Sony Xperia X10 Hands On & First Impressions [Does the Xperia X10 Herald a New Era of SE Handsets? Is the X10 Really Worth All The Hype?]

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If you have even the slightest interest in phones it’s a pretty safe bet that you’re already acutely aware of the up and coming Sony Xperia X10 – after all, its received more than its fair share of attention and hype (not least from ourselves). You’ll understand then, on getting an invite to experience a full hands on with the X10, we were keenly aware that the X10 would either live up to our (exceedingly high) expectations or it would leave us disappointed, under whelmed and feeling that Sony Ericsson had simply failed to deliver the goods. In actual fact, however, having now experienced the Xperia X10 personally I can report that it actually did neither.

A Little Background: Let’s Set The Tone

Admittedly, at this juncture you’re probably assuming that this is bad news. And it is, for me at least, as the Xperia X10 has put me in a rather uncomfortable position.

Let me explain (I need to, or you really won’t understand the gravity of the situation).

Let’s look back at my review of the Sony Ericsson Satio. If you’re familiar with that review (or any of my past reviews for that matter) you’ll know that I pride myself on not pulling any punches. If I think something’s lacking I genuinely feel that I’m fully obligated to convey that to you and, no, you won’t find me making any apologies whatsoever for taking such a hard-line stance.

What if, however, I’m genuinely blown away by something. What then? Perhaps the more cynical of you will think I’m being paid to be gushing. Perhaps you’ll come to the (wholly untrue) conclusion that I’m merely serving my own interests? If you are entertaining such thoughts – and regular readers who are already acquainted with my reviews will know that this isn’t the case – let me act to dispel them now so we can move swiftly on.

I have covered Sony Ericsson products prior to now, and I’d particularly like to draw your attention to my full review of the Satio where I offered up a number of criticisms that where far from serving any such ‘best interests’. In fact, following said review one could have understood Sony Ericsson from consequently giving me a particularly wide birth (other companies have when I’ve given frank reviews – no names).

Sony Ericsson, however, to their credit, took another stance as not only did they invite me to gain hands on experience of their new breed of Symbian and Android based handsets – knowing that I’d pull no punches in reporting back to you – they actually offered me to gain serious hands on time with their new handsets, including the Xperia X10, right under their noses. It’s hard not to respect that. They were taking a gamble.

The question is, did their gamble pay off?

By the end of this text you’ll have your answer, of course (and I’ll leave you in no doubt as to whether this gamble has worked for or against them) but, in actuality, one thing that immediately struck me when I gained hands on time with their Xperia X10 is that, all said and done, Sony Ericsson’s gamble probably wasn’t quite the degree of gamble that I’d initially assumed it to be. Sony Ericsson have, after all, not been backward in coming forward about the virtues of their up and coming X10 Android smartphone and, as I took the X10 in hand, I couldn’t help but wonder why it was that SE felt that the X10 was going to dispel any concerns I had about it possibly proving unable to live up to the hype.

Now, however, I understand.

I understand because, having gained first hand experience of the X10 its clear to me that Sony Ericsson’s confidence in the X10 is far from misplaced. The X10 is not only a seriously impressive handset that’s genuinely worthy of the hype, it also clearly marks the dawning of a new age for Sony Ericsson following what its fair to term as a somewhat of a slump.

No, that’s not entirely correct, as the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 is more than that. It’s a sheer masterstroke of design that has patently been born of SE waking up and smelling the coffee (yes, I’m telling it like it is). It’s an ace card that they’re just about to throw onto the table and the other players here need to realise that now. Nokia, Samsung, Motorola, and, yes, HTC and Apple, we know you’re listening and with that in mind we feel we have to advise you that the X10 is something to start getting very nervous about indeed (if you aren’t already – not that I’d expect anyone to admit it).

