Multi talented phone (Sony Ericsson K800i)

Member Name: cheesycal

Product:	Sony Ericsson K800i
Date:	12/09/06 (5633 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: impressive array of features, excellent camera with xenon flash

Disadvantages: power hungry, poor battery life, slightly big and heavy. video quality is poor

Around this time of year, sony ericsson tends to release a multitalented phone that is both highly functional and affordable. it is very difficult to get the balance right and so far from most of the phone manufacturers, it has constantly been sony ericcson who has almost hit the mark. last year, it was the sony ericsson (SE) k750..this year it is the k800.

by comparison, with the release of the k800, is the nokia n70 which is capable of more but very expensive and the samsung d900 which is not as talented as the k800. i do not have the nokia n70 but i do have the samsung d900. but i shall not compare these two as dooyoo.co.uk does not have a review page for the d900 as yet.

the k800 is the first phone from sony ericsson to be branded with "cyber-shot" the camera brand of sony. it is a 3G phone enabling users to download faster and allows video calls and also video downloads.

as usual with my reviews, i will try to break it down into sizeable chunks.



DESIGN+LOOKS
the k800 is a candy-bar phone (ie it has a screen and keypad below that screen making it look supposedly like a candy bar) with dimensions of 10.5 x 4.7 x 2.2 cm. the phone is slightly longer than the k750 and slightly thicker than its predecessor too. the thickness however is not uniform - near the camera, it becomes a bit thicker and add to it the camera lens cover and you end up with perhaps 1cm thicker at the top. when you lay it down on a table however, it is nice to see the phone slanted so at an angle (due to the increased thickness at the top) but sometimes it looks a little unwieldly.

the screen is fairly large (3 by 4cm) and has a resolution of 240X320 capable of displaying 256K colours.

the phone is a fairly standard SE candybar phone lookswise but the one thing to notice is that the numeric keypad is failry small and is dwarfed by the elongated screen (ie it looks out of proportion). the wieght is 115g which is on the heavy side

the back of the phone, as i mentioned before, has a bump where the camera lens sits. the camera lens cover is purple and slides down to reveal a lens.

the overall colour scheme of the phone is black, grey and purple (purple lens cover and menu key backlight). the purple backlight behind the menu keys is a particularly nice touch and makes the phone look more sophisticated. overall, the phone looks sophistaked and i suppose "chic" but on longer closer inspection, some awkward disproportionate features take away some of the shine.

features+performance

there are features galore in this phone:

3.2mp camera with xenon flash capable of taking video clips
a small front vga video camera for video calls
bluetooth
mp3 player
radio
internet through 3G
quite advanced java games
downloadable applications
voice dialling
expandable memory

i'll run through the important features in detail

CAMERA/VIDEO

the camera is capable of taking 3.2mp pictures which is quite amazing. given the cyber shot brand, you would expect it to take standalone camera picture quality. and you wouldnt be disappointed. to be fair, any phone camera will not come close to a standalone camera..even a 3.2mp camera phone will not do better than say a nikon or canon 2mp digital camera. however, in relation to other camera phones, the k800 is unrivalled save sor the n70 which i hear as similar if not better quality.

pictures taken on the k800 are clear and crisp and colours rendered very well. the autofocus also works very well in a similar fashion to the k750. there is a marketing gimick called the bestshot or something like that which is supposed to help you take a good picture. basically it takes in quick succession 9 or 15 pictures and you can select one or all of the pictures to save. in effect it isa multiple exposure picture which is present in most average camera phones in anycase. dont be duped by salesmen who go on about this!

another thing that sets the k800 from most other camera phones is the use of the xenon flash. unlike most phones that utilise a really bright LED to replace a flash, the k800 uses the flash commonly seen in cameras. therefore you get excellent quality in dark environments. the LEDs in most phones aren't really flashes and do not penetrate beyond half a metre at most. the k800 is capable of taking good pictures of a subject 2 metres away in complete darkness!

there are other features in this camera phone that you would expect in a standalone digital camera. various settings adn even red eye reduction involved in the k800 shows that it deserves teh "cybershot" branding.

the video camera on the other hand is not quite as good as i would have liked. as with the k750, the video quality is not in keeping with the camera quality and even at the very best quality recording, the video is blocky and streaky. i was quite unhappy with this as i had expected sony ericsson to pay more attention to video quality. by comparison, the samusng d900 has an infinitely better video recording that is very clear.

the video calling is quite fun. you access this through the main menu rather than the camera menu (since you are using a different camera). you are given a preview of your face on the bottom left corner of your screen and more than half of the screen is dedicated to the face of your caller. quite fun but i cant see myself using it much.

