Sony Ericsson's K850 successor in the wild?

A Chinese site has scored pictures of what is claimed to be the successor to the recently-released K850, in turn the successor to the lauded K800 "Wilma" that ushered in Sony's "Cyber-shot" camera branding to the world of handsets. Actually, all they really managed to score was the device's shell, which reveals a couple interesting tidbits: it'll maintain the K850's bizarre square keys, and it alleges to sport a 3x optical zoom. With that kind of lens power, it's pretty much a foregone conclusion that there'll be a 5 megapixel sensor lurking under that protective cover (if not greater), making Sony Ericsson's next round of product announcements a potential boon for shutterbugs. Stay tuned.

[Via Gearfuse]

[(Unverified) Posted Aug 20th 2007 4:25PM]

Looks a tiny bit slimmer than the K850, methinks.

[(Unverified) Posted Aug 20th 2007 4:29PM]

Recently released? Where? None of the major carriers have it yet, none of the importers are offering it, and a quick search of ebay shows no sign of it either.

The last official word I heard from a Sony Ericsson marketing rep on a release date for the K850 was late November, and as far as I know that hasn't changed. Oddly enough, there are rumors that Cellular One will be the first to offer it, just like they were the first to offer the W580. Funny how they didn't start acting like a competetive company until it was announced they were being bought out :-p

[(Unverified) Posted Aug 21st 2007 5:40AM]

If you ask me, it just looks like a photoshopped pic of a SE-K810 casing without the innards, the camera lense portion shrunken, and a loud speaker attached.

Just my opinion.

You guys know what I'm talking about though, what with all them "Keepin' it real fake" series on this site..... and then we have the lead poisoning deal going on right now.... which really has nothing to do with this post....

[(Unverified) Posted Aug 21st 2007 4:50PM]

This is "Severine" K850 successor and the first SE to sport a 3xoptical zoom. Sadly the project have been dumped by SE, because Sophia aka K850 is to delayed. Severine is built around the same platform as "Sophia". Sadly we will never see this product in the wild.

[(Unverified) Posted Aug 24th 2007 6:15PM]

While I have no idea whether or not it is legitimate, I doubt it is a photoshop of the K810, as seen here: http://www.intomobile.com/2007/06/19/sony-ericsson-k810i-vs-k850i.html
Too many differences.

I really hope they make this phone (or something like it)--3X optical zoom, better flash location than the K850, non-fingerprint-magnet case material. The K850 looks like crap in most of the pictures I've seen because it's covered in fingerprints.