Xperia X10 Marks A ‘New Way of Thinking’

From the outset when I turned up at the Sony Ericsson MWC UK press event SE were refreshingly open with me that their new breed of handsets (namely the Vivaz, Vivaz Pro, Xperia X10, X10 Mini and X10 Mini Pro – but let’s stick with the Xperia X10 for now) have come about after what appears to be some soul searching on their part. Changes have been made, I was told (I took that to mean that – and this is purely my interpretation – some difficult decisions had been made following a pretty expensive shake down and that, perhaps, even heads had rolled). Either ways, it was clear to me that I was dealing with a newly revitalised SE who have been reborn following having taken a good hard look at themselves and having come to the conclusion that, ultimately, they needed to raise their game. Moreover, talk of their ‘new way of thinking’ clearly isn’t bravado. They mean it. And, what’s more, they mean business.

These new handsets, as previously named, are the result of this ‘new way of thinking’ and, of them all, the Xperia X10 (the focus of this text) is clearly spearheading this new charge. Its right there at the front, its leading by example and, I’ll be bunt about this, if I were the likes of Nokia, Samsung, et al, I’d start taking notice as the X10 is seriously tooled up and its not going to be taking any prisoners.

Brace yourselves. Sony Ericsson have just become exciting again and there are going to be casualties.

The Xperia X10: Style, Substance & Horsepower

So, with the extended preamble now over, let’s cut to the case (that said, I’ve given away what I think of the X10 already, haven’t I) by covering my hands on with a handset that is undoubtedly set to rock more than a few worlds.

Firstly, its appearance. The Xperia X10 positively oozes class from first sight with the main draw, apart from its sleek design, being the device’s generously sized display. Packing in a resolution of 480 x 854 pixels the (scratch resistant) super widescreen display really makes its mark, even before the device is powered up. There’s some considerable real estate here and, as a consequence, the Xperia X10 is proportioned accordingly. Its larger than many phones, certainly, yet it manages to circumvent coming across was being unduly bulky. It my hands at least, it was comfortable to hold and weighted well. Getting the weight of a headset right is often overlooked in terms of how a user experiences it as a physical object but the X10 struck a perfect balance in this respect in feeling neither too light nor to heavy. The last thing you need from a handset is to have to take up weight training in order to hold it for extended periods but, conversely, you also don’t want a phone to feel so light that it seems overly delicate. The X10 feels right and it also feels reassuring sturdy. Moreover, due to its proportions (the X10 comes in at 119 x 63 x 13 mm) its comfortable to hold whilst in both portrait and landscape orientations without ever feeling cumbersome.

Of course, for those that want a more compact phone, thus forgoing the generous display real estate on offer with the Xperia X10, its not like you’re not going to be catered for as you’ll have the X10 Mini and X10 Mini Pro proving more than happy to serve your needs (see below image – the mini really is so compact we had to do a double-take). For me at least, the display stuck me as being beautifully sized and if you’re looking to watch videos and run through photos on a handset the X10 is going to prove hard to ignore for this reason alone. Its clear, from just looking at the display’s size, that the X10 is geared towards serving as an entertainment device and once the phone is powered up this is further underpinned thanks to the screen offering vibrant color saturation and, as alluded to above, an impressive pixel count.

Of course, the Xperia X10’s display additionally offers touchscreen functionality and, thankfully, its of the capacitive variety as opposed to resistive so the responsiveness issues I experienced with the Satio are not repeated here. Indeed, the X10’s display proved to be highly responsive to my every touch and (again, unlike with the Satio) I didn’t find myself having to resort to more force that I would otherwise have liked in order to have my inputs registered.

This is great news as the Xperia X10 doesn’t come with a physical QWERTY keyboard, instead relying on a screen based text input. My time with the X10 however confirmed that entering text using the device’s touchscreen was not an unduly frustrating task – indeed entering text on the X10 felt wholly intuitive and a decidedly fluid affair.

And ‘fluid’ is a word that can be all too readily associated with the Xperia X10 as this is by no means an underpowered handset. Quite the contrary, as, under the hood, the X10 boasts a Qualcomm Snapdragon QSD8250 processor running at 1GHz and throughout my hands on with the device I witnessed no evidence of slowdowns regardless of me trying the catch the device out. The menu systems boast fluid (there’s that word again) animations and I found that this added greatly to the overall appeal of the device. In fact, and serving as testament to the power being exercised under the hood here, I did get the feeling that the Snapdragon had plenty enough going spare in terms of clout regardless of whatever I threw at it (running through menu systems unnecessarily quickly, and so forth).

