Sony Xperia S Review

Been almost 20 days since I got the Xperia S. Brilliant device and there really isn't much that I have to complain about :wink:

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So here's my "small" review. Pics will be uploaded by evening.

Design & Build Quality
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The design is in one word - GORGEOUS !. The transparent bar at the bottom gives it a unique look and above it the design is almost monolithic, just like Sony monolithic design Bravia Tvs. Looks amazing and I can't help stare at my phone VERY often and appreciate the wonderful design. I absolutely love the design, though I wish it were a little thinner. But its really comfortable to hold though. The grip is very good and no slippery feel here, the phone's anti stain coating also helps and after 20 days its still as good as new with no stains or fingerprint marks on the body.

Unfortunately the three buttons above the transparent bar are not that responsive to a soft touch. But a firm touch does the trick.

Build Quality is also very solid, not much to complain about. The device feels really premium in the hands and everything seems well put together. The only slight problem I have with the Build Quality is the back cover. It could have been more solid.

Software and Performance

Xperia S is currently running Android 2.3.7 Gingerbread with Sony custom UXP. When I first saw the UI during the phone's launch at CES, I was blown away by how clean and elegant it looked. And it looks even better on the Xperia S screen :wink:

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The Sony UI isn't too intrusive and is very pleasing to the eyes. Timescape and Facebook Inside Xperia are two big highlights but I can't tell you how good they work as I don't use either of them.
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The Sony music player is fantastic though. The My music part looks similar to Windows Phone as has been mentioned everywhere.
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Other apps Sony included are the power saver app, Xperia smart tags app, Live ware manager, Friends music & videos, DLNA app etc.

The clock and the weather widget are really nice but the Power Control/Toggle widget isn't quite nice. You need to click it twice to open the entire controls list and only then toggle on and off.
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Performance is very smooth and largely free from any lag whatsoever. In the 20 days that I have had the phone, I think I experienced "lag" only 2 days and that too for about 3 seconds.

Never had the need to reboot either and the phone doesn't slow down over time.

Browsing is super smooth and I really don't feel any difference in smoothness while browsing on the XS compared to my laptop. No complaints here. Pages load fast and scrolling is smooth, no stutter or lags.

Benchmarks below
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Multimedia, Screen & Camera

The Xperia S has a 4.3 inch 720p HD screen and it is nothing short of a beauty !!. It has highest PPI of any Android smartphone at 342PPI and is sharper than even the Iphone 4/4S retina display.

It is also extremely bright and at full brightness indoors can even blind you coupled with the super high sharpness

Watching videos on the screen is a treat and has very vibrant colors that truly POP. Except for blacks, I would say it has en edge even over an OLED display. Also colors are more natural on the screen than OLED screens.

Text is super crisp and reading websites without zooming in is possible. Even better than Iphone 4S for reading books !

Viewing angles are not amazing but then who looks at their phone screen from a 60/80/90/120 degree angle ?

At least I don't and head on, the Xperia S screen is more than a match for any other screen out there. Everything pops and makes you fall in love with the screen

It plays all video formats easily and even with the gallery app I could play almost all videos except for 1080p mkv which do play butter smooth but with no audio.
With third party apps like Dice player there is not a hint of stutter no matter what video you play.
Plays 1080p videos in the browser without breaking a sweat too.

Also transferring large files is a breeze as the transfer speed is brilliant. I transferred a 600mb movie to the phone in 55 seconds !

Audio Quality is very good too. For a phone it's very commendable but compared to a quality dedicated PMP like my Sony Walkman A series, its quite less loud at full volume. Though for most people it shouldn't be an issue but then I haven't heard any other smartphone that has the same loudness as my Walkman.

Overall audio quality though is very good and for some reason I seem to enjoy listening to music on the Xperia S a lot now and its been a week since I even switched on my walkman. Oh and the stock earphones sound quite good !! Bassheads would like them for sure. Much better than the Htc Beats earphones

The bass is definitely not as deep as the Walkman but its quite good for a phone, the highs seems better though and almost on par with the Walkman. It has an equalizer so you can change the sound to whatever you like, along with Clear Bass which can be adjusted up to 10 points.

12 megapixel EXMOR R camera. Yup that's probably the biggest USP of this device and it doesn't disappoint. In daylight photos are sharp, clear and detailed with little noise. In low light conditions though you can get a horrible picture if you do not know how to get the settings right.

The Xperia S isn't the best camera phone in the world if you just want to point and shoot and not play around with the settings and have no patience.

But if you have some patience and are willing to play around with the settings then you will definitely come up with photos that would look better than almost any other smartphone out there except for the Nokia 808 pureview.

1080p videos are a smooth 30 fps and quality is great even in not so bright conditions.

The front camera also captures 720 HD video and the quality is really nice.

