Sony Ericsson P990i

Well, SE held to their promise. They phoned today to say my P1 will be delivered to me tomorrow.

While exciting, it is going to be a sad day.. I love my P990.
 
Gecko said:
Well, SE held to their promise. They phoned today to say my P1 will be delivered to me tomorrow.

While exciting, it is going to be a sad day.. I love my P990.
Click to expand...

The P1i is a 'stop-gap' phone between the P990i and the P3i, so with 64MB more RAM, the wait should (almost) be bearable... :)

Gecko, let us know how you get on with the P1i, because if something should happen to my P990i now :), that will be the phone I'll get till the P3i gets released.
 
yeah gecko, im keen too to see how it goes.... if its better than the 990 i want one... and who better to give an honest opionion than a 990 user
 
My views on the P1 so far..

OK, I got the P1i today.. thanks to SE's unfair attitude to only replace one guy's P990 and ignoring the rest's pleas.

My first impression.. SOLID. And WOW. What a phone!

It's a very well designed phone, feels solid in one's hand, and the screen seems much improved over the P990's. Maybe because it is slightly smaller with the same resolution as before, the image seems crisper and sharper, and in the sun it is finally reflective - like the P910's. That means one can see the screen much better in bright light - makes a huge improvement in our South African sun!

The UI is the same, but similar of that of the M600 and W950 - something for me to get to used to.

Then the obvious.. the available RAM. Wow, what a difference it makes!

With the following applications running at the same time, I still have 56.3MByte free:

- Main Menu
- Handy Safe
- Time
- PDF+
- Tasks
- Notes
- Quickoffice
- Video Player
- Music Player
- RSS Feeds
- Camera
- Picture Gallery
- Standby
- Calendar
- Contacts
- Messaging
- Phone
- Swiss Manager Pro
- TomTom6

And the phone is just as responsive as with no apps running!

This is what the P990 (and M600 and W950) was supposed to be.

And the final surprise: The P1i's for South Africa are bundled with a free Bluetooth GPS unit (in the original P1 box) and 12 month free Wayfinder subscription. I don't care much for Wayfinder because I use the very impressive TomTom6 software, but it's still a good deal. I saw the following article a few days ago, but never thought it would come to South Africa since it is a marketing campaign earmarked for Europe. See:

http://www.mobilmagazine.com/Articl...31112037_MOB622/20070731112037_MOB622.dbp.asp

So thats my first impressions. Although I'm a lucky b&gger to get the P1i for free, I still miss my P990 dearly.

Regards
 
A good article. Although I will always love Apple products for its quality, it will be while before they will be able to compete with Symbian / WM smartphones.
 
To compliment above article from KVI, I did the following test on the P1:

The Symbian-series phones of Sony Ericsson are truly able to multi-task, and with regards to the P1, I still have 12.5Mbyte free RAM with all of the following applications running at the same time, and with the ability to switch to any of them at any time:

- X-Plore
- Main Menu
- IM+
- Handy Safe
- Handy Day
- Handy Converter
- GView
- Standby
- Music Player
- Documents to Go Word
- Documents to Go Sheet
- Documents to Go Slide
- AED
- Time
- Converter
- File Manager
- Tasks
- Notes
- Pdf+
- Quickoffice
- Messaging
- Vijay Singh Pro Golf 3D
- Video Player
- Picture gallery
- RSS Feeds
- Handy Clocks
- Fring
- Calculator
- Wayfinder 7
- TomTom 6 (actively listening to Bluetooth GPS Receiver)
- Calendar
- Contacts
- Phone
- Control Panel
- Connections Mgr
- Text input
- Sounds& Alerts
- CLUI
- Web (active session)
- Swiss Manager Pro


The P1 is also shipped with an 1160mA/h battery, which improve the battery life hugely. Difficult to compare 1 to 1 now that I had to give up my P990, but after fiddling and playing with my phone the whole day, playing at least 2 hours of music constantly in the background, the battery level is currently at 24%. It's currently just after 1 in the morning.

