Sony's Dreamworld event in Paris sees some new designs from Sony Ericsson, including the Z200 and T230 handsets.
The mobile phone partnership Sony Ericsson today announced the GSM/GPRS Z200 mobile phone. With a 4K colour screen, 40-tone polyphonic sound and exchangeable front panels, the Z200 is aimed at the youth market.
 | The Z200 is certainly unique
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The clamshell design of the Z200 is unusual for Sony Ericsson, who have tended to produce handsets in the 'candybar' format, such as the popular T68i and T610. Clamshell phones are extremely popular in Japan, and have been popularized in the West in recent years thanks to manufacturers such as Samsung.
The Z200 offers several personalization features such as exchangeable front covers, full colour wallpapers and 40-tone polyphonic ring tones. The phone comes with 2 sets of covers, and additional options are available as accessories. Users that want to use a picture or a part of picture stored on their computer as a wallpaper can use the Sony Ericsson Image Editor software which comes with the phone.
To support the polyphonic capabilities of the handset, Sony Ericsson have made available a range of free ringtones on their web site, some of which have been composed especially for the Z200. Three games are pre-loaded in the Z200 – Mini-golf, Alien Scum and Honey Cave. The phone provides force-feedback effects for enhanced gaming.
Sony Ericsson claim a standby time of up to 200 hours for the Z200, while talk time is rated at four and a half hours. The handset is a handy 98.3g, and should become available in European markets by the end of 2003.
The company also announced an updated 'T'-series handset, in the established candybar format. The T230 is an entry-level phone equipped with a 4K colour screen, 32-tone polyphonic ringtones and picture messaging support through the clip-on MCA-30 CommuniCam camera accessory.
The T230 is, like the Z200, aimed at the youth market, and so games are again a priority. As well as several embedded colour games, additional games and new levels are available for download at the Sony Ericsson web site. The T230 games are feature vibration and sound feedback for a realistic gaming experience. The T230 utilizes the Mophun gaming engine also found in the Sony Ericsson T300, T310 and T610 phones, and there are currently around 60 Morphun games available for download.
The T230 will be available towards the end of 2003, and features up to 300 hours standby with 13 hours of talk time. It weighs in at a feather-light 79.2g.
Additional hi-res pictures of the Sony Ericsson T230 and Z200 are available on the following pages.
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