Introduction
Emelie was the codename of G502, before its launch. Sony Ericsson has always been using female names in case of handsets in development, for example the sister-phone is called BeiBei, which has become G702. The two members of the G series (announced in February) has been interesting because besides their conventional phone design they had a touchscreen and Symbian operating system. I can’t say that we were overly excited of G900 or G700, but they still had something unique.
And now here’s G502, thanks to XXL GSM. And it has nothing, I repeat nothing new, outstanding, extra or special. Zero innovation and new features, this is just another Sony Ericsson handset of the many others. Well, anyway, let’s see who were considered as the target users, let’s just take a look at the company’s website.
Hmm… it looks like the marketing guys didn’t have anything unique either, so they have just mentioned fast email access and data connections. There would be no problems with that, but the thing is that there has already been such a phone, it’s called K660i and it has quite similar specs as the subject of our current review.
Of course HSDPA is very practical, but G502 is a step backwards, compared to previous G series models (the lower model numbering might be a hint for this), so the most charming aspect of Emelie might be its price.
Hirdetés
Exterior
The handset is about as large as K810i, a bit chubbier from the front and slimmer from the side. It is available in black and hazel brown colors, and as it has already turned out of the pictures, we had the first one for testing. The cube-like box had a pretty low number of accessories inside, as besides the phone there was a charger, a completely average stereo headset and of course the usual pile of papers. I have been looking for the USB cable, but no use (and it’s even better that they couldn’t even include a damn CD for such a handset that’s focused on data communication), but in turn there is a 512 MB M2 card.
The specialty of G502 (if we can call it this way) is the keypad. The navigation and numeric keys are waving like a large, calm, frozen ocean, which makes the handset a great subject of photos, as the keypad is quite spectacular from different angles. The controls on this humpy region are also practical, typing is easy. It has been an elegant idea to design the navigation key in order to make it look like a joystick at first, while the orange backlight is also a pleasant one.
The top of the phone is flat, there is a silver stripe running along the sides, which on the left is not broken by anything, while on the right we can only see the volume control keys and the camera’s hotkey. The data connector is at its classic place, at the bottom of G502. It’s a strange thing for a Sony Ericsson, but this phone can be turned on by long-pressing the C key.
Upon taking off the “very plastic” back cover, we can see the M2 card slot. The back side’s design is very subjective; the plain cover is separated from the upper, wrinkled area (considered as a sole by many) by a silver stripe that has the camera on it. The assembly quality is flawless, but the backside is very prone to collect dust.
Basic functions
On the inside the handset is exactly the same as any other recent mid-range Sony Ericsson. We have the usual main menu with 12 icons, which has a QVGA resolution on the 2” display. We practically have five themes by default, but these are very simple, they don’t even change the menu graphics. Handling is easy and precise, there are no problems, we still have the quick menu where we can put any functions we consider important.
The phonebook can store 1000 names and 7000 fields in total, so every contact can have 7 fields on average. The tabbed contact list won’t be no problem for long-time SE users, the software still prefers to use the internal memory, but it can backup data to the SIM if we want to. There are no surprises at messaging either; SMS, MMS (max 300 KB) and an email client that supports attachments are all waiting for our playful fingers (sometimes you just have to write something ambiguous in such a review…). The list of functions is completed by an RSS reader, as since G502 is a data communication genius, one should really put some apps to make it useful.
The other sign is AccuWeather, which could have been seen in other Japanese-Swedish models. It tries to inform the user about the upcoming weather through the internet. I don’t know where does it take its database from, but it tells us really precisely that now, at the beginning of July, we should expect heavy sunshine and temperatures around 30 degrees. Although I think that this could be forecast with a quite high precision on the TV too.
Other organizer functions have changed zero percent. There is a fine calendar with month and week views and repeating events, a proper alarm clock with five different alarm times, a nice code memory for those who tend to forget and there are is also a great stopwatch and a countdown timer. The calculator is not that good only because nowadays is should really have some scientific features, it’s a real shame that even the women’s Nokia 7390 has such features.
Multimedia
There is a 2 megapixel camera on the back, without autofocus. That’s missing probably because they didn’t want to make it better than K550i. And so – although the camera’s menu is almost exactly the same as the one on Cyber-Shot models – it has been expected that the pictures will be of a rather low quality, even though the theme seemed to be good. Test pictures are below, without any comment, as I think even the inexperienced ones can discover the powerful image noise.
