OSNews: http://www.osnews.com/story/19283/Review_Sony_Ericsson_K850i Exploring the Future of Computing en-us Copyright 2001-2009, David Adams adam+nospam@osnews.com Tue, 24 Nov 2009 09:37:40 GMT http://www.osnews.com/images/osnews.gif OSNews.com http://www.osnews.com Comment by moleskine http://osnews.com/thread?299614 http://osnews.com/thread?299614 Thanks for this review. There's no substitute for going along to a store and testing things out in your hands, imho. I was tempted by another phone in the range using the same form factor and key arrangement. A few goes with it soon showed me that these tiny keys and my fingers don't make a happy match. Too bad, as there's a lot else to like here.

Does this phone come with software for your PC or Mac? I don't think you mention this. But I like to back-up the stuff in my phone on a regular basis and a good PC suite is important for this. Nokia's is pretty naff-looking imho, but at least it works OK. Still doesn't come across as much more than a token effort, though. I don't like their rudeness in dropping a hook into your Windows startup ini. Good programs should always ask before doing this, and give users the choice of having a program always on or run and closed when it suits. Wed, 06 Feb 2008 12:51:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (moleskine) Comments RE: Comment by moleskine http://osnews.com/thread?299618 http://osnews.com/thread?299618

Does this phone come with software for your PC or Mac?

I have the predecessor to this, the k800i. Plug it in through USB and it shows up as removable storage. I've loaded photos and a couple of GB of music by drag and drop. A ringtone can be any audio file you put on it.

But if you want to do more sophisticated syncing of stuff I guess you have to use the software that comes with it. I've never tried it, but there's nothing on the packaging about supporting Macs. Maybe the k850 does though. Wed, 06 Feb 2008 13:13:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (jaylaa) Comments RE: Comment by moleskine http://osnews.com/thread?299623 http://osnews.com/thread?299623 The manual only mentions Windows XP and Vista. So no Mac OS support for the synchronization. But you can use the Mass Storage function.

I just got this phone and so far I really like it. The resolution is beautiful and the camera functions are brilliant. I did BTW got it to record of the videocall cam though, I did it while trying to make a video call, which didn't work and I was asked if I wanted to record a video message. This clip then showed up in my Media folder.

I really like the motion sensor in the phone, when you're in Media mode and flip the phone it changes the view! There is even a weird kind of ball game in there which uses the sensor to roll the ball.

The touch keys do need a little getting used to but when you got the hang of it it's really weird to use a phone where you really have to push the buttons. Some people using the phone think the whole screen is touchscreen because they have to touch the softkeys, which is a bit confusing at first.

The phone feels solid and looks tough, perfect for me, I don't like those slimline-superthin phones.

It's an almost perfect phone and I would give it a 9/10, being a SE it already scores 7/10 in my opinion and the Media and Camera functions make it a 9. Wed, 06 Feb 2008 14:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (mike_a) Comments Comment by Laurence http://osnews.com/thread?299627 http://osnews.com/thread?299627 I'm a big fan of the K-series SE phones however I do have a couple of niggles I wish they'd address:
* The PC sync has got progressively worse (both the Windows software and the way the the phone can't recieve calls / texts while plugged into the PC)
* The camera picture quality is poor (yes I know it's a phone and not a digital camera, but I'd much rather have a 2 mega-pixel camera with a sharp clear image quality than a 5mpx camera that's grainy
* The camera image capture is impracticably slow. Again I'd happily settle for a lower mpx camera if the capture speed was quicker.

These are only relatively minor points for what is an excelent series of phones so there's a likely chance my next upgrade (due in a couple of months) will this phone. Wed, 06 Feb 2008 14:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Laurence) Comments pictures http://osnews.com/thread?299632 http://osnews.com/thread?299632 For some nice pictures of the device:

http://www.mobilecowboys.nl/toestellen/5055/fromfeed Wed, 06 Feb 2008 15:21:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (netpython) Comments volume http://osnews.com/thread?299700 http://osnews.com/thread?299700 How was the actual volume on the phone? Maybe i'm going deaf young, but my last few phones seem to be way too quiet. Thu, 07 Feb 2008 03:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (kadams) Comments RE: volume http://osnews.com/thread?299705 http://osnews.com/thread?299705 It was good for my ears. ;) Thu, 07 Feb 2008 04:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Eugenia) Comments Picture quality http://osnews.com/thread?299978 http://osnews.com/thread?299978 Hi,

Nice phone, but the photo quality seems bad to me, the noise is less important that on my k750i by far, but it's like if the picture had an 'impressionist' filter applied on it., For instance the face of Kojak is not smooth.

They've just replaced one problem with another.

Of course, this is not really important with a phone, other functions are really great. Fri, 08 Feb 2008 09:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Manuel FLURY) Comments RE: Picture quality http://osnews.com/thread?299979 http://osnews.com/thread?299979 At least theres no joystick anymore. All the K750's joysticks break in the first 1 or 2 years. Fri, 08 Feb 2008 09:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Auzy) Comments RE[2]: Picture quality http://osnews.com/thread?299981 http://osnews.com/thread?299981 Oh God, the joysticks. Who the hell thought that was a good design? Fri, 08 Feb 2008 10:02:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Soulbender) Comments RE[3]: Picture quality http://osnews.com/thread?299994 http://osnews.com/thread?299994 Oups, mine is still in a correct state.

According to my current luck, I guess it should break within a few weeks Fri, 08 Feb 2008 11:14:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Manuel FLURY) Comments