Sony Ericsson this week launched a mainstream 3G phone, touting the handset as a media-friendly business-oriented device - it's got push email support on board - that's no bigger than an average GSM/GPRS-only machine.

The candybar K618 sports a 1.9in, 176 x 220, 262,144-colour display. There's a two megapixel, 2.5x digital zoom camera on the back and a more basic, VGA one on the front for video calling. Bundled software includes a blog-posting tool for photos

The phone will ship with a 256MB Memory Stick Micro - aka M2 - card for media storage. Content can be copied over via USB - the phone appears as a USB Mass Storage device on your PC. It also supports Bluetooth-based wireless stereo audio.

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The K618 will ship in Q3 in "selected markets", Sony Ericsson said. It will be offered in black and white versions. ®

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