Bang & Olufsen Serenata

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Features

The Serenata is, in fact, a very basic device. It has only two callings (no pun intended): To play music and provide basic mobile phone capabilities. There are no signs of fancy camera tricks or features which people don't use everyday. To put it bluntly, there's only one reason anyone would be interested in paying a premium (we don't have local pricing details because the unit is not available yet, so we are gauging the tab on the previous Serene) for a music player/handset such as this: The lifestyle design associated with Bang & Olufsen.

Besides the wheel (we call it the nerve center since almost every action associated with the device requires us to roll the disc), the LCD panel also has active areas which are touch-sensitive. To switch between the music player and the phone modes, we tap the top left corner of the screen. The top right corner calls up additional menu options, while the bottom of the screen pulls up three shortcut options. Tapping the centre of the LCD once brings up the numeric dial pad. These areas are mapped to different functions depending on whether we are listening to music or using it as a phone.

As a mobile phone, the Serenata will test the patience of many people, especially those who text a lot. The wheel is a tad too sensitive for precise navigation. That said, the handset is not meant for that crowd anyway. So if you happen to have heavy texting habits, look elsewhere. Basic phone features such as Web browser, organizer functions, file manager including other miscellaneous applications are all available. While we managed to get up to speed typing text messages by using a combination of the scroll wheel and the bottom stretch of the touch-sensitive screen, sending a message on a phone with a hardware keypad would probably shorten the time taken by a considerable bit.

The menus on the Serenata are categorized with color codes. Phone-related functions are in blue whereas music-related functions are in red. Whether there's any real practicality is another story, but to the user it's clear when we switch between using it as a music player, or a phone.

Music on the Serenata is sorted alphabetically by artist, albums, tracks, covers, podcast and genres (no equalizer controls, though). There are also options to create playlists and favorites. What's slightly more interesting is the Pure Music option. When activated, incoming calls will be directed to a voicemail automatically and messages will be received in the background so it won't interrupt playback. Music navigation on the device has an iPod-ish feel to it, but we suspect that's because of the scroll wheel.

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