I'm super-excited to report that my new phone is here from Hong Kong! A hearty-red Sony Ericsson W910i. — No idea when this is going on sale in the USA (…rumored for the holidays?), but it might never due to the similar but cheaper-looking W580i having just been released.
A few things that I really like:
- TrackID: A free version of many carriers' music recognition service. — Hold the phone up to record a song that's playing, and it'll utilize your phone's internet connection to figure out what it's called in about 15 or 20 seconds. Awesome! 🎤
- It came with a 2GB Memory Stick M2 already installed… this thing is tiny, yet holds so much! — The phone ships with a USB-key style card reader, and a USB-cable… both of which transfer files very quickly over USB 2. (Photos, videos, music, etc.)
- Lumines, one of my favorite games for PSP, is pre-installed. 😎
The screen on the device boasts a super-crisp 240x320 resolution, unlike many phones that display somewhat “soft” images using cheaper LCDs. — Getting it setup for AT&T wasn't too difficult, but I couldn't use my iPhone's SIM card since they're apparently only designed for that one phone. I had to drive over to the AT&T Store and ask for a replacement (which was free), so that was unexpected.
The WAP settings and MMS settings for AT&T also had to be entered manually. (Keep in mind these instructions are for the W810i, my previous phone, but the menus are similar.)
There were a handful of things I'm not a huge fan of, though:
- There's no flash for the camera this time… although I will admit, I used it as a flashlight more often than for pictures. 😅
- No standard headphone jack on the phone 😕, but they do include a cabled-adapter with microphone and “Send / End” button on the remote. — It does support stereo over Bluetooth for wireless headphones, though!
- The menu interface can “lag” a bit sometimes… so I hope they fix that with a software update.
- As far as I know, there's no way to keep your ringtones from showing up under your song lists with other music, at least yet. — That is definitely annoying, as the tracks are genuinely much shorter.
- The phone supports video-calling through it's front-camera, but the carriers in the USA don't. — I tried video-calling a friend from South Africa who's living in Connecticut and has a K800i, but it failed immediately… while normal voice-calling is of course fine.
- Unfortunately, Apple doesn't officially support it with iSync yet, but luckily someone wrote a plug-in!
… The only things that I felt the need to install were Google Maps Mobile, which is a great way to check road traffic, and also Opera Mini for getting a better mobile-web experience.
Anyway, this phone should work nicely with AT&T(/Cingular), T-Mobile, or any other GSM cellular provider here in the USA. 👍🏻
I'm already creating ringtones on Mobile17. 😉