[Q] Do xperia x2 is a good phone?

[esad (SE Xperia X2)]

hey guys, im asking your opinion..im going to buy a new phone this february, i look that x2 looks nice...but i saw that many people disappointed with this phone because they said it always freeze, lag, low battery life...is that true?? please help me, if this phone good, tell me...im gonna buy this phone next month...if this phone is not good, then tell me why? what can i do to make this phone good? or u can suggest me better phone(must have 8mp camera, long lasting battery, wi-fi provided, great speaker for music, touchscreen, side slider qwerty keyboard, large resolution and screen)...

 

[gbajzelj]

well, it depends on what do you expect from a phone. but mainly, no it isnt a good phone.

if your looking for a good phone buy HD2 (the second hand HD2 is around 80€ more then a second hand X2 but its worth every cent).

its a year old model with still good hardware. you can instal on it MW6.5.X or android... In my oppinion there is no better phone for a XDA forum entusiast.

but let me say another comparison from my own experience (since i had both X2 and HD2) X2 in my country costs like 200€ from second hand and it freezes. battery life is nothing to bragg abouth. bad touch experience its like slavery.
on the other hand HD2 cost from 280 up and its emense freedom. It works great, feels great. touch experience is great. hardware is strong. MW6.5.x, froyo, obuntu, wp7... freedom.

X2 does look good but the software is a joke and not a funny one.

if you have like to much money then get x2 just to see an example how can a solid phone on paper go disturbingly wrong in real life.

have a nice day.

 

[RJH57108]

A lot of people have opinions like the ones expressed by gbajzelj ... and I would like to express one of liking the X2 ...

I have had it since 4/2010. I am very hapy with the phone -- but I like the WinMo 6.5.3 interface with its flexibility -- and not having restrictions on the app use.

Regarding the phone -- I use the standard WinMo frame, disabled slideview, run overclock (with a clock speed of 1024), run Garmin XT, use Clean RAM, Lookout, have bluetooth always on, sync with IMAP email every 30 minutes and I am in HSPDA network coverage.

I get 2 days of battery usage, the last freeze was at least a week ago, and I don't remember when the one before that was. It doesn't play video very well ... but I am not sure if it is the video or not -- they are downloaded ones from UTube that were converted to mp3 format. Movies that I took with the phone itself work fine.

There are times when the phone will stutter and take time to respond -- usually when it is not getting a responce from the web (like PCs do when the network connection is hosed) ... If I wait for no more then 15 seconds, it responds, and then I do a Ram Clean and the X2 is back to normal ... it have been a week since that happened ... and it could be that I have learned not to do certain things -- but they do not appear to be related to a specific set of things that I do ...

The bottom line is that I am very happy with the phone ... and the times that it fails is no more bothersome then when Win XP failed or locked up on a desktop. I really like the keyboard for text entry and the office programs to run excel spreadsheets and storing of data in Word documents.

But as gbajzelj has said, other phones also run WinMo 6.5.3 and will also serve you well ... but I am a long term SE customer, and I have not been disappointed with the X2.

As a side note ... I looked at the new Dell phone (running Android -- I think) at a store, and its responce -- sliding screens / opening programs -- did not seem to be any faster then my X2 ...

 

[robuash]

If you don't mind loosing several hours in upgrading firmware, installing some fixes and avoiding to install almost all the Sony Ericsson buggy software, the phone will work fine. There are several post explaining how to do it, but doing this means that you won't have panels or slideview and some others SE's addings, but the phone will be faster than before (this doesn't mean that it will become in a fast phone) and what is most important, stable whit a decent battery life.
Despite of this, don't get cheated by its theoretical features: 8.2 mpx camera is not what is was supposed to be, it's not bad, but my old Nokia N73 takes better photos, smaller, but better, which is a shame. The video recording is painful. The response of the screen is not good, neither bad, but not good. The amount of RAM, 256 mb (about 100 mb free), could not be enough in some cases. Some features like the LED notifications, the light sensor or the backlight management don't work properly.

In conclusion, X2 isn't a bad phone (if you don't mind spending several hours in tuning it), but its paper features are very far of what they were supposed to be.

Greetings.

 

[esad (SE Xperia X2)]

gbajzelj

then how could i make x2 be a great phone?? how to make it not lag anymore?