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In newer Sony Ericsson products the multimedia features are placed in a dedicated mini-menu, and it’s no different this time either. The interface with a solid background can be rotated to a horizontal view, so we can review images and browse music tracks. In terms of audio, G502 doesn’t have an exceptional performance, it has an average quality, which gets somewhat better when using the headset, but if we change it to a better one, then there can be no complaints about it.
The player has the usual functions like sorting tracks by ID3 tags, playlist support, MegaBass. The album cover can be displayed during playback and of course the app can run in the background. The built-in FM radio has the usual quality and RDS support; we have TrackID too, which identifies tracks played in the radio via the internet. The only game is QuadraPop, which is a Sony Ericsson app we have seen for many years.
Data transfer, battery
GPRS, EDGE, UMTS, HSDPA. These are all present, but nowadays not only G502 is capable of these. Although it’s true that such a data communication arsenal is not very often met on phones that cost less than €170 EUR. I still have a small problem. There is neither a data cable, nor a PC software included with the handset, which is quite surprising. As I had PC Suite already installed on my computer, due to a previous SE test, I tested it, and, how surprising, the two devices have detected each other in a moment, I just had to press a button and start browsing the web. I just can’t believe that so high savings are possible on these two accessories… And this is not the only method of decreasing costs, as there is no secondary camera on the phone, so video calls can be done only with “half-power”.
So there is USB support, at version 2.0, just like Bluetooth. The default browser, however, is still no big deal, it has the basic features like zoom and landscape view, but in user experience it’s far from Opera Mini. No matter, that can be installed easily. Google Maps is again included, it estimates our position based on cell info and it can even plan a route with medium efficiency, but these all need an active internet connection as everything has to be downloaded during use.
The battery went offline after two, rather stressful days. This period might be even doubled at normal users. There is basically nothing wrong with this gadget – if we don’t consider anything else. K660i, which has almost exactly the same features, has a price very similar to G502, and I just can’t understand why there are two models in the portfolio with the same functions, focusing on the same features. And furthermore, for this money we can even get a “smarter” Nokia 6120 Classic.
Bog
Translated by Szaszati
Sony Ericsson G502 has been provided by XXL GSM. The handset can be purchased at:
Budapest VI. Jókai tér 6.
Budapest VI. Teréz körút 18.
On-line at www.xxlgsm.hu.
Specifications
| Sony Ericsson G502 | ||
 | General | |
| Technology | GSM, UMTS, HSDPA | |
| Size | 109 x 46 x 13.5 mm | |
| Weight | 83.5 grams | |
| Available colors | black, hazel brown | |
| Display | ||
| Display diagonal | 2” | |
| Display resolution | 240 x 320 pixels | |
| Display type | TFT | |
| Number of colors | 256K | |
| Memory | ||
| Phonebook capacity | 1000 | |
| SMS memory / max. MMS size | dynamic / 300KB | |
| Internal memory | 32 MB | |
| Memory expandability | M2 | |
| Data transfer | ||
| Frequency bands | 850/900/1800/1900 MHz | |
| GPRS / EDGE | Class 10 (4+1/3+2) / Class 10 (236.8 kbps) | |
| UMTS / HSDPA | present (384 kbps) / present (3.6 Mbps) | |
| IrDA / Bluetooth | none / 2.0 (A2DP too) | |
| WiFi | none | |
| USB | 2.0 | |
| Push-to-talk / RSS | none / present | |
| GPS receiver | none | |
| Basic functions | ||
| Profiles | present | |
| Vibra fucntion | present | |
| Built-in handsfree | present | |
| Voice dialing / voice commands | present / present | |
| Sound recorder | present | |
| Alarm clock | present, also when turned off | |
| Predictive text entry | T9 | |
| Software | ||
| Platform | SE | |
| WAP / HTML browser | present / present | |
| E-mail client | present (POP3, IMAP4, authenticated) | |
| Java | present, MIDP 2.0 | |
| Games | 1 | |
| Currency converter | present | |
| Extra software | Google Maps, VideoDJ, PhotoDJ, MusicDJ, TrackID | |
| Multimedia | ||
| Main camera | 2 megapixels, fixed focus | |
| Secondary camera | none | |
| Video recording | present, QCIF | |
| Music player | present, can run in background | |
| Equalizer | present | |
| FM radio | present - RDS | |
| Battery | ||
| Main battery | 950 mAh Li-Pol | |
| Standby time | 340 hours | |
| Talk time | 600 minutes | |
| Other | ||
| - | ||
