What impressed me most on the K850i’s software is that it multitasks. It doesn’t run on a smartphone Operating System, but Sony Ericsson endeavoured to make its Cybershot different to every other camera-feature-only phone by implementing some decent software. Not that it beats the Nokia N82, but then again, the N82 is a fully-fledged smartphone, which leads us to the discussion of what really is a smartphone. Is it just a device that multitasks? Is it a device that provides internal APIs and allows its use? Or is the K850i a smartphone? We will not consider it a smartphone in our review, but will rather just treat as a non-smartphone, camera-feature-only phone.

The K850i vibrates when booted just like many other phones. Before you get to the home screen you can set whether you want the phone on Flight Mode or not, but you can switch this option off as well, so that it won’t ask you the next time you switch on the phone. It would be quite irritating if you couldn’t, but I don’t really see the point of including this prompt at start-up.

There is a language selection screen, where you can select your SIM card language, or any other of the ones included in the device. Just after that, a wizard pops-up which helps you to set-up the time, date, to copy the contacts from the SIM card, to show you the functionality of the “end” key, and the ‘C’ key. This is very important, as it doesn’t require you to go dig into a user manual, but in short steps gives you a superficial usage guide of the phone.

The home screen features three soft key options on the bottom of the display, and on the top of the display, a bar with the network signal status, the silence icon in case the phone is on silent mode, the profile icon of the active profile, and the battery level status. The time and the date are on the bottom left corner, just above the right soft key option. The network name is on the top middle section. There is no active standby display, and all the statuses described above are laid out neatly.

Picture: Home screen, courtesy of GSMArena

The Menu is divided in 3×4 animated icons, which represent:

• PlayNow - allows you to download music, games, ringtones, and themes. It’s sort of a refined “Download!” application. It’s in browser form, so it acts as a bookmark, and not a program.
• Internet – analysed in the Connectivity section
• Entertainment – analysed in the Multimedia section
• Cyber-shot – analysed in the Camera section
• Messaging
• Media – analysed in the Multimedia section
• Alarms
• Contacts
• Radio
• Calls
• Organizer
• Settings

Picture: Menu, picture courtesy of GSMArena

The Messaging application allows you to create text messages, voice messages, and emails. For some reason, it features a Web Feeds shortcut, which in my opinion has nothing to do with messaging. The email client can search the POP3 or IMAP4 settings instead of having you to painstakingly set them up. And as it’s usual on mobile phone email clients, you can have more than one email account. It’s great to know that Sony Ericsson got the email bit right, besides the push email detail.

Picture: Messaging, courtesy of GSMArena

The Contacts application is also similar to its competitors Phonebook, and it can receive and send all contacts via Bluetooth, which is very useful if you are changing phones, as it makes sure you don’t lose any contact.

Picture: Contacts, courtesy of GSMArena

The “Calls” register only saves received, missed, and dialled calls data, and not the messages or data transferred such as on S60 3rd edition phones. The cost of calls details are saved under a sub-menu of the Settings panel.

Picture: Calls, courtesy of GSMArena

The Organizer contains more than just a calendar. It has a variety of programs that actually allow you to organize your phone. The first one is the File Manager. As usual, not all files are represented, but it is divided in the folders that Sony Ericsson thought might interest you the most. The following folders are arranged between Phone memory, and Memory Card:

• Camera Album
• Music
• Pictures
• Videos
• Themes
• Web pages
• Games
• Applications
• Other

Picture: Calendar, courtesy of GSMArena

Inside the Applications folder you can find FaceWarp, HP Print, and Photo Mate.

HP Print can print images via PictBridge or memory stick (also known as DPOF). It can also create calendars and print contacts, which makes it an useful imaging application, that should be included in many other phones.

Photo Mate is a Cyber-shot guide which explains every single image capture mode and when it should be used. This guide should be found under the Camera application and not the Organizer, it’s quite senseless.

Also under the Organizer menu is the Video Call application, which besides conducting video calls, allows you to share images. I don’t really see the point of including such an application, it’s a waste of space of the Organizer menu. This application pop-ups during a video call anyway.

Calendar is the only application that we are used to see in an Organizer menu, and it’s very similar to all other phones, so I’m not going to describe it.

Picture: Calendar, courtesy of GSMArena

There are few more applications under the Organizer menu:

• Task – set text reminders and schedule calls
• Notes – write text notes
• Sync – synchronise data with SyncML and Exchange Active Sync
• Timer
• Stopwatch
• Light – Very useful application as it takes use of the full power of the LEDs at the back of the device. It can work as a flashlight, as an SOS signal, and it can be set to 1 minute or unlimited time. Fortunately, it does not get hot after long periods of time, even though it is quite intense
• Calculator – unfortunately it has no scientific mode
• Code – stores all passwords, and requires only one password to open it

Picture: Stopwatch, courtesy of GSMArena

Picture: TImer, courtesy of GSMArena

Picture: Calculator, courtesy of GSMArena

The Setting panel had the options that we all know, but there were quite a few that stood up to my eye:

• Update service – Checks for a firmware update, and downloads it over the air, the so-called FOTA. You can even set a reminder for it to check updates periodically.
• Voice control – This is very much to the point. Most devices allow voice control of almost anything, but it’s unnecessary and I don’t know anyone who uses it. The K850i has options directed to handsfree control, such as the setting of voice tags to answer or reject calls, and just like on Windows Vista Speech Recognition, you can set a magic word to activate the voice command service. On Vista the magic word is “Listen”.
• Smart search – While you dial numbers, a list of names comes up as a result of T9 word recognition. Still new in devices, but very useful. The list of names is very small and comes up very slowly. It’s something that Sony Ericsson should pay attention to in the future, and make it faster.
• Call and cost counters – I wasn’t surprised at all by seeing this, but I’m only mentioning it as it’s in the wrong place. It should be in the “Calls” application.
• USB – Now not only a computer can use a mobile phone as a modem, but you can use a computer’s internet connection as your access point.
• Network mode – GSM, or GSM and 3G. Unfortunately you can’t select 3G only.

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