XPERIA X1 - first Windows Mobile device by Sony Ericsson
Due to historical reasons, the WM platform has been largely attributed with being a niche solution should we judge on a global scale encompassing the whole telecom market. The sales of WM products remain on a stably low level despite of all Microsoft’s efforts to promote WM (which might look a bit strange given the variety of vendors designing WM products). The most notable WM vendor, HTC, can hardly compete with any of the top five telecom vendors from Nokia to Sony Ericsson. Sony Ericsson and Samsung have recently increased their activity in the WM segment, taking an interest in developing WM-based models.
The Korean giant has presented the top-class i900 model equipped with a 5 Mp camera, fit enough to challenge even Touch Diamond by HTC (see Samsung i900 Omnia/WiTu, first impressions. Comparison with Diamond and iPhone). Sony Ericsson are making a landfall on the WM market niche, launching their brand new XPERIA product line comprising a number of PDA models, of which X1 is planned to be the first to see the daylight. The gadget is remarkable for being ODM-produced by HTC and has a close native analog Touch Pro tailored and sold by HTC themselves. The former is a premium-class PDA equipped with a keyboard (see Sony Ericsson C905 and XPERIA X1, first impressions).
Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1 is a very specific, yet an efficient PDA. It would make a great choice for those looking for a WM PDA sporting just as much computing power and versatility as fashionable looks, equipped with a QWERTY keyboard (yet not the handiest around). All in all, the product appears to be a balanced solution, on of the best in its class. Final conclusions will be drawn upon testing a next-to-final sample later in autumn. The currently available sample makes a great Christmas gift provided that SE fixes the spotted weaknesses on time, without pushing the release date into the next year.
Advantages: Stylish design, original form factor High quality of materials and assembly Large high-definition screen Powerful CPU, 256 Mb of RAM Wi-Fi and GPS, as well as an FM tuner XPERIA panels firmware launcher 3.5 mm audio jack Long battery life
Disadvantages: High price Challengeable keyboard ergonomics Non-canon screen resolution No TV-out No hardware 3D acceleration
Comparisons between Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1 and HTC Touch Pro are a well expected and natural thing; still, something very important should be kept in mind: positioning, which brings up explainable differences in implementation of certain features. SE think that X1 ought to be a marriage between luxury and technology, standing for an extensive use of metal, a grotesque form factor (concave slider) and so on.
Model:
Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1
HTС Touch Pro
Networks:
GSM 900/1800/1900 и UMTS 900/2100, HSDPA
GSM 900/1800/1900 и UMTS 900/2100, HSDPA
GPRS / EDGE:
+/+
+/+
Operating system:
Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional
Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional
CPU:
Qualcomm MSM7201А 528 MHz
Qualcomm MSM7201А 528 MHz
RAM / ROM:
256 / 512 Mb
256 / 512 Mb
Дисплей:
3”, TFT WVGA 800x480, 65k, touchscreen
2.8”, TFT VGA 640x480, 65k, touchscreen
Camera:
3.2 Mp, auto-focusing
3.2 Mp, auto-focusing
Expansion slot:
microSD
microSD
Connectivity::
miniUSB, Bt 2.0, Wi-Fi
extUSB, Bt 2.0, Wi-Fi
GPS:
+
+
FM:
+
+
QWERTY:
+
+
3.5 mm:
+
-
Battery:
1500 mAh
1340 mAh
Measurements:
110.5 x 52.6 x 17 mm
102 x 51 x 18.05 mm
Weight:
158 g
165 g
Price:
770 euros
915 euros
An important difference from the ODM counterpart is also concealed in the software platform. The graphics shell of XPERIA looks very elegant and promising; the additional available software makes even a bigger difference from the closest competitor. Hardware differences are also numerous, primarily consisting in a different screen but not limited exclusively to that, so making statements about copying or even plagiarism is senseless.
Design makes a strong part of the model, producing a very pleasant impression. Metal is rarely seen in use as far as Windows Mobile models are concerned; no other WM model has been previously spotted to simultaneously feature metal on the sides, front and back panels. At the same time, the handset weighs even less than Touch Pro. Sony Ericsson’s brainchild uses a horizontal slider form factor and comes in two alternate color versions – black and metallic.
