Sony Ericsson W760i
Discontinued 7th January 2008
The Sony Ericsson W760i is an
HSDPA slider phone with a 3.2 megapixel camera and GPS
navigation capabilities. This is the first Sony Ericsson
phone to feature built-in GPS, in this case using the
subscription-based Wayfinder Navigator software
to provide satellite navigation functionality.
Apart from the GPS feature, the Sony
Ericsson W760i isn't a particularly high-end phone.
Yes, it has a pretty good feature set, but the W760i
doesn't compete with the Nokia
N95 - instead, this handset concentrates on music
features rather than the N95's "everything but
the kitchen sink approach".
The display on the W760i is a 2.2"
240 x 320 pixel panel in 262,000 colours. That's substantially
smaller than the N95's 2.6" panel and the N95 8GB's
2.8" display. On the back is a 3.2 megapixel camera,
but one that lacks a flash and autofocus. The W760i
also lacks a video calling camera. The camera itself
is hidden in normal use, and is only revealed when
the W760i is slid open. The mechanism appears to be
almost identical to that seen in many Samsung sliders.
It's
a dual-band UMTS 850 / 2100 handset, and the W760i supports
HSDPA and EDGE data as well as GPRS. Sony Ericsson's
technical
data says that the W760i has WiFi, but we can find
no mention of this elsewhere and we suspect it is an
error.
Of course, this is a Walkman phone so
it comes with a very good multimedia player, and there's
also a capable web browser, email client, RSS news reader
plus all the other software you'd expect from a Sony
Ericsson phone. In addition, the W760i supports 3D gaming
and has built-in motion control.
What is the W760i for, exactly?
Our problem with the W760i is this -
what is it for? If you ignore the GPS, this is
basically just a grab-bag of parts from other phones.
There have now been over 20 Walkman phones in an increasingly
complicated and confusing range. And unless you
specifically want the "Walkman" features,
then the W760i has a much inferior specification to
the N95 which is generally free for contract customers
anyway.
We strongly suspect that the W760i is
the result of an internal political process
within Sony Ericsson rather than an engineering one,
and the camera capabilities and screen have been deliberately
crippled in order not to compete with a forthcoming
K-series GPS phone.
However, if the W760i offers you an
irresistible combination of features, then you'll be
glad to know that it will be available in Fancy Red,
Intense Black and Rocky Silver colour combinations from
Q2 2008 onwards.
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Sony
Ericsson W760i at a glance
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Available:
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Q2
2008
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Network:
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UMTS
850 / 2100 GSM 850 /
900 / 1800 / 1900
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Data:
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GPRS
+ EDGE + UMTS (3G) + HSDPA
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Screen:
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240x320
pixels, 262k colours
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Camera:
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3.2
megapixels
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Size:
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Medium
slider 103 x 48 x 15mm
/ 103 grams
|
Bluetooth:
|
Yes
|
Memory
card:
|
Memory
Stick Micro (1GB in box)
|
Infra-red:
|
No
|
Polyphonic:
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Yes
|
Java:
|
Yes
|
Battery
life:
|
4
hours talk / 14 days standby
(3G) 9 hours talk /
16 days standby (GSM)
|
|
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