Apple iPhone 5 review: Laws of attraction

Introduction

The iPhone 5. As in five million units sold over the course of a weekend. Can't say no to that. This is the latest installment in the smartphone series that changed the mobile phone industry and we can understand people couldn't wait. Now, what is it they couldn't wait for?

The Apple iPhone 5 brings the long anticipated larger screen and more capable internals that we already know are ready to trade blows with the most powerful chipsets out there.

Apple iPhone 5 official photos

There's also the new slender, slimmer body that no photos really do justice to. If all of Apple's claims are true then the iPhone 5 is a real engineering masterpiece - double the performance in a more compact package without sacrificing anything in terms of battery life.

They could've done worse. A lot worse. But this is Apple telling you to prepare to be wowed. So you have every right to play hard-to-please.

Key features

• Quad-band GSM and quad-band 3G support with 14.4 Mbps HSDPA and 5.76 Mbps HSUPA
• LTE support where carriers support it and CDMA support when sold by CDMA carriers
• 4" 16M-color LED-backlit IPS TFT capacitive touchscreen of 640 x 1136px resolution
• Scratch-resistant screen glass, fingerprint-resistant coating
• 1.2GHz dual-core custom-designed CPU, PowerVR SGX543MP3 GPU, 1GB of RAM, Apple A6 SoC
• iOS 6 and iCloud integration
• 8 MP autofocus camera with LED flash and touch focus
• 1080p video recording at 30fps
• 1.2MP secondary front-facing camera
• Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n, Wi-Fi hotpsot
• GPS with A-GPS connectivity; digital compass
• 16/32/64GB storage options
• Accelerometer, proximity sensor and a three-axis gyro sensor
• Active noise cancellation with a dedicated secondary microphone
• Standard 3.5 mm audio jack, stereo Bluetooth v4.0
• Excellent audio output quality (though worse than 4S)
• Apple Maps with free voice-guided navigation in 56 countries
• Voice recognition, Siri virtual assistant
• Supports HD Voice (needs carrier support too)
• FaceTime video calls over Wi-Fi and cellular
• Impressively slim and light
• Great battery life

Main disadvantages

• Aluminum body looks cool but is easy to scratch
• Proprietary connector, incompatible with previous-gen accessories (needs adapter)
• The new display is not proportionally bigger, but only taller
• Unadapted apps run letterboxed due to the unusual resolution
• nano-SIM support only
• Apple Maps app not up to scratch
• No USB Mass Storage mode
• No FM radio
• No stereo speakers
• No microSD card slot
• No NFC connectivity (though that may be nitpicking)
• Stuck with iTunes for loading content
• Mono audio recording in videos

Should the iPhone 5 be worried about not doing quite enough in terms of new design and features? That question sounds ridiculous considering the sales numbers. But there's a long-term perspective that goes beyond a record-breaking opening weekend.

The Apple iPhone 5 live photos

People who thought the iPhone 4S was a half-hearted effort, are rightfully expecting the iPhone 5 to be the real upgrade of the brilliant iPhone 4. In the end, though, there's more to a smartphone's real worth than dry specs. Apple has, on multiple occasions, been able to produce devices that are better than the sum of their parts and few will be surprised at the iPhone 5 pulling off a similar trick.

We also took the Black and Slate version for a spin

There's no time to waste, so follow us to the next page for the unboxing and hardware inspection of Apple's latest. We'll also take a close look at that sweet new display and see whether the claims about it being the most advanced in business hold water.

Samsung and AT&T announce four new upcoming devices

Samsung and AT&T announced four Android devices which are bound to hit the carrier's shelves in the coming months. The bunch consists of three LTE smartphones and one tablet, which also packs the aforementioned network connectivity.

We begin with the Samsung Galaxy Express. The Android 4.0 ICS smartphone packs a dual-core CPU clocked at 1.5GHz and a 4.5" Super AMOLED Plus display (likely with WVGA) resolution. A 5MP snapper and 2000mAh battery complete the list of known specs.

