Sony Ericsson W960


When: November 2007 Worth: $600

Touch screen, musically inclined, loaded with gigabytes of flash memory and designed by one of the heavy-hitters in the consumer electronics industry. Think we're talking about the iPhone? You're only half right, as Sony Ericsson's recently-announced W960i Walkman phone has all those features and more. Whether its an iPhone competitor may be a moot point, as the W960i is going to be a Europe-only phone, while rumors have been circulating that European carriers have balked at Apple's stipulations for selling the iPhone. So the question may not be which phone to choose, but rather which continent. We size up both models, feature for feature, and decide which phone is the one to keep an eye on.

Interface

If there is one true innovation in the iPhone, it's the interface. Besides the multi-touch screen, the interface is filled with nice little effects that add up to a more visceral experience, made for the tactile navigation. The Sony Ericsson phone, on the other hand, will use UIQ, which is a Symbian-based interface. We last saw UIQ on the Sony Ericsson P990i smartphone, and, frankly, we weren't impressed. Many icons were abstract collections of spheres and cubes, with little relation to their actual purpose.

The one to use: Apple iPhone

Design

We are seriously concerned about the lack of a keyboard on the iPhone, for every aspect of the phone. In our experience with Palm OS and Windows Mobile devices, the touch screen keyboards, even simple numeric pads, just don't cut it. They can be inaccurate, insensitive and distracting to use, especially while driving. Still, just look at the iPhone and you want it. It has all the design appeal of the iPod, simple and clean with a symmetrical look and one-button design. The Sony Ericsson W960i is a very nice looking phone, very slim and glossy, and we're generally fans of Sony Ericsson's designs. Still, the iPhone is something completely different.

The one to hold: Apple iPhone

Platform

We were relieved when The New York Times reported, inaccurately, that Steve Jobs would release a software developer's kit (SDK) for the iPhone. Instead, Apple announced compatibility with Web-based apps, and simultaneously launched their preferred Web browser, Safari, on the PC. It's an intriguing step, but with Symbian OS support, the W960i is definitely going to have more third-party software available at launch, especially our favorite third-party app, SlingPlayer. Sure, Google's Web apps might work on the iPhone, so you might be able to open Microsoft Office documents, but proven apps for Symbian already exist, so W960i won't have to worry about possibilities.

The one to develop: Sony Ericsson W960i

Video playback

We're not exactly sure what sort of videos the W960i will be able to play, and though Sony Ericsson is touting "TV quality," we aren't expecting true DVB-H for mobile television. Assuming it will use a similar standard to the iPhone, which will play h.264 video files like the iPod video, we still think that videos on the iPhone will look better, for a couple of reasons. First, the iPhone's 480 by 320 pixel screen has twice the resolution of the Sony Ericsson phone. Second, the iPhone's screen is nearly an inch larger, diagonally, than the W960. Even with the increased size, Apple has improved pixel density to 160ppi, which is better than most computer monitors.

The one to view: Apple iPhone

Music playback

The iPhone has iTunes, with the accompanying music store, so it must be the one to watch for music, right? Not so fast. Sony Ericsson has a slew of interesting music features coming soon, notably the recently announced support for the MusicStation software. MusicStation is basically a subscription-based music store with over-the-air (OTA) downloads. An early criticism of the iPhone has been its lack of OTA access to the iTunes store, which always seemed to us a strange omission, as the iTunes software uses many of the same core elements as Safari for access to the massive catalogue. Eventually, we expect to see the iTunes store on the iPhone, but probably not until the device gets a 3G upgrade. Beyond MusicStation, we're interested in seeing some of the new music organization features on Sony's Gracenote-powered Media Manager software, like smart playlists that group songs by mood and tempo.

The one to listen: Sony Ericsson W960i

Camera

We're not going to make assumptions about the lens quality of the Apple camera, though we hope Apple doesn't go the route of other manufacturers by including a cheap, plastic lens that takes pitiful snapshots, albeit at a respectable, though uselessly high, resolution. We do know that the Sony Ericsson phone's camera will feature a flash, but more importantly will have auto-focus capabilities. In the past, we've been pleased with the image quality from Sony Ericsson's Cyber Shot phones, which use Carl Zeiss lenses, so the W960i is the one we're keeping an eye on, in terms of camera.