Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray: Android Smartphone With Finesse
Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray – With only 3.3 inch screen (8.4 cm) diagonal, thickness of 9 mm and light weight (100 g), the Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray falls into the category of mini-smartphones. While keeping the claims of a standard size unit, with its MSM8255 Qualcomm CPU at 1 GHz, the Adreno 205 integrated graphics and 512MB of RAM. We tested for several days 01Lab and everyday use.
The smartphone Xperia Ray has a nice finish. Its plastic shell is not very noble, but the price of its lightness. The design of the device is simple and very effective, nothing stands out. The only regret is the lack of protection on the micro-USB jack, wide open, which can get dirty easily. Last detail of style, a light band around the Home button on the front, both unobtrusive and useful to know if the smartphone has completed its recharge (the light switches from red to green).
Fluid interface and pleasant
The graphic overlay Sony Ericsson has improved since the arrival of Xperia Arc, and that’s good. Contact lists scroll smoothly, it is fluid, responsive, too pretty to look at and easy to use.
However, use this interface reveals some shortcomings in terms of features and ergonomics that make it a little frustrating. The integration of social networks via the program Timescape (and widget) is a good example: very attractive, but not really practical for everyday use. Some manufacturers, like Motorola and HTC, are doing much better in this area.
The keyboard of the Xperia Ray, however, is a success. The screen is narrow, you can choose between a full keyboard and 12 keys (like a telephone) in portrait mode, or choose landscape mode and use the full keyboard on a scale even more comfortable. Typing is fast and accurate.
A slow
Other defects, some occasional slowness and random. Nothing too serious, however, the Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray remains nervous overall (score Quadrant in 1690). It was during Web browsing it gets harder. The smartphone is functional, but the scrolling of pages can sometimes be slow, not really smooth, especially when Flash modules are displayed. No question of playing sophisticated games, the phone will not run properly, and the small screen is not designed for the players.
Multimedia limited, but quality
Multimedia side, Ray brings the Xperia made a video and audio quality. The image is retouched by the Bravia Engine from Sony (which is never a motor image editing rather than classical).
The player offers good sound reproduction, powerful and well balanced, which can be effectively modified using several equalizer presets (no manual).
The problem is that this smartphone is compatible with many formats. In video, it is limited to MP4 (H.264 up to 720p and 3GP), skipping over the Xvid, DivX and WMV. Even more surprisingly, he failed to read our AAC audio files (though passing on almost all other smartphones), and merely the Wave and MP3 (or WMA or OGG).
The photo sensor of the Xperia Ray has beautiful pictures in daylight, a little noisy in darker environments, but the flash will help maintain a satisfactory quality.
The video quality, at 720p, for its part is correct, but not exceptional.
Enduring a smartphone
We measured good scores for autonomy with the Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray : 5 h 30 3G Web surfing and 7 h 19 in video playback with the screen brightness set to 200 cd / m². In voice communication, we fall in the average mid-range smartphones: just over 8 hours. It is generally good. In normal use, you can unplug the device early in the morning and plugging it back late at night without worry, but no more. - Sony Ericsson Xperia Ray
