Introduction

One year after Sony Ericsson's hugely successful launch of the T610, it released the successor, the T630. Layout-wise, the T630 is very similar to the T610. But there are some significant cosmetic changes. Larger transparent keys, and more uniform colors make the T630 even more aesthetically pleasing. While the T630, just like the T610, contains a 65,000-color screen, Sony Ericsson has addressed problems over the washed-out STN screen of the T610, and produced a sharper, more viewable TFT screen.

The T630 is not, however, merely a cosmetic upgrade. Many features have been refined and improved making the T630 a more complete phone than its predecessor. Consumers loved the T610, making it one of the most popular phones. With Sony Ericsson's recent success, consumers will undoubtedly look forward to the T630. So read on and see how the T630 measures up in our eyes.

Design

As the successor the T610, the Sony Ericsson T630 and T637 had enormous shoes to fill. As a result, Sony Ericsson changed little from its well-designed T610. From the traditional clean lines, to the feature-rich applications and software, there are many similarities that users of the T610 will recognize.

The T637 is simply a North American version of the international T630. Aside from network frequency (The T630 contains GSM 900 / 1800 / 1900 MHz whereas the T637 uses GSM 850 / 1800 / 1900 MHz) and colors, the two phones are identical.

The overall design of the T630 is more or less the same as the T610. The lack of an aluminum shell, however, gives the T630 a more cohesive feel. The T630 is slightly lighter in weight and its more durable construction allows for fewer scratches and dents to which the aluminum-cased T610 was very susceptible. Although slightly fewer colors are available (coming in two colors instead of three), all colors are stylish and well-designed.

The T610 was often criticized as being too much of a fingerprint magnet. It attracted grime and oils easily, so upkeep was frequently required in wiping it clean. Happily, the T637 contains a more "matted" finish to the outlining plastic. Additionally, the plastic on the back makes fingerprints much less visible. Unfortunately, however, keeping the smoother, clearer front plate - which encompasses the top of the screen all the way down to the bottom of the buttons - clean is still a bit of a chore.

Although much of the features are similar to the T610, they are nonetheless exceptional. The T630 possesses an impressive 128 x 160 pixel 65K screen, 32 chord polyphonic ringtones, and a built-in digital camera capable of capturing images up to 640 x 480 px resolution. Also included on the back is a new feature - a tiny "detail" mirror - which allows users to take pictures of themselves. While cool, it seems to hold more of a novelty than anything.

The T630 can automatically resize images for viewing on your PC, enlarging them to VGA size (640 x 480 px). The effect is similar to digital rather than optical zoom. The T630 merely enlarges the pixels while giving the same lack of detail. This is somewhat useless since images will just be larger and grainier on a big screen.

Aside from that, minor firmware updates with a few extra features have been added. Most notably, the addition of the popular Playstation 2 game, VRally 2.

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