sony xperia Sony Xperia Z: pre-order placed!

[Ambroos]

Well there are almost no phones that do have a proper digitizer on board, the Note 1 and 2 are the only ones I know about. It's not really a much-requested feature.

[Richteralan]

Im looking for a 5"+ display for work. Im currently looking at the Note2 but I might hold off and wait for this cause Im still not 100% sure I want something that large. Id like to see a size comparison of the two.

Yes for you a 5 inch + display is what you are looking for because you plan to use it with a stylus. For most of people who uses the phone with one hand most of the time, 5+ is too big.

[medhunter]

Bought Sola 4 months ago as my first Smartphone, to play with android

Sony is famous to be kind enough to get updates to its phones.Sony respects users

I will definitely buy a Z if I have enough money.I was planning to buy S IV.

[Richteralan]

Bought Sola 4 months ago as my first Smartphone, to play with android

Sony is famous to be kind enough to get updates to its phones.Sony respects users

I will definitely buy a Z if I have enough money.I was planning to buy S IV.

The ironic thing for Sola is, it should've launched with ICS, instead of GB.

After what I heard Sony lied with the Xperia S, I'll never buy again.

[Ambroos]

After what I heard Sony lied with the Xperia S, I'll never buy again.

How did Sony lie with the Xperia S?

[Dick Montage]

Having purchased a few Sony phones for people who wanted new androids, I have to say that I'm REALLY impressed how Sony are working with Android. Their customisations don't feel like bloat but rather actually enhance the experience. Their hardware is top notch and their pricing feels fair. Wouldn't have said that of them a few years ago.

[Richteralan]

How did Sony lie with the Xperia S?

Sorry buddy, I have no time to do this over again. But believe me, it didn't happen overnight. It's a cumulative process since the release of Xperia S.

Let's just agree with that I will never buy a Sony, with my past experience of Xperia S, and you LOVE Sony and will buy anything Sony releases.

Let's just do that.

Having purchased a few Sony phones for people who wanted new androids, I have to say that I'm REALLY impressed how Sony are working with Android. Their customisations don't feel like bloat but rather actually enhance the experience. Their hardware is top notch and their pricing feels fair. Wouldn't have said that of them a few years ago.

Their skin is THE best 3rd party skins.

Not sure about fair pricing.

[Hardcore Til I Die]

Looks pretty nice, but aside from the fact it's waterproof and it looks pretty nice, it seems like an evolutionary Android upgrade.

There will be many more quad core, 2GB RAM, 5" full HD phones this year :p

Galaxy S4 will probably be similar specced, but Samsung usually have some really nice Touchwiz features to throw in on top.

[Richteralan]

Looks pretty nice, but aside from the fact it's waterproof and it looks pretty nice, it seems like an evolutionary Android upgrade.

There will be many more quad core, 2GB RAM, 5" full HD phones this year :p

Galaxy S4 will probably be similar specced, but Samsung usually have some really nice Touchwiz features to throw in on top.

Sorry but Samsung's Touchwiz is the worst 3rd party skin ever.

[Hardcore Til I Die]

Sorry but Samsung's Touchwiz is the worst 3rd party skin ever.

I'm not talking about the UI, I'm talking about things like direct call, smart stay, smart alert, etc. They add some useful features.

[Belazor]

Looks pretty nice, but aside from the fact it's waterproof and it looks pretty nice, it seems like an evolutionary Android upgrade.

There will be many more quad core, 2GB RAM, 5" full HD phones this year :p

Galaxy S4 will probably be similar specced, but Samsung usually have some really nice Touchwiz features to throw in on top.

I think most of us are alright with that though, those of us who love the design of each of the Xperia phones but find ourselves paying premiums for sub-par specs by getting one vs getting a Galaxy S series, the Sony Tax as it were. Unless this phone comes out costing ?700, the Sony Tax is no more :)

I just wanted a Xperia with competitive and current specs, and it looks like I got it. That doesn't alleviate my fears that software wise they are still going to be 6 months behind the curve though...

[weagle]

I'm going to wait after the japan launch which is feb 9th i dont see any japan sites sell them otherwise i'd buy it sooner feb 28th will be the next launch date. In a few words galaxy s3 is junk compared to this phone 4 times slower 1gig ram which is what criples it versus 2gigs, galaxy note ii compares but then loses the screen resolution lower resolution camera and lighting no waterproofing, no stronger dragontail glass why buy the note ii? I noticed one thing sony does is offer value for their products you get more for less, waterproofing ever seen the xperia pro versus xperia active 30% difference in price this is thrown in free, you get a 1080p display again none of the other makers offering at this moment, also the higher megapixel camera 13mp with a light sensitive lense so you can take pictures in the dark settings, the nfc features in tv's and media devices brilliant idea sony is the pioneer of this brilliant idea and because xperia z was a secret project dont expect samsung galaxy s4 to have the same features they're now atleast 6months behind in the game and if they release their current galaxy s4 they're actually going to be 12months behind in the game til the note iii comes out. It caught me offguard because just a year ago the xperia mini pro ii was a brilliant phone for the low end market you actually got more value other companies offering lower resolution displays no front facing camera for video chatting, no 720p hd camera for low end phone and slower cpu 600mhz vs 1ghz and lesser ram for the same price when sony brought this phone i was able to even do video chatting using the face camera very well and it wasnt a high end phone and the high end phones weren't capable of doing it because many didnt offer a front facing camera to begin with. So either way xperia mini pro ii was value for the money so is the xperia z, mid range phones did not impress me there was no value to buy them. Way to go sony on the z keep surprising us and we'll keep buying the best you have to offer to us versus the competitor.

[2xSilverKnight]

4 times slower ?? Right stop talking out of your arse

[HawkMan]

No. After Xperia S, No more Sony.

Besides the LCD resolution, I failed to see which part of this phone is better than Nexus 4.

And frankly why do we need 5 inches screen? Why do we need 1080P in a 5 incher?

Why not after the Xperia S ?

It is imho still one of the best android phones out there. the only android phones beating it are newer models sony. I'm no sony fan in general. but for phones, they really know their stuff. sure the SIII and other top phones form other oems may have bigger paper specs, but even on ICS, this thing outperforms the SIII on JellyBean, simply because Sony doesn't just take the source dump from google, compile it and dump it on the phone, they actually do their work and optimize it for their phones. Sure it means longer time for the updates, but at least the updates work and are optimized properly. and therefore you also don't need to run JB instead of ICS since it runs ICS as if it was JB.

I put a custom rom on my S in december or so, and since then, I've continually been asking myself, why. there's some neat stuff. but the themes are inconsistent, the performance isn't really any better, since the official rom was so blazing, and I don't have all the awesome sony apps I had on the custom rom, my plan was to run this until they released a official JB early 2013, since it got delayed, I'm actually thinking of going back to an official ICS rom until the official JB rom. bonus is that the official JB rom also upgrades the camera to be even better than it already is.

If I was going to stay with android, Sony would definitiely be my upgrade path of choice, better camera, better built quality, their whole line is pretty much water proof now, and proper software engineers doing their job.

and as a bonus, factory pre applied shatter proofing on the glass.

[Richteralan]

Why not after the Xperia S ?

It is imho still one of the best android phones out there. the only android phones beating it are newer models sony. I'm no sony fan in general. but for phones, they really know their stuff. sure the SIII and other top phones form other oems may have bigger paper specs, but even on ICS, this thing outperforms the SIII on JellyBean, simply because Sony doesn't just take the source dump from google, compile it and dump it on the phone, they actually do their work and optimize it for their phones. Sure it means longer time for the updates, but at least the updates work and are optimized properly. and therefore you also don't need to run JB instead of ICS since it runs ICS as if it was JB.

I put a custom rom on my S in december or so, and since then, I've continually been asking myself, why. there's some neat stuff. but the themes are inconsistent, the performance isn't really any better, since the official rom was so blazing, and I don't have all the awesome sony apps I had on the custom rom, my plan was to run this until they released a official JB early 2013, since it got delayed, I'm actually thinking of going back to an official ICS rom until the official JB rom. bonus is that the official JB rom also upgrades the camera to be even better than it already is.

If I was going to stay with android, Sony would definitiely be my upgrade path of choice, better camera, better built quality, their whole line is pretty much water proof now, and proper software engineers doing their job.

and as a bonus, factory pre applied shatter proofing on the glass.

For the record, I don't like Samsung and I do hate everyone lumping Samsung with Android.

And you do know you lose the DRM key if you unlock Xperia S, right? And the mBE will not work.

Ah and the "shatter proof" sheet, very scratch prone and not shatter proofing. I took mine off within 1 minute, without any tools. If it is intended as shatter proof you would think it'll be harder to take it off?

Sony does have the best 3rd party UI, no doubt. But sorry, for the price, I will not buy Sony again. It does not worth it.

