Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini Pro

By Ian Knott
 
I was quite excited to get my hands on the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini Pro as it was my first ever experience with the much lauded Android operating system.
It took me all of about 1 minute to absolutely fall in love with it. The phone was running Android 1.6 – which is an older version of the software – but Sony Ericsson has promised an upgrade to 2.1 any day now. That said, I was still blown away by the dynamic menu system, total ease of navigation and the user-friendliness associated with every feature. I just hadn’t experienced so much pleasure from simply flicking through menu systems since the day Sony’s PSP was released. When a gadget makes me feel like a kid with a new toy all over again, I always know I’m onto something special.

What sets the X10 Mini Pro apart from the similar X10 Mini is the slide out QWERTY keyboard – which is a Godsend in such a small unit. However that makes the Mini Pro a fraction larger in length and thickness (about 17mm) which is thick in terms of mobiles these days, but doesn’t seem to matter in such a tidy and attractive package.
The 2.55” LCD screen doesn’t boast the greatest resolution in comparison to other models and brands but it’s vivid and very viewable in bright conditions (something that many expensive phones still suffer from). The screen is no doubt the reason that the Mini Pro has an excellent battery life. Probably the best out of any Sony Ericsson in recent times.
The Mini Pro has a 5MP camera and takes great photos in well lit settings. It doesn’t fare too badly in dim conditions either, where many phones produce grainy and noisy results. There is a nice zoom function within your photo album (making up for the lack of a pinch action) where holding your thumb down on the screen brings up a +/- slider which is very responsive.
One of the best apps on the Mini Pro is called Timescape. It centralises all your communications and friends whether it be from SMS, calls, emails, Facebook, Twitter, Google contacts and groups all communications from them into tiles that can be flicked though. It collates music, pictures and videos associated with friends and contacts. Choose a friend and have Timescape display all known contact and content from that friend in an easy to navigate manner. It’s very, very handy if you’re one who relies on that form of social communication.
Despite coming with many of the usual smartphone apps, the Mini Pro isn’t realistically big enough to fully utilise as a serious business and lifestyle tool, but it’s more of a fun phone with a heap of interactivity thrown in so you can show it off to your friends. The reasonable pricepoint of $699 suggests this too, it’s an excellent entry level Android smartphone that you’ll be very hard pressed to fault.
I only had one bad experience with the Mini Pro and that was in removing (or attempting to remove the back cover to put my Vodafone Sim card in. I could have sworn I was going to break the phone with the amount of force I had to use to get the cover off. It does get slightly easier once you get the knack, but that initial, first time experience was a nightmare.

Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini Pro specifications: