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> I Got a W800 (quick review:
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Recieved a retail W800 2 days ago directly from Sony Ericsson. A great iPod Killer.
just a couple of quick considerations:
If SE wants to really compete with iPod (and they could as their product has a phone and an FM Radio with RDS inside), they MUST make also a MAC software to easily transfer music to the memory stick on the phone. As it is now, with Mac OS X Tiger, when copying files to the card, .ds files are created wich mess up the phone.
Music software is really good. lacks a couple of features here and there, like a proper equalizer (the integrated one is not so good), but very usable.
An annoying feature: when turned on you can choose if power only the player or also the phone, but if listening to music when phone is on and wanted to turn phone off leaving player on, you must first turn everything off and then press power again, and it's not so quick to do.
Headphones are also very good ergonomically and in sound quality. Lack of commands on the remote though. Must keep phone in hands if you want to keep the pause or volume always handy. Good thing is that you can plug any headphones half way through the cable where the phone/answer button is. Bad thing is that the earphones plug on the phone is a bit big. Would preferred something smaller like the ipod.
OS barely gets slower when music is on. Not very noticable.
Another dissapointing thing I noticed is that I thought it was silver and orange (in press pics it looked like that), instead it turns out that silver is actually a yellowish white, wich does not fit very well with silver buttons and metallic orange... makes it look cheaper.
My conclusions are that this is a great great phone. Something that makes you think of placing your ipod in the closet for good. It's the first walkman phone and keeps up it's expectations. If this is what they came up as first product i believe the future is bright.
As i said though, the big downside is the lack of mac music software, especially considering that motorola is coming up with a phone with itunes mobile right inside... and mac users might be far less than window users, but they are for sure big trend setters and SE can't think of making a product wich is worse than another (i-moto), and should not be a great deal for them porting a piece of software, they did it with the theme generator...
K750 or W800 ??
did not have a chance to see a K750 yet so cannot tell if screen and photos are worse but i can say that pics i took in a low light closed room where very grainy. Not much better than a k700, a part from size, so i guess the rumors could be true.
As i said, the yellowish white (next to that metallic orange and silver buttons) on the w800 is quite dissapointing, to the point that most collegues in my office came up saying that it was a really ugly phone! So if design is what you are looking for buy a K750 with an extra 512mb card, if you find a good deal you could even spend less than a new w800!
The mobile-review pictures in their review show exactly what i mean by yellowish white. Very different from initial press pictures. I believe that is a last minute change over early prototypes. Or just good lighting press pictures.
About the itunes dilemma (manual says it is compatible with it):
Yes it works with itunes but no it does not work with i tunes. iTunes does NOT see the phone as it does with an iPod. You can use iTunes to drag songs directly on to the memory stick (wich mounts on the desktop when usb cable is connected) but:
1: if you navigate the phone's music player by artist, the phone will ONLY see mp3's if organized in "artist/album/song" directory order. So you must create folders by hand before copying mp3's.
2: You can drag the files from the finder OR from itunes window but iTunes does not let you drag folders and playlists so you still have to create foders in the memory stick manually.
3: If you have a mac, the system will create invisible files of 0k size wich the phone will see and list as non playable files and give errors so you NEED a utility like FinderCleaner to eliminate all invisible mac files BEFORE ejecting the memory stick.
4: On a mac, copying files is VERY slow. It takes about 3 minutes for a 60mb album. iPod takes the same time for 10 albums.... very annoying. Taht is because the card is NOT mac formatted so it's way slower. Don't know at this point if you can format the card for mac. I don't have a spare one to try and the original has system files on it. Alternatively you can buy a memory stick reader and put the card in there but ejecting it out of the phone is NOT so easy, there is a rubber protection that gives me the impression of braking quick if used too much.
if you have a mac all this is quite annoying especially if you are used to an iPod.
After 48hours of extensive use, this is my wishlist for future versions of W800, on the mp3 part. If these features could be implemented, i would without any doubt put my iPod in the closet for good.
- Full id3 tag display. Currently it truncates long titles.
- Mac compatibility especially for hidden files.
- USB speed on non mac (probably the slow speed is due to the fact that the card is NOT mac formattted).
- Ability to turn off phone and leave player on also when phone is ALREADY ON.
- Remove the folder artist/album/song limitation. Let it do automatically like ipod does. I'd like the possibility of copying files in whatever structure i want, and the phone menu automatically organizes them just like ipod does.
- Volume control and play pause control also on the microphone piece on the headset.
- A proper eq with user presets.
The next 2 features would be a dream if true:
- Firewire
- a bundle version with a 2gb or even 4gb card standard.
As you can see, there isn't much to improve (a part from the last 2), to make it a real iPod killer.... and this is only their first official attempt.
my opinion
the rest of the phone is GREAT. A great feature i did not expect is the charge via USB!
Simon
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Posted: 2005-08-04 11:54:59
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Awesome review, thanks!
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Posted: 2005-08-05 03:33:07
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nice effort - thanks! might be an idea to find third party phone covers to fix up the colour scheme.
and welcome to esato
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Posted: 2005-08-05 03:43:42
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detailed review. thanks.
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Posted: 2005-08-05 05:05:23
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Interesting!
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Posted: 2005-09-14 18:54:09
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Interesting read - thanks
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Posted: 2005-09-14 23:10:21
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Welcome to esato and great review
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Posted: 2005-09-14 23:11:14
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Exelent review!! I too have had mine for 48hrs now and love it to bits
I totaly agree with the Off white colour tho! It is so easy for it to get dirty!! That part really lets the look of the phone down but appart from that the W800`s are great phones
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Posted: 2005-09-15 00:32:48
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"iPod killer"? Hardly, even now that iPod nano has just been released.
IMO, instead of buying myself a very expensive 2GB MSDuo in order for w800i to even come close to a dedicated MP3 player, I'd rather buy an iPod nano.
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Posted: 2005-09-15 04:42:28
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Great Review...Thank you!
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Posted: 2005-09-15 05:28:26
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