Sony Ericsson Xperia X8

Although it might not count as a 'mini' smartphone, the Sony Ericsson Xperia X8 and its 3'' screen aren't far off.  This small touch-sensitive handset runs Android 2.1 and boasts an impressive list of features.  But what's it like to use every day?  Let's take it for a spin ...

Screen isn't very snappy

The Xperia X8's compact form factor means you can slide it into your pocket without even thinking about it, although it is a tiny bit thicker than we had expected.

Unless you're used to a slightly larger smartphone, there's nothing different about using the Xperia X8.  The first word that comes to mind to describe its external experience is 'cute': it's small, and comes with three interchangeable plastic covers in some girly colours.  That's no doubt designed to appeal to the phone's primary target, younger customers.
 
Let's take a look at that small capacitative touchscreen.  It certainly uses capacitative technology, but the real problem is how much of a pain it is to use.  It's not just that it isn't very responsive: it's not very accurate either.  That makes typing any text very difficult, both because of the small size of the virtual keyboard and the lack of sensitivity of the individual keys.  You either hit the wrong letter, or end up pressing the same key twice because your first attempt took so long to flash up on screen.  It's a problem that affects every single app and soon becomes a real pain.  Amongst the good news, the contrast ratio is good and colours are reproduced accurately.

Interface: good, but could do better

The screen might not be very responsive, but neither is the phone behind it.  Launching apps and other tasks take longer than they should.  The user interface that sits on top of Android that we first saw on the X10 mini and X10 mini pro is, however, well-designed.


There's an icon in each of the four corners of the homescreen providing a shortcut to your contacts, music, text messages and the phone dialler.  You can then add a widget (just one!) to each of the three homescreens.

To do anything else, you have to press the physical button to launch the main menu, which consists of four pages of apps which you can organise to suit your own needs.  Sony Ericsson's software layer is easy to get the hang of, but it soon became apparent that it's not very user-friendly and doesn't leave much room for customisation.

We can recommend Sony Ericsson's TimeScape app for interacting with social networks like Twitter and Facebook.

Multimedia

The music player has a nice interface and the audio it produces is of reasonable quality, even if the headphones are lacking in power and the speakers quickly become saturated when you turn the volume up.

It's probably not even worth pointing out that browsing the web on such a small (and unresponsive) screen isn't going to be much fun.  As with everything else, it will do if you have nothing better, but anybody used to making a lot of use of mobile Internet will prefer something else.


The video camera has a resolution of 640 x 480 pixels, which is enough to allow you to record a few short clips here and there but you better not expect particularly clear footage.

There are no miracles with still photos either.  Actually taking a photo takes a while once you've pressed the button, and you should avoid dark environments in favour of well-lit screens.  For a 3 Megapixel sensor, there's actually more detail than we expected, but don't get up too close, as there's no macro mode.


The Xperia X8 lasts a good two days, if not three, but that's partly because it's so fiddly to use that there's less temptation to reach for it than with a more powerful handset.  That 'strength' saves plenty of battery ...