Sample pics below
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Call Quality and Battery Life

Signal reception is excellent on the XS. I always get full bars whereas all other phones manage only 3 bars in my home. Call Quality is also brilliant on both sides the voices are clear and the noise cancellation works nicely as well.

The best call quality among all phones that I have owned and used in recent times.

Full 5 stars for signal reception and call quality

Battery Life was horrible for the first few days. It would discharge completely in about 6 hours with moderate usage. But it has settled now and I get between 18-30 hours of battery life depending on usage with about 3-4 hours of screen on time.
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Overall

I love this phone to death. No major complaints just a few minor ones :

1. Still need to wait 2-3 weeks for ICS, but then that's fine as the update will be bug free and feature lot of cool new apps from the upcoming Xperia GX.

2. Wish the volume was a little higher via earphones. Also the speaker during phone calls is not that loud

3. Battery should have been of higher capacity

4. Screen could have done with deeper black levels

5. The three touch sensitive buttons at the bottom are not always responsive

Nice review

R

how good is the camera? post some macro and lanscape photos.. take the best you can do.

Nice review buddy

Awesum review...
Hey,Can it play videos on the websites,i mean to say flash ones?

^
Yes it can play all videos on websites, even at 1080p resolution

Congrats and Great review mate.

Also congrats since you completed 100 posts

^
Thanks Terabyte :mrgreen:

Great review mate.

Cool review. Wonder why everyone is using the I9300 wall!
That train line photo is awesome btw.

Thanks guys

S

Great review bro & Congrats..........

Nice review mate!
Would like to ask you one thing..
How is the sound quality with iem or headphones?
Is it comparable or better than the usual ipod touch/iphone4/4s?
I am planning to replace the GS2 with a better sounding smart phone,tired of carrying 2 devices all the time.

Seems like a down to earth, honest review. Great!

red dragon said:
Nice review mate!
Would like to ask you one thing..
How is the sound quality with iem or headphones?
Is it comparable or better than the usual ipod touch/iphone4/4s?
I am planning to replace the GS2 with a better sounding smart phone,tired of carrying 2 devices all the time.

Audio quality with headphones/iem is much better than GSII/ Htc One X. Audio quality is comparable to ipod though not exactly as loud. I assume you own an ipod touch, so you really won't have much to complain about unless you like your music REALLY loud. The equalizer is great too and you can customize the sound the way you like it.

I know a lot of people who upgraded from the Iphone 4/4s to Xperia S and they feel the audio quality is as good on the XS.

Listening loud music in full volume in not safe for ears. I can't face the full volume in ipod with original apple earphones.

rider said:
Listening loud music in full volume in not safe for ears. I can't face the full volume in ipod with original apple earphones.

I was not talking about volume.
I do get plenty of volume in gs2 with a decent iem like SM3.
But the quality of sound(loose bass,recessed mid)and the constant whining of the cpu feels like sh%t.
Original apple earphone is utter garbage,ditch it as early as possible.

randomuser111 said:
Audio quality with headphones/iem is much better than GSII/ Htc One X. Audio quality is comparable to ipod though not exactly as loud. I assume you own an ipod touch, so you really won't have much to complain about unless you like your music REALLY loud. The equalizer is great too and you can customize the sound the way you like it.

I know a lot of people who upgraded from the Iphone 4/4s to Xperia S and they feel the audio quality is as good on the XS.

Thanks mate!Now need to find someone who has listened to xperia s and gs3.

^
I'll try and check out the GS3 if I can and let you know what I think

But from what I know, GS3 has the same DAC the Galaxy Nexus has and Xperia S has better sound quality than Galaxy Nexus. But then the GS3 is getting the Voodoo sound so with that mod I guess it would outperform the XS.

Stock both should be similar and I am guessing the GS3 will be louder.

EDIT: Oops Nexus S had wolfson not Galaxy Nexus. Sorry about that.

Read this, might be of some help to you. Xperia S sound quality review (Iphone 4s mentioned as well )

*jonchoo.blogspot.in/2012/03/sony-xperia-s-sound-quality-review.html

red dragon said:
I was not talking about volume.
I do get plenty of volume in gs2 with a decent iem like SM3.
But the quality of sound(loose bass,recessed mid)and the constant whining of the cpu feels like sh%t.
Original apple earphone is utter garbage,ditch it as early as possible.

That comment wasn't for you, I was responding the review by randomuser111 as he mentioned the in earphones sound is not loud enough.

^
I know. Wish it just a tiny bit louder though. But having listened for quite a long time now, I feel the volume is more than adequate and I am very easily lost in the music

Anyways will post a sound quality shootout tomorrow between Sony Xperia S, Sony Walkman A series and Sony Walkman S series. That should help RedDragon too I guess.

