Sony Ericsson W902

Well so far the pictures I've posted in this blog was taken using my newly acquired mobile phone, so i think i should talk about it for today's post.

Music Phone with 5Megapixel camera

W902 is a music phone that is pretty focus on having a "good camera" as well. Marketeers define a good camera by looking at the megapixels. In this case W902 comes with a 5mp camera. However in my opinion they are still way lousier than my super outdated Olympus C-720, which is only a 3mp shooter. The photo above is taken using C-720,  photos in my flickr account are also taken  using that. Photos taken using W902 suffers from excessive sharpening and purple fringing, noise level is amazingly high if pictures taken indoor. Colour rendering can be much better (that's why 2 photos so far are in black and retro coloured). Images are probably usable if you keep them at around 4R size. But why have a 5mp rated camera that can only images usable at 4R size? They should really focus on producing very good 3mp camera for mobile devices. ...anyway who still prints photos nowadays? That is why i agree with apple's decision to put a decent 2mp camera on their iPhone. The camera doesn't come with a dust cover thus the lens gets dirty easily and requires constant cleaning. Luckily the lens can be easily access and clean after removal of battery cover (refer to picture below). The positioning of camera should be shifted to where the LED flash light. This is because we tend to place our index finger right at where they place the camera now, and as a result the lens gets dirty every time we answer a call. Again this is what apple did correctly for iPhone.

Build and Design

The build quality of W902 is really top grade. The actual phone looks exactly like how it does in their marketing posters. The phone measures 110.0 x 49.0 x 11.7 mm and weigh 99.8 gram. Not the lightest of phone but it feels very good and sturdy when held. The battery cover is very shaky and is the main disappointment in the build quality of the phone. The screen is protected by scratch proof mineral glass and images looks really sharp and sweet. However it is disappointing that Sony Ericsson decided to use a different material for the other parts of the glossy surface (refer to image below).

 

Looking at the reflections, only part 2 is made of mineral glass, probably due to costing issues. The screen sits approximately 0.5mm below the rest of the surface. The designers probably hope to further protect it from scratches. However, this together with the closely spaced buttons makes w902 a nightmare to clean. It will definitely be much better if the whole glossy surface is made out of one piece rather than 4.

Another positive part of this phone is how well the buttons feel. The tactile feedback of the keys are very reassuring, the D pad is one of the best I'm tried so far. Being a music phone, W902 comes with dedicated music keys. The music keys are very sturdy so accidental pressing of the keys rarely happens. W902 comes with gyroscope built in, this allows users to control volume and tracks through motion. However you will need to press and hold the walkman key for shake control to work. This brings the question of why don't i simply press skip or volume up button. This usage method is a totally illogical and nonsensical.

One other area i really like is their treatment of textures here. The juxtapose of glossy surface with matte, soft touch buttons and the cross hatching texturing of it's body really appeal to me. This phone is probably designed with guys in mind.

Earphone

The in canal earphone that came with the phone is pretty decent if you are not an audiophile. While definitely not as good as my MDR-EX300SL it is small and really comfortable. The chrome plating of the ear bud could have been better though, it's irregular and makes them look really cheap.

Conclusion

I'm pretty happy with this phone so far, the main irritating point of this phone being Sony Ericsson's insistence on not providing 3.5mm socket for earphone. 

I really believe that once this phone gets dirty, i'll have a major problem trying to clean it up. 

It is really one of the best looking phone out there in the market and the build quality is really impressive. 

The interface is tried and tested other then the stupid Shake control they tried to implement here. 

Lastly, yes it comes with a 8gb memory stick!