Sony Ericsson Vivaz Pro review

Sony Ericsson has recently launched Xperia and Vivaz series devices in India. Compared to the earlier released Sony Ericsson Vivaz, the Vivaz Pro comes with reduced megapixels count but enhanced slide-out QWERTY keyboard. Let's check out to find out how it fares against its elder sibling Sony Ericsson Vivaz.

There are two large, rather significant, differences between the Sony Ericsson Vivaz Pro and the original Sony Ericsson Vivaz. One is the addition of a full QWERTY keyboard, without adding more than a couple of millimetres to the thickness. The second is the camera, which is reduced to just 5 megapixels instead of 8 megapixels on the Vivaz.

It's as if Sony Ericsson deliberately downgraded the camera to give the original, released only a few months before the Sony Ericsson Vivaz Pro, a chance at still getting some sales. Otherwise, why would you not go for the Pro for the sake of 2.5mm extra in depth?

Given the fact the camera has dropped in pixels, the first question is whether it makes much difference to the quality of images. The short answer is, not really. There's an obvious drop in detail, but the sensor also has less noise in low light.

Given the disappointing camera interface is unable to offer a simple auto-flash option, and the LED is far too dim to act as a proper flash, it's actually a good thing to be able to take better photos in dimly lit locations. You can also activate the camera even when the phone is locked, using the dedicated camera button, which also has a similar button for the camcorder next to it.

You can also take photos in widescreen mode, which is set by default. This reduces the sensor to 3 megapixels, which is where it begins to impact on overall performance. It's a real backward step for Sony Ericsson, which did so well since the launch of the K750 in 2005. Now, they don't even use the Cyber-shot brand or camera interface anymore.

If you want to take decent pictures, and want to own a phone using Symbian, there's the ageing Sony Ericsson Satio or Nokia's forthcoming N8 smartphone.

Video recording is a nicer experience, with HD video capture at 1280x720. Although the video can drop frames when lots of things are happening, you'll still get good results to upload to YouTube or watch on a TV with a TV-cable or streaming to a suitably equipped DLNA television – or, alternatively, you can enjoy them on the device's 3.2-inch, 360x640 pixel, touchscreen.

Operating system wise, Nokia is in the process of moving on to Symbian's next incarnation of the touchscreen OS. It's not out for a while, but the Vivaz pro uses the current version that has been around since the launch of Nokia's 5800 in 2008. It looks dated and none of the apps seem to have any degree of uniformity. This is what makes an iPhone so easy to use, and leaves the current version of Series 60 looking exactly like you'd expect for something that was originally designed for non-touch.

Besides new themes and some more panels on the standby screen, there's little that has changed from the Sony Ericsson Satio.

The Satio had a hard time due to a raft of software gremlins, but not as tough a time as any smartphone is now getting for not being either an iPhone or Android phone.

Sony Ericsson has joined the Android revolution by introducing the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10, Sony Ericsson X10 Mini and X10 mini pro, which makes the Vivaz pro look even more like something that will only appeal to the most die-hard of Symbian fans.

The built-in Twitter and Facebook clients are both extremely lacking in features and design detail, although that is easily rectified by downloading something like Gravity instead.

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