Sony Ericsson W715 and C510 preview: First look

Camera shootout

Since we had several 3 megapixel handset on our hands, we decided to make an impromptu camera shootout between the Sony Ericsson C510 and the Sony Ericsson W715 and we threw in some samples from the now elderly Sony Ericsson K810 just for the fun of it. Finally, you'll see that Nokia 5800 XpressMusic also enters the competition, though quite unsuccessfully.

So here are the photos produced by the 3 megapixel cameras of all the four handsets in today's shootout. The Sony Ericsson K810 still seem to lead the pack, although now retired. The C510 is close behind but still leads the Sony Ericsson W715. The disappointing Nokia 5800 XpressMusic trails far behind.

We won't be getting into detailed image quality analysis as the C510 and W715 quite understandably are not final units and there can be a lot of improvements along the way to market availability.

Sony Ericsson C510 • Sony Ericsson K810 • Sony Ericsson W715 • Nokia 5800 XpressMusic

Sony Ericsson C510 • Sony Ericsson K810 • Sony Ericsson W715 • Nokia 5800 XpressMusic

Sony Ericsson C510 • Sony Ericsson K810 • Sony Ericsson W715 • Nokia 5800 XpressMusic

Then we went to test the camera flash performance. The Sony Ericsson K810 is the only one equipped with a xenon flash. The Sony Ericsson C510 and the Nokia 5800 have dualLED flashes, while the Sony Ericsson W715 is obviously underpowered with its single LED flash.

The following test shows the flash performance of all four phones from approximately 1m distance:

Sony Ericsson C510 • Sony Ericsson K810 • Sony Ericsson W715 • Nokia 5800 XpressMusic

The second flash test shows the flash performance from an approximate distance of 2.5m:

Sony Ericsson C510 • Sony Ericsson K810 • Sony Ericsson W715 • Nokia 5800 XpressMusic

Final words

We enjoyed having the Sony Ericsson W715 and C510 with us. They may not be ground-breaking devices, but they are solid-built, no-non-sense handsets that use one of the best feature phone interfaces available on the market and that has now gotten even more rich in functionality.

The Sony Ericsson W715 Walkman is so much close to being the G705 twin, that at first we hardly imagined a place for it under the sun. But, as it seems being a Vodafone-exclusive device is a good reason for any mobile phone to come into being and we like that operators are offering more and more advanced cell phones at subsidized prices. So in the end, the W715 Walkman might not be an effort in vain.

The Sony Ericsson C510 on the other hand comes with the latest interface revision (think YouTube and threaded SMS/MMS) and has borrowed features from the top Cyber-shot dogs (face detection and smile shutter). The svelte camera lens cover and the promise of being one of the most affordable Cyber-shots, would surely assure it a nice market position even though it lacks a xenon flash and is just a notch behind in image quality than the now elderly Sony Ericsson K810.

Overall, we had a nice experience with both mobiles, and we are looking forward to seeing how they will perform in real life once they go retail as finished products.