Sony Ericsson K550i Cyber-shot Unlocked Cell Phone with 2 MP Camera, MP3/Video Player, Memory Stick Micro Slot--U.S. Version with Warranty (Jet Black)

Other products by Sony Ericsson Mobile

Product Features

• This unlocked cell phone is compatible with GSM carriers like AT&T and T-Mobile. Not all carrier features may be supported. It will not work with CDMA carriers like Verizon Wireless, Alltel and Sprint.
• Quad-band GSM cell phone compatible with 850/900/1800/1900 frequencies and GPRS/EDGE data capabilities
• 2-megapixel digital camera with 2.5x digital zoom; digital media player with FM radio
• Bluetooth stereo music streaming; Memory Stick Micro (M2) expansion; access to personal email and instant messaging
• Up to 7 hours of digital talk time and 350 hours of standby time

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 4.2 x 1.8 x 0.7 inches ; 4 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S. and to APO/FPO addresses. For APO/FPO shipments, please check with the manufacturer regarding warranty and support issues.
• ASIN: B000NT9SRY
• Item model number: K550i
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #12,907 in Cell Phones & Service (See Bestsellers in Cell Phones & Service)

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description
Just when you thought Sony Ericsson phones couldn't get any cooler, the K550i Cyber-shot comes along. As part of Sony Ericsson's new line-up of Cyber-shot phones, the quad-band K550i comes complete with a 2.0-megapixel camera that features an auto-focus, LED flash, an active lens cover, picture blogging capabilities, and Adobe photo album software. The phone also features an M2 memory card slot, an advanced music player, an FM radio with RDS, EDGE data support, stereo Bluetooth, and more.

Design
The K550i's slim candybar form factor keeps things stylish and portable. Because of this design, the phone resembles a digital camera, and with its built-in 2.0-megapixel camera lens and advanced camera features, it performs noticeably well as a camera. The top of the device features a massive 176 x 220 display on the front side and a pronounced camera system on the other. The camera unit, which is protected by a lens cover, features 2.0-megapixel resolution, as well as an LED flash and other advanced features. Meanwhile, a five-way directional button on the front of the device controls most of the phone's menus and features. An M2 memory stick slot is provided for easy memory expansion while the phone features 64 MB of built-in memory. In addition to USB and Bluetooth connectivity, the K550i also has an infrared receiver for data synchronization.

Calling Features
The K550i's phone book can hold all your contacts with multiple entries per contact. A call list remembers your most recent missed, received, and dialed calls. The phone's voice activated dialing makes calling up to 50 of your contacts as easy as saying their names, while the built-in speakerphone makes it easy to talk without having the phone to your ear. Polyphonic ringtones are included and there's even a bundled application that lets you mix your own ringtones with up to 16 tracks. Picture caller ID lets you assign a photo to specific callers. Similarly, a ringer ID lets you assign ringtones to callers. For those times you want to keep things discreet, there's a vibrate ringer mode.

Because the K550i is Bluetooth-enabled, you can use a variety of headsets and handsfree kits for total wireless freedom when you're on the go.

Messaging, Internet and Tools
If you're looking for a mobile office partner, the K550i has you covered. Support is built in for sending and receiving pictures, text, graphics, sound and video via SMS or MMS messages. When used in combination with the phone's built-in still and video camera, MMS opens up a whole new world of messaging possibilities. Instant messaging is also supported and the phone ships with a built-in email client with support for POP3, IMAP4, and SMTP protocols. Push email is also supported, allowing you to have instant email on your mobile phone, just like on your home computer. Messages are sent directly to your phone as soon as they arrive. There's also a built-in Web browser for downloads and mobile Web browsing. T9 text entry, a technology that makes it easier for people to enter words and text on handsets, is built into the unit--a plus for mobile email and text messaging users.

Getting on the Internet is easy with the K550i, as it supports the GPRS protocol. When used with a carrier data plan and the phone's Bluetooth or USB data capability, the phone can be used as a wireless modem for laptops and PDAs.