The design is very neutral, featuring a few geometrical patterns in the area of the navigation block below the screen. Side pieces have a chrome coating, the face panel combines glossy and matte surfaces (more on the matte side, also dominant on the back surface) Certain parts sport a grinded metal texture. Looks really cool in real life, the metal adding a posh touch to the whole thing. The available test samples feature a high quality of assembly, which may improve even further in the final commercial build. The sliding mechanism is incredibly smooth. X1, if not up to the highest of premium product standards, at least makes a perfect image phone, which is a very rare occurrence in the world of Windows Mobile products. Even the existing hi-end WM handsets are by and large made of plastic with few to no metal pieces.
Glossy areas are only seen on the face panel, which is a very practical point: you don’t have to fight the grease and fingerprints all the time. The measurements and weight are next to optimal, the handset neatly fits the hand. The menu navigation controls isn’t really handy though, for the convenience was sacrificed to the good looks (and strict geometrical shapes in particular) The button seemed a bit too small-sized for our comfort. After a week of usage or so you end up getting used to the small inconveniences, and stray keystrokes become more and more rare. On the other hand, you get just as many buttons as you would want to have, unlike the well-known models by Samsung and E-TEN which seemed to have too few dedicated buttons for miscellaneous functions. For instance, the bottom left button serves to open the panel launcher, which is to be described in a later section of this article.
What we didn’t really like about X1 was the main keyboard. The buttons feel loose and you can’t always feel if a button was pressed or not. We hope this will get fixed by the release day. The backlight is perfect though: bright enough to eliminate any possible inconvenience when you work in the dark. A brightly colored LED light works as the best reminder so you won’t ever miss a message. Talking in advance, we’d mention that Touch Pro still has a much better keyboard, which is the biggest advantage over the Swedish-Japanese competitor. For the rest of the aspects, X1 is leading and we are going to prove that.
The keyboard of X1 comprises 42 buttons, one of which serves as a shortcut to the standard WM menu. All the keys are grouped in four roughs and well-segmented. The navigation panel consists of 6 buttons plus the central joystick button with the standard four ‘arrow’ directions. Such a large number of buttons was a reason to reduce the size of an individual key, resulting in damage to ergonomics. The backlight of the navigation block is quite good though.
The central area of the navigation button (in a manner reminiscent of Samsung i900) also plays the role of a touchpad. You can bring up the manipulator window on the screen or simply scroll windows with a move of the finger – roughly this is an equivalent of a scroll wheel. A corresponding menu of settings is available, allowing for advanced tweaking of this feature. The solution is becoming increasingly popular in the circle of WM-based solutions.
The edge-positioned elements didn’t leave us disappointed; the most memorable feature is the 3.5 mm audio jack which has never been seen in SE products previously (save for a few ODM budget models which had almost no real influence on the market) and still is a rare occurrence among WM products. Moreover, the data cable slot is of a standard miniUSB type which is another plus. The memory expansion slot is hidden beneath the battery bay cover, also being of a standard microSD type instead of SE’s favorite M2 format.
The camera is located at the bottom end of the lower slider part, there’s no lens guard. So it’s highly advisable to avoid even the slightest physical impact. Talking in advance we’d mention that contrary to the rumors, the camera unit is distinctly different from the one installed on Touch Pro, offering a better quality of the photos. It will receive more attention in a later section of this article.
The basic shell providing access to all other applications used in X1 is an advanced finger-operated launcher utilizing every possibility originating from the touch technology support. Currently it’s the only solution capable of competition with TouchFLO 3D by HTC; the rest of pretender are much weaker, even considering the widget system seen on some Samsung phones. The SE corporation successfully implemented the interesting idea of active panels. In the current state of development, the application has few possibilities yet its potential is immense; it’s up to the company to shape the solution into something more challenging in the future incarnations.
The general idea is that the screen contains nine thumbnails which can be rotated all around in any imaginable fashion. The trick is that all the thumbnails remain simultaneously active – that is, any process running in a thumbnailed window affects the thumbnail image as it would do in a fullscreen mode – the progress bars, status indicators and other dynamic elements change accordingly so there’s no difference from the standard view mode. You are even able to watch the progress of a slowly loading web page right in a thumbnail of a web browser window.