RJH57108

you convience me 2 buy it now..anyway, u disable the slideview, then how u use the phone in side-ways? are there hotkeys to turn the screen to slide view?

robuash

does it really take time to update it? what worst case can happen during update? is it true that update it to MR2 make it fast?


or u guys can suggest me other phone..i would like to have a phone that i can store many music, 8mpx camera, touch and sideslider, support games, great loudspeaker, wifi, no lag, great battery(atleast 2 or 3 days minimum for heavy and moderate usage)

 

[robuash]

MR2 makes the phone more usable and a bit faster, avoiding to install SE's **** adds another bit of speed and stability, but after all, the phone won't become in a snapdragon, it will be acceptable as best.

Upgrading firmware supposes the same risk than in other phones, if you run out of battery or you computer turns off, your phone will become in an expensive brick.

I don't know any other phone with this specs, the are great phones, much better than X2, but in my opinion always have a weak point, or the camera is rubbish, or don't have qwerty keyboard, or the battery is insufficient, etc... For me, no one is absolutely complete, so i can't suggest you anyone.

Hope this info helps, greetings.

 

[esad (SE Xperia X2)]

thnks..well, last question, how much time did it take to update it?

 

[RJH57108]

RJH57108

you convience me 2 buy it now..anyway, u disable the slideview, then how u use the phone in side-ways? are there hotkeys to turn the screen to slide view?

Slideview is a panel that runs on the X2 -- there are panels installed on the phone, and Slideview seems to be started even though you use a different panel ...

Slideview has nothing to do the the screen rotation that is automatically switched when the keyboard is slide out -- there are also auto-rotate fixes for the x2 that will allow programs to rotate to the lanscape mode with just turning the phone (most of the -- don't rotate problems -- seemed to be related to games) ...

For playing music (I actually use it to play audio books) -- I use Mort's MortPlayer -- which seems to work well, and with an ADP2 bluetooth headset, they are easy to listen to ...

Good luck with your decision ...

 

[ashkaeli]

@ RJH57108
(originaly plans to pm but then again the answers may help)
Does the notification bug (the one where alarms e.g. sms notifactions like sounds and vibrate wont work after a while of use) happen to your phone? Had me always resorting to soft reset so that I would know wheter I have sms or not..
Could use some help tuning this phone...
Might as well search for a overclocking program too..
Current using the 'free up ram' feature of sktools..how does it par with ramclean?
If its ok, I would like to pattern tuning my phone from yours..

 

[RJH57108]

I don't have the problems with the notifications ... I get them (both sound and vibration -- also when I have a bluetooth headset in use -- an A2DP capable one) even after days of having the phone on ...

I find that RamClean seems to work better without any problems -- I used to use the SKTools one, but it would occasionally freeze the phone ... the RamClean does not have problems ... I use the Level 3 clean with a scheduled clean every 3 hours ...

 

[ashkaeli]

Will probably reset my phone this weekends if I'm not too busy...
Might as well try the 'start-from-clean-wm6.5' step..
Hope that fixes the notification bug too..
Good luck to me.

As for the overclocking, are you using the method in this thread?
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=767538&highlight=overclock

 

[RJH57108]

That is the right thread ... using nueOverClockTest and Msm7kCpuSpeed ...

 

[damonous]

hey guys, im asking your opinion..im going to buy a new phone this february, i look that x2 looks nice...but i saw that many people disappointed with this phone because they said it always freeze, lag, low battery life...is that true?? please help me, if this phone good, tell me...im gonna buy this phone next month...if this phone is not good, then tell me why? what can i do to make this phone good? or u can suggest me better phone(must have 8mp camera, long lasting battery, wi-fi provided, great speaker for music, touchscreen, side slider qwerty keyboard, large resolution and screen)...

I have not had battery problems with X2; I've used it since Aug 2010. I always have bluetooth on, and connected to my BT watch, BT car stereo, or BT home phone. I have LOTS of stuff installed, and a 32gb SD card. I've been known to run certain apps for 2-3 hrs straight with screen on and still have some juice left over.

In all, I enjoy the phone for it's sleek design and excellent flush screen more than I did the X1 (I bought the X1 the month it debuted, and still have it). The keyboard is absolutely untouchable. That alone is something that makes any kind of bugs something you say, "I'll have to search for a fix for that," rather than, "I better get a new phone".

