The Xcalibur

Azar Zaidi experiences the cutting edge of Sony Ericsson8217;s Xperia X1

Azar Zaidi experiences the cutting edge of Sony Ericsson8217;s Xperia X1
It IS something a knight in shining armour would carry for it is all shiny steel and weighs like a sword! To continue with the analogy, the Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 has everything you would need for boardroom battles. The X1 is SE8217;s first Windows-based phone and has been a long time coming. It8217;s not surprising then that some features the handset boasts of have become the standard since the phone was first announced. Having said that, it can still boast of a few aces up its sleeve.

The first is size. When the X1 was first announced, we thought it would be the proverbial 8216;brick8217;, but it has turned out to be a compactly built phone, even if a bit on the heavier side at 158g. Its steel body is sure to attract envious glances.
Size once again comes to mind when you think of the X18217;s touchscreen. At 3 inches it might be smaller than the 3.5-incher the iPhone sports, but the X1 beats the Apple phone when it comes to pixels. The X1 has a whopping 800 x 480 pixel resolution, which means clearer photos, videos and web browsing.

Right below the screen sits the optical joystick. We8217;ve never been happier to see one of these. Windows Mobile has an intricate user interface to say the least. And business users will do much more with their phone than make calls and browse the web. They will find that the joystick makes it much easier to handle the phone and its many functions.

The phone slides out smoothly in an arc to reveal the QWERTY keypad. Though handwriting recognition with a stylus is available, the keypad is the handset8217;s best input method. The keyboard out in landscape position makes doing simple things like writing a text message, drafting and sending emails, and accessing the programme menu much easier. This and the optical joystick mean you will rarely use the stylus.

Another highlight is the panels feature. This is reminiscent of apps on the iPhone, but is more limited as you can only set nine panels at a time. Each panel is customised to a specific activity, such as web browsing, messaging, playing music, etc. The panels feature is nice, and we did like the media player panel a lot, but it is not as path breaking as SE would have us believe.

Having spoken of the optical joystick, the sliding QWERTY keypad and the panels feature, it is important to mention how these features meld around the Windows operating system to make it more accessible and easy to work. Manufacturers do tend to create an almost parallel operating system that means you can do without accessing the Windows operating system for long periods; this isn8217;t the case in the X1.

The Windows operating system has improved and feels easier to handle. It offers a familiar environment for PC users and means more can be now done on board the phone itself. The X1 uses Outlook Mobile for email, while Office Mobile can be used to view and edit attachments. Corporate mail can be accessed via Exchange ActiveSync. The X1 uses the Windows Media Player, which integrates well with Windows Media Player on your PC, so you can manage and synchronise media libraries without messing with third-party software.

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One feature that does let the phone down is the camera, which is just 3.2mp. It does have auto-focus and an LED flash, but these can safely be considered obsolete. The phone has a built-in memory of only 400 MB, but accepts microSD cards up to 32 GB. The X1 is a 3G phone and expect it to really light up once the technology is fully introduced here early next year. For a phone its size and with all its offerings, the X18217;s battery life is also quite good.
Despite initial skepticism, mostly about its operating system and size, we can safely say the X1 is a great phone, though the price8212;Rs 44,5008212;is somewhat disappointing.
We give it a 4 out of 5.