I love it when I can sum up a cell phone’s entire performance with just five words.  It makes me feel good as a writer.  And that’s exactly what I can do with the Sony Ericsson W518a.  Those five words: “rough controls but otherwise good” are a perfect expression for my time with the Sony.

The Sony Ericcson W518a is being described as a “walkman / cell phone”, and this description isn’t without some truth.  It features a voice recorder, conference call capability, Bluetooth connectivity, speakerphone, mobile email, mobile web, Java application compatibility, 3.2 megapixel camera that can handle video as well as geo-tagging, alarm clock, calendar, basic calculator, stopwatch, and a battery that can generate fully four hours of talk time on a single charge.

There are plenty of great features on this phone, and that’s terrific, but as I said in my incredible five word summary, the controls on this beast aren’t exactly easy to get along with.  I had a fairly rough time actually getting this phone to do what I wanted it to do, and that’s a bad sign.  It’s great that it can do as much as it can, but if you can’t actually MAKE it do what it can do easily, then what’s the point?

Still though, the Sony Ericsson W518a is a pretty solid quality phone, and well worth your time to consider if you’re looking for a new one.

The Good

Lots of great features

The Bad

Balky controls

Score 7 / 10

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