160 Sony Xperia S Pros and Cons/ Sony Ericsson Xperia Nozomi / Sony Ericsson Arc HD - Review, Pros and Cons

Sony Xperia S / Sony Ericsson Xperia Nozomi / Sony Ericsson Arc HD - Pros and Cons

3G

Touch-sensitive controls

16M colors

720 x 1280 pixels, 4.3 inches display which shelter about a ~342 ppi pixel density. Concerning the display, there is no reason to worry or regret about

Multitouch up to 10 fingers

Scratch-resistant glass

Sony Mobile BRAVIA Engine

Timescape UI

No Card slot

A 32 GB internal storage, what a relief!

1 GB RAM

Wi-Fi Direct

Wi-Fi hotspot

NFC

12 MP cam

Autofocus

LED flash

Touch focus

3D sweep panorama

Image stabilization

1080p@30fps video coder

Continuous autofocus

Video light

Video stabilizer

Secondary cam

Android ICS ( soon to be )

Qualcomm MSM8260 Snapdragon Chipset

Dual-core 1.5 GHz CPU, a break through from Sony Ericsson and a true flagship phone

Adreno 220 GPU

Accelerometer

Gyro

Proximity sensor

Threaded view

HTML5

Adobe Flash

Stereo FM radio

GPS with A-GPS

GLONASS

MicroSIM card support only

TV launcher

SNS integration

HDMI port

Active noise cancellation

Document viewer

Predictive text input

Music play Up to 25 hours

Not a quad-core though

Multi Angle shots

Stereo sound

PlayStation (access
to the PS Store)

No microHDMI cable included in the box

Heavy

Viewing angles dont measure up to traditional standards of performance

Good Sunlight legibility

Proximity and
ambient light sensors

A charge and event LED indicator

Poor battery life

Prone to accidental drops

Dedicated camera button

The keyboard is at the bottom of the screen, wont balance well in the hand

£450 sim-free

Lacks Mac support, cannot sync with a Mac

The flap over the charge port is uncomfortable

Slippery back cover

A nice multi-tasker, you can run several apps without a single hiccup

Icons in all shapes and sizes in the app drawer. Some may find it disorganised

OfficeSuite preinstalled but it's only for viewing pleasure

A Media Remote which allows you to control a Sony connected TV

Full turn by turn satnav

GPS is sensitive enoughand, it locks within seconds

Wisepilot preinstalled

McAfee preinstalled

Wi-Fi hotspot

it doesn't automatically find whether your in Wi-Fi network or out of the boundary

Non user replasable battery

A widget which shows most recently taken photos

Youtube HD videos

Audio is outstanding with headphones

Inbuilt speaker sucks

The gallery app shows only a tiny version of any image

The gallery app keeps 3D panorama shots and Multi Angle shots in two different sections

To view the 3D panoramas in 3D, (taking out of the handset), will require a compatible 3DTV.

To view Multi Angle shots taking out of the device?, it will certainly be another Xperia. Where else you can find a compatible app and an accelerometer?

The BRAVIA engine really do improve the day to day image and video viewing qualities

Can switch BRAVIA off
, if you feel like it distorts

No dedicated video player

AVI and MKV videos supported

Some audio codecs are rejected. Better avoid videos with surround sound

Plays 1080p videos

Can watch 720p videos at
100%

No need to have a PC Suite to tag songs. The phone itself does the job if a data connection is present

A massive selection of equalizer presets

The custom preset lets you adjust five frquency bands

Clear Bass slider present

Headphone surround option (can be set to Studio, Club or Concert hall)

When not in the headphones, use xLOUD feature to enhance the loudspeaker output

Only the music controls visible, not the clock on the lockscreen

The radio app automatically scans for the available stations

The Force mono option in the radio can be used when the reception is weak

The overall audio performance is not for the demanding music lovers

Five homescreen panes

Cannot add or delete homescreen panes

Overview mode in the homescreen. Pinch to zoom out on any of the 5 homescreen panes and
all active widgets apprear there for easy navigation