If SE ever really focused on fixing the firmware one more time, or present an Android option ...the X2 would stomp all over similar devices.

But, there are indeed many core issues with this phone that you have to surmount, even after upgrade to MR2 firmware:
1) Fix for the SD Card corruption-bug
2) Fix for the display backlight timeout not being controllable.
3) Fix for forcing the screen to go off, but not the device to 'sleep' (this helps with certain BT & wiFi connections & software)
4) Add software to select programs for auto-rotate w/G-sensor
5) Add Opera
6) Add Advanced Config to tweak system
7) It's better if you overclock it.
8) Add SK Tools for system maintenance
9) Add JetWare bluetooth extension in order to transfer contacts to car stereo (I had to do this with X2; didn't have to with X1)

Items 1-7 are all freeware, although some may be hard to find.

That being said, this is Windows Mobile...so not a real big surprise that you'll have some issues. If you want real 'freedom' with your OS, ...this is what you'll need to work through. If you want trouble-free but vanilla computing, get an iPhone.

The comments above by gbajzelj & robuash are extremely valid, on the opposing ends of view....

gbajzelj

then how could i make x2 be a great phone?? how to make it not lag anymore?

RJH57108

you convience me 2 buy it now..anyway, u disable the slideview, then how u use the phone in side-ways? are there hotkeys to turn the screen to slide view?

robuash

does it really take time to update it? what worst case can happen during update? is it true that update it to MR2 make it fast?


or u guys can suggest me other phone..i would like to have a phone that i can store many music, 8mpx camera, touch and sideslider, support games, great loudspeaker, wifi, no lag, great battery(atleast 2 or 3 days minimum for heavy and moderate usage)

A note on SlideView: this is essentially an extension of their media panel from the X1. While being a frustrating and buggy piece of software as people say, ...it's slick as Hell. I mean, I don't want to delete it (or the whole panel interface). It's why I bought the phone. I just think it's ridiculous when people say, "Fix your X2 by deleting SlideView and all Panels". --Oh, Thanks for that.

Just understand: you do need to buy a standalone photo viewer (Resco is great), and if you can't learn to love Windows Media Player, then expect to buy something like Pocket Player. SlideView is great for a handful of files, but not if you want to spend a lot of time with it. By that time, it will generally have cataloged some file it didn't like and crashed.

SlideView is launched if you press the hardware panel button once; panels are called by pressing the same button twice in quick succession. This could be better. Especially if your phone happens to be bogging-down at the time, ...you might not get the desired result on the first try.



A note on MR2: The firmware includes the "Saturn" black/gold theme from SE, which totally changes the look of your WM6.5.3 interface. It is slick, and it smartly increases fonts in correct areas, while making WM look modern. MR2 however, does not make the X2 magically 'fast'.

And, I think robuash is talking about the type of fixes I listed above. You will need to spend time tweaking. As a matter of fact, after running since about Sept, ...it's about time for a reload from scratch to clean things up. When I have 8hrs to spare, I'll get around to it. (Maybe I'll take a day off from work sometime.)

Lastly, I think someone above mentioned memory. As opposed to the X1, internal memory is very limited on the X2. You have to be real creative how you install stuff, and install absolutely everything you possibly can on the SD card instead of the system. (This is also where SK Tools comes in handy, because it lets you 'move' programs between Card and System & back, even for some programs that don't give you a choice at install time.)

Also, once you dip below 20mb program memory in the phone, it tends to get real buggy. I'm just above that right now, but I've got LOADS of programs installed (creatively, on the SD card).

 

[XtriFe]

I too, been thinking about getting the X2 for a long time. But theyre still quite expensive (In my opinion). I've always loved sony ericsson phones. I had the X1 awhile ago, my first WinMo phone, paid $250 for it, I only buy full qwerty phones, but at the time, i was all crazy about the whole android thing and the X1's keyboard was already giving me issues (space bar and some letters registering twice) so i got really dissapointed and sold it.

Then finally got myself the motorola milestone which i loved, but after tweaking my X1 so much, i sort of got bored with android, but it was still a GREAT phone so i decided to keep it until a couple of months ago mainly because, unfortunately, the milestone i bought (from amazon) was not compatible with my carrier's 3G frequencies so i had to use EDGE all the time, slow as hell. So i sold it and and decided to go with the HTC fuze so i could try winmo again, paid $100 for one(used) and cool and stuff but it still didnt look as good as the milestone or the X1 (thick phone and the screen sucked compared to the X1 and milestone) so i looked up the X1 on ebay and bought one used for $100 too lol.

