sony ericsson W61Oi

sony ericsson W61Oi The W610i is another candy-bar-style mobile phone in the Walkman series from Sony Ericsson. The W610i is available in two colour schemes: fancy Plush Orange (black and orange) and the more traditional Satin Black (black and white). Our review sample was the plush orange model and we immediately fell in love with the stylish design. It has a black front with the small shaped silver buttons, an orange back and rounded edges -- a true eye catcher.

The W610i measures 102mm by 46mm by 14mm and weighs 85 grams, almost identical dimensions to its predecessor, the W660i. The display is a 176 x 220-pixel TFT screen with 262K colours, and can easily be read in sunlight.

Sony Ericsson has gotten rid of the joystick for navigating through the main functions. Instead, the W610i employs a stylish silver navigation key. To its left and right are two similarly designed semi-circles for shortcuts. Four buttons above the numerical keypad allow you to program your own shortcuts for common functions such as contacts, alarm clock, inbox and calendar. The left circle activates the Walkman music player and the right circle brings you to the Activity Menu, which gives you direct access to missed calls, new messages, appointments, running applications and the Web browser. Down the side of the phone are shortcuts for playlists and to activate the camera.

Unfortunately the biggest drawback of the W610i is its numerical keys, which are very tiny dash-like silver buttons. Granted, they look good, but that's about it. The buttons are too close to each other and make typing text messages quickly quite difficult -- at least if you have adult-sized thumbs. Somehow you get used to using the keypad with the side of your thumbs, but we still had to use the delete button often.

Performance The sound quality and the MegaBass feature lived up to the high standard we expected from Sony. The ear plugs on the headphones manage to block out ambient noise and contain the sound, meaning you won't force fellow passengers on the train to listen to your music.

The W610i's battery life is excellent.