A Slender, Sleek and Modern-Looking Phone

The Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini Pro

If you want little and cute, then this could very well be the phone for you, but don’t be surprised if you soon get fed up of having to squint at the screen, or seem to be forever scrolling. 

What We Like

The Sony Ericsson X10 Mini Pro is a tiny little phone, just like its predecessor, the Mini X10 but has improvements.  The most obvious one is the slide out QWERTY keyboard, which is a definite plus when it comes to ease of texting and emailing.  There is also a virtual keyboard when the slider is closed that is well optimised for the screen, but we still preferred the QWERTY.  Naturally, the physical keyboard’s keys are on the small side, but we were able to use it easily because the keys are slightly raised and they are well spaced, though reading what we had written had us reaching for our reading glasses.
 
We were pleased with the Mini Pro’s fast Wi-Fi and HSPA connectivity, and this, in conjunction with Android apps for social networking makes it a great communication tool.

The tiny 2.5-inch display obviously rules out pinch to zoom, but the interface is completely usable.  The icons are large, and there are four shortcuts in the corners of all 20 home screens, so accessing functions is simple and fast.

It’s possible to place a widget on each of the home screens, something we liked because it made accessing information easier than having to open a separate app each time.

What We Don't Like 

The Mini Pro measures a tiny 52 mm x 90 mm x 17 mm when closed, so we found we were forever searching down the back of the sofa for it.  Our carelessness aside, we thought that its miniature proportions still felt a little chunky because of the QWERTY keyboard, but on the whole we were happier to put up with the chunkiness rather than lose the keyboard.

As with other Sony Ericsson phones, the Mini Pro offers Timescape, which brings together your Facebook and Twitter updates, missed calls and texts.  Sounds great, but you can only see a couple of words of your message on the screen and so have to wait for the relevant Web site to load.

The Mini Pro runs Android 1.6, which is outdated and means that you won’t be able to access the full quota of apps available, and some of the features, like support for Exchange email, which later versions of the OS have. 

Conclusion

We are surprised that Sony Ericsson has produced another tiny phone.  Yes, they have enhanced some features, notably the QWERTY keyboard, but we don’t feel it really has a place in the smart phone marketplace.  Naturally, having Android makes it more than a cute novelty but it certainly isn’t cut out to deal with the demands of heavy media or web users.