Sony owes Xperia owners a refund over faulty water resistance

When you buy a phone billed as water-resistant, you generally expect it to survive accidental dunks. Some Sony phone owners have a very different story, though -- their supposedly resistant phones took water damage that required an expensive fix. If...

This could be Sony’s Xperia Z1 ‘mini’: a 20.7-megapixel camera and Snapdragon 800 in a 4.3-inch package

Sony Honami mini

Now this is what we'd call bucking the trend: a leaked document obtained by Xperia Blog, allegedly pertaining to Japanese operator NTT DoCoMo, outs a new Sony device that looks to be a mini Xperia Z1. That Sony would be quick to jump on the mobile industry's popular 'mini' craze is unsurprising, but what does seem peculiar is how the company's approaching the specifications of this 4.3-inch Xperia Z1 f. Instead of just retaining the name and shrinking the Triluminos display down (here, it's 720p) while lessening the spec load, it appears Sony's porting over both the 2.2GHz Snapdragon 800 processor and the 20.7-megapixel camera of the Z1. If true, that would explain the Z1 f's increased thickness, making this Honami mini a near-equal to its flagship namesake.

Its more pocketable screen size could also help attract customers (especially those with smaller hands) that would otherwise shun a 5-inch device. What's more, the Z1 f looks to be taking a page out of the industry's prized color book (see: Apple, Nokia) and could be available in bright pink and neon yellow, in addition to the traditional black and white. Of course, colorful phones are nothing out of the ordinary for Sony's home market and it's possible this variant could be Japan-only. Only time will tell if the Z1 f is more than a clever work of digital smoke and mirrors, but based on what we're seeing, we sure hope it isn't.

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Source: Xperia Blog

Refresh Roundup: week of September 23rd, 2013

Your smartphone and / or tablet is just begging for an update. From time to time, these mobile devices are blessed with maintenance refreshes, bug fixes, custom ROMs and anything in between, and so many of them are floating around that it's easy for a sizable chunk to get lost in the mix. To make sure they don't escape without notice, we've gathered every possible update, hack, and other miscellaneous tomfoolery we could find during the last week and crammed them into one convenient roundup. If you find something available for your device, please give us a shout at tips at engadget dawt com and let us know. Enjoy!

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Weekly Roundup: Surface Pro 2 hands-on, Xperia Z1 review, Valve’s SteamOS efforts and more!

The Weekly Roundup for 12032012

You might say the week is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workweek, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Weekly Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past seven days -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.

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Daily Roundup: Xperia Z1 review, JetBlue’s 12Mbps Fly-Fi, iMessage briefly appears on Android, and more!

DNP The Daily RoundUp

You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.

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Sony Xperia Z1 review: a high-spec cameraphone without the hump

Sony Xperia Z1 review 20 megapixels and no humps

It's time to set the record straight: the original Xperia Z, launched back in February, was a decent phone. A solid phone. It was as if Sony had suddenly paused its chaotic schedule of handset releases in order to take stock of what Android users actually want: things like 1080p, microSD and a premium look and feel. And yet, the Xperia Z failed to be compelling. It wasn't just its subpar battery life that held it back. It was also the lack of a standout feature, which caused the phone to be buried amidst all the news of the GS4 and the HTC One -- and also by the announcement of the Lumia 1020 Windows Phone, whose camera suddenly made Sony's pokey, 13-megapixel module look like old technology.

That's why today, just seven months later, we're looking at a new flagship: the Xperia Z1 (codenamed Honami, and not to be confused with the Xperia ZL), with a far more boast-worthy camera and some other subtle-but-important enhancements. Buyers of the Xperia Z may understandably be displeased at being left behind so soon, but -- as much as we feel for them -- we'd hazard a guess that they don't constitute an especially large population anyway. In contrast, the Xperia Z1 should have much greater mainstream appeal. Read on to discover why.%Gallery-slideshow84026%

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Daily Roundup: hands-on with the Samsung Galaxy Gear and Galaxy Note 3, the Sony Xperia Z1, and more!

DNP The Daily RoundUp

You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.

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Sony Xperia Z1: the new flagship with imaging at its heart (hands-on)

Sony Xperia Z1 the new flagship with imaging at its heart handson

For a while, it looked like Sony was going to work its way up and down the alphabet with each new phone. More recently, however, it's settled on one letter -- for its flagships at least -- and the ultimate letter at that. Following the lead of other OEM's, Sony appears to be easing off the fragmented releases, instead training us that Z means business, Z Ultra means bigness, and the freshly announced Z1? Well that we'll soon find out. The oft-leaked, officially teased and newest member of the Z-family comes with a few distinct features, not the least of which is that Nokia-bating 20.7-megapixel camera. In addition to the show-stopping features, there are a few more that Sony is fast making its own (such as waterproofing). Does it all add up to a new masterpiece, or is it an incremental update? We spent some time with it to try and find out.%Gallery-slideshow79370%

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Sony Xperia Z1 smartphone announced: 20.7-megapixel camera in a unibody aluminum shell

Sony's Xperia Z1, the phone formerly known as Honami, has finally been revealed to the world here at IFA 2013. As expected, the phone is fully focused on imaging capabilities, with a G lens, 20.7-megapixel camera nestled in the back of a one piece aluminum frame and waterproof tempered glass on the front. That camera is more than just the sum of its megapixels, however, as it also has some software to improve picture-taking. First, there's an Info-Eye feature that gives users contextual information about what you're shooting using augmented reality. There's also a Time Shift Burst mode that can shoot up to 61 images in just two seconds. And, all that imaging output is automatically sorted, categorized and kept in the cloud through PlayMemories Online -- and storage is unlimited for folks in the US and most of Europe.

Beneath that tempered glass is a 5-inch 1080p Triluminous display, and the whole phone is powered by a Snapdragon 800 SoC. Additionally, mobile photogs have the option of adding on the QX10 and QX100 external lenses to give the Z1 some serious optical zoom. The phone itself is set to launch this month, and those buying in Germany will get around 100 euros of content for free with the phone, and every device will come with a pass to see the movie Elysium, too. Of course, we still don't know how much the Z1 or its lens attachments will cost, but you can check out our hands-on to find out just how much you'd be willing to spend on one.%Gallery-slideshow79419%

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