Sony Ericsson C905 review: Cyber shot, cyber hot

Spacious phonebook

Sony Ericsson C905 is equipped with a phonebook that can store up to 1000 entries with a total of 7000 phone numbers.

Contacts can be ordered by First or Last name. They are searched by gradual typing of the desired name. You can choose whether the SIM contacts or the phone contacts should be displayed by default. Unfortunately, there is no option for displaying both lists simultaneously. The phonebook lets you auto save to SIM card any new contacts that you're adding to the phone memory.

Sony Ericsson C905 has an ample and elaborate phonebook

When adding a new contact, the available details are distributed over five available tabs. The first is where you put the name and the numbers, the second holds email and web addresses. The third is for assigning a picture, custom ringtone, custom message tone and a voice command. The fourth goes for postal details. The last, fifth tab, is for making an additional note and adding a birth date.

When you enter a birthday, Sony Ericsson C905 prompts adding it to the calendar and setting a reminder, which we think, is a handy feature.

Editing contacts in tabs on Sony Ericsson C905

Finally, Smart Search completes the set of more important phonebook features. It looks up all the contacts whose numbers contain the digits you type on the stand-by screen. In addition, it also lists the names that start with the letters corresponding to the digits.

The much appreciated Smart search

The Call log keeps track of your recent communications. It is divided into four different tabs. They are: All, Answered (Received), Dialed and Missed. When there are several calls made to a single contact, only the last one gets recorded.

Telephony

C905 is handling calls trouble-free, no voice quality or reception issues. Earpiece sound is relatively loud and crisp. Here is how the Sony Ericsson C905 stacks up against some of the other handsets we've measured in our speakerphone loudness test. Sadly, the integrated loudspeaker is an average performer. More info on our test and all current results can be found here.

Messaging traditional

Along with the standard messaging functionality, Sony Ericsson C905 offers the latest Sony Ericsson Manage Messages feature, plenty of settings for accounts, and the option to assign categories to messages. The Manage Messages application enhances message handling. Messages can be moved to memory card or phone memory, arranged by categories, date, size, and contact.

The messaging department

Sony Ericsson C905 handles all common types of messages, all of which - save for emails - share a common inbox.

When composing a message, a warning is displayed when you exceed the 160-character limit, to let you know that the message will be divided in two (or more if necessary) parts for sending. There is also a rich T9 dictionary.

SMS and MMS editors • previewing MMS

Since K850, you can opt to sort messages by category, provided you defined a specific category for each message. Six of them come preinstalled: Business, Favorites, Follow Up, Fun, Holiday, Important, but categories are fully customizable as well. If sorted by category, a big Inbox By Category tag appears instead of the standard small Inbox icon. Under it the categories are displayed but only the ones that contain messages are shown, which is convenient. You can also delete all messages in a given category. However, there is a glitch in the system - in the general inbox there is no indication if a message has been assigned a category. The same holds true for messages that are opened.

The Manage Messages feature, along with Categories, offers wide-ranging customization options and improved message handling.

Message Categories • Sorting by contact, date, size and category is available

The phone also supports push email to boost mobile email usability. Emails are delivered in the background (similar to SMS or MMS).

The email client in C905 supports dozens of settings and all types of encodings, just like some of the most advanced messaging devices out there. With high-speed data in focus with this handset, it's hardly a surprise. Sony Ericsson C905 can save attachments, no matter if they are supported or unknown file formats. Email messages can be sorted by size, date and time.

Unfortunately the phone is unable to handle any documents that are attached to emails (such as .xls, .doc, or .pdf files for example) due to the lack of a document reader. So the options are limited to plain text only and you should have that in mind if you're going for the C905.

The final available options in the Sony Ericsson C905 email client are viewing a message fullscreen and changing the font size (small, medium, large). We did find them both quite handy.