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

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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

Samsung Tocco Ultra Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: Samsung have combined the two sexiest form factors - the touchscreen and the slider - to create a slide phone with a full touchscreen-driven interface. The Tocco Ultra is a flagship phone with an 8 megapixel camera, class-leading OLED display, media player, GPS, Bluetooth, memory card slot and high-speed internet. A lovely phone, although the user interface could be better, especially for texting.
Best buy: *Free* with £35 line rental reduced to £12.50 from Mobiles.co.uk (Red ) or Mobiles.co.uk (Blue) or free with half-price line rental from Dialaphone.

Review: March 2009. Updated April 2009.

The S8300 Tocco Ultra is a next-generation slide phone from Samsung. Just when you thought that the slide phone could go no further, Samsung have come up with a twist: combine the slide design with a full touchscreen driven user interface. The Tocco Ultra combines the best of the Samsung Soul with the Samsung Tocco to create a new slider for 2009

Samsung F480 Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The Samsung F480 Tocco is a high-spec touchscreen phone that offers fantastic features in a sexy ultraslim package. The features include a 5 megapixel camera, music player, FM radio, ultra-fast 3G web browsing and loads of memory! However we have downgraded its rating because of problems with dropping calls and poor voice quality.
Best buy: *Free* from Three (Silver); or £139.95 on PAYG from the Carphone Warehouse (Black or Pink), or £185.90 from Dialaphone.

Review: June 2008.

Samsung are on a roll with touchscreen phones in 2008. First the Armani, then the F490 Nerva, now the F480 Tocco (Tocco comes from the Italian word for "touch".) The F480 is very similar to the F490, and so the question is, what's the difference between the F480 and the F490 and which is better? (OK, so that was two questions.)

Samsung Pixon 12 Review

Best buy: *Free* from Dialaphone.

The Pixon12 is a 12 megapixel version of the Samsung Pixon and will be released in the UK on 1 August 2009. In fact it's the world's first 12 megapixel camera. Samsung have upgraded a number of features of the original Pixon, adding a fabulous OLED screen with a massive 480x800 pixel resolution, support for DivX/Xvid video move playback, HSUPA for faster uploading of photos and videos, and support for memory cards up to 16GB. We can't wait to get our hands on this one!

Most popular contract deals:

Samsung Marcel S3500 Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The Samsung S3500 is a low to mid-range slide phone with a smart metallic finish. Features include a 2 megapixel camera with flash, a music player and FM radio, and Bluetooth.
Best buy: £49.95 on PAYG from Dialaphone or the Carphone Warehouse.

Review: April 2009.

The Samsung S3500 (nicknamed the "Marcel") is a low-end slider from Samsung, with a Soul-inspired design and smart metallic looks. The features that you get with this phone are typical for the sub-£100 price bracket. The Marcel does come with some extra "safety" features, including a "fake call" facility which is intended to get you out of trouble, and an SOS feature that sends an emergency call. Apart from these features, it's a pretty standard phone, and rather expensive for what you get. But it does look nice.

Samsung i8910 HD Review

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In a nutshell: The Samsung i8910HD is a milestone in mobile technology. It's the first mobile to be able to record high-definition video. It's probably the highest-spec phone currently available, with an 8 megapixel camera, huge OLED touchscreen, MP3 player, FM radio, GPS, WiFi, HSDPA/HSUPA and up to 48GB of memory. If you want to be at the cutting edge, this is the phone for you in 2009.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Mobiles

Review: May 2009.

Fwooar! The Samsung i8910HD (originally known as the Omnia HD) is one heck of a sexy phone. It's the first mobile to feature a high-definition camcorder (hence it's name) and it has the world's largest OLED display - 3.7 inches across. It's a Symbian smartphone with an 8 megapixel camera, touchscreen UI, WiFi and A-GPS. Is there nothing this beast cannot do?