So now i have the X1 AGAIN and love it more than ever BUT, theres the keyboard and flex cable issue >< , plus, the keyboard isnt as comfortable as the fuze's. Anyways, it just seems like the X2 would be perfect for me at this time since it would basically be a X1 without the issues i just mentioned. The only problem is that they seem to cost $250/$350 on ebay. For that price i could get used phones with way better specs.

Also, im not sure about X2's current android development.

 

[gbajzelj]

shure X2 can be made farely OK (but not GOOD) phone with a little work and help from our friends from XDA.

but just to reming you. this device when came out costed around 500€ ($600). at lunch (in january 2010) it had old CPU (qualcom msms 7200 came out in 2007, alot devices from 2008 had it) it also had only 265 MB RAM wich was already then to little.

it was slow and buggy at lunch and it still is now (last update in may 2010 i think thats only 4 months after release and that is liie saying your costumers F YOU).

for a phone that costed 500€ at lunch i can assume its high end phone. and some people assumed that and pay for this phone when it came out.
i have to point out that i got it for free in february 2010 and i still have a feeling of being cheeted. for that kind of money it shoud look great (that it does), feal good (typing on the qwerty is nice, but the touch is a joke, even x1 had better touch response but x1 screen was not secured as good as x2 is) and also it shoud WORK good, wich if we buy a phone that is assumed high end it should but x2 doesnt.
what kind of high end phone corupts data on SD card (jeah there is a SDFIX but some data deffinitly got lost before it was made. and that does not sounds like a high end phone) what kind of phone takes almost 1/2 hour to setup (after a hard reset) and then works so slowly that you have to hard reset every week (shure you can hardreset, and interupt the costumizatin to have clean WM6.5.3 and then install some staff by yourself to make it usable)?

if a costumer buys a product (and again 500€ for mobile phone means it should be a mean machine, a multimedia monster, not that it says [email protected] video then even on the QVGA the framerate is not totaly 30fps) that product should work without ours deletting the SE stuff hardreseting it, SD problem fixes, notification problem fixes, LED problem fixes, baterry problem fixes, killing a task in taskmanager freezes... the phone should work great out of the box for gods sake! are you that dumb! IF YOU PAY FOR SOMETHIONG YOU SHOULD GET WHAT YOU PAYED!

just a little comparison i have a X2, had HD2 (had to sell couse i urgently needed money (am deffinatly buying HD2 again), and again the X2 is such a ****ty phone nobody wants to buy so i had to sell HD2), and my friend has htc tattoo.

X2 costs almost like HD2 (x2 €500, hd2 €550 maybe €600 and im talking new phones at thair releases) x2 has the display resolution like HD2, has a very nice query that is great to type. but it has a cpu slover then tattoo (and those who sees 528MHz and think the cpus are the same, THEY ARE NOT. 7225 is newer then 7200 the 7225 it might not be alot faster but it isa little faster) and has the same amouth on RAM as tattoo (256MB). and at my mobile operator with contract X2 costed 300€ and tattoo costed 60€, tatoo at elast has android (donut is realy old now but back then it was fine). im a fan of WM 6.5.x but still on X2 some things, that work on others 6.5.X devices, doesnt work.

in short (not realy):
-price is high end,
-qwerty above average,
-touch is low end (its better with the stylus but average max)
i so miss the touchpad with up, down, left, and right butons from my X1.
-cpu/ram is the low end of smartfhones (already was low at relese in Jan 2010 if i tell you that tattoo came out in Sep 2009 and tattoo is a low range of samrthones)
-it has a high end display resolution (but combination of slow hardware and big display resolution isnt the best)
- it has stability problems (stability wise the phone isnt finished yet. it more feels like a beta tester unit) the SD gets corupted, killing tasks in task manager has a chance your device will freeze and the are then strange happenigh when making a call or reciving a call (not always but sometimes, at least 2x a week) and then people who you are calling or who is calling you is asking "hey man whats wron with your fency phone? is it broken already". and you know that its not broke its the software wich is not good.
the best part of SE programing is definitly the Phone program it runs great. its well finger optimized and the contact list is so fluid, has nice tabs and so on.

to say in one sentence. mediocre phone with good qwerty, slow hardware and a hefty price tag.

at the moment am using it just for mailing, and surfing the web on my wifi. for calling im using my 6 year old nokia 1600 at least nothing goes wrong with that one and the battery runs for 10-12 days.

sorry for bad english.

