this is the 6th phone i acquired in 2021, also a loan collateral. this was released in 2013, 8 years before 2021. this phone started the simple design cues on xperia flagships, yes, up to now, 2021. you get a monolithic phone that might not catch any attention, unless you see simple things as pleasing to the eye like me. though this phone has some share of criticisms from those who think their opinions are valuable. ha! for one, the glass sandwich design was criticized (but look at em phones in 2021). ip certification, which is still quite low on this phone was claimed to be useless (and flagships and even midrangers in 2021 boast such feature in 2021). then, there is that poor viewing angles that i will tell more later on this post.
being older than xperia z2, it is understandable that the
battery charging and life is worse than the latter. however, it managed to
charged faster than the z2, at 3 hours and 55 minutes. but the battery life is
a couple of hours shorter than the z2. it lasts for a day and 32 minutes. more
than 5 hours of which is its screen on time. can we still find new phones with
such screen on time in 2021?
battery score card
this first generation of the z series is still lacking design cues that can benefit to immersive audio. i am talking about stereo front firing speakers. instead this phone has single loudspeaker placed on the lower right corner. but the quality is quite decent. it is just too quiet in 2021, that i usually bump the volume to max to get a similar volume as the half of the xperia 1 ii. put on a wireless audio, experience becomes better. 3.5mm wired audio is also present, since it was released when smartphones consider it as a nobrainer to include. however, the port is covered by flaps which quite minimize convenience. besides, i doubt that the water resistance is still intact since this device is too old and it is refurbished, too.
web browsing is just okay. poor viewing angles is noticeable
here. i think, color shift starts at about 10-15 degrees from the middle. line
of sight should be perpendicular to the display to properly see good color
rendering. the sharpness is there even at some angle. so black text on white
background does not really post issue on viewing angles. but for images and texts
with colors that are not in contrast is an issue. but again, you can always
shift how you look at the display.
gaming is quite decent. it is more powerful than xperia miro
and xperia sp, but this first generation z phone has no sd800 series. so look
elsewhere when you are thinking of games in 2021.
the camera on this phone was enough for photo shoots and
video recording, but not in 2021. even entry level smartphones of 2021 can have
way better outputs. the improvement on z2 over this phone is noticeable. as for
the camera user experience, the z series is quite consistent. you get scene
recognition in auto mode and manual setting is not flexible. there are also
apps within the camera app. if you are familiar with lenses on windows phone,
it is similar to that.
video playback is decent. but, it also suffers on two of the
major criticisms on this phone – the poor viewing angles and the non immersive
placement of the single loudspeaker. it makes the xperia z not ideal for
sharing a movie session, even just for another person, aside from you. benefits of being single, eh?
drawbacks on this phone makes it undesirable in 2021. the
loudspeaker might pass, since not all phones in 2021 has stereo front firing
loudspeaker. but the volume fall too short. the display will also look washed
out compared to the growing smartphones using oled panels, or better versions
of ips panels. but, like every xperia i have, it is a joy to look at. it
resembles a slab of tinted glass. this phone is also light and fits good on the
hand. sharp corners was one of the criticisms also, but i do not find it as an
issue. i never had a cut using it all day. ha!
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