Gadgetory

- some people branding on the back of a smartphone might mean that there's a bit of a tether maybe a ball and chain if you will but for Sony it does mean new horizons for their flagship device and because of t-mobile the Sony Xperia z1 has made it to the US with a few changes do they really change the experience all that much though while we're here to find out because it's charge of a guard from Android I thought a what's going on everybody and this is the Sony Xperia z1s now for pretty much all intents and purposes this is very much the same phone as the original Sony Xperia z1 with a couple different changes underneath which we'll get to in a moment after all this is the same glass finish all around the phone making for a very premium feeling device in the hand and the skeleton that puts it all together and keeps it all together is instead of metal now made of plastic this does make for a lighter phone and if you look in this particular shot there is actually a little bit more length on this version of the phone compared to the original after that though you have the same overall layout with the silver power button and the ports and micro sd and SIM card slots covered with small bits of plastic after that the only real changes are in the headphone jack which has been moved more to the middle and of course the t-mobile logo proudly stamped on this phone's lower back overall this is the same experience when you have it in your hand it is a bit of a large device for what is supposed to be sporting just a 5-inch screen and that is mostly due to the bezels around the screen there's a little bit more real estate at the top and at the bottom particularly which makes for a phone that's a little bit larger than most other 5-inch devices out there the display is the very same one that you remember from the Xperia z1 this is a 5-inch display at 1080p resolution the triluminos display that is backed by the x-reality engine and in the end you do still get the same great quality that was there in the original z1 so if you remember what that one was like is pretty much the same here with great display quality especially when you're looking at it head-on because as has become a trait of many experiences recently the viewing angles really aren't that great but as long as you're looking at it head-on this is akin to a small Sony TV in the performance aspect the z1 s doesn't disappoint because it continues the tradition that the z1 originally started with having the fastest processing package available today and that is the snapdragon 800 with the audrina 330 and two gigabytes of ram as a result power is never in shortage and the already minimalistic expiry you eye moves along just fine without really much incident at all in the hardware department so the first thing we will talk about is the fact that even though the plastic skeleton in here is different from the metal one that we saw in the Xperia z1 the reason why that happened is because t-mobile was worried about reception issues due to the metal with the plastic you should get a you should get better reception quality at least in the eyes of t-mobile but also the certifications that made the original z1 water-resistant and dustproof return here as well so you this phone right here can take a tumble or even take a plunge and it will come back ready for more after that we do have expandable storage in that microsd card slot that bolsters that 32 gigabytes built in at least in this particular device and the usual bevy of connection abilities is included along with 4G LTE support so you can take advantage of t-mobile's high-speed network and then of course there is the 3000 milliamp hour battery that provides quite a bit of longevity for this device there is a lot of power underneath and that screen is quite good so 3000 milliamp hours will get you maybe about a day or a day and a half in terms of moderate to heavy usage but the Xperia UI does come with a lot of power saving features so as long as you take advantage of those you should be able to eke out just enough from this phone that you need maybe a little bit more and then we move on to the camera which is a twenty point seven megapixel camera that brings very powerful optics in this G lens and F 2.0 aperture brings initial low-light capabilities and then there is software stabilization found within the app now speaking of the app it does unfortunately come with the same problems as the original Z 120 point seven megapixels is a great number and it does yield you very very large photos unfortunately when you want to come down from that number it goes straight to eight megapixels even worse 20.7 megapixels is used in the four by three aspect ratio and I'm a sixteen by nine guy so if I want to use 16 by 9 aspect ratio which is what I almost always use I have to jump all the way down to a pixels is just really a bummer and the trump card in this camera is its app enhancements as it does come with a lot of smaller apps that can further enhance your victory photography things like adding dinosaurs to your scene modifying your shot creatively and sharing your view live to social media networks are all possible with even more capabilities in the pipeline with more applications being developed for the camera on the Xperia line unfortunately with all of that goodness you do have to look at the quality of the photos and unfortunately it does suffer from lackluster processing it's just an inconsistent performance two really good quality shots the main problem comes in the darker details or rather lack thereof because the doctor area show up really fuzzy and lack detail it's always in the darker tones inside of a photo that things start to get really smudgy and you can get some low-light shots out of this camera but they're not going to come out very detailed like I just said and finally make it over to the software now what is actually called the time scape UI is what I usually call the Xperia UI and in that regard the Xperia UI is actually a pretty classical type of navigation when it comes to getting around Android however there are some enhancements that Sony put in that really do sweeten the pot what we have here is inside of the recent apps button these small abs now these are very familiar to any experience out there these are small applications that show up on top of your current workspace to allow you to get some quick multitasking done after that certain applications that really give you that sony esque experience or added in as well like obviously the Walkman for listening to your music and the album for looking at your photos and videos PlayStation mobile is available in here but from my experience while some of the games on there are quite fun they don't they basically just pale in comparison to the full offerings that you're probably already enjoying in the Play Store all in all what really makes us like the Xperia UI is that it's pretty simplistic while being very elegant it is quintessentially Sony in its style and its color scheme but for anybody that has used an Android device before especially ones that are more stock like you should have no problem getting into this phone and getting around quite easily without anytime at all and finally we make it over to the price yes this is a t-mobile exclusive phone and as such it does come under no contract plans so you're going to pay $0 down upfront but 22 dollars a month for two years is on top of whatever plan you're going to get and as is the case with t-mobile's plans you do have to pay off the entirety of the phone in the time that you're using it and that total in two years we'll come at about five hundred and thirty dollars and so there you have it the Sony Xperia z1s the version that is now available in the United States courtesy of t-mobile this is very much like the original Xperia z1 which we did like even though we were a bit underwhelmed mostly by the camera despite the hype that it had it just didn't perform the way that we were hoping it would but the rest of the experience is actually quite good and for a phone as sturdy as this with the glass all-around premium feel nice user experience this is still quite a steal when it comes to the Android space and because of t-mobile pricing schemes you can get this phone for zero down and get an entry point into the Android space into one of the best ones that might be out there today so as always thank you guys very much for watching and I hope you enjoyed this review of the Sony Xperia z1s don't forget to check out all of our other content here at the Android authority channel especially our CES coverage from last week we're all recovering from the craziness that was the Consumer Electronics Show of 2014 and I hope you guys really enjoyed our coverage from there we have the best of CES 2014 video right over there and make sure you check it out because that's one of my favorite videos that I've ever put together after that 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