The Samsung Galaxy Rugby Pro is next on the list. The successor of the Samsung Rugby Smart packs LTE and Android 4.0 ICS, tucked into a rugged body, which is built up to 810g military specifications. A 4" WVGA Super AMOLED display, a 5MP camera, as well as enhanced push-to-talk are also part of the spec sheet.

AT&T also announced its own version of the Samsung Galaxy Note II. The phoneblet's specs are no different than the ones found in the international version, save for the presence of LTE and AT&T's logo on the back.

Finally, AT&T announced the addition of the 4G LTE flavored Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 to its lineup of slates.

Pricing and exact availability for the devices is yet to be known. We'll update you as soon as we find out.

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ICS updates for several Sony Xperia devices are now live

After a spring filled with anticipation, the Xperia U, go and sola were among the last remaining devices among the new Xperia line to not be running Android 4.0.

It's unsure whether the update brings with it some of the nifty ICS features we saw on the Xperia T flagship, such as the redone Album and Movies apps, but at the very least these devices will be getting the usual bug fixes, optimizations and peace of mind that come with a higher OS version.

One thing worth mentioning is that the Xperia sola is set to receive a special "glove mode" feature that allows it to utilize the devices floating touch display technology to use the device even with gloves on.

The availability of the update will depend upon market and carrier requirements, so it make take a while for it to come to your particular neck of the woods.

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RIM outs Q2 results, reports loss of $235m and a $2.9b revenue

RIM has released its financial results for Q2 2013 (the company has a shifted financial year) and despite reporting a loss of $235 million, it's not as bad as last quarter, when the loss of the Canadian company was double that.

Revenue was $2.9 billion, which is 31 percent down year-over-year. RIM managed to ship 7.4 million smartphones and 130,000 PlayBook tablets and has a total of 80 million BlackBerry subscribers.

The company reports $2.3 billion in cash and assets on hand. This is a slight increase from last quarter's $2.2 billion. The Canadian smartphone manufacturer says everything is going as planned for the future BlackBerry 10 launch early next year and is looking forward to better times once the refreshed OS hits the market.

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Sony Xperia T available from Three UK for £29 on a contract

The Sony Xperia T is a great looking flagship, although its rather high initial pricetag puts it at something of a disadvantage compared to some certain quad-core offerings (the T itself offers a dual-core Krait CPU).

Fortunately, Three UK is willing to sell you the smartphone for just 29 if you are willing to sign a 30/month Ultimate Internet 500 contract.

There's also a Pay As You Go offer, which comes with a heftier 399 initial fee plus an additional 15 for unlimited data, 300 any-network minutes, and 3,000 texts for 30 days.

"The Bond Phone," as the Xperia T is also known as in the UK, features some impressive build quality and Three is also throwing in two Xperia SmartTags for NFC connectivity, which were not present in the retail package of our review unit. Speaking of our review, you can find it here.

Note that the Bond Phone edition is only available from O2.

Source | Via

Apple apologizes for Maps fiasco, suggest you try the competition

In an unprecedented move, Apple's CEO Tim Cook published a letter on the company's website, admitting that Apple's new maps service isn't up to par with the competition.

In the letter, Tim Cook goes on to say that the Apple Maps app has reached more than 100 million iOS devices and in just over a week users have accounted for nearly half a billion searches. The latter is essential as it helps Apple improve its service.

But here's the shocking part, Tim Cook actually admitted that the app wasn't up to scratch and apologized for the frustration that it caused Apple customers. He even went on to suggest "alternatives".

While were improving Maps, you can try alternatives by downloading map apps from the App Store like Bing, MapQuest and Waze, or use Google or Nokia maps by going to their websites and creating an icon on your home screen to their web app.

The company seems to be hard at work on revising the bugs and problems of its Maps service, but until then, iOS users have the official permission of Tim Cook go elsewhere if they feel unsatisfied with what Apple has done with Maps.

Follow the source link to read the whole letter of apology.

