Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini Review

We'll start this review by trying to explain what the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini is in a few words. So, you know the Xperia X10, right? Well, the X10 mini has nothing to do with it. It's the embodiment of the totally opposite concept that is behind the X10. If we can describe this through numbers, instead of the massive 4-inch screen of the Xperia X10, you get a 2.55-inch one. Get it? It's a totally different experience. That said, we think the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini is a very intimate Android smartphone that has a beautiful design and very little flaws, trying to once again prove the  ever popular idea that size doesn't really matter.

What's in the box:

•    Sony Ericsson XPERIA X10 mini handset
•    5 additional back panels (pearl white, silver, lime, pink and red)
•    2 GB microSD
•    Li-Pol Battery (non-replaceable)
•    Stereo headset w/ mic
•    microUSB cable
•    Travel charger
•    User manual

Introduction and Design:

As of present, the market isn’t really choke full of compact Android phones. When you look at the existing lineup, you see the rather large products like the HTC Incredible, HTC EVO 4G and the Google Nexus One, as well as mainstream sizes like the HTC DROID ERIS in the States and the Hero in Europe. However, a truly small device is nowhere to be seen. Maybe it was this market gap that Sony Ericsson has noticed when coming up with the idea of the Xperia X10 mini we first saw at this year’s MWC.

As the name implies, the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini is a scaled down version of the Xperia X10. In contrast to what Nokia did with the N97 mini however, Sony Ericsson has gone to extremes here, and the X10 mini is now one of the tiniest smart handsets of all times. It has kept the company's “human curvature” design with smooth curves and soft-touch coating on the back, which makes it pleasant to hold. Moreover it is relatively thick with its 16mm so it does not feel as miniscule to handle as it actually is.



You can compare the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini with many other phones using our Size Visualization Tool.

You may find the screen surprisingly small – only 2.55 inches with QVGA resolution. The image quality is fine and since the touch technology is capacitive, using the display is a fun experience, except in bright sunlight where, as usual, it's rather hard to tell what's on there.

At the front below the screen you have the X10 family trademark chrome tapered line, divided in three sections for the usual Android menu, home and back keys. The volume keys are on the right sharing the side with the camera button. All the keys feel nice, with distinct enough click, including the power/lock button on the top. On the back you have a 5MP camera with autofocus and an LED flash, as well as the loudspeaker.


The connectors you’ll find at the bottom of the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini are standard microUSB and 3.5mm audio jack. We also got five additional panel colors in the box to toy with, but word on the street is they will be carrier or region dependent, so not all five will come in all boxes. Even so, with pearl white, silver, lime, pink and red battery covers you can easily swap the looks if you get bored by the munchkin’s Men in Black appearance.


So, as a design the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini is a sweet little smartphone. Although it isn’t introduced as a fashion device, it does have its own sex appeal that attracts attention. It’s incredibly small, to the point where it becomes just slightly inconvenient in bigger male hands. However we wouldn't go as far as calling it a lady's phone; it's just cute. Besides, the Xperia X10 mini pro (the QWERTY variant of the X10 mini) will add the needed size, as it will be a bit higher (and just a millimeter thicker). So, yes, we quite like the X10 mini’s design, and no, we are not pansies.

Interface and Functionality:

The Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini starts you off from the beginning with a setup screen that guides through the basics such as importing contacts from the SIM card or checking one of the tens of locales that ship with the firmware. We even tried the Asian ones out of curiosity how deeply integrated the translation is, and it turned out it goes into every nook and cranny of the UI to display the words in your own language. In addition, the phone takes just seconds to swap locales.

The Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini does ask for a Google login in the initial setup, and even if you skip it, it pops back at the end of the process and you have to deal with it somehow if you want to see the homescreen for the first time.

You probably remember that Sony Ericsson has created a personalized Android interface, called UX, which we examined in our review of the Xperia X10. Well, it is also used in the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini, but has been tweaked in order to be easy to use on the 2.55-inch screen.

Because of the small display, each page of the home screen can have only one widget. Our unit came with 10 of those and counting (some newly installed programs were still adding themselves to the list), so you can have home screens galore if so inclined. In addition, you have four shortcuts to apps in the corners of the home screen, which can be customized.



