Sony Ericsson K500i

I love my Sony Ericsson K500i! It was an of the moment purchase after searching for a phone for over a month but I am so glad I got it!

The Sony Ericsson K500i is a nice little phone that started to give me a sore thumb after about 2.5 months. The joystick is build like rubbish! However, a serious amount of contact-spray solved my problem.

Overall, not bad, but definitely not the best!

I was going nuts when the Sony Ericsson K500i mobile phone first arrived, and friends everywhere were talking about it. I bought it in the next 3 months of its arrival, and it was bringing me respect everywhere. Two months later I had problems with its joystick. A month after that its speaker had something wrong with it, and later its low memory started causing the phone to jam in the middle of games or media player.

Overall I thought the phone was great after I bought it, if it was lacking in memory, but after it kept breaking (it went in for repair under warranty twice) I had had enough. My advice is to avoid this phone.

Had my Sony Ericsson K500i for over a week and I'm totally made up with this phone. I have got a Nokia 6610i as well but it doesn't match the k500i which does video zoom and records unlimited depending on memory. My brother just bought a Nokia 6230 which I think is no way near as good as the Sony Ericsson k500i it has only 6mb memory while the k500i has 12mb plus you can only record 4 minutes at a time and the screen is well too small so if you want a decent video phone for under a 100 pound buy the Sony Ericsson k500i and you won't be disappointed.

I was initially impressed by the feature set of the SE K500i - a good media player (albeit with a lack of memory or card slot), Java, excellent screen and reasonable camera - for the price.

I have since found that the small joystick below the screen - which is necessary to access most of the phone's features - has a lifetime of between 1 and 6 months - I have just made a warranty claim on mine after 8 weeks. I've spoken to other people who own this phone and have had the same problem with up to three replacement phones, until their warranty has expired and they've been stuck with a broken & useless phone.

I should point out that I purchased this phone in Australia, and it *may* be a localised manufacturing fault - but my advice is, _don't_ buy this phone unless you can confirm this.

Plenty of good points are packed into this easy-to-use phone. It has great 'themes' which include a moving wallpaper, and colour themes.

The menus are set out excellently, very easy to navigate. The camera is fantastic, say goodbye to blurry images! Plus, the large screen gives a great, clear display.

A handy feature is that you can write a text message without entering the main menu, the option is displayed on the start-up screen, as is your address book, and a WAP link.

The phone goes into standby mode after a short period of inactivity. It looks as if its turned off completely, but it can easily be brought off standby by pressing any button, and battery power is significantly conserved.

One thing has to be said about the Sony Ericsson K500i - if you've got £90 - buy it, because its got great fun features like mp3 player, usb compatible and video camera, which is way more than you'd get with any other phone for that price. I don't need bluetooth, because I don't have any bluetooth devices, and I only want around 4 songs on it for the mp3 anyway, so the memory ain't a problem.

Brought for £99.95 which I thought was good but then it was lowered to £79.95 the next day and got the £20 refunded - BARGAIN! (from Comet)

Doesn't have bluetooth but never used that so o well. The 3D java games are also good. If you are looking for a reasonably priced and snazzy looking with great functionality then go for this. Uploaded MP3s to the phone and they sound good specially with the loud speaker.

I think that the K500i is an excellent phone with just a couple downfalls. As soon as you pick it up you can feel how light it is and also how stylish it is especially the back of it.

The software is just like the T610 except the handy more button has been removed and instead a quick link to camera is there. The major differnce is that there are two menus really. The desktop allows you to access the most used functions easily such as writing a new text.

The fact that it can be used as an mp3 player is pretty useless as it only has 12mb of memory (I don't care as I have an iPod mini :D). I think the use of MP3 is more towards small files to be used as ringtones. Also the wallpaper can be animated.

It can also download videos off internet so really it can be seen as a 3G fone but without the ability to do video calls. It allows you to record and send video though, this can be handy when friends are doing crazy stunts of anything funnie. It can also play all types of java games and even Nokia game(many forums say this though haven't tried it myself). The 12MB memory allows you to have hundreds of games and ringtones.

The phone also has voice controls and the usual alarm, calender and notes etc etc.

Only £69.99 at the link website(uk)

Although I bought mine in shop for a lot more! :(