Display - I found the TFT display(262K colors) to be outstanding, I’ve never seen another handset of equal display quality. A big part of why the display is so sharp has a lot to do with the resolution and screen size. Now typically we see displays at roughly 2.5in(63.5mm) using QVGA(320×240) resolution, the pixels in these displays are of adequate size, smaller being better. Now imagine shrinking that 2.5in display to 2in but with the same pixel count, you end up with a very sharp looking display, the pixels are so fine it becomes difficult to see them, icons and menus appear so smooth, it’s a real sight to behold. For reference, the majority of other mobile handsets of the same display size only support up to 220×176.

Above Display - Two buttons have been added, located above the display, it’s easy to overlook these buttons, because it blends in so well with the design. Out of all the Sony Ericsson handsets I believe the W600 was the first to use this button setup, the intended use was for games. In the K790 these buttons have other uses besides games, at the network service screen, the left button displays camera photos in a slide show and the right button will display them in a gallery. The buttons in camera mode will display camera options, but I won’t go into any details, as I’m saving it for the camera section later in this review.

Front Speaker - The front speaker appears to be covered by a silver metallic grill. The K800 has a camera built into the grill for video calling, where as the K790 does not. The decision made by Sony Ericsson to leave out the front camera in the American version was a good move. Since there is no true UMTS (3G) GSM network in America that is compatible with the rest of the world, the next best data connection Americans have is EDGE (2.5G), which is not fast enough to support video calling sadly, hence the decision made by Sony Ericsson to remove the front camera.

Left Side - The dedicated play/stop button can be found here, the button is indented to avoid accidental presses. The play/stop button works with both Walkman and FM radio applications, pressing it will activate the last used musical application.

Next to the play/stop button is the Memory Stick Micro slot, the cover of the memory stick is rather flimsy, definitely not something that was built to last. The good news is you’ll rarely open the memory stick slot, there isn’t much reason to do so besides switching out memory cards. The majority of the time you will be transferring files to/from the memory stick via USB cable, so the wear and tear issue of the memory stick cover doesn’t really concern me.

Right Side - The infrared port is found near the base of the phone on the right side, the reason for moving the infrared from the top to near the bottom, I’m unsure of, I don’t see any real advantages/disadvantages to the relocation of the infrared. The dedicated camera button sits next to the infrared port, it’s sole purpose is to snap pictures, no other functions.

The camera button is similar to the ones found on real cameras, it can be pressed half way down to focus the lens then fully pressed to take the shot. The volume button is more towards the top, it also acts as the zoom keys in camera mode, and can be used to display basic handset information at the network service screen.

Top - Power button, besides the obvious purpose of switching the handset off/on, is also a shortcut to select different profiles. Profiles can be rather handy, for example, in normal mode you can receive calls from anyone and the ringer is at level 7 loudness, but that may not be appropriate to use in the office setting, so you switch to office, which you previously configured to have a ringer loudness of 3 and only to accept calls from business associates. This saves a lot of time, rather than manually changing the volume and setting up different “Accept Calls” list. This is just one example of how customizing profiles can be of use, there’s many more ways to customize profiles.

Bottom - There is a metal loop for the wrist strap to tie to and the microphone is also located on the bottom. The multipurpose port, such mixed feelings. I find the multipurpose port to be a clever design, capable of handling so many task through a single port, but I also hate it! Well maybe not the multipurpose port itself, but Sony Ericsson’s unwillingness to budge and give us a normal 3.5mm headphone jack. I understand that this device is not geared towards musical playback, but this has been an ongoing issue with all Sony Ericsson handsets. Yes, you could use A2DP to listen through stereo Bluetooth headphones, but even Bluetooth headphones have their drawbacks, increased size, limited battery life, wouldn’t it be nice to have more options? I’m beginning to notice more and more, the connection between the headphones and the multipurpose port is not solid, the sound cuts in/out when the port adapter is slightly budged. So trying to use the handset during workouts has become a nuisance for me.

Back - The speaker phone and camera are located on the back, as said earlier, the camera forms a slight hump on the back of the K790. The hump isn’t necessarily a bad thing, when the K790 is resting on a surface, the hump creates an incline, making the K790 easier to view. It’s almost as if the K790 is saying “hey look at me, I’m a super expensive sexy mobile handset, I am your last paycheck in material form! You know you want to touch me, don’t be shy!”. Silliness aside, I’m not quite sure if this was an intended design feature, or if Sony Ericsson just needed more space for the camera, it’s most likely both.

Battery Cover - Lately I’ve had trouble with Sony Ericsson’s battery covers, the way they are designed, if you apply too much pressure or not enough, the back cover won’t come off. The first time I ran into this issue was with the Sony Ericsson W810. I spent a good two hours trying all sorts of strange voodoo techniques to remove the hellish battery cover, but nothing would work. I looked online and found I wasn’t alone in this problem, other W810 users had the same issue. I was finally able to remove the battery cover by using rubber gloves that created enough friction to pull the battery cover down. With the K790 and W950, the battery cover problem has been minimized. I still have trouble from time to time removing the battery cover on the K790/W950, but no where near as bad as the W810. On the bright side, at least your battery cover won’t accidentally come off.

Battery Life (As quoted by the manufacturers)

• 350 Hours in Standby
• 7.5 Hours in Call (GSM, not UMTS)

During my personal use, I spent 1-2 hours listening to the radio/Walkman, while browsing the internet, e-mail checks 3-5 times and about 8-10 SMS a day, the handset lasted about 2 days under this sort of usage. This is nice improvement over passed Sony Ericsson handsets. I recall using the K700, back then FM radio was a pretty big deal for mobile handsets, the battery would die after 2 hours of use. The FM radio was more of a novelty than something people could really use, but it seems battery life has reached the point where features like FM radio/Walkman/Camera are actually feasible for every day use.

Menu - The Sony Ericsson GUI (Graphical User Interface) remains the same for the most part. The only change I noticed was the integration of the RSS reader. Sony Ericsson has always put a lot of effort into making their menus look good and it definitely shows in this handset. The animated icons and background gives the menus a nice touch, although it’s not vital for excellent performance, a little bit of polish never hurts. The menus stay relatively customizable, I would prefer more freedom for shortcuts. I prefer to use Opera Mini 3.0 for my internet browsing needs, as opposed to using the built in browser, Netfront. Due to the shortcut limitations I cannot create a shortcut for Opera Mini, the closest I can get is making the folder that contains Opera Mini a shortcut.

Which brings me to my next point, I noticed I was able to run two Java apps at the same time. Previously this wasn’t possible in other SE handsets(not including smartphones).

Connectivity

• EDGE/GPRS
• Bluetooth 2.0 (A2DP supported)
• Infrared
• Modem
• USB mass storage
• PC Synchronization

Call Quality - I had an enjoyable experience making phone calls with the K790, there was only two instances where I was less than pleased the call quality. Both times I was walking down the sidewalk, as cars passed by I could barely hear the person I was speaking with. I’ve always felt Sony Ericsson’s maximum volume could use a boost, as I never had trouble hearing with Motorola handsets. I did hear some distortion when talking on speaker phone with max volume, it wasn’t anything serious though, I just turned the volume down one notch (out of eight) and the distortion vanished. The volume was still sufficient for hearing across the room. The frequency bands used in the K790 is 850/1800/1900Mhz and EDGE for data, typically I got transfer rates of 100-120kbps on EDGE.

Table of Contents:

Page 1: IntroductionPage 2: Physical AspectsPage 3: Camera BasicsPage 4: Camera QualityPage 5: ConclusionPage 6: Camera Options

Filed under: Sony Ericsson