiser and Calendar, you have the option of adding more, and with such a massive variety of extra content out there, it’s hard to pin down one particular application. However, it should be noted that whatever application you download, the Sony Ericsson K850i will handle it with aplomb, and it really does seem to relish loading up third party programs, which is really very good.

As for games on the phone, this isn’t really an area I can say I care for. I’ve never been one to even use the games on my phone, let alone get into them in a big way. The concept of Java games, in general, doesn’t interest me, but I have to say there is one interesting elements of the games on the K850i that caught my eye. You can use the built in accelerometer, the hardware that senses how the phone is being held, to play games. In other words, it opens up the possibility of playing a game not by pressing buttons, but by tilting and shaking the phone.

Whilst games don’t figure very much in my life, that feature there is very intriguing, and it certainly adds a new element to gameplay, if that’s your thing.

Conclusion

In conclusion, then, what do I think about the Sony Ericsson K850i. Is it the best camera phone ever?

Well, no. The camera is phenomenal, there’s no getting away from it, but it just fails to beat the Nokia N82, which I consider to be the best camera phone I’ve ever seen, and which I’ll be reviewing next week. It is a very good phone, but unfortunately, it’s far from perfect. To summarise:

Pros

- Very solidly built, and beautifully designed
- Awesome 5 megapixel camera with Cyber-shot technology
- Gloriously intuitive media manager
- The auto-rotation of the screen is one of the best features ever seen on a mobile phone
- Sony Ericsson’s messaging menu, as always, is sublime
- Support for 2 types of memory card – a first for a mobile phone!

Cons

- Attracts smudges and fingerprints far too easily
- Nav-key may get frustrating
- No optical zoom
- Power-hungry features and applications
- Key layout and interface may not be to some people’s tastes

Fortunately, though, the cons are outnumbered by the pros. The bottom line is, when the Sony Ericsson K850i is good, it’s very, very good. But there is enough room for improvement for me to say that it still has a way to go to be perfect, and that’s reflected in the overall rating. A more pertinent question might be: is it the best Cyber-shot phone ever? And to that one, the answer is a very big yes. If you buy one, whilst it’s not perfect, you’re not going to be disappointed.

Overall rating: 7.5 / 10

Grab yourself the Cyber-Shot brilliance of the Sony Ericsson K850i, today!