o2Cocoon

o2Cocoon,

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Review
More reviews online at
www.mobilechoiceuk.com
O2 Cocoon
O2 Cocoon
From £300 on prepay
www.o2.co.uk
Time warp
O2 may have taken a step back in time when designing the new Cocoon, with its retro
feel, but the 3G device still has a few decent features in tow
don’t know what to make
of O2’s new handset, the
Cocoon. Looking like it has arrived
from another galaxy, the bright
white shell can’t deter us from the
fact that it looks rather
cumbersome. Open it up and the
confusion only gets worse. The
large 2.1-inch internal screen
looks great, with some fancy
graphics and clear text, yet the
accompanying keypad has the feel
of a retro television remote.
However, looks can be deceiving;
as we investigated the Cocoon’s
features we found that, despite its
rather odd appearance, it is quite
an impressive handset.
O2 claims that this is a phone
that talks to you, which is slightly
misleading. It is in fact referring to
the LED screen that magically
appears under the white shell to
inform you of various actions, such
as when you’re receiving an
incoming call or text message, or
when using the media player, the
title of the track and the name of
the artist is displayed. It has a
slight eighties feel to it, but we’ll
give O2 the benefit of the doubt
and assume that this was
intentional.
One neat application on the
Cocoon is its Nest. Effectively a
docking station, the Cocoon can
be inserted upright on its side,
giving the look and feel of a mini
alarm clock. When charging from
the Nest via a USB cable, the
Cocoon’s LED screen displays the
time. As well as telling the time
and giving you that welcome
morning wake-up call, the Cocoon
also doubles up as a mini media
player. With 2GB of internal
memory, the Cocoon can store
approximately 1,000 songs that
can be played either when docked
in the Nest or while in your
pocket.
When in the Nest, songs can be
skipped, paused or stopped via the
buttons positioned on the side of
the phone – although when in the
Nest they are on top. Confused?
Unfortunately, the buttons were
slow in their response and would
often result in us cancelling the
initial instruction by pressing each
button twice, having not realised it
had recognised the first button
click. The volume can be controlled
via the dial that doubles up as the
hinge on the phone, although the
volume is fairly disappointing when
played through the ‘loud’ speakers.
The Cocoon comes with a
headphone adapter that allows you
to plug in two sets of headphones
so you and a friend can listen to
your playlist. You may want to
draw straws as to who ends up
with the supplied headphones, as
the sound quality suffers as a
result. The Cocoon can be
synchronised with your PC or
laptop and all your songs can be
managed through Windows Media
Player.
The FM radio, while a welcome
feature, ultimately disappoints for
two reasons: firstly, the reception
is poor and, although the Cocoon
comes with an attachable aerial,
it’s not ideal to have an additional
lengthy wire coming out of the
Nest. Secondly, when the radio is
in use, no other functions,
including making calls, can be
utilised. This is in contrast to
the media player that can continue
to be played (or paused if you’d
rather), albeit at a quieter volume
while making and receiving calls.
With both 3G and Bluetooth
built-in, the latter can be activated
by simply holding down the #
button. Surfing the web was fast
â– 
Size
94x49x21mm
â– 
Weight
92g
â– 
Display
256,000 colours
â– 
Resolution
240x320 pixels
â– 
Camera
Two megapixels
â– 
Video recording/playback/
streaming
Yes/yes/yes
â– 
Video calling
Yes
â– 
Audio playback
MP3/AAC/
AAC+
â– 
Ringtones
Polyphonic, MP3
â– 
Radio
Yes
â– 
Connectivity
Bluetooth, USB,
A2DP
â– 
Internal memory
2GB
â– 
Memory card slot
Yes
â– 
Messaging
SMS, MMS
â– 
Internet browser
WAP 2.0/
xHTML
â– 
Email client
POP3, IMAP4
â– 
Java
Yes
â– 
Games
EA Air Hockey
,
Tetris
(Demo),
Sims 2
(Demo)
â– 
GPRS
Yes + 3G
â– 
Frequency
Quad-band
â– 
Talktime
300 minutes
â– 
Standby
350 hours
and easy, while pairing to other
Bluetooth devices proved to be
straightforward enough.
Unfortunately, sending songs via
Bluetooth – a feature that O2 is
keen to promote through the
Cocoon – proved near
impossible.
In the days of five-megapixel
cameras, the two-megapixel
snapper found on the Cocoon is
fairly basic, although it does come
with auto-flash, a self-timer (with a
choice of five or 10 seconds) and
a 4x digital zoom. There’s also a
video camera that allows playback
and video calls. When watching
videos on the handset (the
Cocoon comes with a number of
music and promotional videos
already stored), users can watch
in full screen by selecting that
option and then turning the
handset horizontally. The quality of
the example videos certainly
impressed.
O2 has placed a great deal of
emphasis on making the Cocoon
both user friendly and personable.
The navigation is straightforward
and has a feel of a Nokia in that
it’s easy to navigate around the
phone, although we would
recommend still viewing the user
guide on the accompanying CD to
get the most out of the device. At
the bottom of the screen is a list
of fast-track applications that
allows you to access your most
used applications quicker than
going in via the main menu. You
can edit this list to fit to your
personal preference and it even
allows you to designate particular
contacts as picture icons to
the list giving you a speed dial
facility.
As a clever marketing ploy, O2
has included some hidden
features in the Cocoon.
Apparently, when entering the O2
Arena (formerly known as The
Millennium Dome), the Cocoon will
transform to give you a number of
new options, including maps,
news and insider secrets. The
mind boggles.
The Cocoon is something of a
hybrid in that it’s got the look and
feel of a phone that, say, perhaps
David Hasslehoff would have used
in
Knight Rider
. Yet, underneath
its brash exterior lies a fun,
efficient and easy-to-use phone.
There are issues with some of the
features, such as the FM radio,
but if you’re after a phone that’s
unique, and has 3G, Bluetooth
and an impressive media player,
then O2’s latest handset could be
worth looking into.
Also consider
Sony Ericsson W850i
This Walkman phone allows full-track
over-the-air downloads from Sony
Ericsson’s online store and also boasts an
FM radio.
Pros
The Nest and LED screen are good novelty value, with the
2GB of internal memory allowing you to enjoy a range of
tunes on the music player.
Cons
While lightweight, the Cocoon remains bulky and the quality
of the FM radio was a big disappointment.
MOBILE CHOICE VERDICT
82
%
Danny Brogan
danny.brogan@nhmedia.co.uk
More reviews online at
www.mobilechoiceuk.com
H
ERE at
Mobile Choice
, we
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