A certain telecom market expert (whose name must not be pronounced in vain by lowly mortals, so we'd rather refrain) then started speculating about HTC's impending death, without even knowing that it was actually the ODM producer bound by contract to develop and issue SE's ambitious PDA. He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named dispersed a good dose of rumor concerning the alleged new leader of the Windows Mobile platform, which made little to no sense. Unfortunately, even the most knowledgeable of telecom experts manage to get the info on time, which on some unlucky occasions leads to misinformation lurking into serious-looking articles; that's just what happened this time as well. The recent article claiming the cancellation of two smartphones in full obedience with the mentioned person's piece of advice was violently refuted by the manufacturing company themselves. Such a reason for pride can only squeeze a bitter smile from Sony Ericsson's officials, for the real fact behind the cancellation of the two products is the massive reorganization taking place within the UIQ group under the guidance of Symbian foundation (rather than a couple of articles on a site). He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named found himself deeply offended which led to degrading remarks targeted at XPERIA X1, which started being depicted as a bleak shadow of HTC Touch PRO unworthy of public attention. Let's have a more sober look at the products, pushing aside all of the emotion.

Another interesting solution developed by Sony Ericsson, a sample of which has been recovered from a crashed UFO by one of our recon teams and subsequently delivered to our test lab, is C905 the new Cyber Shot flagship equipped with a 8 Mp camera. The model was first announced back in summer, the Swedish-Japanese alliance galloping ahead of the competitors. An analog by Nokia will only appear by the next year. The closest alternative to appear is Samsung i8510, selling for a higher price and actually debuting on the market a month earlier. C905 is Sony Ericsson's second chance to recover their positions in the segment of top cameraphones. Talking in advance, we can state that the product looks really interesting. Just below you will read a brief preview covering the basic facts about the new product to keep you entertained while waiting for the two full-scale reviews which are currently in the works.

Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1

People who enjoy drawing comparisons between this PDA and HTC Touch Pro simply forget about the serious difference in market positioning. XPERIA is a brand associated with premium products; the X1 model, much unlike HTC, makes use of metal plating and has a much better looking body in general. The design, actually, is one of the primary selling points for this products. Seldom you can spot a Windows Mobile PDA enjoying a metal casing, and, in this sense, never have you seen anything like X1 before. He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named didn't take into account the fact in his breath-wasting accusations a low material and assembly quality targeting the product in question. We are uncertain what exact aspects of quality were behind this fit of rage, but if this solely concerns the quality of assembly this is obviously too far on the fancy side, for even our pre-sale sample is so neatly pieced together that we would have never been able to find a slightest reason for attacks as far as quality goes. There might have been something challengeable in the earlier prototypes, but drawing judgments on a final product based on impressions from an early sample is pure profanation of the journalist's profession.

Only the face panel sports a glossy coating, which helps to keep away the grease and fingerprint; in this sense, the handset is very practical. The control buttons located below the screen are geometrically shaped, which adds to the handset's style (we still have to admit that this does little good, if no harm, to the ergonomics). The keyboard is rather mediocre, the buttons don't feel tight enough to distinctly feel if a key was pressed or not. We sincerely hope this will be fixed prior to the first commercial shipment. The handset's dimensions are well-balanced, which makes it fit the hand like a glove. The stylus is still present, despite the interface's strong optimization for finger control. We will publish an exhaustive overview of XPERIA's new interface; for the time being we would like just to say that its closest counterpart is TouchFLO 3D, involving similarly designed animated panels.

On the hardware side, strong parallels to the original HTC platform can be observed so don't expect anything revolutionary. It's one of the most powerful hardware solutions currently available for Windows Mobile products, yet it could have been even better mind the 5 Mp power of Samsung i900i. The screen is just as good as it comes, sporting a resolution of 800 x 480 pixels. The onboard memory equals to 400 Mb, expandable via a platform-unspecific microSD slot. X1 is also SE's second handset with a 3.5 mm audio socket available something which even HTC doesn't have.

The price is expected to fit in a 700-750 euro bracket, though can still be subject to a reduction depending on the prices of competitive products by that time, especially HTC Touch Pro. It's going to enter the international market by the end of the year. A detailed review covering every aspect of the product is currently in the works, so stay tuned and come to see us again at smape.com shortly.

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Sony Ericsson C905

Here comes a handsome-looking slider compactly sized, sporting a soft-touch surface. It's has a rather thick body though, which adds a little discomfort when you hold it in the hand. On the other hand, Samsung i8510 can hardly boast of a thinner body. That's what you get along with a 8 Mp camera. Sporting a higher price, the Korean solution seems to lose on most fronts to the Swedish-Japanese opponent. C905 combines patches of black- and metal-colored surface, which produces a very impressive feel (the white and gold versions don't look as good though). The quality of assembly and materials are perfect, no looseness between the parts at all, not even a slightest feel of wobbliness. The sliding mechanism could have been a bit better, at least we hope for an improvement in the first commercial samples.

The thick body degrades the ergonomics, but as far as the rest of the features are concerned, the product is a winner. The keypad isn't the handiest thing around a compromise with the stylish design, obviously. The camera lens guard is built in fashion which keeps it from sticking above the surface, which prevents accidental opening. The grinded metal texture adds a few points to the overall design score. The real-life performance of the camera is still unimpressive it feels like it needs a better firmware. We are expecting a firmware update just in a few days; once it's out and installed on our test sample, we will do a second shooting session and publish a camera test review with the updated results. For now we'd just check out several interesting software features expanding the camera's functionality the ability to shoot automatically in response to a detected movement and automating shooting. The full review will cover these aspects as well as the rest of the camera features. In the video department, things go traditionally poor. Even the 8 Mp flagship suffers from a bad implementation of video shooting the resolution stays within the strict limits imposed by the QVGA standard and the quality isn't the highest around.

The stuff inside C905 is pretty remarkable. It has even got a Wi-Fi unit, previously found exclusively in Motorola ZN5. The rest of the conventional phones still lack such a functionality, though the situation will improve shortly. A GPS unit served by a copy of Wayfinder Navigator 7 software is available. Also there's a TV out on board. The rest of the features are quite typical; the screen is a bit small, only having a 2.4'' diagonal, that's simply too modest for a hi-end cameraphone. The storage is expandable with the help of a M2 slot; charging, synchronization and audio output are all done through a universal Fast-Port slot.

As we have already mentioned, C905 will hit the shelf only in October. The estimated starting price will amount to 550 euros, later notched down to 500 euros. Samsung's competitive solution is going to sell for 630-680 euros. Unlike X1, the model is expected to become a mass product with an ambition to penetrate into the upper sections of the sales chart. Expect a detail review of C905 soon on our site soon.

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Author: Dmitriy Ryabinin

SMAPE.com

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