Samsung G600 Review

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In a nutshell: The G600 is still a fantastic phone. It combines fab looks with a superb 5 megapixel camera, a fully featured music player and 1 Gbyte of memory. It avoids the touch-sensitive keys of the U600, making it a totally practical phone to use. Available in black, pink, purple and silver. The Belle version is a chic burgundy colour that comes with free nail varnish - go for it, girls!
Best buy: *Free* with a free Nintendo Wii from Mobiles.co.uk (Black); or £49.95 on Pay as you Go from the Carphone Warehouse (Black, Pink or Silver).

Review: August 2007. Last updated July 2009.

The Samsung G600 offers the power of a 5 megapixel camera in Samsung's now-classic slimline slider format. Although it's two years old, the G600 has an amazing spec and a beautiful design to match. Samsung don't always make perfect phones - the E900 and U600 irritated some users with their touch-sensitive buttons - but the G600 gets everything just right and is a real classic. Whilst it lacks the wow factor of newer phones, it's just a fantastically good phone to use with nothing to detract from the experience.

Samsung Armani Night Effect Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The Samsung Emporio Armani phone is a classically shaped phone that has been given an Armani makeover. It's a sleek black bar with the Emporio Armani logo emblazoned on the front, side and back. It's unique feature is the LED edging strip that glows like neon. Apart from the styling, it offers a 3 megapixel camera, music player, FM radio, memory card slot, Bluetooth and 3G.
Best buy: *Free* from Dialaphone.

Nokia 8800 Arte Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: It's Nokia's most exclusive phone to date, and you won't see many of these on the street. The 8800 Arte is crafted from premium materials, and should be considered as a luxury item, not a tech gadget or a workhorse phone. Still, it has 3G, a 3 megapixel camera, and a music player, as well as making you look good while you're making calls. But if you have to ask the price, then it's not the right phone for you!
Best buy: £430.61 from the Carphone Warehouse.

Review: January 2008. Updated October 2008.

The Nokia 8800 Arte is Nokia's latest in its premium range of phones. Following on from the 8800, 8800 Sirocco and 8600 Luna, it seems that the marketing guys at Nokia felt that £400 - £500 for a phone was no way nearly enough, so they have priced the 8800 Arte at close to double that. This is pushing prices towards Vertu levels (Nokia's ultra-exclusive brand), so the chances are you won't see many of these phones on the street

Nokia 6700 Classic Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The 6700 Classic is a good phone. With smart looks, a quality metal finish and a high specification, we can see this becoming Nokia's top mid-range phone in the second half of 2009. Top features include a-GPS, a 5 megapixel camera with autofocus and flash, a music player, an FM radio with RDS, Bluetooth, HSPA and a memory card. Things to watch out for include freezing / shutting down and breakable screens.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Mobiles.co.uk (Silver) or free from Dialaphone (Silver) or Dialaphone (Black); or £179.90 on PAYG from Mobiles.co.uk (Silver) or £219 sim free direct from Nokia.

Nokia 6600i Slide Review

Nokia 6600i Slide Consumer Reviews

Love your mobile? Hate it? Please share your experiences to help other people choose the phone that's best for them. Please do not review this phone if you have not used it. This is a review site, not a forum, so please don't just ask questions. Please do not use swear words or offensive language, and please, no advertising!

Nokia 6600 Fold Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The Nokia 6600 Fold is a very attractive clamshell phone. With an invisible outer display that lights up when you tap it, and an electromagnetic opening mechanism that opens the fold automatically, it's definitely not a run of the mill phone, but is a little but special. You'll find that it includes the full range of features that you'd expect: a 2 megapixel camera, 3G video calling, a stereo music player, an FM radio, Bluetooth and support for memory cards up to 4GB. But the reliability of this phone is very poor, and we'd suggest that you avoid it.
Best buy: *Free* from Three.

Nokia 6500 Classic Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The 6500 Classic is Nokia's thinnest phone so far, and is a stunningly beautiful phone too, with its polished metal casing. It's an easy to use phone that does just what most people want from a phone - make calls, take pictures and play music. Supplied with 1 Gbyte of memory and a stereo headset, it's already equipped to go. The one thing missing from this 3G phone is video calling. We have deducted marks because of poor battery life, reliability problems and the small keypad. Available in Black, Bronze, Pink or Silver.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Mobiles.co.uk (Black); or £79.95 on PAYG from the Carphone Warehouse (Black or Bronze),

Review: October 2007. Updated September 2008.

