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NorthGeek Review: Sony Ericsson Xperia X10

By now you all know that we have been in possession of a brand spankin’ new, white Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 courtesy of Sony Ericsson Canada (@SonyEricssonCA on Twitter). This cool new Android handset, running Google’s OS in version 1.6, comes in a sexy casing with a solid 8 megapixel Sony camera built-in, LED flash, a truly impressive 4″ touchscreen (at a resolution of 480 x 854 pixels), and boasts Qualcomm’s blazing fast 1GHz Snapdragon processor. To enjoy your various media in Sony Ericsson’s proprietary Mediascape media browser, they even throw in an 8GB microSD card. If you’re an online social maven, then you’ll enjoy Sony Ericsson’s own Timescape – an aggregated timeline of you and your friends’ Twitter, Facebook, and email updates.

We played with the device for nearly a week and put together this video review for your enjoyment and education. Let us know (in the comments or by tweeting us at @NorthGeek) if you have any questions! Enjoy:

NorthGeek Unboxing: Sony Ericsson Xperia X10

Thanks to Sony Ericsson Canada, we have our paws on this slick little device. Stay tuned for some hands-on impressions in the coming days. In the meantime, here’s a quick unboxing video to whet your appetites:

Please be patient, the video may still be processing so its FULL HD delight might not be there yet…

Sneak peak at Sony Ericsson Xperia X10

Yesterday in Vancouver, NorthGeek met with Peter Farmer and Neil Dutton from Sony Ericsson Canada about the upcoming Xperia X10 launch. Canada is highly anticipating the release of this new Android device, and, well, so are we. The news is that we should know in mid April exactly what it will cost and when it will be here, which will likely be sometime in Q2.

THE SPECS
You probably already know that it comes with the blazing fast 1Ghz Snapdragon processor, a mega four inch WVGA display, and a sharp 8.1 megapixel camera… also 13mm thick, white or black, microSD up to 32GB (16GB included). If you want more specs, check them here.

SIGNATURE APPLICATIONS
“Signature Applications” is Sony Ericsson’s label for their Android skin — the front look and dominant applications on the Android platform. On the X10, this is dominated by Timescape, Mediascape, Infinite Button, and face recognition. Learn more about these in their online demo. Basically, the device is focused on aggregating your social media streams. It’s not just SMS, MMS, emails, and photos, etc, but also connecting with Facebook, Twitter, and something called MySpace, so you can visualize a person’s presence and correspondence in one place. Sony Ericsson is not the first to do this, but it’s certainly useful and centrally located on the X10.

However, the links within the apps go to the individual services’ mobile sites, not embedded apps like Hootsuite, Seesmic, or Facebook for Android. Also, there’s no Flickr yet — what other integration will you want? We will have to wait and see how Sony Ericsson continues to innovate and add functionality here. Will these features (a mix of the Signature Apps mentioned above) eliminate the need for standalone apps? I doubt they will — apps like Hootsuite or Facebook are so impressive and complete — so we will see how we might use both options or if they will coordinate well.

WHY MORE THAN A VANILLA ANDROID DEVICE?
Rogers has been recently tweeting about the Google Nexus One becoming available in Canada, so it’s hard to ignore the face-off between these two devices. The Nexus One also has the Snapdragon processor (yes, it does have a smaller 5MP camera and 3.7″ screen), but a bare-bones Android likely offering quicker performance and speed. And the most recent version of Android, always.

The X10 comes with Android 1.6, because the Signature Apps need to adapt to new Android OSs, and won’t have the same battery management, task management, etc. It would be difficult for any Android device manufacturer to keep pace with Google’s quickly iterating OS if there is a skin built on top which always needs revisions.

The X10 is trying to do something different here. With a background in media, hardware, and taking chances with their phones (eg. their attempt to embrace Symbian a few years ago), as well as recognizable brands like Cybershot and Walkman, Sony Ericsson is trying to create a unique device experience here. Their skin is impressive and slick, but it will take some time to determine if it is better and who will embrace it. Is a skin really better for Android?

THE BUSY CANADIAN ANDROID LANDSCAPE
Rogers now has lots of Android devices. They are likely a world leader on this front, and were even the first mobile operator to offer both an iPhone and Android. Sony Ericsson believes that there is room here for multiple Android phones. All this competition is going to be very, very, very good for consumers. Watch out Apple.

OVERALL
This piece of X10 hardware is phenomenal. It feels great in the hand, is good looking, has a class-leading screen, and sports a camera verging on real. We’re still wondering if a skin is a good thing. They are competing with the Nexus One now, which sells without support from Rogers — does this matter? Ultimately, we need to spend more time with the device, but this certainly looks promising for Sony Ericsson in the future of smartphones. Coming soon is NorthGeek’s Nexus One review (the Canadian version with 3G frequency support).

Google loves sponsoring talent for YouTube videos

I posted recently about the amazing Ninja Unboxing video that Google sponsored. If you haven’t seen it yet, you should! Check this one out, too – another Google-sponsored video, quite impressive:

Google’s Nexus One phone released AGAIN (and this time it counts)

For those who have been waiting for the next big Android phone (with a Snapdragon processor, for example…) to hit AT&T and Rogers up here in the Great White North, wait no more. Google has announced a version of their somewhat underachieving Nexus One phone that will rock the 3G bands of AT&T and Rogers. Available now and shipping lightning fast, we at NorthGeek are quite excited. So excited, in fact, that we’ve included this awesome Ninja Unboxing video. Sweet stuff:

NorthGeek Product Review: Sony Ericsson Naite eco-friendly GSM mobile phone

Sony Ericsson recently launched their GreenHeart™ initiative, with the aim of offering an environmentally friendly option to mobile phone users. As the company puts it, GreenHeart™ “introduces green innovations that reduce the overall environmental impact of the phone without compromising on style or features.”

We think they did a great job with the Naite. The Naite is a $25 (with plan) compact phone, now available from Fido in Canada, that does pretty much what you’d expect from any compact candybar phone in 2010 – it has a solid 2.0 megapixel camera, and another mini cam on the front of the phone for video calling; is 3G compatible; has a solid TFT screen with excellent clarity, brightness, and color; and is email ready, with a WAP browser as well.

For more details and a closer look, check out our video [sorry, we lent our HD video camera to a friend at SXSW, so please enjoy this standard def review]:

To keep the video under 10 minutes for YouTube, we had to cut out some parts… Here’s what you missed:

Available colours:
– Vapour Silver
– Ginger Red

Dimensions: 108.0 x 47.0 x 12.6 mm

Layar: Augmented reality on your mobile

Have a look at a new “life browsing” experience, available now! Check out layar.com.

iPhone, Nexus One 3G Frequencies

Also known as, why you can’t use the new Google phone in Canada… yet.

The chart shows the 3G frequencies (different from 2G) supported by each of these two devices, as well as the 3G frequencies of four mobile carriers.

Rogers/Fido does also use 1900MHz but it seems only for 2G, not 3G. Bell and Telus’ new HSPA network uses 850MHz (possibly also 1900MHz — this is unclear but irrelevant here).

Can people run the Nexus One on Wind Mobile in Canada? It seems so. So why can’t you buy the Google phone in Canada yet? Or you could always bear with EDGE speeds from The Three Stooges. And considering that option, I still think it’s a terrible shame you can’t buy this shiny new toy in Canada yet!

We also want to know why Google decided to go with that spectrum selection? Either T-Mobile had a say, Google is in no rush to ship millions of devices to the mass market, or… price? Qualcomm pushback? (Other Android devices do have a different choice of frequencies.) Please share your thoughts below!

More info at Wikipedia. However, this info is surprisingly mysterious. Ok, maybe no one really cares about it? Prove us wrong!

NorthGeek is very excited about Google’s Navigation

This is something that just makes you think, “well, duh” – it had to happen, and finally, it has. Now shipping with all Android 2.0 phones (‘all’ being the Moto Droid for now, at least) is the new Google Maps Navigation which is an internet-enabled, voice prompting GPS navigation app that takes full advantage of all of Google Maps and Google Local’s network features, from business contact info to street view. Have a look:

I’m quite excited for more Android 2.0 phones to come out, especially a GSM one. My only question now: what to do with my Blackberry Bold?