Sony Ericsson P800 Review

Sony Ericsson P800
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★★★★☆
4.0 / 5
From 59 reviews
78% of users recommend this

  • Screen Quality

  • Battery Life

  • Features

  • Reception

  • Style

  • Value For Money

James Hardman.'s review of Sony Ericsson P800

★★★★☆
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Sony Ericsson P800

“Sony Ericsson's P800 has Bluetooth, is tri-band, does...”

Written on: 08/06/2003 by James Hardman.

Good Points
Has everything

Bad Points
Big and pricey

General Comments
Sony Ericsson's P800 has Bluetooth, is tri-band, does picture messaging, has a camera, has a touch-screen, does web browsing, offers GPRS, and even lets you speak to other people that also have a telephone.



The fact that you can draw a map and send it to another picture-enabled 'phone is a nice touch. The camera and screen are pretty good and larger than most. They don't compete with a proper camera or the screen of a laptop, but then they're not in the same price bracket either.



Though we say the 'phone's screen is bigger than most, it still isn't big enough to do web browsing. All web pages require an awful lot of scrolling making it almost useless as a portable web browser.



We had some difficulty getting our Bluetooth HBH-30 headset to work with our P800, but after removing it and adding it back a few times it magically started working all on its own.



When collecting your voicemail, remember to leave the lid closed so you can press 3 to delete that message from your mother-in-law. This foxed us on the first attempt and though we might have been a bit thick, at the same time the phone wasn't terribly intuitive.



The biggest drawback with this monster is its weight. It's easily twice the weight of competing 'phones. Surprisingly, Sony Ericsson didn't take the opportunity to maintain the mass of the battery as a proportion of the whole, and like most 'phones, with Bluetooth enabled the battery is dead about 36 hours after a full charge.



All in all, this 'phone is disappointing, particularly once the price tag is taken into account.

  • Value For Money

  • Features

  • Reception

  • Style

118730_Nik.'s Response to James Hardman.'s Review

Written on: 25/07/2003

When reviewing phones I think it is important to compare apples with apples which I don't think you did with this review. I moved to the P800 from an SPV (4 in six months) as it offered the only alternative for what I needed it to do. The P800 is a full function PDA and a phone rolled into one, not a phone with organiser features, and as such is the best available...at the moment.
<br>
<br>So what does it do well:
<br>Large, clear screen, good contact and organiser funtions, easy synching (with a PC at least). Pulls in a signal well with good clarity, Bluetooth is nice (I have Sony Ericsson headset), triband, voice dialling. You can set up multiple WAP and GPRS dial-ups and email accounts as well as use it as a modem to your laptop.Incidentally the email client supports HTML and common attachments and you can choose to just download the headers only opening only relevant mail, thus cutting down on cost. There are also some good apps to download, which include the excellent Opera browser....oh and low cost! Only £49 on a £50 tarrif (for a minimum of 6 months) with Orange and you get £20 back for an old phone with charger and manual. Phones4U even offer it at £25, but you do need to be on a £100 a month tarrif for three months, too rich for me.
<br>
<br>Bad points:
<br>Complicated to use some applications so a fairly steep learning curve, although phone functions are straight forward. Memory stick duo means expensive (and limited) storage. Can't drag and drop files to use as ring tones...but now I'm nit picking
<br>
<br>Summary
<br>If you just want a phone don't get one. Then you will notice the size and weight of the P800 and the lack of battery life compared to phones, and it doesn't look sexy either. However if you want a full function computer in your pocket that can replace your PDA (and even my laptop although I could still provide support while on holiday), be used to keep in touch with your email on the road and also be used as a phone with triband support, voice dialling and bluetooth all in one package, there really is no alternative.

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