[HawkMan]

My shatter proofing hasn't scratched at all. And actually, no it does need to stick better to help shatter proof the glass. It just as to hold it together to give it at extra bit of strength. It's also not meant to be scratch proof and Sony recommends other protection on top, but I haven't had the need.

So hat if I lose the drm keys? They tell you what happens when you unlock and it's a user choice, and it's also not necessary.

[AbandonedTrolley]

There are a few things about Sonys firmware that I don't like on the S which makes me stick around on CM10

Icon colouring, still based on GB, please move on to the cyan colour, it looks so much nicer.

NFC icon (no way to turn it off other than turning NFC off)

GPS don't ask me if I'm sure that I want to turn it on and make me hit a check box. I pressed GPS for a reason, I don't need another step to turn it on.

CM10 eleviates all my issues really, only thing I miss is the better camera options, although I don't take photos with my phone that I would think about keeping anyway, just upload to social networks and that's about it.

The phone is great the 32GB storage is still no where near full and I love it. I will certainly look to another Sony when it's upgrade time.

[Draconian Guppy]

I really hope the frequency response on this is decent!

[HawkMan]

as I recall when I turned on/off the gps with the sony widgets it just went on and off.

I used/used HD Widgets to do it anyway, so I can have a nice clean home page with just nice white icons and no frames or crap. I don't remember the colors y default on GB, but I'm also not a fan of the ICS/JB cyan. that's what my pone uses, but I like them in white instead of cyan.

as for photos I use camera FX and Pro HDR Camera. But I wish I could install the new cybershot software someone released. and add in bravia screen without hacking around.

Mostly I miss the superior gallery and video player and the play to function though. I have yet to find a decent video player with a working play to function.

[Zoom7000]

I dunno if this is just me, but doesn't the design have a major flaw here, being the placement of the power button? Doesn't it fall right where most people would put their hands when they are on a phone call?

Maybe I'm not holding it correctly! :rofl:

[Ambroos]

I dunno if this is just me, but doesn't the design have a major flaw here, being the placement of the power button? Doesn't it fall right where most people would put their hands when they are on a phone call?

Maybe I'm not holding it correctly! :rofl:

It's pretty smart. When you're in call and the proximity sensor is triggered the standby button doesn't respond. Also, on a handset this big a power button on top would require you to adjust the way you hold the phone every time you need to press it. When it's in the middle of one of the sides you can press it without adjusting, no matter whether you're left-handed (index finger) or right-handed (thumb).

My Xperia T also has the power button on the right side and I vastly prefer it over the top placement on my Xperia S. The only downside is that you sometimes press the power button when you want to change the volume while watching a movie on your phone in the dark :p

[AbandonedTrolley]

as I recall when I turned on/off the gps with the sony widgets it just went on and off.

I used/used HD Widgets to do it anyway, so I can have a nice clean home page with just nice white icons and no frames or crap. I don't remember the colors y default on GB, but I'm also not a fan of the ICS/JB cyan. that's what my pone uses, but I like them in white instead of cyan.

as for photos I use camera FX and Pro HDR Camera. But I wish I could install the new cybershot software someone released. and add in bravia screen without hacking around.

Mostly I miss the superior gallery and video player and the play to function though. I have yet to find a decent video player with a working play to function.

Yeah it does using the Sony widget, but as I like my screen minimal I never liked having those there and prefer toggles in the notification drop down. You could get a GPS one but as it was 3rd party it forced you in to the settings.

I've been using ProCapture as my camera on CM10 which seems pretty decent. As for a gallery I've always used Quickpic just for the sheer speed of it.

[Belazor]

So after reviving my old Xperia arc and putting Xperia Ultimate HD on it, it's now almost fully usable (I say almost because it still chokes up occasionally, but the sliders have not failed to respond once thus far). I've also replaced the launcher with NovaLauncher and themed it like the guy In the vids Exynos posted has it set up. I was blown away by how awesome I was able to make it look, I always believed this would take custom roms to do. Joke's on me there.

In short, there's now no doubt in my mind that this will be my next phone, unless something is announced that defecates on this phone specs and design wise - something I strongly doubt.

Now the problem shifted to, black or white? Leaning more towards white, though I think white would have looked better if more of the bezel was white too a la iPhone. Still though...

[undertaken316]

For those who want a better and clearer look at the device check out this unboxing.

http://youtu.be/ITOpxQ7E7pQ