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Sony Xperia ion for AT&T ICS update is now available

The LTE flavored Sony Xperia ion for AT&T's has finally left the land of Gingerbread. The handset's long overdue Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich update is now available to download directly from Sony.

The update to Android 4.0 brings a number of features to the smartphone. They include tabbed browsing, offline reading, desktop mode, etc. Of course, users will also receive Sony's proprietary UI on top of Google's OS.

In case you are an owner of the said device, you can download the update over here.

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Samsung launches Galaxy Note II in India and Germany

Samsung has launched the Galaxy Note II in India and Germany. In India the phone is being priced at '39,990 (around $750) whereas in Germany the phone will be sold for 699.

In case you're not aware of this device, the Galaxy Note II is an updated version of last year's Galaxy Note and is basically a stretched Galaxy S III. It has a 5.5-inch Super AMOLED display, up from 5.3-inch on last year's model and comes with the same pressure sensitive S-Pen stylus from the Galaxy Note 10.1.

Other features include a 1.6GHz quad-core Exynos processor, 2GB of RAM, 8 megapixel camera with 1080p video recording, 16/32/64GB internal memory with microSD card slot and the latest Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.

Update: Australia and South Korea also got the Note II today and we expect many other countries (including most of Europe) to join the fun in the following days.

LG announces the Optimus Vu successor, the Optimus Vu II

It's barely been six months since LG announced the awkward Optimus Vu and the company has already come up with a successor.

The Optimus Vu II, as it is called, comes with same 5-inch, 1024 x 768 resolution 4:3 display and looks just as unwieldy as before. Now, however, there is a newer 1.5GHz dual-core Qualcomm MSM8960 from the Snapdragon S4 series ticking inside.

Other changes include 2GB of RAM, a slightly bigger 2,150mAh battery, IR blaster functionality to use the device as a wireless universal remote control, Miracast support, wireless charging and VoLTE capability. There seem to be some new software features as well but the poorly translated text from LG's Korean press release does a bad job of explaining them.

We wonder why LG would release a successor to a product that they launched so recently and with so few changes. Also, if it has anything to do with the launch of the Galaxy Note II today in certain markets around the world.

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A look inside the new proprietary Apple A6 chipset

Ever since the iPhone 5 announcement, it's been a mystery what exactly makes the new A6 processor tick. We've already seen its impressive performance benchmarked, but now we get to take a closer look at the architecture itself.

A new microscopic examination of the chip not only shows the custom dual ARM cores side-by-side, but also lets us see the unique triple-GPU layout.

What does this mean? Simply put, Apple have invested in customizing their own chipset, which results in an optimized architecture capable of producing better results without having to rely on higher clock speeds.

This extra customization process in the face of off-the-shelf solutions like the Cortex-A15 shows some great innovation from the Cupertino-based tech giant.

Source | Via

BlackBerry 10 beta 3 released, shows revamped UI

At a special event yesterday RIM unveiled the BlackBerry 10 beta 3 running on the company's new test device, the Dev Alpha B.

The UI look and feel of this latest BlackBerry 10 build is what RIM will be putting on its final BB10 devices in early 2013. And according to those, who've tried it, it really has the potential to grab people's attention.

Let's start with the new UI features. Starting with the new beta, to wake the device, you simply swipe from the bottom of the screen. Then, you are welcomed with the traditional batch of homescreen panels.

However, there's a twist. The first homescreen isn't really a homescreen in the sense that it holds widgets and app shortcuts. Rather, it houses the so called "Active Frames". You can have up to 8 of them and they represent currently running applications. Mind you, only four fit on one screen, so to view the other four, you'd have to scroll down.

RIM has done good job of backing in gestures in its OS.For example, you can jump straight to the homescreen from any app by swiping from the bottom up. Making the opposite swipe (top down) brings up the settings menu or another contextual menu, depending on the app you're in.

