That’s the same 1GB of traffic for either $60 or $11,000.

I do not believe that there is any possible justification for such a huge discrepancy in these prices. It’s merely Vodafone acting in a rapacious manner in an attempt to maximise profits extracted from those who don’t fully understand what they’re doing with their shiny new phones.

The Really Useful Features

• Access to Google Mail and LiveJournal from wherever I am. This is particularly useful at the moment as my temporary workplace blocks access to these sites.
• Internet access device for my laptop using 3G UMTS (up to 384kbps).
• High quality 3.2 megapixel digital camera, complete with direct upload to Flickr or LiveJournal courtesy of Shozu.
• Listening to music using the included headset and a 2GB M2 memory card.
• Using the Google Maps application for on-the-go navigation.
• Easy synchronisation of the phone calendar with my Google calendar using GooSync. If only it supported contacts as well (yes, it can be done in a two step Google-PC-Phone process but I don’t want to).

Bits of Good Design

• Sony Ericsson have replaced the sometimes fiddly joystick with a functionally equivalent but easier to use directional pad.
• They’ve replaced the superior Xenon camera flash with a LED photo light. While this isn’t so good for photos it means you can use the phone as a flashlight. I used this feature a lot on my last phone, especially when going down dark paths on steep Wellington hills at night.
• It multitasks! You can receive/send texts while connected to the internet while listening to music.
• You can set multiple alarms and even specify which days they operate. I’ve got one setup to ring at 6:45 from Mon-Fri but not in the weekends. (I cunningly remembered to turn it off for Labour Day.)
• While the connector is the same old ginormous Fast Port plug, it’s been moved from the bottom to the side which seems to work better, especially for headphones.
• It charges itself from USB.
• The shiny metal lense cover is beautifully integrated both physically and electronically. Once you get over the initial hesitation about using enough pressure to open/close it, it works very well and switches the camera immediately into camera mode.

Bonus advantage! We got a Sony Ericsson k530i for Kim the week before and the way that they both use the same chargers and cables and so on just makes life easier.

Stuff That Isn’t So Great

• I’m now paying $86/month to the dreaded Vodafone for my voice and data plans.
• The video quality is still limited to 176×144 pixels (aka crap).
• I miss the clock screen-saver on the k750i. This meant you could check the time without having to press a button.
• Why does the little power bar show the battery to be about 80% full when the phone status reports it’s 55% full?
• Power consumption when doing 3G data is high. When plugged into the mains it still manages to charge but only very slowly.
• I have no idea why the PC software takes 10 minutes to install itself.

My Next Phone

But no matter how good this phone is there’s always something more to desire. Some things I’d like in the next one:

• An even higher res screen. 320 x 240 pixels on a 1.9″ screen is pretty good but a bigger screen with even more pixels would be even better.
• Better text entry. I’m not sure how this would be down while still keeping the same size – and not losing the tactility of the buttons ala the iPhone. Maybe haptics will save me.
• An even even faster data connection.
• It’s going to have be an even better internet terminal (see all three points above this one). I’m impressed with what this one does but it’s still far short of a ‘real’ internet terminal. I wonder whether I’m going to have to sacrifice my desire for small size to get what I want.

And to finish, I’d like to mentally apologise to the very helpful woman at Etown who got me to change my mind from buying the k810i to the superior k770i. Yes, I shouldn’t have been surprised when you were reasonably knowledgeable about the product lines even if you were female and young and dressed like a [classist epithet deleted]. If only stereotypes weren’t so useful much of the time…