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| Sony Ericsson W300i Walkman! |
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Conclusions & Other Weirdness In my “other job” (the one not involving this website, that helps me avoid things like poverty), I travel a lot, and am on the road almost every single day for hours at a time. As an inexpensive flip phone with a hands free unit, this phone is excellent! Though I didn’t do any in-depth tests of the phone's battery life, it has been able to daily survive lots of roaming, active calls, almost constant music playback when not on a voice call without me having to bring along a car charger during my routine 8-9 hours days. Compared to my last Motorola phone (an inexpensive C155) with an identically rated 900maH Lithium Ion battery, it's a champ in the battery life department. The only real battery test I performed was an impromptu torture test of the phone in “Walkman Only” mode. This mode apparently exists to allow you to still listen to your music while on a flight, as many airlines ban the use of cellular phones due to interference with equipment on passenger jets. In “Walkman Only” mode with a full charge, the phone lasted almost 14 hours before shutting off, which is extremely good. Driving around between two states, I've never had a call drop because of MY end going south, and signal and voice quality has been quite good. When flipped open on the road (not wise, that's what the hands free kit included is for) earpiece volume is a little too low, though the speakerphone is excellent being quite loud and quite clear.
The Walkman functionality is excellent. Even with Sony's tiny earbuds, the sound quality is quite good. Perhaps Sony should have included something a little better, as the built in Megabass® EQ setting is totally not nice to these earbuds, but since the earbuds are separate from the hands free unit, you can freely add the headphones of your choice. I even went as far as hooking the hands free unit directly to my PC's Logitech Z680's. Sound quality was comparable to the audio out of my PC from Winamp, Windows Media Player, or KMPlayer. Since the phone supports bluetooth, you can use a bluetooth headset with the phone, and I borrowed several to test with it. A friends Motorola bluetooth headpiece worked excellent, with great mic and speaker quality. Another friend, who happened to have a Jabra BT620 Stereo bluetooth headset (that I've been rather envious of), allowed me to experience my first major disappointment with this phone. Only a handful of Sony/Ericcson's cellphones support the needed A2DP profiles for Stereo Bluetooth, and sadly, this isnt one of them. To be fair to Sony, many media capable phones do not support A2DP either. However, this is Sony, and they are branding this as a Walkman Phone. Not including A2DP support in my mind is a glaring omission. Despite this being a midrange phone, I feel it's something they should have included, if for no reason than my personal frustrations dealing with the wired headset. Well you can't have everything.
Speeds with Bluetooth for
file transfers and whatnot are excellent and
Before I conclude, I'll share some pictures, and one video with you.
Outdoor evening picture of
the aforementioned Steakhouse. Even in the
One evening at Miyako's Sushi Group, a local sushi bar, giving my bartending buddy Jeremy, his once chance at stardom! (converted to Flash, for your convenient viewing. Just right-click and select PLAY)
The camera is a little out of it's element in dark settings, so keep that in mind. The video recording, while “neat” is a little too choppy, blocky, and low in resolution for anything other than MMS messaging or a quick email attach for fun. Overall, I've been well pleased with the Sony/Ericsson W300i. It's a
The only caveats for me are the somewhat small screen size which effects the enjoyment of video content on the phone, and the lack of A2DP profile support for stereo Bluetooth headsets, which I feel is an obvious omission. Why can you buy a docking station with amplified speakers and a subwoofer, but not use a stereo Bluetooth headset? It seems counter to the whole idea of a “WALKMAN” if you get my meaning. Still, considering hardly anyone getting a new phone gets one at full retail (I myself got the phone on sale for $69 with a one year contract agreement). It's a really good phone for the money. Overall, a great phone and a great media player all in one.
Recommended!!
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