And by the end of the month will update my review after the ICS update. Lots of exciting stuff on the way with ICS. Improved audio, walkman player, amazing new gallery app, much better battery life and improved performance and super smooth UI.

Xperia S audio quality review vs Sony Walkman

Finally done comparing my Xperia S with my Sony Walkman players :wink:

To be frank, when I first bought the Xperia S I didn't plan to transfer any songs to it as I knew the sound quality would not please me and I would continue to use my Walkman.

After getting it though, I did transfer a few songs to it just to check the audio quality. My first impressions were quite positive but I wasn't blown away to be frank. The volume was quite low compared to my Walkman and the bass was a little over powering on flat EQ.

Now its almost close to a month now since Ive had the S, and in the past 1 month I have listened to my Walkman for only 2 hours at max.

Of course the XS doesn't sound as good as my walkman but it still isn't bad at all and is excellent for a smartphone.

Let me start with the comparo without writing anything more which you are probably not interested to read anyway.

Sony Xperia S vs Sony Walkman A/S Flat EQ

With a flat EQ, the Xperia S does not sound significantly worse than the Walkman. The low frequencies are a tad bit more pronounced on the XS compared to Walkman and the highs are a little bright as well.

Overall presentation is good and I would even say the XS sounds more "enjoyable" than the Walkman with flat EQ.

Xperia S - 7.5/10
Walkman - 8/10

Sony Xperia S vs Sony Walkman A/S Custom EQ

With custom EQ on both, the difference between the two becomes apparent instantly. The bass is much tighter and powerful on the Walkman devices compared to Xperia S. XS is also much less loud ( XS max volume is equal to Volume level 19/30 on the Walkman devices)

The highs and mids are also much better on Walkman and the Xperia S seems more distant whereas the Walkman sound is more "in your ear" in a good way. Soundstage is also wider on the Walkmans by quite some margin.

Vocals are also nowhere as clear. Though I would say separation is quite good on the Xperia S, almost close to the Walkman devices.

Reading this you might be thinking the Xperia S is a crappy MP3 player, but no it isn't. It's a very good music player, just not in the same league as a Sony Walkman.

One good thing about the XS is that the audio quality grows on you the more you listen to it.

And it sounds very "fun" and "enjoyable".

One thing that I have to mention is the lack of hiss on the Xperia S. It has virtually no hiss, both of my Walkmans do have a slight hiss though. So in this respect the XS beats the Walkmans

Overall sound quality rating

Sony Xperia S 6.5/10 ( Relative to other phones 9/10)
Sony Walkman S 8.5/10
Sony Walkman A 9/10

Do keep in mind though the 6.5 score is relative to the Walkman devices, which have the best sound quality among all MP3 players except a few others from Cowon and some niche players. So compared to an Apple Ipod, the Xperia S is excellent and has almost as good sound quality.

Also there are mods available now for the Xperia S that improve the already excellent sound quality. The mods increase the volume and also improve the sound quality across the board, with tighter bass.

NOTE: You would need to unlock your bootloader and use a custom ROM to use the mods.

Anybody curious what Xperia S can manage when overclocked

Mind you, this is still with Gingerbread. Come ICS the scores would go even higher.

Quadrant
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Antutu - Higher than Htc One S
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Vellamo - Higher than Asus Transformer Prime Tegra 3 Tablet
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Passmark Performance benchmark - Higher than GS3, Htc One X, and Asus transformer prime
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Nenamark 2 - One X gets 47.5, with ICS Xperia S should manage 46-47
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Browsermark - Close to what One X scores WITH Ics !!
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LinPack Single and Multithread - Very close to One X score in multi threaded, higher than One X in Single threaded
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Peacekeeper HTML5 benchmark test - much higher than One X even with Gingerbread, close to Apple Ipad 2nd/3rd Gen
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nice review, can you just post the original high quality pics, just want to see the pics in high resolution

you know I LOVE SONY :razz:

^
Sure

You can check out high quality photos on my Flickr Page

^^thanks a lot

seriously no one can beat sony's quality of camera, music, and clarity of screen :hyper:

^

Speaking of music, I installed Beats Mod 3.0 for Xperia and RockBox today, and I have to really change the ratings now that I had given to the XS in my earlier post comparing SQ vs Walkman. The volume is MUCH louder now, the bass now has a lot of body and the highs have also improved so much so that I wouldn't mind living without the Walkman now.

Very impressed with the SQ now. So for those looking for a smartphone with SQ to replace your ipod/ipod touch or other similar players should seriously consider it.

Xperia S ICS 4.04

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Will post more later if anyone here wants me to.