BLUETOOTH and CONNECTIVITY
bluetooth is easily accessed through the phone settings menu and nothing has really changed from the k750. it is easy to use and also rather fast at transferring files. if you have a bluetooth dongle on your computer, you can use the k800 has a remote which is useful when doing powerpoint presentations. you are given a cd with the sony ericsson computer suite and it takes a while to install all the drivers for your phone. after that however, the suite is user friendly and quite exhaustive in what you can do. you can sync it with your computer ie outlook contacts, email, even time and date and load phone contacts, videos, songs, etc.

MP3 player and radio
the mp3 player is once again quite intuitive and there isnt much to say about it really. you have the option to play mp3s through the loudspeaker which is indeed very loud and the sound is quite good. the radio, unfortunately i havent really used, but i expect it to be very good like the k750...(im sorry!)

the headphone socket is a proprietary one meaning that you cannot plug in your sennheiser or even sony headphones witha standard jack. you are supplied with headphones/handsfree kit in anycase but these arent very good quality. you can buy an adapter nowadays if you search around.

3G
3G means that you can use video calls as well as an improved internet access (compared to GPRS or WAP). the internet access is indeed fast but it tends to be that 3G sites are also more packed full of pictures and flashing bits so it still takes some time to load. some companies offer free replays of the goals from the premiership..these are quite good in terms of quality...you can make out the ball and its movement but i wouldnt buy 3G for this sort of service.

GAMES+APPLICATIONS
bundled with the phone are 3 games...fotoquest fishing (cant remember the exact name), minigolf castle 3D and a tennis game. minigolf castle 3d is played using the k800 on its side therefore giving a wide screen rather than a long screen. you can hook up for multiplayer games through bluetooth for the golf and tennis...but i dont see the appeal. there are 4 more games you can download from the sony ericsson site including quadrapop, a puzzle game similar to tetris that is fun!

you get two applications with this also. a face warp program into which you load a photo and it warps the face for you (fun for about 2 seconds) and a no nonsense photo prinitng program designed to hook you up to a photo printer by bluetooth. here you can adjust how you want your photo printed but no excitement here either.

currently the k800 is still relatively new and therefore there are not many programs and games availabe. but i expect this phone to become really popular and soon there'll be plenty of things to download.

the k750 has a smaller screen therefore the games and applications will work but not in full screen mode.


OVERALL
i've just realised that this review is getting long. so i'll be quick about the rest.
k800 has onboard memory of 72 mb which is large but then again quite small if you wish to use the phone as a camera or an mp3 player. for these purposes you can expand the memory using sony's new M2 memory cards which as usual with sony's proprietary products is more expensive without offering much advantage. you are looking at around 40 pounds for a 512mb card although hopefully the prices will be lowered.

the call quality is very good. you have options to use the normal GSM bands only, 3G only or all and an icon will pop up when 3G is available. therefore since it can spread over all bands, you wont experience recpetion problems unless you wish to use 3G capablilties. the sound is quite clear although slightly on the low volume side.

ringtones are downloadable or you can use your mp3s has ringtones. they are very clear and loud.

i think i have written enough! thanks for reading all of this!

i would not recommend replacing your camera or your mp3 player with this phone despite its features. standalone proiducts will always do better and offer more features. also the memory card for the k800 (M2) is expensive and not switchable with the memory stick pro duo or whatever sony has made in the past.

in all a multitalented phone that excels in all departments with a camera deserving of the cybershot brand.

ps k800 is quite power hungry and if you use the features you will probably need to charge every night or so...the battery life on normal usage i would say is about a day and a half to two days so i plug in my charger every night. as reported by other users, it does tend to crash once in a while. it also has a slight lag in the software.

Summary: phone every bit deserving of the cybershot brand which performs in all areas

Processing/Quality:
Reliability:
Ease of use:
Sound quality:
Variety of features: