Sony Ericsson Yari Review

If you are going to be successful in the UK market, you need a strong line up of mid range phones. The mid range is where the business really happens. Cheap prepay phones have their place, as do the multimedia all singing all dancing devices, but the mid range is where the majority look for their phones. You only need to look at devices from Nokia and Samsung, to see how wide a range you need in this market sector and it is something that Sony Ericsson has been lacking. What a mid range phone needs is to be strong in all areas, with maybe a top end feature here and there not included, to keep the cost down, and to just ‘do’. Nothing complicated, nothing difficult, but not too basic either.

The mid range is where the Sony Ericsson Yari is squarely aimed. And the device brings with it some nice touches, enough to make it unique in its class, which is a job all of its own. A simple, almost conservative slide design, the Sony Ericsson Yari has a 2.4 inch TFT display, supporting up to 256,000 colours. A standard QVGA size, the display is what we have come to expect from Sony Ericsson over the years. Just 15.7mm thick, the Yari is a pocket friendly 115g; thanks to the slide design the alphanumeric keypad is well spaced, although the keys are perfectly flat, which may not be to the liking of heavy texters.

The camera on the Yari is a more than adequate 5.0 Megapixel device, with autofocus and an LED flash. Geotagging is supported, along with face detection and image stabilisation. For a handset that is not being branded with the Cybershot name, that is more than acceptable, and should offer excellent image results. Video recording is enabled on the camera, but we find that the VGA recording offered on the Aino is not also on the Yari, leaving the Yari with QVGA quality at 30fps. Along with many others, I look forward to the day when Sony Ericsson realise that today, on a mid range device, that isn’t enough.

Data wise the Yari is well featured, with support for HSDPA Mobile Broadband up to 3.5 Mbps and all the usual suspects backing that up, including GPRS, HSCSD and EDGE. Although the lack of WiFi may be a disappointment for some, the lack of this feature is one of the points that keeps the phone in the mid range, and also keeps the price down.

There is plenty on the Yari to keep you entertained. The most innovative of these features is gesture control gaming. Popular already in Japan, gesture control gaming is something you will already be aware of if you have ever used a Nintendo Wii. One of the games pre-loaded on the Yari is tennis. Activate the game, set the device up, on a table top for example, and stand in front of the phone, imagining you have a tennis racket in your hand. The front facing camera will pick up your motions as you play the game. I can see the appeal of this, and Sony Ericsson predict that multi player games will soon be available, and that can only enhance the fun, but I do wonder about the feasibility of such gaming on such a small screened device. Maybe combined with a TV OUT option, it would come into its own. Still, it is early days for this technology in devices available in the UK, and it will be interesting to see how it captures the imagination.

Aside from the gesture gaming, the Yari carries many other media features. Although not a Walkman device, the latest version 3.0 Walkman player is included, with support for all the major digital music formats. The Walkman player also has some nice background graphics, such as an old fashioned cassette player or gramophone. We also find on the Yari an old favourite application of mine, Track ID, plus support for Blogger, and a native YouTube application.

Overall, the Sony Ericsson Yari is a strong handset, with many good features and an interesting twist on mobile gameplay. Not the most stunning handset to look at, but is sure to sell well, and could be the phone that brings Sony Ericsson some much needed sales. Rumours suggest a release date of October, watch this space for more news as we get it.

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