The lockscreen shows notifications for Facebook events

The music player widget enables the user control the
music playback without unlocking
the phone
(track info
and playback controls available
on the lockscreen, no need to unlock the phone to
control the player)

A Data monitor (can set up alarms for data sent, received, total data sent, recieved and can set start dates for sessions)

The data monitor doesnt show usage per app etc, only the total usage

Phonebook syncs with multiple accounts, including Exchange and Facebook,

Custom ringtones

If you touch the antenna at the bottom it will make signal strength weak

Smart dialing

Voice dialing

Loudspeaker ringing output is not loud enough

The email app supports multiple Gmail accounts

A one, stable, solid centered inbox for all other email services is absent

A Media Remote which will remotely control DLNA-capable BRAVIA TVs and Sony DVD/Blu-ray players

Though Bluetooth is 2.1, Wi-Fi Direct compensates

Where are the gaps in this phone which may gather dust? They are around the translucent bar, around the port covers, around the scratch resistant screen and around the rear cover. Litteraly they are everywhere

Who needs a rear cover when the battery is undetachable? a Micro SIM drawer would have been enough

Have unibodies become the thing? Like polycarbonate or aluminium?. The phone we are focusing on isnt covered in one

You will notice an incessant yellow tinge to all white areas though its highly unnoticable

A good and consistent reception

The notification LED is pretty smart. It shows different colors assigned to indicate different events, blue for a missed call, orange for charging etc

The excessive image compression which was a decease prevailant from previous Xperias is still extant in Xperia S too. You cannot change the JPEG settings as you pine to have nicer files

Stills average from 2MB to 3MB and 1080p videos around 100MB per minute each (though compressed) in size, can you shutter without a physical memory card?

The autofocus is slow

A good movie companion

The frequent McAffee antivirus notifications are really annoying and cannot easily be disabled

The settings and functions you can assign to NFC Smarttags aren't sophisticated enough yet to make them useful

There's no airplane mode,

Can't disable data without disabling calls

Integratable with the Xperia SmartWatch. With it you can send notifications directly to your wrist over Bluetooth.

There are two NFC SmartTags boxed that you can assign different setting packs to use to automatically adjust the phone to specific atmospheres. Just bring the tag near the phone and select the actions you want it to perform. Next time the phone come closure to the tag, it will automatically be adjusted as commanded

The Exmor R™

16x digital zoom

CMOS sensor

Upgrading to the newer (4.0.3) version could trigger troubles or in most instances, hangings. Bugs not fixed yet

Sharp uncomfortable corners

Turn Bravia engine off unless you watch videos or stills. It sucks battery life

Most users complains about scratches on the display. But the phone has a "screen protector" over the Scratch-resistant glass. Your scratches are probably on the protector , not on the glass display itself

Hanged...? What you usually do? Restart it or just remove the battery? but sadly the battery in this case is an undetachable one

Many games from the Play Store are incompatible

Hangs a lot

Its microSIM only. So you try to cut your SIM and easily end up damaging it

User available RAM is near 696 MB to 700MB. The rest -328Mb - is reserved for the system

Slippery

With the supplied quick charger, it only takes 1h 10mins to fully charge the 1780mah battery, adjust your life style if necessary

Touch buttons not very responsive

50GB cloud storage

Anti Stain Coating

Cannot transfer files more than 4gb in size. Its FAT32

The display turns yellow when the device catch the heat

No USB mass storage

Turn off your phone and turn it on. You may notice that some of the apps you installed are gone without trace or have become grey boxes and no longer responsive or the warning "application not found" prompted . Keep the phone away from your dog. The phone is reportedly Grey hounded!

Many have the same experience, most of the apps run in the background even after killing them and publicly heralding their demise. Most users remorse over

PS: The legendary yellow tint issue is been addressed. The affected devices are pulled back and replaced. Its reportedly a factory defect on some early birds