Interesting design, decent screen, good battery life, reasonable price
Processor could be better, not latest version of Android, no 4G
The Xperia Z is the jewel in the Sony smartphone crown at the moment, but there are some interesting things happening further down the scale, like the Xperia L, which combines style and capability for around half the price.
It's on sale now for around £229.
As you can guess from the price, the Xperia L lacks the HD screen, quad-core processor, 4G connectivity and waterproofing of the Xperia Z, but it does have a few items in its favour.
Design
It's a good-looking handset, with Sony's dynamic curve design that gives it a distinctive arcing shape. It's not especially slim at 10mm but that curve makes it seem thinner than it is. Top and bottom have an unusual looking slant to them too, which shows off the metallic strip that runs all the way around the handset. At the bottom there's also a rather attractive LED effect that pulses when you receive alerts.
On paper, the 4.3-inch touchscreen sounds like a step too far down towards budget level, with a resolution of 854x480 pixels -- well below the Xperia Z's full HD 1,920x1,080. At 228ppi it has roughly half the pixel density of the Xperia Z, and even behind some midprice rivals like the Google Nexus 4 (320ppi). But while it's perhaps lacking a bit in detail, it still manages to deliver rich and vibrant colours with good contrast that show off movies to good effect.
Android, software and processor
It's running Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean which is a perfectly fine operating system, but one that's now starting to look a bit old, especially with version 4.3 already starting to appear. Still, the age isn't immediately obvious since Sony has updated its user interface and you can now arrange the icons on the various screens in different ways -- alphabetical, most used or your own custom arrangement.
The dual-core processor is backed by 1GB RAM which is pretty much the least we'd expect on a phone of this price these days. It does a decent if unspectacular job of keeping all its various processing balls in the air, though it did start to lag just a little with a handful of apps running at the same time. In our AnTuTu benchmark test it managed 10,918 -- not bad, but noticeably behind Samsung's recent S4 dual-core devices like the S4 Mini and S4 Zoom.
Photography
The 8-megapixel camera includes an LED flash, autofocus and Sony's Exmor RS sensor for better capability in low light. It starts up very quickly and you can get it going even quicker with the Quick Launch mode, which takes a snap or starts the video running as soon as you switch on. Other features to play with include HDR, panorama mode, image stabilisation and calibrated smile detection (you can set it to detect different levels of smile). Picture quality is pretty good overall, with nice sharp edges and accurate colour balance.
There's 8GB of memory on board, though you can bump that up by a further 32GB via microSD card -- not for apps though, just pics, vids and music. The battery held up reasonably well too, giving us around a day and a half of steady use.
Conclusion
The Sony Xperia L is far from the cutting edge of smartphone development, but it's a good looking, solidly built low to midrange device with a decent screen and a pretty good camera. The processor is a little lacking, and it's a shame it's not running the latest version of Android but it's a solidly capable handset for the money.
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Software: Google Android 4.1 Jelly Bean
Processor: Dual-core 1GHz Qualcomm MSM8230 Snapdragon
Memory slot: Yes
Display: 4.3in TFT, 854x480 pixels
Connectivity: Wi-Fi a/b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.0
Ports: microUSB, 3.5mm headphone jack
Camera: 8-megapixel with LED flash, auto focus and Exmor RS sensor; VGA front-facing camera
Video: <strong>playback</strong>: MP4, H.264, H.263, WMV
Audio: <strong>playback</strong>: MP3, eAAC+, WMA, WAV
Radio: Yes
Battery: 1,750mAh
Size: 129x65x10mm
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