The idea of the UX interface is to deliver better (U)ser e(X)perience by tweaking Android’s appearance and adding media and social integration through the Timescape and Mediascape applications. Mediascape is missing on the X10 mini, but Timescape is still here, although with somewhat limited functionality. What it does is to show you an aggregate chronological view of the latest Facebook and Twitter updates, along with your messages and missed calls (its most frequent automatic refresh period is 15 minutes). You can, of course, filter the content so that you see only tweets, for example. From Timescape, you can link online profiles to your contacts, which will then allow you to see status updates in the phonebook – a feature we are beginning to see more and more frequently. Timescape is also available as a widget, so the latest social correspondence is just a tap away.



The main menu can be  pulled up from the bottom of each home screen. It, of course, contains all your apps, and those can also be freely rearranged or dispersed to the four screen corners to your likings.



We personally think that Sony Ericsson has hit the jackpot with the UX interface. Everything is scrolly, touchy, swipy, animated and easy to find. Oh, and did we mention how FAST everything works on the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini? It's so snappy we have to capitalize the words. There is no lag present out of the box, unlike the big screen brethren Xperia X10, where the processor has to render much more pixels. Here the tiny low res screen draws little power from a weaker than in the Xperia X10 CPU. Transitions are tastefully done and the only negligible slowdown we noticed was when we added all widgets to home screens and tried to quickly swipe through the dozen or so resulting screens. 

As afficionados of HTC's Sense UI, which was the first major Android overlay we have to admit it feels crowded compared to this transparent simplicity. Honestly, we were skeptical about the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini's ability to feel like a true smartphone because of its screen size, but all we need to use it as such is already delivered. The UI has been so customized that we wouldn't cry if the handset can not be upgraded to a later Android version -  the fact of the matter is you rarely realize you are running Android and not some proprietary Sony Ericsson OS. It is tailored to the small screen in a way that allows even male fingers do a tap dance on the menus. Nevertheless Sony Ericsson announced that the X10 mini will get Android 2.1 later in the year along with the rest of the X10 stable.



Messaging and Connectivity:

The email app is another instance of nice little details adding to the positive experience - it shows the messages in full HTML by default. In the dedicated Gmail app you always have to take one more step to read messages in their full bloom, similarly to the desktop version..

Now, not all is puppies and flowers with such a limited view, of course. For example, scrolling through content in the browser is only good for a quick reference, let alone filling in forms and passwords with the on-screen numpad. YouTube videos can be played from the browser thanks to the dedicated player, but other sites' Flash content is a no-go. Other than that, however, the browser is speedy, minimalist and easy to navigate.



An obvious drawback of the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini's screen is typing speed. With the default text input it all feels like what it is - writing a text message old school with a glorified numpad, despite the good predictive text option. You can install a full QWERTY from Android Market, but it is barely useful only in landscape mode since you can't use sharpened fingernails on a capacitive screen, and that's exactly what you'd need to accurately pinpoint the micro letters. As time passes, writing becomes quicker, but nowhere near fast enough for lengthy conversations threading which the phone is otherwise capable of. We sincerely hope that the addition of a physical QWERTY keyboard to the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini pro would improve that aspect.



The Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini gets under your skin with how easy to use it is out of the box, and the synchronization options the company is shipping all its phones with recently only contribute to the all around feeling of completeness. Sony Ericsson, as most manufacturers already, has made it seemless to back up the phone content to the clouds by registering on its website with the Sync option, much like with Apple's MobileMe or Microsoft's My Phone services.

You can also communicate with the phone and update the firmware via the PC Companion application (it’s on the memory card together with the user manual). An additional download from Sony Ericsson's site is a flashy multimedia manager and converter hub called Media Go or its Mac equivalent Media Sync, which works with iTunes. Sony Ericsson is also offering the PlayNow app and music store, which, however, still leaves a lot to be desired in terms of choice; at least it is translated to your locale and has songs on tap.

Software:

The company is throwing in some programs for free -  like the TrackID song identifier, a barcode scanner and the push Exchange email RoadSync software for the corporate types, but Wisepilot navigation and one of the two preinstalled games are trial versions.

The usual suspects of Google services on an Android handset behave as they should with search combing both through the phone and the web. Gmail is easily searchable too, and attachments get the preview treatment. Google Maps scrolls without lag and directions are clearly arranged.