If you’re worried that the Xperia X10 may look great, offer swish and beautifully realised (but not crassly overstated) UI animations but, ultimately, prove to be underpowered rest assured my experience of it proved that any such concerns are wholly unwarranted – the X10 runs like a sports car (no, let me correct that – the X10 runs like a Snapdragon). And, whilst I’m covering this side of things, you just need to see SE’s Timescape and (especially) Mediascape features in operation to truly understand the true horsepower the X10 has at its disposal (but more on those features later).

Back to the screen. I’ve already indicated that its clear SE have worked hard to design and build the Xperia X10 with its use as an entertainment device squarely in mind and, whilst the X10, on account of its generously proportioned high pixel count and vibrant display, will serve to especially well in this regard (watching film clips, for example, really underpins why the screen size and aspect ratio are key attributes) there are other bonuses that are worth more than just a cursory mention.

The first is that the X10’s menu systems appear wholly uncluttered, even when there’s a great deal of information on the screen. There’s space to breathe and, as a result, the X10 never overwhelms even when conveying the true scope of exactly what’s on offer here in terms of over all package and functionality. Again, when it comes to Timescape and Mediascape the level of information the X10 can get across without seeming overly busy (from a visual perspective) is impressive – I keep teasing you concerning Timescape and Mediascape but not unduly so, as you’ll see later.

Additionally, as the X10 also boasts impressive imaging credentials (both in terms of still image and video capture) the screen once again impresses with the extra real estate the X10’s display boasts proving decidedly helpful. The X10 can, and would, serve you well as a competent substitute for a dedicated point and shoot camera; you’re looking at 8.1 megapixel resolution paired with LED flash and features such as Touch focus, image stabilization, geo-tagging capabilities – courtesy of the X10’s onboard GPS – and, of course, the obligatory face and smile detection. Where the X10 comes into its own is its ability to give all that display real estate over to displaying your imagery. Dedicated compact point and shoot cameras (indeed, DSLRs) simply cannot and don’t offer you screens that even vaguely compare.

If you’re looking for a camera phone that’ll do your exposures justice, the X10 will (as it does generally across the board) deliver. Or, in other words, if you’re crying out for the convenience of a camera with sound video capabilities that excels as a portable digital photo album look no further – though don’t be surprised if your audience’s expressions of interest are more to do with them being genuinely impressed with the phone rather than your snaps or video clips.

Oh, and lest I forget, in terms of the X10’s capabilities as an entertainment device I should also state that its good to see that the X10 comes with integrated 3.5mm headphone socket. No bespoke connector required here (unlike with, for example, the Satio) which shows that SE have listened to user feedback. If you want to run with your own headphones when using the X10’s multimedia capabilities its as easy as simply plugging your headphones in (or, in other words, its as easy as it should always have been).

Xperia X10’s Timescape & Mediascape Signature Applications

Obviously, in terms of the above, whist I did gain good hands on time with the X10 I didn’t, due to the nature of the event, manage to sit down with the X10 for hours on end testing everything that’s on offer here (hence this being a text concerning my hands on time rather than being a full blown review – which you can, incidentally, expect from us later should SE indeed pass a review unit our way). I also didn’t manage to get anywhere near as many pictures of the X10 as I would have liked, primarily as I was too busy using it (and enjoying doing so) to keep firing off snaps and when it comes to SE’s Timescape and Mediascape features I really ought to have captured both in action on video but, again, they impressed me so much that it actually didn’t even occur to me to film both in action (lesson learned there).

Thankfully, then, SE have this covered so you’ll excuse me for falling back on using one of their videos showing the above features – or ‘signature applications’ as SE refers to them – in action and, what’s interesting here is that, in practice, these features as just as impressive as they appear to be in the video below.