A number of handy software tools are bundled with the K550i, including a voice memo recorder, a calculator, a calendar and an alarm clock. Use the K550i's Bluetooth capability to set up a wireless link with a Bluetooth accessory or connect to a computer or hand-held device to exchange and synchronize data. The phone also supports the SyncML PC synchronization standard. This means the phone can be used with the included Sony Ericsson Sync Station software, which lets you synchronize your Microsoft Outlook calendar, contacts, notes and tasks with your K550i. The phone also supports a USB mass storage mode, allowing you to store and transport important files like documents, images, and music files.

Imaging and Entertainment
Blurring the lines between high-end digital cameras and cell phones, the built-in 2.0-megapixel Cyber-shot camera with LED flash and autofocus is ideal for catching and sharing smiles on the fly. Use your shots to keep in touch. Send a picture message, or upload to your blog for all to see. You can even connect a USB cable and send straight to a printer. The phone's camera also supports video capture and playback. Video clips are ideal for those unexpected great moments in life. Use the pictures you take as wallpaper to dress up your phone to your different tastes. There's even an included application called Video DJ that allows you to edit video footage right on your phone. Make it look great with advanced editing options before uploading footage to your blog.

The K550i is a powerful gaming companion, too, with support for enhanced, Java-based 3D gaming. The phone comes preloaded with several games and more are downloadable from Sony Ericsson. Lastly, the K550i has a nifty MP3 player and built-in FM radio with search function and RDS, so you can load up your memory card, or tune into the radio and listen to your favorite music on the go.

The k550i also sports an airplane mode feature, which allows the user to safely use the non-wireless functions of a phone (such as music, games, or organizer functions) on an airplane during flight.

Vital Statistics
The Sony Ericsson K550i weighs 3.0 ounces and measures 4.0 x 1.80 x .50 inches. Its lithium-ion battery is rated at up to 7 hours of digital talk time and 14 days of digital standby time. It runs on the GSM/GPRS/EDGE 850/900/1800/1900 frequencies. The phone comes with a one year limited warranty.

Product Description
The main idea with the K550 is to reach a broader audience with our Cyber-shot™ camera phone proposition. Consumers interested in mobile phone photography will therefore be offered a compact 14 mm thin 2 megapixel camera phone with several high-quality camera features such as auto focus, active lens cover and picture blogging.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great phone with a few minor annoyances, June 14, 2007

By	M. Fields (Pittsburgh, PA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The k550i phone is a great small feature-packed phone. The camera on the phone takes excellent pictures, suitable for making 4x6 prints. The phone has a panorama mode that allows you to stitch together 2 or 3 images with a very good stitch guide. Also, there is a nice image editor built into the phone that can do auto-levels, contrast, brightness, and a bunch of other nice tools. You can see many full size pictures by visiting flickr and searching on "k550i". The MP3 player works great ... sound quality is excellent, though volume is soft and some may find the max volume is too low. You will want to get a micro memory stick if you want more than a few songs. I like how the included headphones double as a handsfree set and transition from music to phone back to music effortlessly. I found creating a few playlists very intuitive and easy. Battery life is very good, even with lots of music/radio playing and picture taking. The radio features trackID, which takes a sample of the song you are listening to and looks up the artist, song title, and album ... actually have found it very useful(requires data plan). The web browser is a good WAP browser for basic use ... I like that you can change to landscape screen orientation browsing.

OK, now for the annoyances: When the flash is turned on, the LED lights stay lit constantly, and they are very bright ... human targets usually complain. I was surprised that digital zoom for the camera is only allowed at VGA resolution, and not at 1MP. There is a workaround ... after taking a 2MP picture, you can zoom in on it and save the visible area to a new picture. I take pictures and immediately send them to flickr ... the phone presents a nag screen warning that the file is large, which cannot be turned off. The "take picture" button is a two-step button like most cameras, with a focus step then a snap step, but the second step takes a hard press causing you to shake the camera and get a blurry picture. Instead, I use the center joystick button on the face of the phone, which focuses and immediately takes a picture. Sending a picture as an email immediately after taking it requires some kooky steps: (press joystick in, select "view", zoom out one step, then select More->Send As->Email).