Now here's a tasty-looking phone. Nokia have finally joined the ultra-thin revolution with the 6500 Classic phone. This is the slimmest Nokia phone released in the UK and, incredibly it's a 3G phone too! And doesn't it look nice, with its sleek aluminium casing ("individually polished", according to the Nokia blurb) and available in Black and Bronze. Let's pause a moment to enjoy the looks

Nokia 6303 Classic Review

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In a nutshell: Our favourite Nokia just got upgraded! The 6303 Classic is a modern reworking of the classic Nokia 6300. It's a no-nonsense easy-to-use handset with an attractive stainless steel finish and great features - a 3.2 megapixel camera with autofocus and flash, MP3 player, FM radio, 3.5mm audio jack, Nokia Maps, plenty of memory, Bluetooth, USB and good battery life. Available in Stainless Steel or Matt Black.
Best buy: *Free* with a free Compaq laptop from Dialaphone (Silver) or with free line rental from Mobiles.co.uk (Silver) or Mobiles.co.uk (Black); or £79.95 on PAYG from the Carphone Warehouse (Black or Silver), or £79.90 from Mobiles.co.uk (Black or Silver).

Review: June 2009.

The Nokia 6303 Classic is the upgrade for the Nokia 6300, which has been a bestseller for the past couple of years and one of our favourite Nokias of all-time. The 6303 Classic updates the technology and the styling of the 6300, fixing the 6300's problems of poor battery life and small memory.

Nokia 5800 XpressMusic Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: Nokia's first touchscreen phone is impressively good. It may not have quite the polished feel of the iPhone, but with so many good features, it's in many ways better than the iPhone. Headline features include the very high resolution touchscreen with 16 million colours, the 3.2 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics, 3G video calling, an excellent web browser with support for Flash, the music player & FM radio, GPS positioning with Nokia Maps, WiFi, Bluetooth and an 8GB memory card. Available in black, red or blue.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental or a free gift (PlayStation 3 or Dell laptop) from Mobiles.co.uk (Black) or with half-price line rental from Dialaphone (Black) or Dialaphone (Comes With Music Edition); or £149.95 on PAYG from the Carphone Warehouse (Red) or £195.70 on from Dialaphone.

Review: February 2009. Updated March 2009.

We've waited a heck of a long time for Nokia to catch up with Apple, LG and Samsung and launch a touchscreen phone. And here it is at last! It's a 3G smartphone, and belongs to Nokia's XpressMusic range.

Nokia 5630 XpressMusic Review

Nokia 5630 XpressMusic Consumer Reviews

Love your mobile? Hate it? Please share your experiences to help other people choose the phone that's best for them. Please do not review this phone if you have not used it. This is a review site, not a forum, so please don't just ask questions. Please do not use swear words or offensive language, and please, no advertising!

Nokia 3600 Slide Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: A good budget phone, with battery life the only big let-down. For under £100 you get a lovely ergonomic slide phone with a fantastic 3.2 megapixel autofocus camera, an MP3 player, FM radio, Bluetooth, memory card and applications like Nokia Maps and the Opera web browser. The sales package includes a stereo headset and a 512 MB memory card.
Best buy: £49.95 on Pay as you Go from the Carphone Warehouse (Black), or £49.95 from Dialaphone (Black or Pink).

Review: January 2009. Last updated July 2009.

The Nokia 3600 Slide is a great example of what Nokia can do when they don't try to hard. It's an entry-level camera phone, that packs in every feature that you could demand from a sub-£100 GSM mobile phone. It's a compact phone that sits nicely in the palm and looks kind of cute when closed. It slides very smoothly open to reveal a textbook-perfect keypad that's just the right size, and is very easy to use. No problem texting on this one! When you slide the phone open, the gorgeous 16 million colour display springs into life, providing familiar Nokia menus and crisp graphics.

