Don't be fooled by its minimalist body and built, because the Sony Ericsson C510 ticked a lot of boxes we thought it won’t.

At a time when everybody is jumping on to the touchscreen, multiple megapixel camera phone bandwagon, the C510, with its seemingly meagre specs (2.2-inch, 3.2-megapixel camera) and rather sober exterior, is almost akin to a breath of fresh air.

The C510 has a sturdy built with an excellent finish and at 0.5 inches it’s a slim and light phone. Its display, at 2.2 inches, is compact, but has a high resolution of 320x240 pixels and 262k colours. The phone has a built-in accelerometer, which rotates the display automatically between landscape and portrait modes when the phone is turned. The accelerometer also powers motion-based gaming.

As far as its user interface is concerned, it retains the classic 4x3 grid. But new functions, options and applications mean they are all stuffed into this grid and are not always easy to find. But there is continuity here and because the C510 is essentially a budget offering, we don’t mind it much.

The C510 is a Cybershot and obviously packs a very good camera. We are not in the favour of talking up a phone on the basis of megapixels and the C510, with its 3.2-megapixel camera, is testimony to the fact that you don’t need more megapixels on your camera.

Did we say budget offering? The C510 can boast of face detection, Geotagging, photo feeds, picture blogging and Smile Shutter, which SE feels is the highlight of this phone. This feature lets you automatically take a shot when your subject is smiling, but you do have to point it in the right direction. The C510 packs an LED flash and digital zoom, and can record video clips. Video calling is also possible.

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