Despite the flaws, I am very happy with the phone considering the price and features.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good, but not there yet, November 13, 2007

By	j.p.genda "jpgenda" (Monterrey, Mexico.) - See all my reviews

The pro's
* very compact design, almost too small for my big hands, but over time one gets used to its dimensions, AND enjoys the small design. Fits into the front pocket of my jeans! The center button (the one which looks like a 5-way) and its surrounding ring (this ring has the four directions) feel very sturdy, they seem to be made of actual metal. The ring has four tiny dots of light, where four arrows could be, signaling each one direction, and look very cool when they glow along with the keypad, in dark environments.
* I just changed to the K550 from my previous nokia 6820, which has an expandable flip qwerty keyboard, and missed the nokia keyboard at the beginning. However, the predictive text interface is almost perfect (read con's) and I almost do not miss the keyboard anymore. Predictive text also allows you to create your own dictionary entries (this is more or less a common feature of cellphones) and allows you to enter your dictionary to maintain it: edit or delete entries (this is very uncommon and useful!). The predictive text has several modes one of which turns on "national characters". when I sometime type a message in spanish, comes handy since it allows the use of spanish accents.
* very large memory for contacts, and the fields used in contacts are very compatible with outlook, which means you will not lose data when synchronising your contacts into your PC. When I synchronised with outlook from the 6820, the mapping of fields was different, so one got lost or misplaced information in the process.
* at 2 MPixels, very good definition for a camera that is always with you, for that spontaneous snapshot.
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the con's
* the chrome finish of the center ring is starting to wear off after only three months of use! the entire surface of the ring, starting with its perimeter, is wearing thin and leaking blue light. looks cheap and old, too bad for a set this expensive.
* The "national character" feature behaves strangely, in the sense that when I turn it on, it changes the message length limit from 160 down to 60 characters, for no good reason. And when you turn it off, the limit is still there, you would have to start a new message from scratch for the limit to be 160 again. Also whe you turn teh feature off, the phone "forgets" the words one has created with spanish characters, literally hiding a portion of your custom dictionary. I dont think of these as design flaws but more as software bugs, but they are real, limiting and annoying.
* the light of the camera, two very bright and white LEDs, is good as a lamp to fing your way walking through a dark place, but is a terrible, almost useless flash for taking pictures in the dark, which is what it's suposed to be. The camera works well only under good natural light or decent room lighting. Not worthy of the cybershot name.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very happy with it - highly recommended, November 29, 2007

By	Zafer Aktan (Monterey, CA. USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I had a Sony S710a which I unlocked when I was in Prague, but it was not a quad phone and I had problems when I travel some countries like Turkey and Poland. So I decided to purchase a small quad phone which is AT&T compatible. With K550i I found the phone I was looking for. It is doing everything S710a was capable of and more much more. The reception quality is very good. I always have more bars than my S710a at the very same places. The Gmail client, Google Maps client and Opera Mini version 4 (great browser for a mobile phone) works flawlessly - can't run Yahoo GO (it display the wierd message of not available memory, even I have 67Mb on the phone) but who cares. With AT&T unlimited media package, I can surf the internet, use Jajah for VOIP international phone calls and more. Picture quality of the 2MP camera is very good, have a 2GB miniSD card and have no problem with spacing. Have not used the radio too much but it is there if you want to listen your favorite FM station and it requires carrying the plugin cable/head phones. The commercially available or free application for the phone are numbered. But I have been using it as a router to the internet via bluetooth and my Microsoft Vista Dell XPS 1330 laptop - because AT&T unlimited package on the cell phone plan (only 20$ per month), it is an excellent way of using your laptop anywhere. I am also planning to purchase the new Nokia N810 web tablet next year and use K550i as router as I do with my laptop. With Nokia 810 and K550i, you don't need no iPhone. The combo will do everything I need (including Skype video calls ;) The phone is very stylish and light - I am very happy with it after 6 months and I highly recommend it to anyone. I hope this proves useful.
Regards