A New Challenger Appears: Sony Ericsson P990i Review
I know some people remember about June of 2006 I had a Sony Ericsson T637 that I sourly hated because it was still conformed to MIDI ringers. I would end up loading the MIDI version of the Mega Man X prelude level song just to deal with it. I will give that phone one thing... The stability was a nice change versus the pains of the slow and dated P2K system that my previous Motorola SLVR L6. It wouldn't be until after that when the newer Sony Ericsson phones would be much more well rounded and even robust as devices. My cousin would end up getting a P910i which he loves to death even to this day. Many of my friends have jumped on the bandwagon with the Sony Ericsson Cybershot K800i 3.2 megapixel camera phone and have had nothing but praise for the phone.
After many dead fish in the water about buying my Treo just because it lacked a sync cable, I ended up expensing $4 for it and finally got serious biters. One of them being an offer for a Sony Ericsson P990i as a straight up trade. Sure, it required a drive to Watauga/Fort Worth, Texas, but it was more than worth it for being lost about 1 hour on the cluttered web of highways. I would get to the trader's home and would receive a complete suite of goods unlike the stale offers online for the same phone but it would only be the charger cable, sync cable and nothing else. Here was the contents of what I received:
- Sony Ericsson P990i smartphone and built-in-stylus
- Keypad flip removal kit and replacement hinge plate
- Wired stereo headset
- USB data cable
- OEM replacement charger cable
- Desk cradle
- Extra stylus
- Full size Memory Stick Pro Duo to Memory Stick Pro adapter
- 512MB Memory Stick Pro Duo (by SanDisk)
- 2GB Memory Stick Pro Duo High Speed (by Sony)
I was rather impressed by the completeness of this kit, and I have been rather happy with the trade. Enough on that whole bit, let's get to the good stuff and talk "essential" specs! Specs are from the Sony Ericsson P990i digital manual.
Signal Bands: GSM 900/1800/1900 and UMTS 2100
Extra connectivity: GPRS and 3G, no EDGE, 802.11b, Bluetooth 2.0 with A2DP support
Storage and Expansion: 60mb on board, Memory Stick Pro Duo readable up to 4gb
Imaging Devices: VGA video phone camera and a 2 megapixel camera with flash and auto focus
Operating System: Symbian 9.1 with UIQ 3.0
FM Radio Connectivity: 87.5 - 108.0 frequencies, 20 channels may be memorized.
The phone is well rounded, but well with my final days of AT&T, it's hard living with a tri-band world phone without an 850 frequency on the baseband chips. Some spots where the the 850 signals rain supreme, AT&T fans will have an issue with this. I don't mind it, because I am leaving for T-mobile anyhow so it is a small price to pay for a well rounded smartphone. The UIQ 3 interface is rather clean in shape and style in addition to simple for users of smartphone devices. Some who have used Windows Mobile devices may either find this clean and simple or feel they are in a dumb down interface. The Sony Jog-wheel is nice to shoot through the device settings with one hand, but the only thing counter-intuitive is the keypad lock. It's not a pair of keypress combinations anymore like on my cousin Sol's Sony Ericsson P910i... it's a physical slider key that you have to slide. Not too much of a bother, but I will agree with others on the web on that one... it is a little annoying.
Feature wise, it is well equipped. Phone book and calendar have limitless capacity for phone book entries and events, The alarm clock is pretty loud for me, which is VERY good and highly essential. The media player functions are rather robust and show the foundations for the Sony Ericsson Walkman series PDA phones as there are a list of equalizer settings on various modes to enhance the music from it. The P990i is the first phone I have owned to have a radio feature and it's really somewhat nice to have. It comes in handy for me, as sometimes I do wish I had a radio in my room, but the feature solves the problem and keeps the noise level down for my family. The camera does the job, but it's by no means a Cybershot series phone with only 2 megapixels and an LED flash/lamp.
Things I have not tested are the capabilities of Bluetooth 2.0 like wireless stereo or multi-linking devices, 3G video phone calls because I just don't have the capabilities to do that just yet. The Bluetooth thing, I will need a stereo headset for that which will cost a chunk of coin. The video calls won't happen until T-Mobile unrolls out their 3G network stuff later this year or early 2008. The 3G isn't compatible with AT&T so I miss out there. I really like the phone, just I can't really give it a fair review when my provider doesn't like to support one band of service... Expect me to do a more fair review on call quality when I shift over to T-Mobile on October 27th.