BlackBerry 10 SDK Beta 3 in action Photos by TheVerge

What's really interesting is the new BlackBerry Hub. This is RIM's unified messaging service. It integrates all your email accounts, messages from social networks (Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn) and puts them in one place.

It's accessible by a sort of weird gesture - swipe up and to the right (think of it as a reversed L). Once you access it, you can see your notifications alongside the aforementioned emails and messages.

Back to the homescreens, swiping right of the Acitve Frames, reveals the classic list of App icons. They can be manually moved around and sorted to your liking. RIM has integrated an interesting feature allowing you to switch the device into personal or work mode when you swipe down from top of the screen when viewing the App icons screens.

Choosing Work mode allows you to launch an app in a secure mode. For example, a company might restrict copy and pasting in certain secured apps.

TheVerge was at the developer event, and made a user interface video of the latest BlackBerry 10 SDK Beta 3 build. Check it out below.

Judging from the footage, the latest build of BlackBerry 10 looks very promising. It's very fast and fluid, and packs a lot of interesting UI features that its competitors just currently lack.

As for the new device, it features a 4.2-inch display with RIM's standardized resolution of 1280 x 768 pixels. As TheVerge points out, its speaker grill, cameras, microphone and buttons really resemble the recently leaked BlackBerry 10 L Series phone.

What your take on RIM's progress with BlackBerry 10 so far?

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Texas Instruments withdraws from smartphones, goodbye OMAP

Texas Instruments is dropping from the system-on-chip for smartphones and tablets manufacturing and will give up on its OMAP lineup.

The companys OMAP boards are less and less popular among mobile manufacturers most of them bet on Qualcomm, while Samsung and Apple are developing their own solutions (Exynos, A6). The major disadvantage of the OMAP chipset is the lack of on-board 3G/4G modem.

That forces manufacturers who rely on OMAP chipsets to use additional radio chips, which increases battery consumption and production costs. Now you understand why smartphone manufacturers prefer Qualcomms complete solutions, rather than this expensive process.

TI says its focus will shift on to a broader market including industrial clients like carmakers, though it did not announce specifics and the investors were left wondering.

Anyway, TI will continue to support its current clients, but will significantly reduce efforts on developing new OMAP chipsets.

The news might come shocking for some, as the TI OMAP 5 was expected to be the first chipset with dual Cortex-A15 CPU, and now it's fate is uncertain. Nonetheless, TI OMAP's presence was barely felt on the market, so the company's exit won't create too much of a disturbance.

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Nokia may file a lawsuit seeking a ban on HTC WP 8X

According to the latest online gossip, Nokia considers seeking ban for the upcoming HTC flagship Windows Phone 8X. The Finns accuse HTC of copying the Lumia 820 front panel design for its Windows Phone 8X.

Nokia unveiled the Lumia 820 and 920 in the beginning of September. HTC announced its two WP-powered headsets two weeks later. Shortly after Nokias EVP of Sales and Marketing tweeted "It takes more than matching color to match the innovation of the Lumia 920." aimed directly at HTCs new phones.

The source says that Nokia is going to take serious actions against HTC and seek a ban on the Windows Phone 8 sales.

No matter what Nokias intentions are, both Nokia and HTC have huge support from Microsoft (and Qualcomm), and we bet the issue will be resolved without entering the court room. And even if it did, we doubt Nokia will end up victorious it takes way more than two weeks to develop a smartphone and there's no way HTC managed to redesign the 8X in the short time between the Lumia 820 announcement and its own event.

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DisplayMate tests the displays of the iPhone 5 and Galaxy S III

Popular display analyzing company DisplayMate has decided to put the iPhone 5 through its various highly scientific tests and pit it against the Galaxy S III. The 4.8-inch Super AMOLED HD display of the Samsung flagship faces the 4-inch IPS LCD screen of the iPhone 5, as well as the 3.5-inch display of the iPhone 4 for good measure.

DisplayMate tested many characteristics of the displays, such as screen reflections, brightness and contrast, colors and intensities, viewing Angles and display power Consumption, running time on battery. So what's the verdict?

