Thursday, November 11, 2010

Sony Ericsson XPERIA X10 (on 2.1--Eclair) General Impressions




After a week of heavy use and scrutiny on my new X10 (I have experienced both 1.6 and 2.1 on this), I have collected my likes and dislikes for this phone. She's starting off where bada left me. And those shoes are not easy to fill: 16M color S-AMOLED screen, multitouch, a very capable video player

Likes
  • Huge vibrant screen
  • Minimalist design that makes it look classy and sexy and stand out
  • Classy glassy UI
  • Access to Swype text input
  • Access to Android Market Apps
  • 8.1 megapixel camera takes snaps well and is the best android camera phone, and remains as one of the best for the year
  • Finally, a 3.5 mm audio jack
  • Android OS (Eclair 2.1)
  • Stock keyboard works perfectly with auto correct, editing mechanism wonderfully implemented
  • Timescape is beautiful and does not lag
  • Social phonebook automatically links contacts with the same names
  • Flashlight widget, among other very useful widgets, makes me really happy
  • Access to beautiful live wallpapers
  • Workarounds if you don't like the stock solutions
  • 720p HD video recording! (after 2.1)
Dislikes
  • Unwanted apps running in the background is kind of iffy--but maybe Android's fault (needs root access to stop them from starting up)
  • Too little RAM undermines the phones capacity
  • No file manager out of the box
  • Timescape and Mediascape eat too much memory
  • Face recognition would have been nice but implementation is dotty (my phone recognizes me as my friend)
  • Mediascape can't create playlists, needs workarounds--wouldn't mind a Walkman 3.0 instead
  • Rogue screen resolution makes some apps screwy (Swype)
  • No multi touch support though the workarounds were very serviceable
  • 65k color limit bites
  • Questionable battery life
  • No FM radio (!!!)
  • Mediascape does not have equalizer! Can't play Divx videos
  • Too much blue going on the ux
  • Tagging people's pictures would have been a joy especially if you can search them up rather than scroll through all of your one thousand contacts all written in smallish fonts and no search box is provided!
  • Size may be uncomfortable after holding for a long time
  • Plastic USB slot cover--very iffy
  • Phone lags after 23MB RAM left, sometimes does not--weird behavior
Now you think I'd stop there. Not so. Time to be a b*tch compare the past with the present.

X10 over Wave
  • Android OS
  • Bigger screen
  • Better internet browsing experience
  • Larger RAM
  • Larger screen
  • More stylish, classy, and elegant design concept
  • More phone functions via widgets and extensions
  • Ambient light sensor
  • No 1000 message limit
  • Sent messages does not get auto removed after 200th message
  • Better in-box package
  • Android social media apps outdoes bada counterparts very easily
  • Can install swype
  • live wallpapers
  • 8MP camera
Wave over X10
  • S-AMOLED screen
  • multitouch support
  • Hardware Call answer and drop keys
  • brushed metal body wins over plastic any day, but I find the Wave's body design iffy
  • Samsung Dive Lock
  • Better video and music experience
  • Has etiquette pause
  • Native SMS scheduling, birthdays, and other built-in functions
  • better usb port
  • front-facing camera
  • better loudspeaker
  • USB door wins over plastic flap, hands down
  • 16M color display
  • Can take screenshots without workarounds
  • Cheaper
Overall, I enjoyed the X10 more than the Wave. For one, the X10 has more apps available to it, and those apps are your popular apps like Foursquare, better Facebook, better Twitter, Tweetdeck, Seesmic. After 2.1 the social phonebook of the X10 is on par with HTC's, which is to say, it outdid the Wave already that leaves manually linking contacts. Sure the 16M S-AMOLED screen multitouch display wins over 65K color TFT single touch screen any day, and video playback is handled better by the Wave, but then again that's all it is better at. Messages, which is very important to me, is very well implemented on the X10--esp after the 2.1 update. The beautiful and unique UXP on the X10 beats the Symbian looking, iOS-copying UI of bada. I just miss stuff from the Wave like the sliding USB door--I really hate the plastic flap. But that's about it.

Stay tune for the completion of the Wave's review and the X10's review, hopefully within the week.

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