Android Market will be somewhat limited of choices, considering the unorthodox screen size of the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini, but Gtalk and the YouTube app complete the Google experience on the phone. YouTube videos play smoothly and the chat program is integrated within the contacts list, so as you can see who is online by the little green dot against their names, the way you are used to in desktop Gmail, cool stuff.

Camera and Multimedia:

The camera interface is nicely personalized, but sports almost no options, although the camera is 5MP. You can toggle the LED flash on and off, choose from four different shooting modes, jump to the gallery... and that’s that. Since the phone is about simplicity and ease of use we don't have any problems with the number of options here - choice is good only if not overwhelming. Moreover the pictures came out with above average quality on full auto settings as the samples below reveal, all while starting the camera and time between snaps take literally a second.


Images  could be a bit sharper but nevertheless have nice, accurate colors and a lot of detail; it's on par with what we observed from the Sony Ericsson Xperia X2, despite the lower res with the X10 mini. All said, you won't be disappointed by the casual outdoor shots from the chubby gnome, while the indoor shots are acceptable in moderate lighting with some white balance tinkering. On the flip side, the flash is weak for night shots more than two steps away and thanks to its small size the phone can be easily shaken when pressing the camera shutter, thus getting the blurred treatment at dusk.



Video is recorded in VGA resolution at 30 frames per second, the only actual setting being to toggle the LED light on and off. It plays on the phone without artifacts, has decent sound volume and very true colors, but some details are not as distinct as we would like on a big screen. Don't mind us, it's decent, but we are just spoiled by recent HD video-centric phone reviews.

Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini sample video 1 at 640x480 pixels resolution.
Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini sample video 2.

We already mentioned that the Mediascape part of the Sony Ericsson UX interface is not present in the Xperia X10 mini. The songs and videos that the phone indexes from the microSD card are run by the default music or video players as separate entities.

Pictures and videos are grouped together in a gallery but the concept of it is nothing mind blowing - you simply scroll kinetically through a grid of pics and vids in a chronological order, tap to choose, double-tap to zoom or slide one finger firmly up or down the screen until you reach the desired size, easy as that. From there attaching to email or uploading the media file is just a tap away to most popular services, or it can be done straight from the camera screen after taking the shot or the video.

As usual with Android handsets, DivX and Xvid formats are not supported out of the box but the popular MP4/H.263/H.264/WMV files run fine, if you can survive watching with your nose almost touching the screen. DivX and Xvid require higher bitrate than the H.264 container for the same quality and take a bigger toll on the CPU, hence battery life, that is why they are usually left out anyway.

The music player has a pretty, but lean interface without search option, and you have to use the phone search for a song. The included headset is lacking the base sounds somewhat but the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini has a loudspeaker that manages to produce a very decent sound. One of the really, really better ones we have heard. It is not very loud, but the sound is deeper than what the typical phone loudspeaker produces, with no sharp and crackling noises, so we are totally in for it.

Performance:

As a phoning device the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini functions more than adequate, with audible voices on both ends and a bass-friendly speakerphone. There was no distortion even at the highest volume level from the earpiece and our conversations went on and on until the X10 mini started to feel quite warm.

The same phenomenon we observed while reviewing the Sony Ericsson Vivaz pro after more than 20-30 minutes of uninterrupted talktime. The manufacturer rates the battery officially for 3.5 hrs of talk and 15 days of standby (with 3G on).

Conclusion:

You may have felt it already that the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini left us with some very positive impressions - it is snappy, functional and cute as a clumsy puppy. As the creator of the minimalistic Android handsets market niche, its maker can only be praised about execution.  The company has shown how Google's mobile OS can be painted over for a smooth and flawless user experience even on a small canvas.

We really like the UX interface on the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini for its simplicity and smooth flow. Even if we distanced ourselves from Timescape and Mediascape (not available on the X10 mini), the deeply coherent interface on the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 and the X10 mini feels much like a brand new OS, not even a shell over the Android kernel.

The Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini is a tiny everyday hero which offers a great improvement over the stock Android user experience, probably on par with what the iPhone can give you out of the box - this would have been a blasphemy just a few months ago.

There aren't much, if any, smartphone alternatives to the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini currently on the market, although there are some diminutive featurephones. Thus you are all set to be unique and colorful as a proud owner of this puppy gadget and when its keyboarded version, the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini pro, arrives in a month, it will be a welcome addition to the ever expanding X10 line.

Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 mini Video Review: