As much as we love getting the hottest news about high end smart phones and the latest OS updates, there are still plenty of 2G handsets that manage to grab our attention like no other. Take the Sony Ericsson Yendo mobile phone. This latest Walkman handset is a simple enough device to take in, but when it comes to practicality and usability, it certainly makes one wonder why we bother with smart phones at all (barring net access and other frivolous functions aside that is).
The SE Yendo smart phone first appeared in leaks and rumors as the W150 TeaCake before it was later given its final name. While we certainly find the older TeaCake name a lot more interesting (given that you can mistake it for an Android name), but at least Sony has not changed any of the phone’s specifications at all.
It comes with a 2.6 inch TFT touch screen display. For a basic 2G handset, that is already pretty big, so expect to be able to watch videos without any scaling problems on the Yendo (the resolution is 240 x 320 pixels). The response time is decent, but finger tracking is not as accurate as the X10 Mini –mostly due to the resistive touch screen display, which also means that the phone will not be able to handle multi touch features.
As one might expect, the big feature here is the music playback feature. The Walkman software is pretty impressive in its features, such as playlist editing and TrackID. But of course, the best part is the music quality during playback.
With its 2 mega pixel camera, users can expect to be able to shoot decent quality images that are perfect for uploading online. It can also shoot videos at a low quality rate. For storing videos, images as well as music, users will want to rely on a microSD card (up to 16GB) as the handset only comes with 5 MB of free space.
The Sony Ericsson W150 TeaCake has been featured a lot recently after the device was revealed in a series of leaked images showing off the new handset from the Swedish Japanese joint venture.
According to initial rumors and speculative reports about the handset, the device is going to bring together the Sony Walkman technology with Google’s Android operating system (not that the Android does not have its own media/music playback capabilities, but having the Walkman technology certainly helps.
As exciting as that initial news may be, it seems that Android fans are in for a bit of a disappointment as new screens of the TeaCake’s user interface reveals little to no signs of the Android operating system. Not exactly the kind of news you would want to hear if the previous announcements have made you excite for the handset –but there it is. Of course, one cannot help but think, and hope that the Android mobile platform would still be used in the handset.
After all, the TeaCake is already featuring a phone form factor that closely resembles the X10 Mini and many even thought that the W150 is simply a Walkman-based version of the Mini itself. Should Sony Ericsson suddenly decide to come out and reveal the full details on this device and announce that it would indeed be running Google’s OS, they would be making plenty of fans happy.
While the TeaCake is currently off the ‘sure’ list of Android handsets, Sony Ericsson still has a couple of other devices that will be using the OS –the XPERIA Shakira is a definite shoo-in for the open source OS. The device is virtually the missing link between the XPERIA X10 and the X10 Mini. The X10 Mini Pro is due to be released soon –this handset is pretty much like the X10 Mini with a slide out QWERTY keyboard.
The Sony Ericsson W995 caused quite a stir at the World Mobile Congress last week. I don’t think we have seen a phone with quite a high set of features from Sony Ericsson in quite a while.
What Sony has done quite spectacularly is combine the features of a cybershot phone like the Sony Ericsson C905 and added the walkman technology that we all know to be great. The Sony Ericsson W995 also comes with an 8 megapixel camera, with autofocus and face detection. There is a 2.6 inch screen, which is suitable for viewing images and video for short periods of time and a 3.5mm headphone jack. For the full spec list, please see the official press release here. Overall the W995 is set to be the phone of 2009. However we are eagerly anticipating the arrival of the Sony Ericsson Idou in 2010.
Why not check out a video of the phone below and see what you think.
As much as we love getting the hottest news about high end smart phones and the latest OS updates, there are still plenty of 2G handsets that manage to grab our attention like no other. Take the Sony Ericsson Yendo mobile phone. This latest Walkman handset is a simple enough device to take in, but when it comes to practicality and usability, it certainly makes one wonder why we bother with smart phones at all (barring net access and other frivolous functions aside that is).
It comes with a 2.6 inch TFT touch screen display. For a basic 2G handset, that is already pretty big, so expect to be able to watch videos without any scaling problems on the Yendo (the resolution is 240 x 320 pixels). The response time is decent, but finger tracking is not as accurate as the X10 Mini –mostly due to the resistive touch screen display, which also means that the phone will not be able to handle multi touch features.
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