Sony Xperia 5

[Aneres11]

So I know that literally no one is interested in Sony devices around these parts , and well, any parts really , but I just picked up an Xperia 5 for £349 brand new from someone at work who upgraded to it, got the free PS4 and didn't want to change his current phone!

I told him he could get more on eBay, but he didn't want the hassle!

Anyway, I bought it with the view to give it a go as I have always liked Sony devices, it's just the camera that lets them down generally.

I've had this for over 24 hours now and it's honestly one of the nicest phones I've ever held. Smaller than the Xperia 1 which was a beast, but with the 21:9 screen it makes it a skinnier phone that just fits in the hand nicely.
I'd be really pleased if that was the next phase with smart phones. Making them taller does make it harder to reach the top of the screen, but you get much more content on the screen and it makes even the bigger phones easier to hold.

Screen - amazing. OS - amazing. Build quality - amazing.
Haptics - like any other rubbish Android.
Battery - really very good indeed considering it's a smaller battery powering a big screen. Google could learn a thing or 2...
Camera - disappointing. Yup as expected, it's disappointing. It is capable of taking a really good photo, and it seems to be faster at snapping than previous Xperia devices. But portrait mode is not really up to snuff compared to other devices and the front facing camera is honestly one of the worst I've ever seen.
Not that I take selfies, but doing a test of it and it's laughable.

I love the design so much though. It's just lovely.

Will carry on testing the camera though at the weekend etc and see how I go with it. For that price I can't complain coz I can sell it for more than I paid.

 

[HappyIntro]

That is one nice looking phone, congrats on your great deal. If I was in the market for an Android phone, I'd take a hard look at Sony's offerings.

 

[Aneres11]

That is one nice looking phone, congrats on your great deal. If I was in the market for an Android phone, I'd take a hard look at Sony's offerings.

Thanks. They’re strange devices really as one part of me thoroughly recommends them, the other part doesn’t.

If they could just sort their cameras out and put better haptics in (Pixel 4 standard) they’d be onto an absolute winner.

 

[Aneres11]

So my Xperia 5 has received it's Android 10 update this morning and it is made (what I think is) a great phone even better.

Full gestures like the Pixel now which work just as well, and a dark mode across the board.
You could enable a dark mode in developer settings which I had done, but it didn't darken notifications or settings menus etc.

Now it's fully stealth.

This has been the phone my sim has been in for over a week now and have zero desire to go back to iPhone or Pixel.

I think it's the one of the best hardware designs I've used. Loving it.

 

[MarkX]

How are you finding the Xperia 5?

I'm finding myself drawn to it.

 

[Aneres11]

How are you finding the Xperia 5?

I'm finding myself drawn to it.

Its a great phone. Such a nice device to use. The feel in hand is amazing and I really love the 21:9 aspect ratio. It’s something I want other manufacturers to move to in 2020.

The camera is the downside, but it is still capable of taking fantastic photos. You just need to make sure you use the right mode. Auto generally gets the job done, but switching to manual allows you to control HDR, and can often give better photos in indoor lighting as you can choose the type of light source you’re working with.

watching Netflix on it is a joy as is any 21:9 video consumption. Considering there’s a small battery in there it regularly gets 6 hours SoT.

Hardware is just second to none for me. As is generally always the case with Sony.

 

[MarkX]

As long as the camera takes a half decent photo I'm happy. For me, the cameras on any of the high end phones are more than adequate.

How is the fingerprint scanner/facial recognition?

 

[Aneres11]

As long as the camera takes a half decent photo I'm happy. For me, the cameras on any of the high end phones are more than adequate.

How is the fingerprint scanner/facial recognition?

Oh yeah, FPS is pretty useless too unfortunately. It isn’t so bad if the screen is woken before attempting but even then it sometimes misfire. Hope they fix it in an update.

I don’t recall there being facial recognition. Will check.

 

[Hastings101]

I had an Xperia X Compact a few years ago and loved it besides the terrible camera. Good quality when it worked, but it was so slow that the picture was usually blurred or messed up the rest of the time. Glad to see they haven't thrown in the towel yet as Sony's phones are the best looking on the market IMO.