The Walkman Lives!

Sony Ericcson is aiming for the low-end mobile music market with the new W350 Walkman phone. This is a simple unit for simple needs: just standard phone features and music player.

If you’re looking to stop carrying around an MP3 player and a mobile phone then this sleek and slim handset might be the perfect solution for you. Plus it comes in both North American and World Phone versions depending on if you need to travel overseas or just around the US and Canada. There are four colors to choose from so you can pick the one that suits you best – Electric Black, Hypnotic Black, Ice Blue and Graphic White.

The phone features an easy-to-use flip-down interface with the display and a simple music control button set (forward, back, play/stop) on the front face with the standard keypad inside. The display is 128x160 pixels with up to 262,144 colors and probably won’t do video well (although it is possible) but it will do album art quite nicely. It also sports a 1.3Megapixel camera for those quick snaps, photo blogging or picture messages and offers up to 4x digital zoom.

The W350 also has standard phone features like speakerphone, vibrating alert, polyphonic ringtones and the usual lineup of applications including phone book, alarm, calendar and calculator. It is WAP enabled which means you can do some limited web browsing and the RSS reader will let you keep up on some of the latest news.

But the real place this mobile stands out is the music department. After all, the Walkman brand is synonymous with mobile music and this phone does music well. Not only can it display album art while pounding on your eardrums with the Mega Bass feature, but it also comes with a 512MB Memory Stick Micro which means you’ll have enough space for up to around 400-470 MP3s or AAC tunes. While listening to a song on FM radio you can record a few seconds of it and the TrackID service will identify it for you. This could also work with badly named files on the handset and maybe by using the sound recorder to record something from an external source and ID it.

The phone also features email capabilities which would be difficult if it weren’t for the predictive text. Of course with Bluetooth you might also use an external keyboard. But the Bluetooth connectivity’s best use would be a stereo headset (Sony HBH-DS205) available separately from Sony or other vendors.

This is not a high end, jack-of-all-trades mobile. This is aimed at those who mainly want to play some tunes and use some standard phone features. So if you can’t go anywhere without your Elvis or Iron Maiden and don’t want to drag around two different units for music and phone, this could be the perfect answer. Plus it’s pretty damn cool looking which is always a bonus when showing off to your friends.