Overall feels very fluid and snappy. Benchmark scores are also slightly higher than earlier. Loving the face unlock and Walkman/Films/Album apps

K

randomuser111 said:
^

Speaking of music, I installed Beats Mod 3.0 for Xperia and RockBox today, and I have to really change the ratings now that I had given to the XS in my earlier post comparing SQ vs Walkman. The volume is MUCH louder now, the bass now has a lot of body and the highs have also improved so much so that I wouldn't mind living without the Walkman now.

Very impressed with the SQ now. So for those looking for a smartphone with SQ to replace your ipod/ipod touch or other similar players should seriously consider it.

Can you please tell what this "Beats Mod 3.0" is and where can I find it and install? Will this be compatible with Xperia Sola? Is it a ROM?

Kalyan said:
Can you please tell what this "Beats Mod 3.0" is and where can I find it and install? Will this be compatible with Xperia Sola? Is it a ROM?

Yes it works on Sola as well. Its just a flashable mod. Go to Xperia S themes and apps forum on XDA. You will find beatsmod 3.0 there.

P

@randomuser111:Congrats on your new phone

Nice review

The design is in one word - GORGEOUS !. The transparent bar at the bottom gives it a unique look

I like the transparent bar too, good concept by placing those capacitive keys on top, but does it glow???

Hey buddy if you don't mind can you please post quadrant benchmark results on ICS?

^
LOL!!!!!!! Hahahaha what's wrong with you buddy

Been a long time since I updated this review. Will post a few updates over the next few days but first a shootout between the cheapest Quad Core phone LG Optimus 4X HD and Xperia S.

Note:- I took figures for the LG Optimus 4X HD from Anandtech

1. GL Benchmark 2.5 Egypt HD (Offscreen 1080p)

LG Optimus 4X HD - 8.7 fps
Sony Xperia S - 8.4 fps

2. GL Benchmark Classic (Offscreen 1080p)

LG Optimus 4X HD - 34 fps
Sony Xperia S - 21 fps

3. Linpack Single Threaded

LG Optimus 4X HD -48.665
Sony Xperia S - 52.892

4. Linpack Multi Threaded

LG Optimus 4X HD - 115.222
Sony Xperia S - 89.786

5. Sunspider Javascript 0.9.1

LG Optimus 4X HD - 2209.2
Sony Xperia S - 1548.9

6. Basemark ES 2.0 V1 Taiji

LG Optimus 4X HD - 30.89 fps
Sony Xperia S - 21.37 fps

7. Vellamo

LG Optimus 4X HD - 1539
Sony Xperia S - 1774

8. BrowserMark

LG Optimus 4X HD - 91918
Sony Xperia S - 108726

The above benchmarks are what anandtech uses in its smartphone reviews and I have not selectively chosen benchmarks to benefit the XS. Two more benchmarks are used by Anandtech - Basemark ES Hoverjet and Basemark OS but I haven't included these two as these two benchmarks are not available to the public.

So as you can see, 4 cores doesn't always mean better than 2. The Xperia S won in 4 out the 8 benchmarks here and Optimus 4X won in 4 as well.

Anyway, hope it clears some confusion that some people have about the Xperia S and those who think that it lacks power

I had a hands on a friend's Xperia S. Everything was good but I have to say that the speaker is crap enough to ditch the phone (at least for me). I mean, c'mon Sony, at ~28k, the speaker sounds like shite. At least give some volume.

G

very nice review ....each and everything simplified.....good job done bro :-D

Has the battery life improved

Battery life has improved but still nowhere as good as galaxy s3 though

H

guys any problem with the xperia s,i hear from friend of random call dropping and call reception not of good quality plus random hangs...or its it just with one off case...cause i have tried the phone and faced no problem what so ever,but now after hearing it i'm confused on whether to advice people to buy it or not...

Nice Love my XS

FINAL UPDATE -

This will be my last update in this thread as I've decided to sell my S.

Been a great experience I'd say, didn't really use custom ROMs much on it all. The Stock Sony ROM works just fine IMO. No issues at all, no cracks or any other hardware fault thankfully

It's still as good as new haha.

Anyway, I'll miss it though. The first Sony branded phone !!!!

Also, I did receive many queries on it over the past year but I won't be able to help any longer I'm afraid.

P.S.

Expect my Xperia Z review soon

randomuser111 said:
FINAL UPDATE -

This will be my last update in this thread as I've decided to sell my S.

Been a great experience I'd say, didn't really use custom ROMs much on it all. The Stock Sony ROM works just fine IMO. No issues at all, no cracks or any other hardware fault thankfully

It's still as good as new haha.

Anyway, I'll miss it though. The first Sony branded phone !!!!

Also, I did receive many queries on it over the past year but I won't be able to help any longer I'm afraid.

P.S.

Expect my Xperia Z review soon

Thanks for all the help man...truly appreciate it...