I have owned the Sony Ericsson w580i for about a few weeks, and while it was originally a Rogers branded unit, I have since
unbranded it via wotanserver as I wanted mp3 ringtones and flash themes. As such, current firmware is R6BA020 which is just
Generic firmware.
Sony Ericsson PC Suite for syncing with Outlook, etc
Reception
So far so good. Reception is clear. Haven't lost signal yet. Having used some pretty beastly phones for RF, my standards have
become pretty high for RF quality, and living in my basement, good reception is key, and the w580i does not fail.
At times it will fall down to 1 or 2 'bars' but I'm still able to make crystal clear calls.
Call Quality
Incoming:
One thing Sony Ericsson has never disappointed me with is sound quality. Every Sony Ericsson that I have ever owned/played
with has been simply amazing as far as sound quality goes. The w580i is no exception. The balance is perfect, the sound is
plenty loud, and I haven¡¦t noticed a lot of buzz.
Outgoing
No complaints here, or from anyone else I have spoken to. From talking with people, they say it does pick up some background
noise, but that when I do speak, I'm very clear.
Camera
The camera is a 2 megapixel camera, without autofocus. Nowadays it seems that any decent camera without autofocus on a phone
is considered a disappointment. While I wasn't expecting k750i/w810i level quality, I was pleasantly surprised with the
quality of the camera. The sample pictures below were taken in a low light situation, in regular lighting (I will get a
picture up ASAP) the camera is pretty good. There is a zoom on the camera, but it only works in Video mode, I don't know why.
Obviously the lack of a flash makes low light pictures pretty difficult.
The phone also has a neat little timeline feature where you can see what pictures you took on a certain day of a certain
month.
Camera Menus
Save to
Battery
The w580i is powered by 930mAh battery. Battery for me seems to be standard Sony Ericsson quality. A day of about 2 hours
worth of calls, an hour of radio use, an hour of walkman use, about 10 text messages and constant playing with the phone
(opening and closing) leaves me with about 60% battery. Today I haven't been playing with it much and I'm at about 90%.
Aesthetics
Simply put, the w580i is a gorgeous phone. I went with the white one because I felt the colours contrasted a little better
and things just 'popped' more. The white does have a bit of a silvery tinge to it though, it's not really a pearl white ala
white w810. The phone is nice and clean looking, not overly cluttered with junk.
Left side of the phone has the volume rocker keys which also show your status if you do not have a headset plugged in. Right
side of the phone contains the SE fastport, which seems to be the new location of the port for a lot of their new phones.
The buttons that contain the 'back' and 'c' delete keys light up when there is an incoming call (can be turned off) or when
you're navigating through the menus just playing with the phone etc (can't be turned off). Colours can be customized to suit
your needs depending on your theme. They're a nice little touch, but it would be nice to be able to turn them off as I'd
gather that they drain the battery a bit.
Screen
Nice, clear, crisp screen. I've recently used the k790a and Pearl which have stellar screens, and the w580i in normal
lighting situations doesn't disappoint. In direct sunlight the screen becomes a little difficult to see, especially if you've
got a dark theme. The lack of a standby clock as a screen saver kind of hinted me to that. You can however display the
standby clock when the phone is locked by pressing the volume rocker keys.
Keypad
I was a little concerned with the keypad on this phone for two reasons. Number one is the growing number of people who have
S500i's that have cracking keypads. Number two is the size of the keypad. I can't really comment on the first issue as
everything seems to be a-ok but I guess only time will tell. The size of the keypad took some getting used to, especially
being spoiled by keypads such as the k790 and the Pearl. I've gotten used to the size of the keypad though, and I've really
come to like it. The keys have a nice tactile feel to them.
Build Quality
No major issues here. To those who have played around with the dummy in Rogers stores and think that is the quality of the
phone, think again. The phone has a nice feel to it. The slide has a nice feel to it, snaps open and closed nicely. When the
phone is open, it does wobble a bit if you put pressure near the top, but that is somewhat expected.
On to the major gripe about this phone is the near impossible to remove battery cover. I honestly feel as though I'm going to
break the phone when trying to remove the battery cover. When I flashed the phone, I managed to find a sweet spot when I had
to remove my sim card, but I have been unable to find it since. It was roughly near the top of the battery cover, with one
thumb on either side of the words "Sony Ericsson" pushing towards the bottom of the phone.
User Interface
Typical Sony Ericsson interface here. When the phone was Rogers branded, you could customize the shortcuts on the d-pad, but
that was it. I've since unbranded the phone, which allows for full customization of the shortcut buttons as well as allowing
for flash themes. Quite frankly, while the UI is nice, I'm getting a little bored of it as it has been the same UI for the
last couple years. It would be nice for a little change, but I'll take a solid UI over a buggy attempt at something new any
day.
Connectivity
Standard stuff here as well. Bluetooth 2.0 via A2DP, USB Cable and Edge. No IR, which isn't all that surprising as it's a
pretty dead technology.
Bluetooth works well overall. I haven't picked up an A2DP headset yet, but I will soon. The phone pairs great with my
Macbook, and averages transfer speeds around 60kb/s. Pairs no problem with my Samsung WEP410 as well.
Fitness Apps
One of the nice little features of the w580i is the included fitness application. It includes a step counter, calories lost
counter and settings for walking or running. It can track multiple runs, how many steps you take in a day on average, and
graph it all. It's pretty cool.
Walkman/Radio
Radio is the same as in any SE phone, although it has one nice little add on, TrackID. If you are unsure of the name of the
song, TrackID records a small clip of it and searches the internet for a match. It will show you the name of the song, the
artist, and the album you can find it on.
Walkman 2.0 makes it's Rogers debut on the w580i, and I must say I love it. I love the album art support, and just the UI in
general. It looks a lot nicer and just has a nicer feel in general. Standard equalizer settings and the like available as
well.
One of the cool features of the phone is the "Shake to Shuffle" feature. If you hold the walkman button and shake the phone,
the phone will shuffle to a new song. It's a nice little feature. The unfortunate thing is that you cannot use this feature
if you turn the step counter off, as turning the step counter off turns the accelerometer off.
The phone includes the standard HPM-70's that come with any walkman phone nowadays.
Ratings
Performance : 9
Build quality : 9
Battery life : 9
Value for Money : 10
Software : 10
Camera : 9
Keypad : 9
Screen : 9
Overall : 9.25
Overall, one of the best phones I've used. Great RF, nice keypad, nice screen, decent camera, Walkman function is awesome and
well worth for the money.
PRO's
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