Noka and Sony Ericsson have been in a high end camera phone contest for the past two years.The two company target different users to the max vs. elegant feature phone.

The Sony Ericsson K850i is a quad band GSM unlocked phone with US 3G, and that's a big deal: with Sony Ericsson imports, we've been lucky to get the US 850MHz band for GSM, let alone US 3G. The phone is sold by online retailers and importers, but currently isn't offered by a US carrier (there are rumors that AT&T might carry it sometime in the future). The K850i has triband UMTS/HSDPA 3G that will work anywhere in the world 3G service is available, and GSM/EDGE/GPRS that will work anywhere in the world GSM is available. The phone will work with AT&T and T-Mobile in the US, though the 3G makes it particularly attractive to AT&T customers.

Obviously, the 5 megapixel camera with autofocus lens and Xenon flash is the centerpiece of the Cybershot K850i. And it didn't disappoint us, in fact for the first release firmware out the door the camera was stable, and overall did an excellent job of imaging. Those of you who were hoping for a clear winner between the latest versions of the N95 and the SE K850i in our camera battle will be disappointed. It's a toss up-- with each camera winning in different categories. The K850i is the clear winner in usability, which is to say offering a more dedicated camera-like experience. The N95-3 (which runs the latest camera firmware available for the N95 line) is still too slow: it takes several seconds longer for the camera application to launch and be ready for first shot, autofocus times are improved from early N95 releases but is still slower than the SE, and file save times seem interminable compared to the K850i. The SE isn't as fast as a dedicated digital camera, but it's quite usable and you just might manage to catch a fleeting moment that the N95 will assuredly miss.