According to DisplayMate's lab measurements, the iPhone 5 has a "state-of-the-art-accurate" display, and is the best one they've ever seen, even if there's room for improvement in some areas. Compared to the iPhone 4, the IPS LCD display of the iPhone has lower screen reflections and much higher image contrast. The color gamut is also significantly improved and more accurate than before. But what about the Galaxy S III?

In a word - the OLED technology isn't able to produce the same kind of accuracy that the iPhone 5 IPS LCD does. That's because OLED is a relatively new technology that isn't yet as refined as LCDs are. As a result, it doesn't perform as well as the iPhone 5. However, DisplayMate promises a very bright future for OLEDs as they've been evolving and improving at a very rapid pace.

The display brightness of the Galaxy S III is about half of the iPhone 5 due to OLED's low power efficiency resulting in power constraints. The image contrast and screen readability of the Galaxy S III in high ambient lighting is also poorer than that of the iPhone 5.

As far as the color gamut is concerned, Apple has made a noticeable effort in making the colors as accurate as possible, while Samsung hasn't really done this in their OLED displays. As a result AMOLED displays have inaccurate color representation and over saturated colors.

There's one thing that you should keep in mind however - the DisplayMate tests only judge the screens based on its accuracy. In reality, many people prefer the extra punch offered by the over saturated colors on AMOLED screens, even if they are not as accurate.

Check the source link below to see the the full comparison table with included measurements and assessments.

Source | Via

Limited Edition Martian Pink Galaxy S III goes official

A few days ago we told you that the Galaxy S III will dress in pink and hit Korea first. Today Samsung has officially announced the Martian Pink version of the smartphone.

The Martian Pink Galaxy S III will be a limited edition available only in 32GB flavor and only in South Korea (for now at least). So if you live there and want one of those lady-targeted flagships you, should start looking for it right now.

There is no word on the international availability, but we guess this version will hit selected markets soon rather than later.

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Apple sells 5 million iPhone 5's in the first three days alone

Flagship smartphones sell by the millions and that's a given. Some 2 million people pre-ordered the new iPhone 5 and the total number of sold devices in the three days since the launch on September 21 has reached and surpassed 5 million units.

Sales predictions were a bit higher (standing at around 8 million units), but as you know, market predictions are not what you would call an exact science.

Last year the iPhone 4S sold in over 4 million units over its first weekend of market availability, while the iPhone 4 sold just 1.7 million units in its debut weekend back in 2010.

Yet again however, the demand has exceeded the initially available supply and some of the people who made pre-orders will have to wait for their deliveries until October.

The iPhone 5 launched on September 21 in 9 countries - the US, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and the UK.

Another 22 countries will get it come September 28. The list includes Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.

The total number of markets where the iPhone 5 is available should reach 100 by the end of the year.

As usual, tempting carrier deals aside, the iPhone 5 remains one of the most expensive smartphones on the market with official SIM-free prices in Europe running around the 670 mark.

If you are interested whether you would be able to make use of the iPhone 5 high-speed LTE connectivity in your country, check out our list. If you are not among the lucky ones, you can still count on HSPA, of course.

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Camera samples shot with Galaxy Nexus 2 I9260 leak on Picasa

It's been nearly a full year since the last Google Nexus phone was announced (though we witnessed the launch of the Nexus 7 tablet in the meantime). We've already seen some leaked specs of an update for the Galaxy Nexus but now we have photos uploaded to Picasa to back those up as well.

The EXIF info in the photos labels the device "GT-I9260" - the expected model number of the successor of the current Galaxy Nexus (I9250). Unfortunately, the photos were not shot at full resolution, so they can't confirm the upgrade to 8MP that the camera of the next Galaxy Nexus is rumored to receive.

What the photos do reveal however, is a F/2.65 aperture and a 4mm focal length. The Galaxy S III has an aperture of F/2.6 and a focal length of 3.6mm, while the Galaxy S II has an aperture F/2.65 and a focal length of 3.97mm, so it might be theoretically possible that the new Nexus phone may have the same camera as the Galaxy SII.

