O2 Cocoon mobile phone
Nothing to do with pods, pensioners or swimming pools
Review O2 may have beaten its rivals to the iPhone, but it’s already launched a first assault on the mobile music market with a distinctively quirky own-brand design, the Cocoon. With 2GB of tune-packing internal memory and 2GB memory card support it’s ready to go toe-to-toe with most other music phones. And, strangely enough, alarm clocks too...
O2 has been plugging away at its mobile music credentials for a while now. Think the O2 - aka the Millennium Dome - and the O2 Wireless Festival, for starters. Then the O2 Cocoon was dropped on us.
O2's Cocoon: simple, two-tone design
The Cocoon certainly is different. As well as a distinctive curvy old-school iPod-white clamshell casing, and a full rundown of HSDPA 3G-enabled features, the handset offers, uniquely, a natty scrolling hidden display on the outside of the casing and an alarm clock alter ego.
Developed in collaboration with mobile maker Pantech, the Cocoon makes a good fist of music playback. It sports a multi-format music player - MP3, AAC, AAC+, WMA and WAV files are supported - and has 2GB of internal memory, along with Micro SD support for cards of up to 2GB. An FM radio with RDS is inside too.
A two-megapixel camera on the front of the Cocoon takes care of snapping and video shooting while a smaller camera inside the clamshell delivers video calling. HSDPA promises mobile broadband download rates and internet surfing wherever the network supports it.
A white music player isn’t exactly the height of design originality, but the smooth, uncluttered Cocoon is strikingly different for a mobile phone. The sides of the phone are in a contrasting black finish, with several music player control buttons and a key-lock slider lined up on one side, and a mini USB socket, Micro SD card slot and back panel release key on the other.
Closed, the Cocoon looks tidy, though it's heftier than many slimline models shimmying onto the market. It weighs in at 114g and measures 9.4 x 4.9 x 2.1cm at its widest points.
Speakers and portage on the side
At first glance, there appears to be no external display, as you’d ordinarily expect on a flip phone. However, the clever O2 design incorporates a hidden blue LED array behind the white plastic. When activated by a call, message or music track, this displays in large characters caller ID, music track info, or the opening bits of incoming text messages, scrolling from right to left. Smaller indictors glow to indicate alarm set, message waiting, battery level, incoming call, and so on. And then there’s the clock...
COMMENTS
Re: O2 have balls
"If you're asking £295 for this as a PAYG shows O2 have either big balls or they've totally lost touch with reality"
If my recent dealings with them are any indication[*], it's definitely the latter and one of the main reasons I've booted them into touch and gone over to T-Mobile instead (I've also 'downgraded' from an XDA Mini to a Nokia 6300 - never been happier)
Having seen a Cocoon in the York O2 shop, the first thing I thought was 'Eeeewwww!' - looks like the bastard offspring of an iPod and a bedside alarm clock and, given the quality of O2s reception round here, is probably more useful as one of these than as an actual phone.
[*] - eg. ringing their customer support to request my PAC code and having to sit through an advert for the bloody iPhone.
Own worst enemy
Is it me, or is O2 going to bite its own arse?, they have already bought a deal for the iphone, why have this aswell
O2 have balls
If you're asking £295 for this as a PAYG shows O2 have either big balls or they've totally lost touch with reality if they think this phone is worth nearly £300. At that money they're saying it's got more to offer than nearly anything coming from Sony-Ericsson, Nokia, LG or Motorola. They're clearly a bit mad.
The phone lacks one thing and the review lacks another..
Why don't manufacturers put a standard 3.5m jack in music phones? My SPV is the same as this, uses some crappy proprietary plug and they charge you a fortune for a new set of headphones. It was cheaper to buy a new MP3 player than it was to replace the orange (nothing special except the price) headphones.
- I know they also need to add a mic. and other control lines too.. but there are ways of dealing with that.
- And yes, it comes with a 'adapter', but I'll bet the adapter has crummy strain relief, breaks after reasonable use, and costs a fortune to replace (if you can even buy it separately).
As for the review, yet again we are not told about how the phone synchronises.. Just mac and windows info and no discussion aboutr wether it mounts as a USB drive (and is therefore compatible with pretty much everything.)
- Simon; this is, unfortunately, in the finest tradition of el-reg reviews.. Please, please give a overview of the sync method (USB filesystem, vs. proprietary/activesync/telepathy) and then note any handy apps they supply for specific OS's. Ta.
Bonus..?
Oh wow, there's a bonus.. A corporate entity changing my wallpaper for advertising purposes? It's like they read my mind!
A pint of Bishop's Ringfinger to the first person who hacks that to send out goatse.. :)
