Sony Xperia Go is one of the first Sony rugged handset after parting ways with Ericsson. This is a very compact handset with stunning design. Sony has taken inspiration from its fellow Android Smartphone and came with this design. This is not a high-end Smartphone but a mid-range Smartphone which will satisfy the needs of a standard android handset. This handset is IP67 certified which makes it dust and water resistant. There are not many Smartphone which provides this features for a mid-range category of handsets, but Sony has able to achieve it without burning the pocket.
Design and Built:
The design of this Smartphone is very similar to the Sony Ericsson Xperia active, but there are few changes in it. Xperia Go is little bit taller than active which is done to accommodate the big screen. Sony Xperia Go is lot slimmer than other Smartphone but it is not very compact. The back panel is made of plastic and it feels while handling it. Below the capacitive screen there are three keys which are for Home, back and Menu control. On the left hands side there is a 3.5mm audio jack which is protected by plastic. On the right side, there is microUSB pot is provided for charging and file transfer with volume rocker. The power button is at the top of the phone. The back panel consists of 5MP camera.
Display:
The size of the HVGA LCD capacitive screen is 3.5 inches (480 x 320 pixels resolution) and supports 16M colors. The pixel density is around 165 ppi which is not at all good enough for any mid-range Smartphone. The screen is protected with scratch resistant glass and is water (up to 1m and for 30 minutes) and dust proof. Sony Mobile BRAVIA Engine tries to improve the display but is not that great. Up to 4 fingers can be used for multi-touch.
Features:
It comes with Android 2.3 Gingerbread, but the update for Ice Cream Sandwich update is available. The OS is fast and responsive and doesn’t generally lag. The internal storage is of 8GB but only 4GB can be used by users. The provision for external memory makes up for this which is of32GB. For connectivity GPRS, EDGE, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth v3.0 with A2DP and EDR, and microUSB port. Support for GPS is also available. 2G and 3G are easily supported by this Smartphone. The inbuilt music player is very good with interactive UI.
Performance:
This Smartphone is powered with NovaThor chipset and uses Cortex-A9 Dual-core 1 GHz processor with 1GB of RAM. The processor is may not be that powerful but since this is a mid-range handset, it is good enough for standard use. 1080p videos refused to play in this phone but playing 720p doesn’t have any issues. For GPU Mali-400 is given which is for standard use. 1305 mAh will provide 520 hours on 2G and 460 hours on 3G.
Problems:
Physical camera control is missing and there is no secondary camera. The output of the loudspeaker was not at all good which is expected from a Sony Smartphone. Support for the DivX and XviD video format is also missing.
