Sony Ericsson W995 Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: Sony Ericsson's latest flagship Walkman phone is also a brilliant camera phone with an 8 megapixel camera, with face detection autofocus and flash. Packed with features such as GPS, Google Maps, YouTube & BBC iPlayer support, WiFi and motion gaming, this beast has too many good things to mention! Available in Black, Silver or Red.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Dialaphone or Mobiles.co.uk (Silver) or direct from Three.

Review: June 2009.

Sony Ericsson have really revved up with the release of the W995. Not only is this a flagship Walkman phone, but it also matches the camera capabilities of the Cyber-Shot range. And it's priced as a mid-range phone, so in value for money terms, it's going to be a hard act to beat.

Unlike the weird clamshell design of its predecessor, the W980i, the W995 has a straightforward slide design. Although the phone isn't particularly slim, the top half that contains the display is just a few millimetres thick, with the bulk of the phone in the lower half. This makes the phone quite easy to hold when texting, and the keypad is quite ergonomic, even though from photos the buttons look like they are too small. The TFT screen is typical for this price range, with a resolution of 240 x 320 pixels. The built-in accelerometer automatically rotates the screen between landscape and portrait modes.

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: Sony Ericsson's flagship Walkman phone offers a best in class audio experience, with premium quality headphones, 8GB of built-in memory, FM radio with RDS and touch-sensitive music controls. But it's let down by a poor camera, battery life and software glitches.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Mobiles.co.uk; or £99.95 on PAYG from the Carphone Warehouse.

Review: October 2008. Updated May 2009.

The Sony Ericsson W980i is Sony Ericsson's latest flagship Walkman phone, and is the upgrade to the W960i. The guys at Sony obviously read our review of the W960i, because they took our suggestions on board and added HSDPA and quadband!

Sony Ericsson W850i Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: A slide-design Walkman phone, the W850i features Sony's award-winning Walkman music player with enough memory for around 1000 songs, a built-in FM radio, 3G video calling and a 2 megapixel camera. The W850i's camera is not as good as the W810i, but it has the benefits of being 3G and having a sexy slide design!

Review: October 2006. Last updated July 2009.

This is quite an old phone now - nearly three years old, and the fact that it's still available in the shops says a lot. We awarded the phone 4 stars when we originally reviewed it, but it's now showing signs of age. Still, it's a nice solid phone and there are some excellent deals around now.

The Sony Ericsson W850i is a Walkman-branded phone in a slide design. Sony Ericsson are new to sliders, but they have produced a very nice design that slides nicely, has a nice keypad, a 5-way scroll key that's much easier to use than the joystick design of the K800i, and makes excellent use of the slide format to include a large screen. It's available in a choice of black or white. The white version has a real 24 carat gold Walkman logo for added bling! The keypad features a funky lighting effect that pulses to the beat of the music. On the outside, it's a beautiful phone.

Sony Ericsson W705 Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: A Walkman phone with the latest music features, an FM radio, a 3.2 megapixel camera, 4GB memory card, WiFi, Bluetooth, 3G with HSDPA, shake control & motion gaming. But frustratingly unreliable. Available in Silver or Red.
Best buy: £199.95 on PAYG from the Carphone Warehouse (Silver).

Review: March 2009. Updated July 2009.

The W705 is yet another Sony Ericsson phone that appears great at first but turns out to be a lemon. When will Sony Ericsson get this right?

The phone is a slider and quite a dinky one too, being very compact and weighing just 98g. It has a quality metallic finish, available in Silver or Red, and slides open nicely to reveal a compact but ergonomic keypad. The music controls are well thought out, and make the phone very easy to use, whether in its open or closed position. The display is a decent size, with 262,000 colours and a good resolution of 320 x 240 pixels. First impressions are of a quality product.

Sony Ericsson K550i Review

Phone rating:

Best buy: £88.03 on PAYG from the Carphone Warehouse (Black or Plum).

Review: May 2007. Updated July 2009.

The Sony Ericsson K550i is a very good entry-level phone.

The K550i is the upgraded version of the popular K510i, but it's massively more powerful, borrowing many features from Sony Ericsson's flagship K800i Cyber-Shot phone. The camera is a 2 megapixel camera with a photo light and digital zoom, that includes the autofocus feature first found in the K800i. Instead of a fixed focus camera, with autofocus you can ensure that the subject of your photo is firmly in focus, leading to noticeably sharper images. The K550i features "picture blogging" - take a picture and send it straight to your own image blog for friends and family to view. There's also a good quality video camera.

Sony Ericsson G502 Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: A lightweight 3G phone with a classic design, user-friendly keypad and a good range of features, including a 2 megapixel camera, a music player, an FM radio, and a memory card slot. In addition the G502 excels at mobile email and web access.
Best buy: £69.99 on PAYG from Three (Black).

Review: October 2008. Updated May 2009.

Sony Ericsson have a lot of mid-range 3G handsets that all look pretty much the same, and at first glance the G502 seems to be just another one. Its specs are very similar to the K660i, for example, and it looks quite similar to the K660i too. But the clue to the G502's purpose is the G in its model number. The "G" range is PDA-flavoured, and G series phones include plenty of tools for organising your life.

Samsung U900 Soul Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The U900 is Samsung's flagship phone of 2008. It's a super-sexy super-slim slide phone that looks very "2008" with its dual-screen touch-sensitive controls and metal casing. With a 5 megapixel camera with autofocus, 3G video calling, MP3 player, FM radio and plenty of memory it should tick most people's boxes. The only reason we haven't awarded it 5 stars is because some people think that the ringtone and call volume are too quiet. Available in Graphite, Silver, Pink or Black.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental or a free Nintendo Wii from Mobiles.co.uk (Pink); or £124.95 on Pay as you Go from the Carphone Warehouse (Graphite, Pink or Silver).

Review: April 2008. Updated March 2009.

The Samsung U900 Soul is Samsung's flagship phone for 2008. Is it a triumph of marketing, or can the Soul really live up to the mega hype? Mobile Phones UK checks it out!

At first glance, you can tell that the Soul is something different from the usual Samsung slide design. We've watched the slide phone evolve over the past 4 years from the compact but definitely-not-thin D500 to the superslim D900 to the wow-that-really-is-thin U600 with its touchscreen controls that left some users unimpressed. More recently the Samsung G600 has been top of the bestseller lists. The reason why we're waffling on about the history of the slide phone is because it's obvious that the Soul is something quite different. Let's call it the next-generation slide phone. The photos here do it no justice at all - trust us, it looks much better in the flesh. The body is made from metal, giving it a high quality feel, like one of Nokia's premium handsets. We absolutely love the sleek, minimalist design and the way that the thumb rests securely on the base of the slide. The slide moves smoothly up to reveal a flat keypad. OK, so the keypad won't be to everyone's taste, but if you can handle a Motorola RAZR, you'll have no problems with this. The U900 is ultra-slim at 12.9mm thick, and is almost exactly the same size as the old Samsung D900.

The feature that truly sets the U900 apart