Sony Ericsson XPERIA X10 mini pro deals & review

In a word or two

The Sony Ericsson XPERIA X10 Mini Pro is an advanced Android handset with a small frame and full QWERTY keyboard.

The Design

A little bit bigger than its sibling, the X10 Mini, the Sony Ericsson XPERIA X10 Mini Pro houses a slide-out QWERTY keyboard in its miniature body. Both Minis are smaller versions of the XPERIA X10 and will appeal to you if you want a quick, versatile, app-full and friendly mobile phone in a neat package. Your choice between the Mini and the Mini Pro will come down to how you prefer to type on your phone – on-screen or on a physical keyboard, with a compact keyboard or a QWERTY one.

The look of the Mini Pro is the same as the Mini with added length, a little additional width and 1mm extra thickness. It is still super small and effortless to hold and use in the one hand, and you can easily pop it into your pocket or handbag when you are on the move. Apart from the slight size difference, the Pro is also heavier than the Mini but the addition of a QWERTY keyboard more than compensates for this.

When you slide out the keyboard on the Sony Ericsson XPERIA X10 Mini Pro, the screen automatically rotates to landscape view so you can easily see what you are typing. All the keys are individual, round and nicely spaced which allow for confident typing. There are four rows of keys and the keypad is larger than the one on the Palm Pre, and both the keys and slide-out mechanism feel solid.

The 2.55 inch touchscreen is capacitive and responds to the lightest touch. Whether you are scrolling through the screens of icons or opening a web link, you will only need to sweep and lightly press for results. The screen also has a good resolution and displays images with a sharpness and bright colour – which helps to make up for the small screen when you are watching videos or browsing online. The experience is boosted by the shortcut keys in the corners of the screen which let you open these particular apps directly. And you can select which four apps to decorate each of the corners, choosing the ones you most use for extra convenience.

Specifications

You get pretty much all the goodness of the original X10 with a smaller frame and physical keyboard on top. Some of the features have been trimmed along with the size, though, including the processor (from 1GHz to 600MHz) and the camera (from 8 to 5-megapixels). However, the Sony Ericsson XPERIA X10 Mini Pro retains speed, functions and connection for diverse mobile communication.

The X10 Mini Pro runs on the Google Android OS and has the Timescape UI on the surface. This stylish interface ensures you can reach what’s important to you easily – all your texts and emails are listed under your friends together with any social networking messages and updates. This is similar to the interface on the Samsung Wave, and saves you from always having to open several apps to catch-up on all your communication. Of course, when you do want to open apps, you have plenty to choose from including Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Google Talk. There is also access on the phone to the Android Market for downloading more apps when you want.

The inbuilt Mediascape widget supports music and video. The camera lets you record video footage so you can watch your own footage on the media player or stream videos from sites like YouTube. The music player has links to the music store as well as YouTube so you will be spoilt for aural choice – and there is even an FM radio onboard the Sony Ericsson XPERIA X10 Mini Pro.

Considerations

The QWERTY keyboard on the Mini Pro makes the handset quite a bit thicker than the original X10 and marginally thicker than the Mini.

Verdict

If you want a compact smartphone with a good camera, music player, social networking, touchscreen and physical QWERTY keyboard, the Sony Ericsson XPERIA X10 Mini Pro is for you.