It takes a lot of computing power to keep the whole 9 thumbnails active, yet the HTC powerful hardware platform copes with the task without problems. Lags occur only occasionally, yet in an amount not exceeding the slight lagginess of TouchFLO 3D earlier observed in pre-sale samples; until all the optimizations are done for the final version of the product, we can’t come to a final verdict on this point. The 256 Mb of RAM is a very big amount for a WM smartphone, and currently the XPERIA panel application consumes less memory than TouchFLO 3D does.
The default set of panels includes:
• Sony Ericsson panel – a panel to read news, weather, finance, world clock and shortcuts to communication and applications.
• Media Experience panel – center for viewing and playing multimedia files.
• Slideshow panel – slideshow of recently taken videos and photos.
• Microsoft Today panel – this panel is the actual Microsoft today screen.
• 3D Fish panel – a panel that showcases the 3D features of the phone; a fish tank with 3D fishes.
• FM radio panel - a panel to access your FM radio straight.
• Google panel - provides access to all GOogle services.
Also it’s possible to add custom user panels. Among the existing panels 3D Fish is the most remarkable feature – the inhabitants of the fish tank lively react to stylus touches. Tapping on a single fish will likely repel it, while slashing a track will bring the whole fish school along the drawn pathline. Here’s a small video covering the possibilities offered by the exclusive launcher and its individual panels:
HTC seems to offer a more advanced launcher shell, a feel of rawness can still be felt around X1. However the potential of the concept is great and leaves a vast margin for future developments. As for now, it’s a not too functional, yet effective looking solution. Next year we shall see a reworked version of the application which is going to challenge HTC on par, or even excel their work.
The gadget is equipped with a 256 Mb of RAM and 512 Mb of Rom, of which about 400 Mb is available to the user. As it was mentioned above, a microSD memory extension slot is available.
The screen is nearly ideal – a large 3’’ matrix supporting a 800x480 resolution. The picture quality is amazingly high – all the details are clear-cut and bright, sporting wide view angles. The screen of X1 displays a good resistance to the direct sunlight, the screen image fades off but slightly. The only observable flow is the necessity of additional software support for the non-canon 800x480 resolution, some of the applications failed to launch in a correct viewmode and it will take the software developers for some time to address the issue.
The connectivity part of X1 is based on the high-potential Qualcomm platform, which results in rich variety of hardware features including even an FM tuner with RDS support. The device is designed to operate in GSM 850/900/1800/1900 & UMTS 850/1900/2100 networks, supports GPRS/EDGE as well as HSDPA.
The wireless communication is done with the help of onboard Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR (Enhanced Data Rate) and Wi-Fi units. Both modules work perfectly; we had no problem handling them over the course of our tests. The A2DP profile enjoys a perfect implementation – the wireless headset audio sports a high volume and quality, the connection is rarely if ever released (we can’t recall a single instance). The following miscellaneous Bluetooth profiles are supported:
- File Transfer
- Generic Access
- Generic Object Exchange
- Handsfree
- Headset
- HID
- Object Push
- Personal Area Networking
- Serial Port
- A2DP
- Audio/Video Remote Control
- SAP (SIM card access profile)
Global Positioning is based off Google Maps software, just like in the case of HTC. The signal quality is remarkably high, standing up to the standards established by Touch Pro – the identity of the base chipset tells for itself, the same goes to radio functionality.
The hardware side of X1 bases off a Qualcomm MSM7201A chipset with a mounted 528 MHz CPU. That’s not the quickest CPU on today’s market, yet it provides high performance rates. It’s a bit too early to publish the scores achieved in synthetic benchmarks because there would be little correspondence to the real-life performance of the final commercial version. The only thing we can say for sure right now is that the solution has enough computing power for accomplishing the majority of typical tasks.
A genuine type of camera is used in this model; the quality is better than in Touch Pro. The photos are comparable to others taken with this kind of 3.2 Mp unit by the same manufacturer, no surprises ahead. The following photo resolutions are available:
The currently available sample doesn’t bear the final version of the camera, the camera firmware is still being developed and constantly update. As for now, the image quality is just fine. The 5 Mp PDAs are still ahead, yet all of those are plain candy bars. Inside its native niche (e.g. against the background of Touch Pro) this model looks a clear winner.
X1 is powered by a high-capacity 1500 mAh battery. The manufacturer claims a 3.5 hours full recharge cycle, 10 hours of talktime and 580 hours of standby in GSM networks. Our test results are too raw to do any judgment because of the unfinished state of the model, which is yet to appear in its final version, so we won’t be quoting any numbers until the finalized version becomes available. As for now, a full battery charge is enough to keep the device online for roughly two days of moderate duty cycle, which so far is great for a WM device.
The software functionality of X1 is based off the Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional operating system, a review of which available on our site (see Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional Base Functionality Review). The standard features of the preinstalled software package are currently being discussed, the only sure points on the list are Opera 9.5 as an alternative to IE, an RSS reader and Google Maps global positioning application. There are few coincidences on this front with the software package of the HTC product. The panel launcher is the most characteristic feature of the software platform, presenting a serious commercial trump; still SE seems to able to beat even that. We wonder what will happen when the next version comes out.
Considering the generally low demand for Windows Mobile PDA phones, the two models can only expect a very moderate popularity, the situation aggravated by the high prices. The brand power factor combined with a number of objective advantages (the screen, audio out, the use of metal) make X1 a more remarkable solution, so it’s bound to enjoy some extra attention on the market. Yet it will never become a mass product.
It would be logical to design the next PDA in a candy bar form factor in order to cover a larger audience; that’s exactly what is planned for the following XPERIA model, which is to appear by the end of the year. It will finally reach retail stores by the start of the next year, more than a year after the announce of the closest HTC Touch Diamond. Sony Ericsson are doing their best to minimize the time gap between the announces of original HTC products and corresponding ODM developments for SE.
As it was mentioned for a few times, HTC is the real-life manufacturer of Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1, yet the implementation and market positioning make a huge difference between the two models. Moreover, Touch Pro will become available in retail sale by the second fortnight of September while the competitor still has no established release date which may extend into the next year as well.
Model:
Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1
HTС Touch Pro
Network:
GSM 900/1800/1900 и UMTS 900/2100, HSDPA
GSM 900/1800/1900 и UMTS 900/2100, HSDPA
GPRS / EDGE:
+/+
+/+
Operating system:
Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional
Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional
CPU:
Qualcomm MSM7201А 528 MHz
Qualcomm MSM7201А 528 MHz
RAM / ROM:
256 / 512 Mb
256 / 512 Mb
Screen:
3”, TFT WVGA 800x480, 65k, touchscreen
2.8”, TFT VGA 640x480, 65k, touchscreen
Camera:
3.2 Mp, auto-focusing
3.2 Mp, auto-focusing
Expansion slot:
microSD
microSD
Connectivity::
miniUSB, Bt 2.0, Wi-Fi
extUSB, Bt 2.0, Wi-Fi
GPS:
+
+
FM:
+
+
QWERTY:
+
+
3.5 mm:
+
-
Battery::
1500 mAh
1340 mAh
Measurements
110.5 x 52.6 x 17 mm
102 x 51 x 18.05 mm
Weight:
158 g
165 g
Price
770 euros
815 euros
The strong sides of X1 are a metallic casing, the high mobility (compact size and small weight), a large screen, a 3.5 mm audio jack, a high-capacity battery and a high quality camera. Touch Pro is notable for a better software compatibility (a canonic screen resolution), a more user friendly launcher and WM extensions, a TV-out, a more convenient keyboard and the availability of hardware 3D acceleration.
All of this put together makes clear what the difference in positioning would be like: the practical Touch sporting a handy keyboard vs. the ambitious-looking, fashionable XPERIA clad in metal. The starting price for X1 is lower, yet a number of price reductions for Pro are bound to occur prior to the release of the competitive product.
Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1 is a very specific, yet an efficient PDA. It would make a great choice for those looking for a WM PDA sporting just as much computing power and versatility as fashionable looks, equipped with a QWERTY keyboard (yet not the handiest around). All in all, the product appears to be a balanced solution, on of the best in its class. Final conclusions will be drawn upon testing a next-to-final sample later in autumn. The currently available sample makes a great Christmas gift provided that SE fixes the spotted weaknesses on time, without pushing the release date into the next year.
+ Stylish design, original form factor
+ High quality of materials and assembly
+ Large high-definition screen
+ Long battery life
+ 3.5 mm audio jack
+ XPERIA panels firmware launcher
+ Powerful CPU, 256 Mb of RAM
+ Wi-Fi and GPS, as well as an FM tuner
- High price
- Challengeable keyboard ergonomics
- Non-canon screen resolution
- No TV-out
- No hardware 3D acceleration
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Nokia
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Stylish design, original form factor 
High price
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