Which one did you buy? Sounds like yours had battery problems
I've got an SE W550, battery life is typically 4 to 5 days, with 2 or 3 hours of mp3 playback (whilst driving into work, out running), maybe half an hours gaming (Worms Forts 3D), taking a few pictures (with the MXE-60 flash, very useful). Got a few colleagues with K750s, W800s (both basically the same phone underneath), and they get similar results.
I don't doubt SEs claims about battery life in walkman mode either - 25+ hours is easily attainable. In fact, if I could just use it as a phone, it would probably last for 6 or 7 days.
You're permanently stuck in the past, refusing to accept device convergence, improvements in designs...
I've got a SE W550, colleagues have got SE K750s, W800s. The W550 camera is only okay-ish. The K750 and W800 cameras are actually usable for taking pictures in replacement of a lower-end digicam. They can print pretty decent 6x4s.
The best thing about this range of phones is that they are actually very good at being a phone. The signal strength on them is great, battery life is pretty good, the UI is generally more intuitive than the Nokia S40 devices that the world seems to irrationally love.
Thankfully I built all the PCs at home; apart from my profile, all the kids/wifes signons are user level. I set them as supervisor on the original setup, but it took me about, er, half an hour, to realise that wasn't too good an idea.
In fact, the first win2k build I did on one of these PCs, I stupidly let it onto the net without A/V or a firewall. That only took about 5 to 10 minutes to get slightly compromised, 1 hour and it was pretty much fubar, but thats not exactly news.
1. Mini CD players are pretty lousy, on reliability and sound quality (at least those that friends have had haven't lasted that well).
2. Sound quality. Those so-called listening tests aren't worth the paper they're written on. The Sony kit generally has much higher quality DACs than most other consumer MP3 players (and as a side note, SE Walkman Phones have higher quality output stages than iPod Nanos). I've got several friends who have systems that easily show the differences between these formats; ATRAC is definitely superior at any given bitrate than MP3. The same people also happen to work in the industry and would be quite happy to prove you wrong.
3. MD HiFi units. We are talking about truly decent quality MD recorder units.
Have to admit that early on, I liked the *idea* of MD (and DCC), but was heavily into high end audio. When I first heard DCC, it sucked big time, and I do mean BIG.
The original MD players that I heard were also not that good (we are talking about putting them through very expensive kit that highlights all the good and bad in the source). However, as time went on, the technology matured, and it has evolved into a seriously capable format, but massively hampered by what is in effect hugely incompetent management.
Never used sonic stage to get music onto my NetMD, never, not once.
The nero image drive/Simple burner solution is one easy way around it.
Burn your MP3s onto a nero CD image, load that image into Nero Image drive, then use Simple burner to load the tracks onto your MD. Sure, its a little slower, but at least you have no issues with removing tracks off your MDs via their own software.
I remember the early days of "consumer" digital audio. DAT was killed off by SCMS (early days of DRM, shudder at the thought), delays in getting SCMS formats agreed, what could/couldn't be done in the digital domain.
Its interesting that MD has continued, albeit in a niche.
Does anyone remember DCC? Now that was a really bad format.
You can get bluetooth headsets for about £20 ($30?) a piece, so licencing costs don't appear to be a major issue.
As for sound quality limiting take up, my Moto HS810 is BT1.1, and the sound quality on calls is fantastic, either via my Moto V525 or Siemens SX1 (both BT 1.1), or my newer SE W550 (BT 2.0).
So many people making the same ill-informed comments.
The beatles back catalog, that they are involved in the re-issuing of, along with video footage, etc. are either the biggest or the second biggest selling artists of all time (Elvis Presley being the main other contender for #1).
And apple corp themselves are apparently still licensing Beatles related products and re-issues of Beatles recordings (there are probably re-masters of their back catalog released around the world semi-regular).
Some of these uber devices are actually good at the prime functions.
I've got an SE W550, colleagues have got K750s, W800s. They all have either good or excellent battery life, excellent signal (doubly so with the W550), usable or good cameras, decent MP3 players, etc. etc.
The SE K750 actually takes pretty decent pictures in most conditions. The Nokia N90, whilst not as good as its Zeiss branding would make out, is still pretty good.
