Decent but disappointing (Sony Ericsson K770i)

Member Name: iamasadlittleboy

Product:	Sony Ericsson K770i
Date:	07/02/09 (320 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Camera, it's a sony, it works

Disadvantages: Read the review

I got this at the start of December as an Early birthday present (I turned 21 on Christmas eve) after my w610i finally conked out, and with in a week secretly regretted not taking the other one was offered (k800i). I had previously used Sony's exclusively for the previous 4 years starting with the k700i, which was upgraded to the k750i, which was upgraded to the k800i, which vanished (got stolen...?) then got the w610i. There was a w900i that i had for about 2 months before passing it on with a broken screen (a problem my brothers since had 3 times with the very same phone).

So I had a decent idea of what to expect, a candy bar phone, brilliant camera, easy to use, decent music player, easy inteface... Welll thats it, it wasn't quite that welcoming. For those that have used the k800i or the k700/750 they'll all know about the phones layout, more specifically the short cut buttons on the side for the camera and music player, as well as for the volumne. Sadly the one of these I often found the most useage for has vanished, the music button's no longer there (or anywhere for that matter).

In fact the music players gone from being really good to being totally crap, sorry but what the hell were Sony thinking when they gave use this crap to play music? I am a big fan of having all my multimedia in one place, my camera, phone and mp3 player are all my phone and likewise my digital radio, CD player and DVD player is my laptop. But the music player just seems so difficult on here, needing to go fully through the menu systems when it used to be a matter of pressing 1 button. I know some of you reading are thinking im just being lazy, but walking around pressing a button whilst it's in your pocket is easier than taking it out of your pocket, going through the menu, putting music player on, having your headphones come out of the phone as you try to put it back in et ad finium. In fact the head phones coming out often turns the music player off full stop. Hugely irritating.

The buttons are easy enough, the phone unlike the rest of the serious has directional buttons and no long the dreaded stick that gets sticky...(yes I realise how badly worded that is), and this is the phones selling point over it's brothers and sisters, the stick, seemed to want to quit working after 9 months which meant you'd need to find a needle to get out the white gunk (skin?) that had gotten behind it.

Though another gripe is the buttons, on the other phones theres a "Toolbar" button, which allowed you simply to switch between programs. Now this is something that won't effect most folk, but as I usually use the internet on my phone (Via the Opera Browser I've downloaded) I'd like to switch between that and the music player quickly, sadly to do this on the older phones it was:
Press toolbar button, switch programs
Now it's:
Press the hang up button, click minimise, go through the menu's, switch programs.

For an upgrade (from the k700/750) it seems to be a huge step backwards on the grounds of user interface.

The camera however is equal with the k800i, both 3.2 mega pixels of beautiful quality which takes wonderous pictures, and explains why it's my first choice digital camera at the moment. I can't complain at all about this, at the bottom of this review theirs links to to a picture taken with the k800 and one taken with the k770 for your compartive needs.

Now the more normal phone functionality (probably or more concern to the readers here), the phones easy enough to make and recieve calls with, if your used to Sony's you'll find it as quite natural, though if your used to other phone's I'm not sure ow you'll find it, same applies to texting really.
Taking photo's is again easy, open the lens and click away, nothing difficult there.

The additional functions are alarm, calendar, stopwatch, timer, torch and calculator among other bits and bobs that you'll never use. Which can come in useful (sneaking down the stairs at night is the torches main use).

The text memory can store upto 1000 messages which is nice enough, the internal memory can be expanded with an M2 memory card which really makes the phone so much more useful than the default memory.

Overall the phone is fine and I'm griping at things most people won't notice, but they bug me, and thats the problem, I like using opera, i like listening to music. Many will have an mp3 player and won't use the mobile net much, if at all. If your wanting a stylish, and useable phone this will do the job, but there are better alternatives out there.

Picture comparision:
K800i picture of a giant Penguin in the plaza in Paisley taken in 07:
http://img12.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dsc000046 nl9.jpg

Picture of my bedroom taken 2 weeks ago with k770i:
http://img3.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dsc00812wm 7.jpg

Summary: should have been better

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