The
Sony Ericsson Xperia mini pro has the look and feel of its Xperia X10 predecessor: a small, pocket-friendly messenger that offers a lot for its size and price. Some clever use of space and there's suddenly room for a 3" screen in what's virtually the same package.
We're having the pleasure of a white Xperia mini pro. It's entirely made of plastic: the battery cover has glossy finish that usually gets all smudged up in no time, but fingerprints are nearly invisible on the white paint. Those are inevitable on the screen of course.
There's little in the way of embellishments, which the white body seems to do well without. Two silver strips on both sides of the Xperia mini pro are the most conspicuous accents. The
Home key up front and the QWERTY deck have the same trimming. The phone looks good in a simple, fresh way.
The Sony Ericsson Xperia mini pro has a 3”
HVGA touchscreen – a scaled-down version of the so-called Reality
display in the Arc and Neo. It's been scaled down both in size and resolution, but still a notable improvement from the original 2.55" QVGA display.
The
LED-backlit LCD unit is enhanced by
Sony’s proprietary Bravia Mobile Engine. The display produces really nice colors, has decent contrast but the viewing angles are limited. There's considerable loss of color when viewing at an angle. What we were impressed with is the excellent sunlight legibility.
The small Reality display is excellent
The capacitive screen has excellent sensitivity. The slightest of touches will do for user input to be registered.
Below the display is the usual trio of hardware controls. The difference to the last year's model is the Menu and Back keys are capacitive, with a single hardware control in the Home key. Quite surprisingly, the new Xperia mini pro has managed to both increase screen size and get better controls. The Home button has good press, while the capacitive controls are well-defined, nicely backlit and haptic enabled. All are very comfortable to use.
There are three keys at the bottom of the front panel
Above the display, we find a status
LED, the earpiece, the proximity and the
ambient light sensors plus the video-call camera. The proximity sensor disables the display during calls.
There's both manual and auto display brightness setting and the ambient light sensor is doing a good job of adjusting to the available lighting.
The earpiece is flanked by the status led, two sensors and the video-call camera
The left side of the Sony Ericsson Xperia mini pro is completely bare. The only thing to notice here is a small slit to use and pull the battery cover open.
The empty left side
On the right-hand side, things have stayed the same as before: the volume rocker on top and a shutter key at the bottom. The volume rocker is reasonably comfortable, the up and down keys are prominent and solid to press. The shutter key is super soft, with very deep half press. We liked it. .
On top of the handset is the power/lock key. It’s a bit small but easy to reach and press. The other things to find there are a
microUSB port, the 3.5mm audio jack and the secondary microphone used for noise cancelation.
The screen lock key is right next to the Xperia mini pro peculiar audio jack
The bottom of the Xperia mini pro features the lanyard eyelet only. The microphone pinhole is on the QWERTY keyboard near the bottom of the phone.
No more teasing, let’s slide the Xperia mini pro open and reveal its key feature: the four-row QWERTY keyboard. Just like its predecessor, the mini pro’s keyboard is reasonably sized and does a wonderful job unless you have really big fingers.
There is enough space between the keys and the press feedback is good. There's something about this keyboard we liked better than the original X10 mini pro. Maybe the keys are a bit more prominent, or the finish is different - making them more tactile. Anyway, there's nothing in this keyboard to complain about. Of course, the size is something to consider - you'd do well to try this messenger to make sure it's a fit.
The back of the Xperia mini pro features the 5 megapixel camera lens and the LED flash. The loudspeaker also goes in here, slightly to the right.
Removing the battery cover reveals the hot-swappable microSD card slot and the SIM compartment.
Taking a peek under the cover
The 1200mAh battery is said to ideally last 340 hours of standby and 5 hours and 25 minutes of talk time in a 3G network. In reality, the Xperia mini pro managed over 3 days in stand-by, connected to a Wi-Fi network most of the time. When we really put it under pressure though, the phone barely lasted a day. It was always connected to both the 3G and Wi-Fi networks, we did heavy browsing, music and video playback, and the usual benchmarks.
The Sony Ericsson Xperia mini pro is comfortable to handle and fits every pocket. There isn't a more compact messenger currently on the market. The Xperia mini pro is a well-built handset, with high quality, albeit plastic, finish. The slider runs sharp and even, no wobbles and such. The mini pro lives up to its name, efficient and a pleasure to use.
We got our hands on the Asus Eee Pad MeMO ME370T earlier today, and Nvidia just confirmed its price and chipset: the 7-inch Android tablet sports a 1280 x 800 resolution and a quad-core Tegra 3 SoC (not a Qualcomm SoC as previously thought). The best part? It'll only set you back $249.
Flustered with the original Transformer Prime you just purchased? We'd advise you to have a seat. ASUS just took the wraps off an all new Transformer Prime (the TF700T) here at CES, which is presumably designed to rival Acer's newly-announced Iconia Tab A700. Notably, this guy won't be an outright replacement for the existing TF201 model; it's simply an upmarket alternative for those tired of the same specs over and over again. Speaking of, let's dive under the hood of this 
one, shall we? It's a 10.1-incher with NVIDIA's Tegra 3 within (1.3GHz quad-core Cortex A9), a Super IPS+ / Gorilla Glass 10.1-inch display with a downright silly 1,920 x 1,200 resolution (watch out, Lenovo!) and 32GB or 64GB of internal storage space. There's also an 8 megapixel rear camera / 2 megapixel front-facing cam, support for 1080p playback, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR, a micro-HDMI port, microSD card reader, a 25WHr Lithium-Polymer battery and a chassis that weighs just over a pound. It'll ship with Android 4.0.1 onboard (yeah, that's Ice Cream Sandwich), and will be compatible with the exact same keyboard dock as the existing Prime. Needless to say, ASUS is aiming for the stars with a build sheet like this, and the $599 to $699 retail price points enable you to know it. It'll land next quarter here in North America, and no, there's no GPS functionality listed on the spec sheet after the break; though we've been informed that this new Prime will come with a new back panel design (pictured after the break) that should enhance WiFi, BT and GPS performance.
Moving onto more diminutive offerings, the Eee Pad MeMO (ME171) that we saw months ago is getting a formal reveal here in Las Vegas, boasting a 7-inch WXGA (1,280 x 800) IPS capacitive touchpanel, a 1.2GHz dual-core Qualcomm 8260 processor, a gigabyte of memory, 16GB / 32GB of storage, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR, a 1.2 megapixel front / 5 megapixel rear camera (with 1080p recording), an A-GPS sensor, gyroscope, proximity sensor and a micro-USB port. There's a 4,400mAh Li-polymer battery reportedly good for some 8.5 hours of video playback, and it'll be Android 4.0.1 running the show. The unit checks in with dimensions of 7.8- x 4.6- x 0.50-inches (and a weight of 14.2 ounces), and while mum's the word on price (sadly), it'll supposedly ship in Q2 to North American adobes.
keep up with the newest technologies and contemplate about how these will be used in the future. On this blog I'll share my thoughts about the future of technology, based on the high Tech Road Show Blog inventions of today. 
Sony Ericsson Xperia mini pro
The camera key and the volume rocker are on the right
The lanyard eyelet is at the bottom • the microphone pinhole is on the kyeboard
The 5 megapixel camera is joined by the LED flash and the loudspeaker at the back
Handling the Xperia mini pro
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