Camera Phone Reviews

Sony Ericsson W880/W888 Walkman Phone

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The W880/W888 represents a milestone in the Walkman® phone portfolio. Although without doubt one of the slimmest music phones available with a 1GB capacity, the true beauty of its design is seen in the brushed stainless steel finish and the stand-out colour variants; either Steel Silver or Flame Black.

Of course, the W880/W888 is about more than just good looks. The Disc2Phone music management software allows the user to transfer their tracks easily and with no fuss from PC straight onto the phone. With Bluetooth Audio Streaming, all of that music can be enjoyed wirelessly on a Stereo Bluetooth Headset such as the HBH-DS970, or by streaming music directly to a home or car stereo (via the new Music Bluetooth™ Receiver MBR-100). Importantly for a music phone, all of this functionality has been introduced without having to compromise on battery life. The W880/W888 delivers up to 18 hours music listening time & features a Flight Mode which allows the phone to be switched-off in mobile-prohibited environments.

The W880 Walkman® phone is a UMTS 2100 GPRS 900/1800/1900 music phone and will be available in selected markets from Q1 2007. The W888 Walkman® phone is a GSM variant, minus the video telephony functionality, intended specifically for China where 3G services are not established.

Sony Ericsson W880/W888 Reviews

GSM Arena has a review of the Sony Ericsson W880 and writes, "We've seen better quality cameras from Sony Ericsson, not to mention the lack of autofocus. The camera offers night mode, self-timer, panorama, frames, and burst shooting modes. It also features white balance correction. Several color effects are available, too. The menu interface has gone through some minor graphics updates and now the menu looks a bit 3D. ... We are very pleased with the performance of the camera - taking pictures doesn't take long even at the highest resolution and quality settings. The shot-to-shot times are great which is usual for the recent Sony Ericsson mobiles. Sony Ericsson W880 has no dedicated macro mode, everything closer than say 80 cm from the lens will be out of focus."

Trusted Reviews has a review of the Sony Ericsson W880i and writes, "The W880i is a Tri-band GSM and 3G handset with a front facing camera for video calling. The back facing camera shoots stills at resolutions up to 2-megapixels, lacks flash, auto-focus and a self portrait mirror and I found it rather disappointing. My standard reference photo of the coloured dish shot under ordinary household lighting, lacks brightness and definition and looks washed out. Outdoor shots also failed to give very good colour reproduction, and the camera didn’t seem able to capture much detail despite photos being taken at the Fine rather than Normal quality setting. Photos look OK on the phone, though, and you can switch to showing them in landscape mode with a simple press of a soft-menu key, to take full advantage of the available screen size."

Pocket-lint reviews the Sony Ericsson Walkman W880 and writes, "Now that we've had some time to live with and use the phone, our first glance impressions were right. The W880 is a well polished phone that certainly has the wow factor along with a bit of retro styling thrown in for good measure. It's solid stuff from our Swedish friends. ... if music or blogging is your passion, you won't go far wrong with this Walkman handset, just make sure you have a quick play with the keyboard in the shop before parting with your cash."

TechDigest reviews the Sony Ericsson W880i and writes, "Image quality from the camera is passable, with snaps good enough for sending to friends or emailing around. ... The W880i is a sleek, small 3G handset but what it makes up for on style it loses in usability. It's not that it's impossible to use, just that it'll take some time to get used to before you're fully up to speed. It's got decent multimedia credentials and surprisingly good sound from the bundled headset. The TrackID music recognition utility is a nifty add-on, though you're unlikely to use it that much once the novelty wears off. If you can live with its input idiosyncrasies, though, with prices starting from free with contact it's a good looking, feature packed multimedia mobile."

ENN reviews the Sony Ericsson W880i and writes, "where it falls down is not so much in the device but rather the accompanying software that enables you to transfer photos and music from your phone to your PC. To get this working on my home PC was a task and a half to say the least. After much faffing around I had to give up and try it on my laptop. That worked... eventually. One more thing: the keys are teeny, so people with large fingers should be extra careful when punching in a phone number -- they could end up inadvertently calling long-distance."

IT Reviews reviews the Sony Ericsson W880i and writes, "From a full battery charge we got a little over five hours of continuous music, which is not as much as we'd like from a phone designed to replace our standalone music player. The camera, too, is a bit disappointing. Capable of a maximum stills resolution of 2 megapixels it is not at the leading edge, but has a base specification that shouldn't cause too many heads to turn away. However, without a flash, self-portrait mirror or auto-focus it is somewhat hampered, and we found it let us down in terms of both colour reproduction and detail."

RegHardware reviews the Sony Ericsson W880i and writes, "The W880's camera is a two-megapixel job. It has 2.5x digital zoom, but only if you're willing to take snaps that have a 0.30-megapixel resolution. Nighttime shots and indoors snaps show a fair amount of noise, though this can be reduced with the camera's night mode. Outside you can take a better pic with the W880, but viewing the images at full size reveals the detail lost to image compression and the camera's unimpressive optics: ... This is a camera for quick spur-of-the-moment shots destined to be viewed on-screen, emailed or picture messaged."