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	Home / Cell phones

	The perfect music phone	By Sindre Lia, Monday 6 February 2006

As music phones grow increasingly popular, Sindre Lia makes a list of essential features required to get you rockin'.

A range of mobile phones are marketed as music phones nowadays, yet many of them would be wise to stick to playing MP3 ringtones rather than actual music. What should the perfect music phone offer, and, more importantly, is it available in stores right now?

Getting the basics right

First of all, playing music isn't a feature which should just be tacked onto a phone as this usually results in an overall system slowdown - of which Motorola's ROKR E1 is a good example. Once that's out of the way, overall music quality and particularly loudness are important factors, as is an intuitive user interface for browsing music; the ability to quickly adjust equalizer settings; and hard buttons for frequently accessed functions including Play/Stop and Rewind/Fast Forward.

Naturally, you'll also need some way of getting music onto the phone, for which USB 2.0 is the only reasonable alternative with its ability to transfer hundreds of songs in the course of a minute. USB 1.1, by comparison, could take up to 30 minutes to do the same - but in either case, make sure a cable is included. High-speed wireless connectivity is of course the ideal solution, but nothing looks set to beat USB 2.0 for years to come.

Synchronize and listen

Having the technology to get music onto a handset is all good and well, but there are a few more requirements which must be met. First and foremost, users must be able to carry out hassle-free synchronization with a PC and its full music library, and the ability to purchase and download music over-the-air will prove a major advantage - especially if it can be synchronized back to a PC so you don't have to repurchase all of your music should you decide to upgrade your handset.

Another particularly important aspect is the quality of bundled headphones, which are typically of the rather mediocre sort. When shopping, make sure you try bundled headphones on for size and comfort - a rule of thumb is that rubber beats hard plastic. If these aren't up to par, look for a handset with an integrated 3.5 mm jack, which lets you hook up higher-quality alternatives. Avoid handsets which use conversion dongles, which are not only cumbersome and easily-lost but also cost a small fortune to replace.

Quick tip: if you're looking for deep bass, go for a handset with in-ear earphones, also known as earbuds.

Storage, sweet storage

Naturally, you're also going to need somewhere to store your music, and 512 MB of storage capacity out-of-box - either in the shape of internal memory or a memory card slot - should be considered a minimum for any music phone. For many, a microSD slot accompanied by a bundled 512 MB memory card would do the trick, leaving alone the internal memory for storage of messages and pictures. Optimally, however, a music phone offers a hard drive for storing music on it - think Nokia N91 or Samsung SGH-i300.

So, where can I find it?

Unfortunately, all current music phones suffer from being first-generation products - and as such, there is currently none available in stores today which meet all of the requirements mentioned above. Still, there's no need to despair as a range of second-generation music phones faring quite a bit better are just around the corner. For more information, just follow the links below.
Music phones soon to be released in Europe
Music phones soon to be released in the US