Nokia N97 Review

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In a nutshell: Available in Black or White, the N97 is more a mobile computer than a mobile phone. Packed with every imaginable feature, Nokia's designers have succeeded in creating a device that is supremely powerful yet easy to use, with a user-friendly touchscreen and a slide-out QWERTY keyboard. With music, video, photos, email, web and downloadable apps all easily accessible from the customisable home page, the N97 delivers everything that we could ask for on the move. Big, heavy and expensive, but just about worth it!
Best buy: *Free* from Dialaphone (White) or Dialaphone (Black) or Mobiles.co.uk (Black) or £499 sim free direct from Nokia.

Review: June 2009.

The N97 is much more than an enhanced N96 - it has a slide-out QWERTY keyboard and a touchscreen display. Other features include a 5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics, GPS, WiFi and 32GB memory. Nokia claim that it is the "most powerful, multi-sensory mobile computer in existence". Throw away your laptops, guys, the N97 is here!

Nokia N96 Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: Nokia's flagship smartphone just got better! Complete with 16 GB built-in memory, GPS satellite navigation, a 5 megapixel camera with autofocus, 3G video calling, and every other gadget you can think of! On the downside it's large, battery life is poor, and the Symbian operating system is still not 100% reliable.
Best buy: *Free* with half-price line rental from Mobiles.co.uk (Black).

Review: September 2008.

The Nokia N96 is probably the most eagerly anticipated phone release of 2008. But that's partly because we've been anticipating it for so long! Lengthy delays usually mean that the engineers struggled to deliver what the marketing boys promised, so we're going to be checking the N96 very carefully for signs that some of it may not work quite as it should.

But first of all, let's take the phone out of its box and just admire it, because it's a lovely piece of kit. It's big of course - slightly bigger even than the N95, and a touch heavier too - but it's not the heaviest phone ever. But putting that to one side, it's still a really nice phone to look at. It's smoother and curvier than the N95, and the buttons are less confusing.

Nokia N95 Review

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The most technically advanced smartphone ever! Complete with GPS satellite navigation, a 5 megapixel camera with autofocus, 3G video calling, and every other gadget you can think of! On the downside it's large, and like most smartphones does not have 100% robust firmware. If you've used another Nseries phone or Symbian phone before, then you'll love it! Available in 4GB and 8GB versions; in silver, black or red.
Best buy: *Free* from the Carphone Warehouse (8GB Comes With Music) or direct from Three (8GB).

Review: April 2007. Updated October 2008.

Another Nokia Nseries smartphone! And this one is the most technically advanced ever! Can it really live up to the hype, or will it prove to be as unreliable and bug-ridden as some of Nokia's other Nseries phones?

The headline features of the eagerly-awaited Nokia N95 are mouth-wateringly amazing:

• Built-in GPS navigation
• 5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss & Tessar optics
• Wi-Fi wireless internet connection
• 2.6 inch display with 16 million colours
• Ultra-fast HSDPA data transfer

Let's start with the basics. The Nokia N95 is a 3G smartphone built on the Series 60 Symbian interface (version 3.1). Let's be clear from the start that these types of phone are slow, have a tendency to freeze or shut down, and have unstable firmware. They are also large and heavy. At 120g the N95 is of average weight for a smartphone, but is pretty bulky, despite its slide design. At least you won't forget which pocket it's in! When closed, you can access menu functions using the 5-way navigation key and the associated control keys. The N95 also has several other dedicated media keys that can be used as shortcuts to media functions. This is a good feature if you like to have lots of buttons to push, but sometimes they just end up getting in the way. When you slide the phone open you have access to a full keypad, but like the Nokia N73, the buttons are too small to be really comfortable. The user interface will be familiar to anyone who has used a Series 60 phone before: it's not as simple to use as the Nokias of olden days, but you wouldn't expect such a high powered device to be, would you? So, without getting into the functionality of the phone yet, we'd give it 2 stars for usability