Has the Katana finally surpassed the RAZR? Check out our Sanyo Katana Eclipse review to see if this slick 3G phone is Sprint's best multimedia flip.
Review summary of the Sanyo Katana Eclipse:
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 The Sanyo Katana Eclipse is the Katana series finally honed to pleasing, unique multimedia phone, and unique is probably the key word. No longer in the RAZR's shadow, the Katana has the cool customizable color-changing LEDs that we liked, and a bevy of great multimedia features. Unfortunately, not all of these worked so well, especially if network reception was an issue, but Sanyo has the basics covered. The phone makes great calls, comes packed with easy-to-use calling features, and includes some surprisingly good messaging tools. Is this phone better than the new Motorola RAZR VE20? They're an equal match, so if you like the flashing lights, stick with this phone, but if you need larger screens and a more polished interface, check out the latest competitor. Release: August 2008. Price: $150.
Pros: Cool design, with flashy, color-changing LED lights. Solid interface, if a little blocky. Calls sounded great; with a load of good calling features as well.
Cons: 3G features, like music, video and location-based search, underperformed. Reception problems hurt data services. Mediocre camera. Cramped keyboard.
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Full review of the Sanyo Katana Eclipse:
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Design - Very good
Sanyo is a sneaky phone company. They tend to make unattractive phones that work very well, like the Sanyo Pro 700 or the older Sanyo M1. But on the side, they run a business competing with the RAZR, in the Katana family. Mostly, these have been underpowered, well designed though underwhelming phones, though the Sanyo Katana DLX was Sprint's top multimedia phone, more than a year ago. The Sanyo Katana Eclipse takes the shiny, streamlined style of the previous Katana phones and updates them with a couple unique features.
Our favorite of these are the color changing LED lights on the side of the external display. They are quite colorful and bright, and completely customizable. We haven't seen this used much, but we used to own a Motorola V600, which had similar, though less dramatic, effects. It's a fun addition, especially if you're the type to leave your cell phone on your desk in front of you.
One problem we had with the Katana Eclipse's design is that the phone's speaker is on the external flip, so when the phone is opened the speaker is facing away from the user. This made sounds seem to come from far behind the phone, which hurt the audio feedback. Otherwise, the menu was very clean and easy to use, though the system font was a bit blocky looking. Also, both the internal and external screens are a bit smaller and less impressive than similar screens on the new Motorola RAZR VE20, also released today on Sprint.
Calling - Very good
We found calls on the Sanyo Katana Eclipse sounded very clean and clear. We tested the phone driving down the highway with the windows rolled down, and it fared very well, even better than the RAZR VE20 we were also testing. Voices sounded clean with no distortion. Reception was a problem. This phone was often roaming while other Sprint phones managed to hold onto a bar or two of service. But battery life was very good. We managed more than 5.5 hours in a single call, which beats Sanyo's estimate by an hour.
The Sanyo Katana Eclipse had a nice address book with plenty of fields for a multimedia phone. Our favorite contacts feature was the ability to pair flashing LED patterns to different contacts. We could even set different lights depending on the type of contact made; so if our wife left us a voicemail, the phone might flash green, but if she sent us a picture message, the phone would flash yellow.
Beyond the flash and dazzle feature, though, the phone also performs well for calling. The speakerphone was nice and loud, though we prefer speakers that are a little more vocal. Conference calling was very easy, though, and so was the speaker-independent voice dialer. The phone also paired nicely with all our Bluetooth devices.
Messaging - Very good
The Sanyo Katana Eclipse packs all of the standard messaging software for a Sprint 3G phone, and that's not a bad thing. The phone has messaging options for SMS, MMS, Voice SMS, Instant Messaging and e-mail. The Sprint Mobile E-mail app was our favorite messaging option. It was a very nice looking e-mail program, with a well-organized mailbox and plenty of e-mail presets, including settings for AOL, Hotmail, Gmail or any IMAP or POP account you like.
Unlike the competitor RAZR devices, the Sanyo Katana Eclipse uses a keypad that is well-divided into individual keys. This would seem to make typing easier, but actually this left the available space to press each key much smaller. The keyboard felt a bit cramped, and we found ourselves watching our fingers to make sure we weren't getting hung up on the edges around the keys.
Multimedia - Good
For multimedia, the Sanyo Katana Eclipse gets the boatload of Sprint Power Vision services, including the Sprint Music Store, Sprint TV and the Sprint Movie service. Reception made a serious difference with video playback, and reception was not one of this phone's strong points, so we were dissatisfied with the video experience. The Sprint Movie store has some interesting options, including "10,000 B.C". and "The Eye," but videos looked very choppy when reception fell as low as 2 bars, and stopped completely when we were roaming.
The music store is also showing its age, as are most over-the-air download services. Playback options were very light, even with the external music controls. We like that the Katana Eclipse uses real, hardware keys on the outside instead of touch controls. But we would still like to see a more polished, advanced music player with better playback control and more features. We'd also like to see a player app that wasn't so focused on directing us to the music store, where we'd be obliged to spend money for tracks.
The Sanyo Katana Eclipse comes with a 256MB microSD card, which is really tiny for today's listeners. We'd like to see 1GB or more, at least, in a multimedia phone (especially one that will launch for $100). We'd also like to see a 3.5mm headphone jack, though the phone did pair with our stereo Bluetooth headphones just fine.
Web browser - Mediocre
The Access Netfront Web browser on the Sanyo Katana Eclipse choked on our page. What it did manage to spit out looked pretty bad, anyway. Most pages optimized for simler WAP browsers came through fine, though reception again made an impact on our network speeds. The most annoying problem with the browser was the constant clicking required to scroll through a long page, as holding the navigation button didn't work for smooth scrolling. Combine this with the phone's constant beeping from the speaker behind the external flip, and you have a recipe for mute.
Camera - Mediocre
The 1.3-megapixel camera on the Sanyo Katana Eclipse took fairly unimpressive images. These didn't even look great on the camera's small screen, though of course they looked much less flattering at 100% zoom. Colors were strange and overblown, or completely washed out on low light pics.
Serious Happy Snap
Our editor in a cluttered office. Fine that you can's see the tired redness in the eyes, but the black shirt is the same color as the grey carpet and the brown hair, so clearly the colors are dulled, except for the few oversaturated red books in the background.
Snake Eyes
The reds are pretty bright here, but not as bad as we expected. Details are a little foggy as you move away from center, though.
Jelly Bellys in Hand
Our hand is not really that red, and those Jelly Bellys are not really that blurry. We couldn't get a good focus on this shot, even in our studio light tent.
GPS Navigation - Good
For GPS, the Sanyo Katana Eclipse has a bunch of interesting options, though some were much better than others. The Sprint Navigation software, for one, keeps pace with the other carriers. It looks pretty good, and includes modern features like live traffic updates that help you avoid jams. The phone also features Sprint's Family Locator service that helps you figure out where your kids are, providing they have an active Family Locator-enabled phone.
We had some trouble with Sprint's location-based version of MSN Live Search. The search engine can listen to a voice request, which it sends to the server to be translated into text. We had lots of trouble with this feature. We asked for a local "Whole Foods." First we got "lotus house," then "clare anns antiques," and a bunch of times there was no answer whatsoever. When we typed the name manually, we got correct results, but Live Search would be more helpful if it linked to Sprint Navigation to get live, turn-by-turn directions. Instead, it just gives you the directions as a static list.
Price and availability
The Sanyo Katana Eclipse is now available for $150 on Sprint's network. A $50 mail-in rebate is available when signing up for a qualifying plan.
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