The key here is the bringing together of a host of information in an exceedingly intuitive manner that seamlessly integrates both offline and online content to the extent that it all pulls together as a decidedly cohesive, easy to navigate system that, in use, appears deceptively simple. In terms of usability, considering the numerous online and offline sources and content types both Mediascape and Timescape are acting to pull together, both features ran both smoothly and without any noticeable lag. I would, considering both are pulling over so much online content (along with locally stored information/media), have expected to have been acutely aware of what was being served from the phones internal storage and what was being pulled across from online portals. In reality, however, it was alarmingly cohesive and well realised – and both systems presented a veritable wealth of information whilst gelling everything together beautifully.

Take Mediascape for example. If, say, you go in looking for images of a friend the system will not only pull across images stored locally but it’ll also pull over any relevant images such as Picassa and Flickr, all of which is duly pulled together in what I can only describe as something akin to a stream of consciousness. It’s all there for you, and its there in pretty much a blink of an eye.

But its not just imagery. You can factor in video content and audio content too and if, say, you go looking for something that the system can find yet more information on, you’ll get it in the presented stream (yes, YouTube is covered). Looking for something else? Say information concerning your favourite band? No problem, the system will come back at you with a wealth of sourced material, again presented in a highly intuitive, easily accessible manner, along with any relevant tracks you may have stored on the phone.

Timescape works in the same fashion, but this brings together all your social contacts as well as instant messages, mails, SMS and notifications that are relevant to you. As an example, say I wanted to check just whats going on with a friend, the Timescape application would offer me the full lowdown. I tweeted said friend the other day, mailed him a couple of times in the week, he left a few notifications for me on Facebook and we’ll throw in a few SMS exchanges for good measure. Its all there in one ‘timeline’. Forget having to logon to Twitter, checking your SMS inbox, switching across to your mailbox and then having to go across to, say, Facebook to get the full picture – Timescape does it all for you.

If you have ever felt overwhelmed by the numerous avenues for communication you have available to you in our digital world, thus finding it all to easy to loose track, Timescape will prove nothing short of a revelation – and, of course, it’s a great time-saver to.

Now there are those who prefer compartmentalisation, for want of a better word, but you can still have that. The option, however, of firing up the Timescape app when you just need to get abreast of things quickly and don’t want to spend a while faffing about, logging in one place, navigating to the next social networking portal, searching for the entries you require, remembering that you said X to Y in an SMS on Monday whilst you said Z to Y by mail last Thursday and perhaps a mixture of the two by SMS only last Tuesday (then on Wednesday you changed you mind and popped them a Facebook notification)…well you get the picture.

Mediascape and Timescape put you firmly back into the driving seat when it comes to the wealth of media, information and communication that you use in your day to day life and, in case you hadn’t gathered, both impressed me no end.

These signature applications are seen by Sony Ericsson as major selling points concerning the Xperia X10 and, having toyed with both myself, I don’t believe that their confidence it them is at all misplaced. These are selling points and I trust that SE will spend some considerable time, and money, in getting this message across in a wholly unambiguous fashion as these apps alone will undoubtedly see many opting for the X10 on and over competitors handsets.

Xperia X10 Hands On: Closing Thoughts

So, there you have it and I’ll admit, having just re-read the above myself, this reads as if I think that the Xperia X10 is a masterstroke of handset design. Ultimately, however, this is exactly what I think and I see no justifiable reason as to why I should pretend otherwise.

Had the X10 have left me feeling cold, I would have told you. But it didn’t. What it did do is serve to reaffirm that, as mentioned above, Sony Ericsson have woken up, smelt the coffee and have obviously decided its time to reaffirm themselves in the handset market. And the X10 will indeed do just that, and it’ll do it with aplomb.

The Xperia X10 is a revelation. It not only looks great, but it runs like a dream and the thought SE have put into this handset – its design, its features, its usability – positively shines through. The X10 is sheer brilliance, pure and simple.

Or, if you really want me to put myself on the line here, I’ll put it another way. Alex (our Sub) asked me, on my return from the SE press event, whether I’d actually consider replacing my beloved iPhone 3GS with an X10 and I could only offer him a single word answer.

Yes.