Sony Ericsson W395 review

The Sony Ericsson W395 is a budget music phone that channels the music playing skills of the outfit’s Japanese parent, and stuffs them into a cheery handset with a low pricetag. But is it low enough? Read on and find out in our full Sony Ericsson W395 review.

If you’re in the market for a simple Sony Ericsson phone which will double up for your music on the commute, you’ll be right at home with the Sony Ericsson W395. Build wise, it’s a fun little phone to pop in your pocket. The slide is smooth and snappy, the keypad is quick for firing off SMS missiles, and the two megapixel camera is borderline passable for slapping on a PC screen. There’s no 3G though.

We love how the Sony Ericsson W395 echoes the look of Sony’s Walkman line more than any other phone from the mobile spin off, from the curved edges to the central track controls and dedicated Walkman button. The speaker is surprisingly good too, and the battery will go for more than a few days before needing a top up.

Beyond this though, there’s little new on the software front. There’s no Google Maps and there’s not even Facebook – all you can do is send pictures to Blogger.

You can probably guess what our main problem with the music oriented Sony Ericsson W395 is though. In fact, the only people who can’t are the design team at Sony Ericsson, who, even after eight long years have still not learned to put a 3.5mm audio port in, so you can use your own headphones.

The bundled buds don’t sound too bad, but are horribly plasticky, and come with a call answering toggle so high up the cord, it may well tug one of your buds out of your head. Oh, and needless to say, the memory card slot is Sony’s Memory Stick Micro format, so you can’t just swap out the microSD card on your current phone.

We’re tired of moaning about Sony Ericsson’s persistent design flaws now. There’s little wrong with what the Sony Ericsson W395 tries to do, but that limited feature set doesn’t quite cut it any more. If you’re already on a low end Sony Ericsson phone, there’s little impetus to upgrade here.