 

[XtriFe]

im not 100% sure yet but after reading this whole thread im thinking of just fixing my xperia X1 (ribbon cable issue) and sticking with it rather than buying the X2

 

[gbajzelj]

well X1 is more fun then X2 for shure. 6.5.3 is more finger friendly but the touch respond is not good with fingers (if X2 had capacitve display this would be a totaly diferent song). plus 6.1 that is on x1 is more functional. more stuff works as it should. alot of programers did not rewrite their apps for 6.5, 6.5.X so some apps have some truble here and there. spb shell (used 3.5.3, 3.5.5 runs to slow) in landscape on my X2 with 6.5.3 has some problems with hight and width. its not a big problem but its notiseble.
plus X1 has SE panel1 and 2 that i love. and the biggest plus in my opinion alot of roms to flash.

if i had a chance to swap X2 back for X1 i would. oh and if you get your X1 repared. and if you get sick of panels, spb shell, android, ubuntu... give a try to spb pocket plus wich i adored on my x1 its a nice small plugin for todayscreen. you have icons on the today screen, and nice tabs (7 max i think) and it looks realy nice. uses nice icons for everithing.

X2 might be OK to get if you get one totaly functionl and with no demage to the body for less then X1 will cost to get repared. but i dont think that is possible.

wish you luck.

sorry for bad english.

 

[XtriFe]

I see, thanks for your answer. Well, what about the X2 camera? i keep reading mixed reviews, some people say its garbage, others say its as good as the cybershot branded phones. How good is the camera in comparison with the X1?

And also the keyboard, thats the main reason i'd buy the X2, the camera would be a plus, IF its any good. But i guess those reasons alone arent enough for for me to spend $250 right now. I'd just save a bit more and buy a moto milestone or something.

 

[damonous]

I see, thanks for your answer. Well, what about the X2 camera? i keep reading mixed reviews, some people say its garbage, others say its as good as the cybershot branded phones. How good is the camera in comparison with the X1?

And also the keyboard, thats the main reason i'd buy the X2, the camera would be a plus, IF its any good. But i guess those reasons alone arent enough for for me to spend $250 right now. I'd just save a bit more and buy a moto milestone or something.

I realize this is a month later, but if you (or someone) is wondering about the camera, you should know:

The X2 camera, while indeed being 8.1 mpxl ... only manages "2 mxpl" when in 16x9 mode. At least, this is how the menus describe it. On the X1, there was no distinction about a lower amount of mpxl's in-use when in 16x9 mode.

In reality, I'm not sure if this is truly a surprising bit of 'reversal' (where the older model is actually superior, albeit with a lower 'spec'), or if they just didn't 'publicize' the lower mxpl in the 16x9 mode on X1. --It does tend to put a 'bummer face' on you when you see that in the X2 camera menu.

Now, that being said ... I'd say that (however you shoot) the X2 camera is superior to the X1 in one very major way: lower compression. Although I took many a fine shot on my X1 ... the compression was pretty bad (especially on a city scene, etc. with a lot of varying detail & colors). The X2 shots have a more 'normal' look.

On the downside, the X2 seems to be more 'focus-finnicky', no matter what you do. You really need arms of steel to take a perfect shot on the X2 (and that was not the case on the X1, especially when using the 'motion mode' in the presets).

On the upside, I think the X2 produces better color balance in most lighting situations. I often take pictures of whiteboards at work after meetings. With the X1, I always needed to run pictures through varying levels of color-correction before sending-out, etc. I still do with X2, but to a lesser extent. Something with the contrast-balance is better so that lined text (like you have from board markers) maintains its quality. --This may again be another example in favor of X2 because of lesser-compression, actually.


So, it's a trade-off:
X2 'feels' like a much better camera (overall)
X1 is a little more solid/reliable, but less-potent & 'feels' more like a cellphone camera.


(There we go again. Yep, X2 is a sleek, upgraded phone, ...but with its share of quibbles.)

 

[larzazral]

maybe this website may help you to make a choice..

http://www.gsmarena.com/sony_ericsson_xperia_x2-review-443.php