Sony Ericsson Elm review

How often do you come across a phone that caters to your needs as well as that of the environment. Meet Sony Ericsson's latest eco-friendly handset Elm. A windows 7 compatible device, Elm  packs in the best features and provides users with tools that help them make the most of their creativity.

Available in two colors, metal black and pearly Rose, Sony Ericsson Elm comes in 110x45x14mm in dimension and packs in a host of features catering to the socially mobile. At just 90g, Elm feels quite sturdy and comfortable contrary to what you would expect from a light weight phone. Made out of recycled materials, Elm comes with minimal packaging which is in sync with its trademark of being a eco-friendly phone.

Elm sports a 2.2-inch screen with a resolution of 240x320 pixels.The screen size is definitely one of the disappointing aspect of the device. While the mobile users are increasingly leaning towards the bigger screen, a small screen size definitely doesn't act in Elm's favor.

As we mentioned Elm is quite a sturdy device and has a simple and user friendly interface. The main menu is similar to other Sony Ericsson models and boasts of three options for the users to choose  from namely Grid, Rotating or Single Icon. The keys are well placed and aid in seamless navigation across the phone. The keys on the right hand take you to a menu bar which opens up options for searching google, Playnow and Google Maps. Elm’s menus and features are simple thanks to the central select button which aids in both navigation and selection of the items.

In addition users will be delighted to find shortcut keys to their contacts as well as the Google search which is located on the left and right hand side of the main select button.

Elm while an amazing device comes with a fair share of flaws. One of the annoying things that the mobile users are likely to find about Elm is its proprietary headphone and charger connection. Nothing wrong with the headphones or the charger, it's just that you will not be able to just pick any random 3.5 mm headphones with this device, but rather stick with something that Sony approves of.

Elm comes equipped with a 5 mega-pixel camera which assures great quality pictures. It's face detection tool finds and focuses on the face in your view finder, so you can say goodbye to blurry 
faces.

In addition it also has a digital zoom up to X4. One would be quite impressed with this feature, unless you have go down and dirty with the device. What would surprise you foremost is the fact that you cannot zoom before taking the picture. Quite ironical but sadly true. If you attempt to take a photo you get a message that "zoom is not possible at this resolution". You therefore need to choose a lower resolution setting to make the zoom work. The zoom at the end tends to be jerky and therefore if you are looking for a camera phone, Elm should be at the bottom of your list.

Elm also comes equipped with a photo flash, which would normally aid in taking pictures even in dark. However Elm once again disappoints you in that department as well. While the LED flash does  come up to help you focus in on your subject, it doesn't stay long enough for you to frame the shot. The saving grace is the Photo fix which adjusts light balance and contrast after you have taken  a picture and the provision for optimizing the quality of the pictures.

Like most of the Sony Ericsson phones, Elm boasts of a good sound quality and options for further enhancing the music quality. Choice of adding bass frequencies to provide body to your music as  well option for using original artist recordings are also provided. Video player quality is also standard, nothing to rave about, but simple enough to take quick videos on the go.

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