The Sharp 902/903 models have pretty good 2/3mp cameras, and even have optical zoom.
Not forgetting Samsung and others who have effectively gone and integrated a phones functionality into 5+mp cameras.
And of course, you haven't lived until you've driven one of those 400hp Yugos. Most entertaining.
I'll agree that those blinking LEDs are pretty much useless, but on the SE phones, you can get an add-on flash unit that works as a full blown flash unit. On my SE W550, the images are still a little grainy, but I can take pictures in total darkness. With a K750/W800, it actually makes them into a totally capable 2mp autofocus camera.
I've got a few motos around the house, none of them have battery problems.
My son has my old V525 and T720 - both last 3 to 4 days of normal usage. Less if you play a lot of games
Daughter has a V300, similar story - battery lasts very good on that.
Finally, my wife has an E398, basically a ROKR with less memory. And the battery on that is fantastic - she typically gets over a week out of it. We are in a good signal area though.
I've got a Siemens SX1 - better feature set than any of these others, but I can only get up to 2 days out of the battery.
Look at the Symbian operating system. Its an evolution of EPOC - one of the original PDA operatings systems, which predates Windows CE, at least in usable devices.
In general, S60 devices (and UIQ) compete head on against Windows Mobile on pretty much all features.
Also, Nokia do the communicator range, which are a true phone/PDA hybrid. Bit of a brick, but if you want a full keyboard, wifi, 640x200+ screen, there isn't much that really comes close.
Okay, maybe I'm being pedantic, but Nokia *do* make PDA phones. They've been making them for years. In fact, they were (probably) the first company to actually do such a product (the 7650).
The V635 is a pretty good phone, and you're right, it does have a very usable camera. I've seen plenty of pics from them, and they are equal to or better than a cheapo disposable.
The K750/W800/N90 images are better again - they are on a level with a "proper" 2 megapixel camera.
On the V635.... Im probably going to be getting one for my son for christmas. They're available for silly low prices now.
I've got an old Siemens SX1. 120mhz ARM cpu, it does 3D gaming very, very nicely. Midtown Madness plays very nicely.
Look at something like the Orange SPV C550 - its running a 220mhz CPU, has a 240x320 resolution screen of a very decent size/quality. Things are developing.
Mobile gaming isn't about playing games with the same depth of play as their desktop equivalents. Its nice to be able to play something like this whilst stuck in the queue at the supermarket, or just bide away a little time during slack points in the working day.
And as other posters have said, it doesn't have to be games - use your imagination to use the 3D engines in other ways.
I'm in tech support for a large US companies European operations. We've shipped hundreds of Blackberries to management and reps. They absolutely adore the blighters. Of course, this case only affects the US use of Blackberries.
Now, what I'm interested in is - just what is the scope? Can our European users roam in the US and still use the Blackberries? Does it only affect BES's in the US?
There does seem to be a lot more of these lockouts and restrictions on US phones - here in the UK, whilst the phones can often be highly branded (mainly Vodafone), its still relatively easy to add your own ringtones, themes, etc, either via bluetooth, irda or cable.
The thing with Moto and other manufacturers is that they are more than willing to do operator related restrictions - if Verizon/Cingular or whoever wants to restrict your own uploading of files, Moto are more than happy to add such restrictions - they are just doing what their customer (the operator) wants.
Dunno, I thought the Razr was quite good, at least as a phone - decent signal, battery life is okay, the phone book is a bit basic, but thats about the main negative (and at least in the UK, its getting to a pretty sensible price now).
Now, what most people would love to have is basically what you have described, and the phone is just round the corner - motorola call it the SLVR/V8 - its basically a RAZR style candybar, but with the ROKR feature set (and possibly a megapixel camera, depending on where you read).
I was under the impression that bluetooth could transfer data a lot faster (100k+ per sec), so okay its not totally suited to huge data transfers, but invariably on phones it is restricted to something stupid like 10k per sec.
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Which one did you buy? Sounds like yours had battery problems
I've got an SE W550, battery life is typically 4 to 5 days, with 2 or 3 hours of mp3 playback (whilst driving into work, out running), maybe half an hours gaming (Worms Forts 3D), taking a few pictures (with the MXE-60 flash, very useful). Got a few colleagues with K750s, W800s (both basically the same phone underneath), and they get similar results.
I don't doubt SEs claims about battery life in walkman mode either - 25+ hours is easily attainable. In fact, if I could just use it as a phone, it would probably last for 6 or 7 days.
No, they DON'T all suck.
The SE K750, W800, Nokia N90 (with Zeiss optics), Sharp 902, are all good examples of 2mp autofocus camera phones that take decent pictures.
The upcoming SE K790/K800, Sharp 903 are 3mp camera phones that also take decent pictures. I seem to remember that the Sharp also had an optical zoom.
You're permanently stuck in the past, refusing to accept device convergence, improvements in designs ...
I've got a SE W550, colleagues have got SE K750s, W800s. The W550 camera is only okay-ish. The K750 and W800 cameras are actually usable for taking pictures in replacement of a lower-end digicam. They can print pretty decent 6x4s.
The best thing about this range of phones is that they are actually very good at being a phone. The signal strength on them is great, battery life is pretty good, the UI is generally more intuitive than the Nokia S40 devices that the world seems to irrationally love.
Thankfully I built all the PCs at home; apart from my profile, all the kids/wifes signons are user level. I set them as supervisor on the original setup, but it took me about, er, half an hour, to realise that wasn't too good an idea.
In fact, the first win2k build I did on one of these PCs, I stupidly let it onto the net without A/V or a firewall. That only took about 5 to 10 minutes to get slightly compromised, 1 hour and it was pretty much fubar, but thats not exactly news.
1. Mini CD players are pretty lousy, on reliability and sound quality (at least those that friends have had haven't lasted that well).
2. Sound quality. Those so-called listening tests aren't worth the paper they're written on. The Sony kit generally has much higher quality DACs than most other consumer MP3 players (and as a side note, SE Walkman Phones have higher quality output stages than iPod Nanos). I've got several friends who have systems that easily show the differences between these formats; ATRAC is definitely superior at any given bitrate than MP3. The same people also happen to work in the industry and would be quite happy to prove you wrong.
3. MD HiFi units. We are talking about truly decent quality MD recorder units.
Have to admit that early on, I liked the *idea* of MD (and DCC), but was heavily into high end audio. When I first heard DCC, it sucked big time, and I do mean BIG.
The original MD players that I heard were also not that good (we are talking about putting them through very expensive kit that highlights all the good and bad in the source). However, as time went on, the technology matured, and it has evolved into a seriously capable format, but massively hampered by what is in effect hugely incompetent management.
Never used sonic stage to get music onto my NetMD, never, not once.
The nero image drive/Simple burner solution is one easy way around it.
Burn your MP3s onto a nero CD image, load that image into Nero Image drive, then use Simple burner to load the tracks onto your MD. Sure, its a little slower, but at least you have no issues with removing tracks off your MDs via their own software.
I remember the early days of "consumer" digital audio. DAT was killed off by SCMS (early days of DRM, shudder at the thought), delays in getting SCMS formats agreed, what could/couldn't be done in the digital domain.
Its interesting that MD has continued, albeit in a niche.
Does anyone remember DCC? Now that was a really bad format.
You can get bluetooth headsets for about £20 ($30?) a piece, so licencing costs don't appear to be a major issue.
As for sound quality limiting take up, my Moto HS810 is BT1.1, and the sound quality on calls is fantastic, either via my Moto V525 or Siemens SX1 (both BT 1.1), or my newer SE W550 (BT 2.0).
So many people making the same ill-informed comments.
The beatles back catalog, that they are involved in the re-issuing of, along with video footage, etc. are either the biggest or the second biggest selling artists of all time (Elvis Presley being the main other contender for #1).
Apparently not.
The wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_records states that Apple Records still owns the right to the beatles videos and movie clips.
And apple corp themselves are apparently still licensing Beatles related products and re-issues of Beatles recordings (there are probably re-masters of their back catalog released around the world semi-regular).
Some of these uber devices are actually good at the prime functions.
I've got an SE W550, colleagues have got K750s, W800s. They all have either good or excellent battery life, excellent signal (doubly so with the W550), usable or good cameras, decent MP3 players, etc. etc.
The uber devices are here, they're good products.
Dude, its happening.