People who does not like the form factor of this phone (I'm still getting used to it, especially the keyboard), will most probably be converted by the performance of it. And the size.
 
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Thanks for the cool 'reviews' Gecko, I think my P990i might just end up having an 'accident'... :)
 
Gecko said:
And the final surprise: The P1i's for South Africa are bundled with a free Bluetooth GPS unit (in the original P1 box) and 12 month free Wayfinder subscription. I don't care much for Wayfinder because I use the very impressive TomTom6 software, but it's still a good deal. I saw the following article a few days ago, but never thought it would come to South Africa since it is a marketing campaign earmarked for Europe.
Click to expand...

Is this supported in SA? How about Namibia? I am planning a trip up there soon and a GPS might be useful. I assume you need an extra bluetooth GPS unit as well?

Edit: Ah ok I have done some more digging and I see there are SA maps? Does it include the rest of southern africa? Still not sure however what I need to purchase.
 
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morkhans said:
Is this supported in SA? How about Namibia? I am planning a trip up there soon and a GPS might be useful. I assume you need an extra bluetooth GPS unit as well?

Edit: Ah ok I have done some more digging and I see there are SA maps? Does it include the rest of southern africa? Still not sure however what I need to purchase.
Click to expand...

@ morkhans
I don't know about maps for Namibia, but there are South African maps for TomTom and Wayfinder.

Wayfinder seems to download the maps depending where you are, so who knows, there might be maps for Namibia. I think it uses Tele Atlas maps, so you can always do some research to see whether they cover Namibia.

Referring to my comment about the P1 above - you get a FREE Bluetooth GPS Receiver with the P1i, together with a free 12 month Wayfinder7 subscription.

I'm a big TomTom fan, but after testing Wayfinder7 this weekend, I'm really impressed with their software and SA quality maps.

I still like TomTom though since it needs no internet connection to operate. The map is stored locally on your memory stick.

@ Wynsam, please give Wayfinder's Free Trial a try and see how you feel about their quality versus TomTom and let me know. I'm quite impressed with there SA maps (downside is it downloads as you drive, but then caches it), and it's street address Search function works quite well.

But more importantly, I've done a test to compare memory footprint (usage) between TomTom6 and Wayfinder7:

According to SMPro:
TomTom6 uses approx. 6MByte of RAM while in use
Wayfinder7 uses approx. 3.5MByte of RAM while in use

Handy to know when using a P990.
 
Gecko said:
@ morkhans
I don't know about maps for Namibia, but there are South African maps for TomTom and Wayfinder.

Wayfinder seems to download the maps depending where you are, so who knows, there might be maps for Namibia. I think it uses Tele Atlas maps, so you can always do some research to see whether they cover Namibia.

Referring to my comment about the P1 above - you get a FREE Bluetooth GPS Receiver with the P1i, together with a free 12 month Wayfinder7 subscription.

I'm a big TomTom fan, but after testing Wayfinder7 this weekend, I'm really impressed with their software and SA quality maps.

I still like TomTom though since it needs no internet connection to operate. The map is stored locally on your memory stick.

@ Wynsam, please give Wayfinder's Free Trial a try and see how you feel about their quality versus TomTom and let me know. I'm quite impressed with there SA maps (downside is it downloads as you drive, but then caches it), and it's street address Search function works quite well.

But more importantly, I've done a test to compare memory footprint (usage) between TomTom6 and Wayfinder7:

According to SMPro:
TomTom6 uses approx. 6MByte of RAM while in use
Wayfinder7 uses approx. 3.5MByte of RAM while in use

Handy to know when using a P990.
Click to expand...

Ah, that is good to know, Gecko!

Might get Wayfinder7 for my P990i...
 
Sony Ericsson P1i

@ Gecko
I got my SE P1i this morning (Nashua Mobile), after closer inspection I noticed the lack of mentioned GPS receiver/software, so it doesnt seem that every SP distributes this specific bundle.

