SONY XPERIA U REVIEW

Design and Features
Unsurprisingly, where the Xperia U feels most budget is in its design
and build, but not in the way you’d expect. Its combination of a matt
white unibody chassis and glass screen is as classy as most premium
handsets, while the clear plastic strip that runs below the screen is a
nice touch, just as it is on the rest of the Xperia lineup.
No, where the budget leaning is most obvious is the size of the thing.
Although the screen is technically the same 3.5in diagonal as that of
the iPhone, it’s considerably narrower and all told the phone looks and
feels small. What doesn’t help is the thick bezel that makes the display
look even smaller than it is.
Otherwise, there are just a few subtleties that further take the edge
off, such as the thick black trim round the screen’s edge and the
rather obvious gaping hole for the front facing camera, but neither of
these are close to being deal breakers.
What’s more that smaller size makes this a superbly easy handset to
handle. It weighs just 110g and with dimensions of 112 x 54 x 12mm
it’s an easy fit in the hand. As with the rest of the current Xperia line,
those stylishly squared corners do dig into the hand a little but not
enough to really worry.
One point to note is that the matt finish of this white version does pick
up dirt quite easily, which is something to be aware of if you’re a
regular newspaper reader.
That removable end cap simply pulls off and alternates slide on. There
was a spare yellow one in the box of our review sample which we tried
and then promptly ditched – we weren’t all that impressed with the
combination. You can also get a black version of the phone that comes
with an alternative pink end cap. Gimmick? Yeah, pretty much.
Adding to the overall ease of use are a great selection of buttons and
other features. Below the screen are three nicely responsive touch-
sensitive buttons for navigating the main interface while the right edge
is home to the three other main controls, the power, volume and
camera shutter buttons.
The power button isn’t quite so easy to reach in left-handed use but
for right-handers it falls perfectly under your thumb making for easy
one-handed use. Likewise the volume rocker is easy to reach, and the
shutter button is great for controlling trickier shots – hold it down and
it’ll jump straight to the camera even when the phone is locked too.
Up top is a headphone jack while on the left edge is a microUSB
socket for charging and hooking up to a computer to transfer files.
There isn’t, however, a microHDMI socket for hooking the phone
straight up to a TV.
You can remove the backplate to access the 1290mAh battery and
(normal size) SIM slot but there’s no microSD slot for expanding upon
the 8GB of built in storage. This latter point could be the deal breaker
for many as in fact only about 4GB of this is user accessible. This will
mean regularly having to remove and backup images captured on the
camera to make room for more, swap in and out different music
depending on your mood and possibly even having to uninstall some
apps to make room for others.