Sony Ericsson W580i

The W580i is another product by the Sony and Ericsson combined effort. The unit's stylish and no frills design utilizes a slide opening mechanism and is available in equally attractive silver / orange and black / orange color combinations. The new Walkman logo right beneath the screen alone is enough to make most mobile phone aficionados' hearts start pumping. Most especially true for the music loving mobile phone user looking for seamless cell phone and media player integration. The W580i's music player can play back not only MP3 files but AAC, AAC+, eAAC+ and WMA files as well, making it versatile. So Apple users would certainly delight in this fact as a lot of Mac users prefer the AAC format.

The W580i fails though in the memory department; providing only 12 mega bytes of built in memory. This is ironic since the W580i is targeted at the music-lugging demography, and 12 Mb is obviously not enough. As expected, the unit does have a memory slot for users who want to upgrade their storage with a Micro M2 memory card. Good thing that the W5801 has its own stereo FM tuner. Still, for its purpose the internal memory should have been enough for at least a decent collection of tracks.

Sony Ericsson W580i Camera and Display

The Sony Ericsson W580i houses a 2 mega pixel camera with digital zoom capable of recording still images and videos. And the built in camera in this unit is very reliable. It may not be the best in the market, but what you are getting is certainly great for its price. Bright outdoor shots have sharp details and pictures taken at overcast environments sill look decent. But as expected with camera phones, indoor photos do not render well and the picture noise level is noticeable. But all in all, picture taking with the W580i's camera is a pleasurable experience. It even comes with its own set of menus dedicated to the camera and video functions.

The user has the option of taking photographs in VGA, 1 mega pixel, or 2 mega pixel sizes. Additional shooting modes such as panorama and burst are also offered. Shots can be tweaked a bit more with the camera application's white balance, color effects, and others. A nice addition also is the photo blogging feature which allows the user to not only send images via MMS messaging but can also publish their photos directly from the phone to a blog site. Now that's mobility, and may get a big chunk of the web logging market. Photos are displayed well with the W580i's 240 x 320 pixel resolution screen.

Sony Ericsson W580i Design and Accessories

With the W580i, Sony Ericsson refuses to be outdone in the design department. It looks stylishly clever with a minimalist flair. With the slider closed, the façade is only occupied by the glorious screen, a large D-pad and a couple of buttons on each side. The orange accents give the W580i its youthful flair, especially with the Walkman logo at the center of the phone's width. Once you slide the W580i open, the ergonomically designed striking orange keypad is revealed. At this point though, the fun stops. As upon great inspection you will notice the frailty of the phone's keypad. This is a shame as with the unit targeted towards the youthful market, heavy duty texting is sure to occur.

This is no good when your keypad has the tendency to crack. And the slider is definitely no toughie either and has the tendency to quickly accumulate dust in between the two halves of the phone. The D-pad though is a joy to use. This is as should be considering that the D-pad will experience heavy use when navigating though songs and other files. When you don't have the luxury to look at the phone's D-pad when doing certain activities during music playback, therefore rendering it hard to navigate through your tracks, you may choose to just shake things up, literally. The W580i has a clever little feature called the Shake Control that allows the listener to skip to the next track by just pressing on the Walkman logo and then shaking the phone. This little feature proves very useful indeed, especially during athletic activities like jogging or biking.

Summary of Sony Ericsson W580i Features

• Weight: 94 g
• Width: 47 mm
• Height: 99 mm
• Thickness: 14 mm
• Network: Quad Band (GSM 850, GSM 900, GSM 1800 & GSM 1900)
• Screen Resolution: diag: 2”. 262k TFT Color Screen (240 x 320 Pixels)
• Data: GPRS Class 10 (4+1/3+2 slots), 32 - 48 kbps, HSCSD, EDGE Class 10, 236.8 kbps
• Connectivity: EDGE, Bluetooth, USB, Fast Port, GPRS, Modem
• Web Browser: Access NetFront™ Web Browser, RSS Feeds
• Music: FM Radio, Walkman® Music Player (MP3 & AAC)
• Camera: 2 Mega pixel Camera, 4 x Digital Zoom
• Messaging: SMS, MMS, SMS Long, Email
• Expansion Slot: Memory Stick Micro M2 Option
• Tones: Polyphonic Ringtones, MP3 & AAC Tones, Vibration
• Software Features: Sony Ericsson OS, PC Suite software
• Other Features: Java Games, MusicDJ, PlayNow, Picture Blogging, Macromedia Flash Lite
• Battery: Sony Ericsson standard BST-38 Li-Polymer rechargeable battery (3.6v). 930mAh capacity, 9 Hours Talk Time, 370 Hours Standby

PROS: Good camera, Shake control, Photo blogging, good quality inclusive ear buds, great connectivity, stylish and ergonomic design, more than decent music playback, long battery life

CONS: The keypad has tendencies to crack, slider easily accumulates dust, small memory space

Overall: If music is your thing and you are looking for a clever mobile phone and media player integration, then the W580i is definitely for you. It tops in both the form and function department with a lot more additional perks than its size would make you think possible.