@ Everyone :)

What I actually want to ask is what type of GPS receiver would I have to acquire specifically for the P1i and if its available locally where would I look?

AS for the phone itself, it is truly a breathe of fresh air (my past three phones have all been Nokia's). I can say without a doubt that the responsiveness/performance, battery life and build quality of this P1i is outstanding. Overall, I rate it an excellent handset!
 
Scandium said:
@ Gecko
I got my SE P1i this morning (Nashua Mobile), after closer inspection I noticed the lack of mentioned GPS receiver/software, so it doesnt seem that every SP distributes this specific bundle.

@ Everyone :)

What I actually want to ask is what type of GPS receiver would I have to acquire specifically for the P1i and if its available locally where would I look?

AS for the phone itself, it is truly a breathe of fresh air (my past three phones have all been Nokia's). I can say without a doubt that the responsiveness/performance, battery life and build quality of this P1i is outstanding. Overall, I rate it an excellent handset!
Click to expand...

That's a bit of a surprise to hear. I got mine directly from Sony Ericsson SA, so I would imagine that's how all suppliers would get it.. Do you have a Wayfinder Navigator 7 sticker on your P1 box? If so, they removed the BT GPS receiver from your box.

Secondly, before I got the P1, I bought myself a Holux gpslim 240 from eBay and shipped it in. You can basically buy any BT GPS receiver, but it wise to buy a good one which got at least got a SIRF STAR III chipset (high sensitivity). The more expensive ones are also in general faster than the cheaper ones. You can expect to pay round about R700 and up for a good one.

Further on I completely agree with your opinion about the P1. It's a well built, solid phone, with great responsiveness due to the huge amount of RAM. Battery life is really good keeping in mind all the apps running simultaneously in the back ground. It impresses me on a daily basis.
 
Hi there

I have the Holux M1000 which I imported from the States. Got it off ebay. Cost +- R500. I am extremely happy with it.
 
Amaze

Does anybody know what version of Amaze works correctly on P990i?
 
DeonS said:
Does anybody know what version of Amaze works correctly on P990i?
Click to expand...


I've just tested it on the P1i. They don't have the P990, P1, M600, W950 officially supported (funny enough they do support the new W960i), but I downloaded the M608c's version, is seems to work OK(ish). Reason why I say OKish is that it doesn't fully support touch screen stylus operation, so the interface can get a bit frustrating.

It being Java, it's slow, and I think it eats up lots of data over your GPRS connection. But the principle concept seems to work well, the maps looks relevant, and the search function for street address seems to work. I'm going to test navigation over lunch. Will let you know.
 
Feedback on free amAze GPS navigating software

I've just tested amAze GPS navigation. Not bad! With voice navigation etc.

Just a bit slow, but definitely still usable.

Only problem I found with it is that the Street Address search function seems to work, but when navigating, it takes me to a wrong street address. :confused: I will play with it some more to check whether it is not finger trouble on my side.
 
Gecko said:
I've just tested amAze GPS navigation. Not bad! With voice navigation etc.

Just a bit slow, but definitely still usable.

Only problem I found with it is that the Street Address search function seems to work, but when navigating, it takes me to a wrong street address. :confused: I will play with it some more to check whether it is not finger trouble on my side.
Click to expand...

Gecko, I'm glad you're testing your GPS in Somerset West, SO, if you get lost, worst scenario is that you might end up in Gordons Bay, Grabouw, or Bettys Bay, but not so if you're visiting Gauteng.

Here you might end up in Khotsung and those dudes are pretty cheesed off at the moment, they might wanna vent their anger at you - and it won't be pretty. :eek:
 
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I've posted this on www.my-symbian.com as well, but hoping that someone here can help me...

Have installed MS Office 2007, after I've installed the latest PC Suite and cannot get a successful sync between my P990i & Outlook 2007.

When I try to sync, I get an error on the phone and a 'sync failed' with PC Suite.

Anyone experienced this and got a workaround?
 
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