Sony Ericsson w960i Review

Overall Rating

Great look and feel, lots of features, good internet and planner applications

Hmm. Not a lot really. Occasionally you can press the touch screen and get haptic feedback without anything happening, but it's not that often and it's worth this one little niggle, trust me!

Believe it or not, I was given the Sony Ericsson w960i phone for FREE! I sent back my W880i several times and in the end they (O2) replaced it with this one. I couldn't believe my luck because I couldn't afford to pay the extra £80 on top of my free upgrade to get it.
Anyway...

Do you like gadgets? Do you like complicated phones that take time to find your way around? Do you want to be the coolest kid on the block and have everyone want to have a look at your new toy? Then this is the phone for you!

For starters, it's slightly larger than most of it's competitors, but it doesn't matter, what you feel like you're holding is a complicated and cool piece of technology, not some cheapo pay-as-you-go bit of tatt.

The touch-screen interface is great and responds well to both finger touch and the stylus (which unlike the Viewty, comes neatly fitted to the inside of the phone out of the way until you want it.

You can use the keypad to text and send messages, or the screen has a handwriting recognition application which is great fun, if a little fiddly to get the hang of (and let's be honest, it's a great toy too). Once you do get the hang of it though, you use it all the time.

It has email, internet, and all the usual stuff including a pretty good 3.2 Megapixel camera.

The camera itself is pretty good. To be honest, there's not a lot of difference between a 3.2 and a 5 mp camera these days and if you want an all-singing, all-dancing snapper, you'd be better off with the Viewty. However, if like me you use your mobile to take photos of your mates when you're drunk, then this one will do just fine.

When scrolling through the pictures, you can't use your finger to push them on like you can with the LG or the iPhone, which I found a trifle disappointing because the idea of a touch screen is to have that WOW factor. You can still move the screen around with your finger on the internet and most other applications though.

The battery life is pretty good for a smart phone and with normal use you can get a few days out of it - if like me you are constantly playing with it though, it will run down a lot quicker. However - this is no Nokia and out does a lot of other smart phones in this area alone.

This phone has a great 'office' suite on it and you can read Excel, word and even PDF's on it, so it makes it one of the smartest smartphones around. It's like a PDA without the 'annorak' label hanging over you. There are lots of applications you can get for the phone for free, including google maps which is pretty cool. Be warned though, get a data package if you're going to play with applications like this - it'll cost you a fortune otherwise!

It has a Sony Walkman on it of course and this is pretty good with a mega bass expansion and equalizer. It also comes with 8GB built in memory so that should keep you going thank you very much.

It has a couple of games, including a pretty good Vijay Singh golf game on it.

Basically, this is a great phone to play around with. If you're looking for an uncomplicated, straight forward touch-screen phone, I'd recommend the KF700 from LG. But if you want the Daddy of all current smart phones, this one won't let you down. I've had it for nearly two weeks and still keep finding things to do with it that I didn't know I could! I just can't leave it alone!

It's not an iPhone - it's better. And I really mean that. The iPhone has a lot of street cred and very little else. This one has everything in spades. Go on, treat yourself to a good phone for a change - you know you want to!