The SE K750 actually takes pretty decent pictures in most conditions. The Nokia N90, whilst not as good as its Zeiss branding would make out, is still pretty good.
The Sharp 902/903 models have pretty good 2/3mp cameras, and even have optical zoom.
Not forgetting Samsung and others who have effectively gone and integrated a phones functionality into 5+mp cameras.
And of course, you haven't lived until you've driven one of those 400hp Yugos. Most entertaining.
I'll agree that those blinking LEDs are pretty much useless, but on the SE phones, you can get an add-on flash unit that works as a full blown flash unit. On my SE W550, the images are still a little grainy, but I can take pictures in total darkness. With a K750/W800, it actually makes them into a totally capable 2mp autofocus camera.
Linux? We want OS/X running on platforms other than Macs and Dells ...
I've got a few motos around the house, none of them have battery problems.
My son has my old V525 and T720 - both last 3 to 4 days of normal usage. Less if you play a lot of games
Daughter has a V300, similar story - battery lasts very good on that.
Finally, my wife has an E398, basically a ROKR with less memory. And the battery on that is fantastic - she typically gets over a week out of it. We are in a good signal area though.
I've got a Siemens SX1 - better feature set than any of these others, but I can only get up to 2 days out of the battery.
Yours sounds like its faulty.
Look at the Symbian operating system. Its an evolution of EPOC - one of the original PDA operatings systems, which predates Windows CE, at least in usable devices.
In general, S60 devices (and UIQ) compete head on against Windows Mobile on pretty much all features.
Also, Nokia do the communicator range, which are a true phone/PDA hybrid. Bit of a brick, but if you want a full keyboard, wifi, 640x200+ screen, there isn't much that really comes close.
Okay, maybe I'm being pedantic, but Nokia *do* make PDA phones. They've been making them for years. In fact, they were (probably) the first company to actually do such a product (the 7650).
You want an XCute DV2 ... I think thats the model number. Its got a 6megapixel camera.
The V635 is a pretty good phone, and you're right, it does have a very usable camera. I've seen plenty of pics from them, and they are equal to or better than a cheapo disposable.
.... Im probably going to be getting one for my son for christmas. They're available for silly low prices now.
The K750/W800/N90 images are better again - they are on a level with a "proper" 2 megapixel camera.
On the V635
I've got an old Siemens SX1. 120mhz ARM cpu, it does 3D gaming very, very nicely. Midtown Madness plays very nicely.
Look at something like the Orange SPV C550 - its running a 220mhz CPU, has a 240x320 resolution screen of a very decent size/quality. Things are developing.
Mobile gaming isn't about playing games with the same depth of play as their desktop equivalents. Its nice to be able to play something like this whilst stuck in the queue at the supermarket, or just bide away a little time during slack points in the working day.
And as other posters have said, it doesn't have to be games - use your imagination to use the 3D engines in other ways.
I'm in tech support for a large US companies European operations. We've shipped hundreds of Blackberries to management and reps. They absolutely adore the blighters. Of course, this case only affects the US use of Blackberries.
Now, what I'm interested in is - just what is the scope? Can our European users roam in the US and still use the Blackberries? Does it only affect BES's in the US?
Hollywood is already one step ahead of you on this one ....
There does seem to be a lot more of these lockouts and restrictions on US phones - here in the UK, whilst the phones can often be highly branded (mainly Vodafone), its still relatively easy to add your own ringtones, themes, etc, either via bluetooth, irda or cable.
The thing with Moto and other manufacturers is that they are more than willing to do operator related restrictions - if Verizon/Cingular or whoever wants to restrict your own uploading of files, Moto are more than happy to add such restrictions - they are just doing what their customer (the operator) wants.
Dunno, I thought the Razr was quite good, at least as a phone - decent signal, battery life is okay, the phone book is a bit basic, but thats about the main negative (and at least in the UK, its getting to a pretty sensible price now).
Now, what most people would love to have is basically what you have described, and the phone is just round the corner - motorola call it the SLVR/V8 - its basically a RAZR style candybar, but with the ROKR feature set (and possibly a megapixel camera, depending on where you read).
I was under the impression that bluetooth could transfer data a lot faster (100k+ per sec), so okay its not totally suited to huge data transfers, but invariably on phones it is restricted to something stupid like 10k per sec.