The firmware versions listed in the EXIF info in the two photos is I9260XXALI5 and I9260XXALI6.

In one of the photos, there's a portion of an Excel window with a table listing Bluetooth specs for something, but there's nothing interesting that can be made out.

Besides the camera, the Samsung I9260 Galaxy Nexus "Premiere" is supposed to have a better CPU (Cortex-A9 dual-core at 1.5GHz instead of 1.2GHz), a microSD card slot and the same 4.65" Super AMOLED HD screen.

Would it be okay if the next Galaxy Nexus really isn't based on the Galaxy S III? The OS it will run is still not clear - typically, a Nexus device would come with the latest available iteration of Android, but Jelly Bean is still very fresh (barely powering a percent of all Androids), so it might be too early for Key Lime Pie.

Source | Via (in Chinese)

LG Optimus Vu II specs leak, S4 chipset confirmed

Having just released its 5-inch Optimus Vu phablet globally, LG is hard working on its successor, as a specs leak reveals. The LG Optimus Vu II is a direct answer to Samsung's Galaxy Note II, though its specs sheet is hardly as impressive.

The LG Optimus Vu II will reportedly be powered by a 1.5GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 MSM8960 processor and have 2GB of RAM. According to the leak, it'll be running Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich on the same 5-inch, 1024 x 768 pixel screen with a 4:3 aspect ratio.

The battery of the second generation Optimus Vu is slightly bumped and will be 2150mAh instead of 2080mAh. Other than that, the rest of the specifications seem to be left untouched. There's no information on the availability and pricing.

However, we've already seen the new universal remote app LG is readying, so the Optimus Vu II will surely have more surprises up its sleeve.

Source | Via

Apple iPhone 5's A6 chipset performance examined in detail

Ever since the Apple iPhone 5 was announced, the A6 chipset which powers it has been something of a riddle. With Apple mentioning nothing on the exact specifications, we had to wait another week to find the core count and architecture, as well as the RAM amount and GPU model.

Now however, we got to learn the rest of the A6 secrets, thanks to a detailed review of its performance, courtesy of Anandtech. The suspicion that Apple went for a custom CPU architecture was confirmed and we learned that its maximum clock speed is 1.2GHz. The rest of the A6 specs highlights include 1GB of RAM and a PowerVR SGX 543MP3 three-core GPU.

More importantly, however, we found out how those perform in real life and how the iPhone 5 compares to the other iOS products and the Android top dogs.

The guys from Anandtech went for the browser tests first, and saw the Apple iPhone 5 to have a huge advantage over its competitors. The A6 chipset helped the new iOS flagship make easy work of the competition at the BrowserMark, SunSpider and even Googles own V8 tests.

Apple iPhone 5 browser benchmarks

Whether or not the iPhone 5 is the ultimate browsing device greatly depends on your screen size, resolution and browser preferences, but its sure shaping to be the fastest one around.

The GPU benchmarks came next and the Apple iPhone 5 was able to pass the test with flying colors, too. Despite being a core short of the A5X GPU inside the new iPad, the A6 PowerVR SGX 543MP3 came very close to it in terms of raw performance. And since the iPhone 5 has far lower resolution than the third-generation iPad, it should offer even higher framerates on those games.

Apple iPhone 5 GPU benchmarks

The beastly graphics chip swept away current Android top dogs, and only came slightly short of the Adreno 320 inside the LG Optimus G. Once again, though, the lower resolution helped the iPhone 5 get better real-life framerates.

Apple iPhone 5 GPU benchmarks

Finally, we got a couple of charts, comparing the iPhone 5 performance to that of the iPhone 4S. It turns out that the A6 easily delivers on the 2x performance increase promise.

