My w710i arrived today from hi-mobile.com and somehow despite being out for over two weeks now the mobile phone forums are pretty quiet about this phone. So I'm going to post my impressions and hope some others will follow my lead. Before this phone I've had two motorola phones (v551 and v635) and a sanyo 4900 back in the day before even those.

Appearance
The phone looks great, and feels very light weight. It does have more of a plastic look than the metalized motorola's that I was used to but it actually seems pretty appropriate.

Opening the phone the screen is as sharp as you would expect from a new model(which means its very good). I played one of the demo movies before class and the guy next to me leaned over and said he was amazed how good the video looked. Otherwise the appearance is about what you expect from pictures online.

The 4 directional navigation button is smaller than on my motorola phones and I have to press it with my thumbnail as opposed to just using my thumb. Minor annoyance but worth noting.

Camera
I took a few pictures and I think they look like what I would want from a camera phone. Which means that this phone won't replace my digital camera but it will provide some good shots when i suddenly realize I really need to take a picture of something. Fair enough. I took some pictures of the actual phone doing some actual things.

Walkman
The headphones that come with the phone are awful. Just completely garbage. I switched to my sony MDR-51 and still haven't decided what I think about sound quality. I don't like the way any of the equalizers sound so thus far I've left it on the flat setting. On flat I would say the sound is really good, but maybe not quite as good as on my ipod. Again, in the walkman category it looks like the music on the phone will be primarily for when I don't want to cary an ipod but still want to listen to music.

The main inconvenience is trying to decide what to do with the headphones when I'm not listening to music? Usually with a mp3 player you wrap the headphones around the device, but with a phone like this you need to be able to pull it out of your pocket and answer it quickly if you receive a call. So for the time being I'm stuck with a mess of cables when I'm not listening to music. Adding music is a breeze on this phone, just plug it into a mac or pc and drag songs on, or better yet use synctunes

Sound
Many people have complained that SEs are too quiet which hasn't been a problem yet. I do have the speak volume set all the way up and can hear well on the streets of NYC. So far everything is good here. If you want bass, then wow, Megabass delivers on the w710i.

Megabass is still definitely included and hearing it with my headphones was pretty impressive. When you are in walkman looking at the song that is now playing you can click more then go to settings and go to equalizer. You can pick from things like normal, bass, megabass, treble boost, vocals, or set your own... Each of the settings shows what equalizer preset it corresponds too... except for megabass which is guess is sony's little secret concoction.

Fitness
I haven't done the advanced calibration yet, but for whatever reason the step counter counts ~ 1.5 steps for every step I take. I have been walking around rooms 10 steps at a time and when I pull the phone back out of my pocket it reads 15 steps. It seems more accurate in my back pocket than in my front. Hopefully this is something that just needs to be adjusted because the fitness apps are the main reason to get this phone over the z710.

I finally got a chance to do a thorough test of the work out apps on the w710. I walked a few laps on the track, entered the known distance, walked a few more laps and checked how accurate the distance reading was. I'm assuming part of it was luck but the phone got my distance correct straight down to the meter. I don't really expect that kind of accuracy every time but I'm pretty encouraged by that.

I ran with it for a while and loved it. You can set alarms if you go above or below a certain speed. It conveniently measures time, speed, and distance. It even pauses automatically if you need to stop and make a call or change a song.

Software
Compared to motorola the software on the w710i is a dream come true. It looks fantastic and has nearly every option I could want. I haven't noticed any lag, the games are fun, the walkman software looks like it will work pretty well for my needs, and everything is incredibly customizable. I would assume the software is pretty similar on most other SE phones so I doubt this will make anyone switch from one SE to the w710i, but if you are thinking about coming from another brand expect to be pleased. All of the options can be overwhelming at first, and the different button lay out (no call button) seems frustrating at first. However after having the phone for ~1 day I am already familiar with the changes and don't think about the difference.

The phone came with a chinese plug style charger, but Hi-mobile tossed in an adapter. Bulky but tolerable. The phone also came 'branded' with two different themes called 'david'. I'm going to take a wild guess and say these are for the Taiwanese pop star David Tao. So it was loaded with his picture and a ring tone of him which I would say is pretty hilarious. Its a shame that besides his themes there are only limited other options but I hope to find more themes via other sources. Otherwise the chinese options on the phone are not very noticeable.

Conclusion
For final conclusions I would say this phone is the best option right now if you are looking for a reasonably priced clamshell Sony Ericsson.

Pros: