When you say Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 you automatically think about a big phone, with a generous 4 inch screen. If you also add the word “mini” at the end, you might remove 1” from the screen display, 10-20 mm from the essential dimensions and then sell the phone at a lower price. In this case, however, the changes have been more drastic, and the similarities between Xperia X10 and Xperia X10 mini are minimum. Even so, Sony Ericsson managed to create a spectacular product with this dimensions. We are going to present one of the smallest smart phones on the market!
The construction of the phone spins around the 2.55” screen. At the base we can find the three Android specific keys. X10 mini is 36mm shorter and 12 mm thinner than the original model. The volume buttons and photo camera trigger are on the right side, and in the lower side we can find the headset jack and the microUSB slot. The photo camera with LED and speaker are located on the back of the phone.
As you probably know already, the Li-Polimer 950 mAh is not detachable. The back side only offers access to the microSD/SDHC card slot and for the SIM card. In the package we can find a 2 GB card and stereo headset. The audio quality of the headset is decent and only the most pretentious users will feel the need to change it.
In the package, you can find no less than five colored cases for the Xperia X10 mini, besides the black one that comes already installed by the manufacturer. Powering and computer connection is done through the microUSB port. Sony Ericsson has also put in the package the microUSB cable and power cord with a single USB port. We have to say that the 3.5 mm jack allows the phone to be connected to a headset premium, MH810. It is compatible with only four Sony Ericsson phones – X10 mini, X10 mini pro, X8 and Yendo ).
Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini should be twice as cheap as the Xperia X10 and this explains why it doesn’t have the same Snapdragon 1 GHZ processor. However, it comes with MSM7227 Qualcomm, 600 MHZ. The RAM Memory is not specified, and as storage solution we have 128 MB of internal memory available. The Android 1.6 is really fast using this hardware configuration.
The 320×240 resolution is not very suitable for a smart phone. The people who will buy the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini will have to ensure that their priority is the low dimensions. THe lack of the physical keyboard or even of the QWERTY keyboard on the screen will be strongly felt by people that intend to use this phone for Twitter or Facebook applications or to write emails.
The main screens of the interface can be personalized with widgets, the most important one being Timescape. It displays Twitter and Facebook updates, but also tracks the incoming calls and text messages. In the four corners of the screen we can find icons that can be personalized, just as the soft buttons from other phones. These locations are used for options to menu access.
The menu is initially spread on four screens, however it will also extend based on the number of applications installed by the user. Access to applications is pretty fast with the help of Android Market. The screen resolution will limit the number of applications that can be installed on this smart phone, but a decent percentage of the applications available on the Android Market are compatible. Since Google is behind the Android operating system, it’s obvious that this phone also comes with YouTube, Gmail, Google Talk and Google Maps applications.
Xperia X10 mini is going to be delivered with a GPS navigation named Wisepilot. It is developed by Navteq and has very good coverage. Unfortunately, the maps are downloaded off the Internet, and for voice indications you have to purchase a license..
The internet browsing application offered by the manufacturer is behaving very well, however the screen is not helpful at all. Its difficult to pick a font size that looks good on the QVGA monitor. Big fonts can be seen better, however the quantity of the information on page is reduced. Zoom can only be done with the help of screen buttons, and it doesn’t have multi touch support. Navigation with the help of multiple tags is plus, however it does not have Flash support.
For a phone that comes from Sony Ericsson, Xperia X10 mini is a disappointment regarding the offered audio player. Besides the Shuffle feature, it does not offer anything else. Although artists and song search is done easily, it equalizer is not there. We appreciated the fact that we can also search on YouTube.
The FM Tuner has an interesting graphic interface. The video player is a bit spartan and only has one bar to fast forward the video and a pause button. We have nothing bad to say about the audio jack of the phone. The volume is good, however the low frequencies have been altered a bit.
A 5 mega pixels photo camera with autofocus is always a nice addition. Unfortunately, we again see a spartan application. Besides the LED activation as a Flash, the user only has four photography modes: Auto, Macro, Twilight and Sports. Filming is only done at VGA resolution with 30 frames per second. We have seen mobile phones from Sony Ericsson with more modest photo cameras that had more options that the camera of the Xperia X10 mini. The quality of the photos is not bad when we have plenty of natural light.
We thought that since we are dealing with a small smartphone, with a small screen, the battery might be a surprise. Well, this is not the case. 30 minutes talking time, 15 minutes browsing the Internet, one hour listening to music and a few more minutes playing around with the phone and that’s it. Pretty annoying was the fact that once the battery is consumed, restarting the phone can only be done a few minutes later. If the phone is used more intensely, especially browsing the Internet or updating the social media applications, than the autonomy can easily decrease a lot. A bigger battery is out of the question, so people that are interested in this phone should be aware of this.
Despite the small problems mentioned above, the phone made a pretty good impression. Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 is a miniature smart phone and we don’t have a lot of bad things to say about it. The screen couldn’t be 4”, and the current interface fits very well. Many base applications are poor regarding features, however the phone does not compete with a top HTC smart phone. It’s possible that future versions of the Android operating system might come with a lot of improvements, however there will still be applications limitations that are compatible with the QVGA resolution.
Pluses and minuses
+ smallest smart phone on the market
+ fast operating system
+ GPS, WiFi, 3G with HSDPA
+ five colored cases in the package
- it doesn’t have any Xperia X10 similarities
- the resolution of the screen is too small for a smart phone
- lack of physical or QWERTY keyboard
- battery cannot be replaced and has a mediocre autonomy
- photo camera with limited features.
