Sony Ericsson M600i

The Treos and BlackBerrys may get most of the smart phone press, but it's important to note that alternatives do exist. Sony Ericsson is one particular phone manufacturer that's been churning out these convergence devices for years under the guise of its P900 series. While we've yet to see the latest P990 make it to US shores, we did manage to get our hands on the Sony Ericsson M600i, a beautifully slender device that runs Symbian OS 9.1 and has support for high-speed UMTS. It has a dual-function keyboard similar to that of the BlackBerry 7100 series and captures the same sex appeal as does the Motorola Q. If you can do without a camera and Wi-Fi, the M600i could be the perfect stylish smart phone for you.

That said, the phone doesn't have carrier support in the US, so you'll have to get it unlocked at the hefty price of US$400. Sony Ericsson is well known for its stylish and attractive phones, and the M600i is no different. While it isn't as thin as the Q, it's still slim in its own right, measuring only 107 x 57 x 15mm. It looks sleek and feels comfortable in the hand, thanks to its smooth metal body and softly rounded corners. It also fit very easily into our pants pocket. It does somewhat resemble a remote control, so holding it up to your ear may take some getting used to.

Design

One of the best things about the M600i is the amazingly large and bright QVGA touch screen. Measuring 2.5 inches diagonally, the LCD boasts a 240x320-pixel resolution and 262,144 colors--markedly better than the Q's 65,536 colors. The screen is saturated with color; images and text are sharp and very easy on the eyes. The backlight timer is adjustable, as are the themes, wallpapers, colors, and menu style (grid or list views). Because of its touch-screen interface, you can easily navigate through the menus just by using the included stylus (it's housed in a skinny slot on the upper-left side). You can also choose to use handwriting recognition, a virtual keyboard, or the dual-function QWERTY keyboard for text input. The touch screen shows smudges after a while, especially if you end up using your finger to select menu options instead of the stylus.

A particularly clever design idea of the M600i is the inclusion of a jog dial located on the left spine right above the Back button. The jog dial proved invaluable for quickly scrolling through contacts, messages, and long Web pages, while the Back button provided an easy shortcut to the previous screen. It's worth noting that the Back button doesn't actually shut down the current application; it just minimizes it. You actually have to go to the Task Manager menu to terminate open applications. This is good if you like to run multiple tasks at once, but we think shutting down applications shouldn't be so tiresome. On the top of the device are the infrared port and a Power button, while the right spine is home to a programmable Hardware button, and a Memory Stick Micro (M2) card slot.

At first glance, it may seem like the M600i's dual-function rocker-style QWERTY keyboard would be difficult to maneuver. It does take some getting used to, as you have to press on the edge of the keys for the desired character, but it's a lot easier than it looks. There are two letters per key, and if you press it to the left, it inputs one letter; pressing it to the right enters the other letter. Thanks to a great key layout, tactile buttons, and predictive text, we found ourselves acclimating to the rocker-style keyboard pretty quickly.

On the bottom of the M600i is a charger port, with which you can either attach the included AC adapter or USB cable to charge. Since the M600i doesn't have a headset jack, the same port is also how you connect the included wired headset. We found this unfortunate because we would have liked to use our own pair of earbuds instead of the ones provided.

Features

The Sony Ericsson M600i has a wealth of features that are sure to please smart phone fanatics. Running Symbian OS 9.1 and UIQ 3.0, the M600i also boasts UMTS support and the usual cavalcade of business applications, such as QuickOffice, which lets you write, edit, and read Microsoft Word and Excel documents, and a PDF viewer. The M600i comes with 60MB of internal memory, and in a nice touch, Sony Ericsson includes a 64MB Memory Stick Micro (M2) card with the phone. However, if you plan on carrying more documents or multimedia files, you might consider getting a 1GB card.

Other office-worthy features include email with support for Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync plus POP3/IMAP, notes, voice recording, an alarm clock, vibrate mode, voice dialing, a file manager, a speakerphone, a stopwatch, a calendar, a calculator, a unit converter, and even VPN access. The address book is limited only by the available memory, and each entry will accommodate a total of 13 numbers, email addresses, or Web page URLs and can be assigned a caller group or one of 21 included polyphonic ring tones. You can also assign a photo to each entry, but you'll have to download images onto the phone since the M600i doesn't have a camera. The M600i also supports text and multimedia messaging. A PC Suite application will sync your email, contacts, calendar, and tasks with your computer, in addition to transferring any pictures, videos, or audio to your phone.

The M600i comes with the Opera browser and a dedicated RSS reader, which many techies will appreciate. The data transfer speeds were admirable in our tests, though we didn't always reach the high speeds that UMTS promises. The handset features support for the A2DP Bluetooth Profile, which allows for the streaming of high-quality audio content wirelessly. We were impressed that we could also use the M600i as a Bluetooth modem.

While the M600i is primarily a business device, it still comes with several impressive multimedia and entertainment features. There's an audio and video player that supports AAC, MP3, MP4, 3GP, and RealPlayer streaming formats. Both audio and video quality are superb, and you can display the video in both landscape and portrait mode. You can also download photos into a Picture Gallery so that you can show them to your friends later. Though we appreciate this feature, the lack of a camera does negate its potential usefulness. The M600i also comes with a MusicDJ application that lets you create and mix your own ring tones, and 3D games that include Vijay Singh Pro Golf and QuadraPop.

Of course, there are hundreds of third-party Symbian OS applications that you are free to download and add to your application library, not to mention the ability to download games, wallpaper, themes, graphics, and even music via Sony's PlayNow service.

Despite all its many features, we found the lack of Wi-Fi support and a camera sorely disappointing. Although we understand UMTS users might not need Wi-Fi and cameras aren't standard in business smart phones, we expect more features from such a pricey device. We also would've appreciated it if this supposedly business-friendly smart phone had quad-band world phone support instead of just triband.

Performance

We tested the triband Sony Ericsson M600i (GSM 900/1800/1900) in San Francisco using T-Mobile's network, and call quality was excellent. Callers couldn't tell we were on a cell phone, and we could hear them loud and clear. Speakerphone quality was also great. We also had no problems pairing the Sony Ericsson M600i with the Nokia BH-800 Bluetooth headset.

Although we generally had no problems with the user interface and operating system of the M600i, the phone did crash occasionally. We had to power-off and power-on a few times to get it running again. In other instances, we noticed a few seconds of system lag. These problems didn't occur very often, but when they did, it was quite frustrating.

The Sony Ericsson M600i has a rated talk time of 7 hours and 30 minutes and a standby time of 14 days. According to FCC radiation tests, the M600i has a digital SAR rating of 1.15 watts per kilogram.