Apple iPhone 5 vs Apple iPhone 4S

An interesting detail came up during that review. Apparently the iPhone 5 is able to improve its performance by a further 10% when not connected to a carriers network. Its yet unclear why the difference is so dramatic, but the reviewer promises to look into it and report back if he finds anything.

For even more tests follow the source link.

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Apple iPhone 5 aluminum shell plagued by chipping issues

It seems to have become a routine now. Every year Apple releases a new iPhone and while most of the customers are delighted a subset of buyers pull the short end of the stick. With the iPhone 4, it was the antennagate issue, with the iPhone 4S it was the battery life problem and now some iPhone 5 buyers are noticing dents on their prized possession.

Yes, many owners, particularly of the Black & Slate colored model, are reporting dents and scratches along the chamfered edges of their new iPhone right out of the box. We haven't seen many reports from owners of the White & Silver model, but that just might be because the color isn't particularly popular.

Now, anodized aluminum is known to pick up scuff marks easily. Because the color is painted on top, even a minor scuff can make it come off, revealing a shiny silver spot below. Also, aluminum is a soft metal, so it dents very easily, especially along thin edges. You'll find scuffs and dents on practically every anodized aluminum object that has been used for a while.

Which is why it wasn't a shock to us when we saw the iPhone picking up dents along the edges in this drop test. However, it is surprising when the device comes with scuff marks out of the box and points to poor quality checks at Apple's end.

Of course, Apple will readily replace any such device for you. But if you're importing this device to a different country (and we know many do), you will need to be careful and hold on till the issue gets sorted.

Update: Apparently, white units have the same issues as the black ones. We are really hoping Apple makes an official statement soon enough and explain the cause.

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Sony Xperia tipo review: Mini just got bigger

Introduction

The NXT line gave Sony the strong start they needed after returning to the smartphone game on their own. The Japanese then focused on filling the lower ranks and, yet again, we see them look for inspiration in the old Sony Ericsson scrapbook.

Sony Xperia tipo official pictures

The Sony Xperia tipo is right on time for the anniversary of the Xperia mini's launch. The little droid by Sony Ericsson is still a reasonably popular choice for bargain-hunters. But it's time it stepped down and made room for the new generation.

The Xperia tipo is also doing fairly well in terms of software. While some of the first Sony smartphones had to wait a fair while to upgrade from Gingerbread, the tipo launches on ICS. Attractive design and a modern OS are the key features of this entry-level Android smartphone with modest specs and an affordable price tag.

Key features

• Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE and dual-band UMTS support
• 7.2 Mbps HSDPA and 5.76 Mbps HSUPA
• 3.2" 16M-color capacitive TFT touchscreen of HVGA resolution (320 x 480)
• Android OS v4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich
• 800 MHz Cortex-A5 CPU, Adreno 200 GPU, Qualcomm MSM7225AA chipset
• 512 MB of RAM
• 2.5GB of inbuilt storage
• microSD slot (32GB supported)
• 3.15 MP fixed-focus camera, geotagging
• VGA video @ 25fps
• Wi-Fi b/g/n, Wi-Fi hotspot
• GPS with A-GPS
• Accelerometer and proximity sensor
• Standard 3.5 mm audio jack
• Stereo FM radio with RDS
• microUSB port (charging) and stereo Bluetooth v2.1
• User-accessible battery, Li-Ion 1500 mAh

Main disadvantages

• Fixed-focus camera, No LED flash
• Mediocre screen quality
• No front camera
• Non-hot-swappable microSD slot
• Loudspeaker performance is so-so
• No DivX/XviD support

The Sony Xperia tipo is a bit underpowered compared to its Sony Ericsson predecessor - the CPU and the graphics chip are expected to be slightly less capable than the Scorpion/Adreno 205 combo inside the Xperia mini. As a result, the 720p video playback and recording are out of the equation.

Sony Xperia tipo live pictures

But hey, the tipo is not in the HD race, as its price tag will quickly testify. The handset targets the entry-level market and Android ICS is its key value-adding feature. But is there more to it? Stay with us for the whole story.