Mobile Phone Blog:

Images and new specs have surfaced of the Sony Ericssson Xperia Arc HD, codenamed the Nozomi.

The Android smartphone will allegedly run on version 2.3.5 of the Google operating system at launch and will be powered by a Snapdragon 1.5GHz processor and at least a 1GB RAM.

The 4.3 inch LCD display will have a HD resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels along with a 12 megapixel camera capable of capturing full HD videos – that’s one hell of a camera!

Apparently there won’t be the option of a microSD card slot so you will have to make do with the 16GB or 32GB onboard storage, but who are we to question the mighty Sony Ericsson?!

See all Xperia Arc S deals…

Well, it was rumoured earlier this month (as I wrote about in a blog post at the time), and now it’s been made official by the two companies involved. Yes, according to their own press release, Sony Ericsson is no more. No more rumour, it’s a done deal; Sony is buying out Ericsson’s share, for the princely sum of €1.05 billion (about 925 million quid), and will take full control of the mobile manufacturer.

So, what does this mean for their phones?

Well, at the moment, no-one rightly knows, but for one thing, it seems logical that they’d stop being called Sony Ericsson, and would switch over to just being called Sony. Makes sense, since Ericsson would no longer be involved at all, right? (more…)

I really hate it when Sony Ericsson do this; they’ll announce a phone early in the year, and then proceed to not actually get it on sale until nearly the end of the year. I’ve seen ‘em do it loads of times, and blow me down, they’ve gone and done it again, with the Sony Ericsson Xperia pro. The phone was announced at the Mobile World Congress in February, and according to Engadget, it’s just now going on sale, in October.

Granted, the Xperia pro wasn’t that exciting, but then, you try and look eye-catching when you’re announced at the same time as the phone that everyone had been waiting for, the Sony Ericsson Xperia Play. But here’s the kicker: can the Xperia pro cut it in today’s market? (more…)

Well folks, here’s a bit of news that’s arrived about three years after it should have done. According to IntoMobile, Sony Ericsson have announced that, as well as breaking even in Q3, they’ve finally decided to stop making feature phones, and transition over to making nothing but smartphones. And yes, I have to admit, the word “about bleedin’ time” are swimming wistfully across the front of my brain.

Basically, ’tis brilliant news, this, ‘cos it means more phones like the Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc, and less phones like the nowhere-near-as-exciting Zylo and Elm. Anything that means us consumers get more high-end smartphones is absolutely a-ok by me.

Oh, and there’s more news, too… (more…)

Ooh, ooh, ooh! Here’s some news that’s pretty much guaranteed to make a lot of gamers happy (well, if they use one of a very specific range of phones): according to their own blog, Rockstar Games have decided to bring Grand Theft Auto III to iOS and Android! ‘Tis all thanks to the fact it’s GTA III‘s 10th anniversary this year, and to mark the occasion, Rockstar’s ported the game over onto the new iPhone 4S (but not the iPhone 4), the iPad 2, and selected Android phones and tablets.

That “selected” in there is a bit annoying, though, because it’s not listed as coming to the Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc, which is the phone my sister (a massive GTA fan) wants. A couple of the phones ain’t even available in the UK… (more…)

Now then, for a massive nerd like me, this is damnably intriguing. As I’ve mentioned before, I love science, and I especially love big science, even if I don’t always understand it (string theory, I’m looking at you). And when it comes to big science experiments, they don’t come much bigger than the Large Hadron Collider, at CERN.

So imagine my glee over the fact that there’s now an Android app all about the LHC, called LHSee, available now through the Android Market. Download it, and you get loads of background info on the LHC, as well as the chance to play armchair particle physicist on yer Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc (Arc, geddit? ‘Cos particle accelerators are shaped like rings! LOL! Oh, please yourself)… (more…)

Okay, I know I’ve already done a post about two Android games, this week, but you’re going to have to put up with another one, because…. oh my god, you guys, look! Boulder Dash, a game I played the ever-loving bejeezus out of on the Commodore 64, is coming to Android phones!

WIN! I tell you, whether I do get an HTC Vigor, or whether I decide I’m too skint and get the HTC Sensation instead, I am so buying Boulder Dash as soon as I get the phone. No ifs, no buts, it shall be mine. And then I can pretty much flush my entire social life, such as it is, down the swanny, because I will never put the phone down again… (more…)

Hmm, now then, this could be a potentially interesting development. Years ago, Sony and Ericsson famously threw themselves together, to form Sony Ericsson, and their phone started wearing a weird bubble-shaped badge, with a double-barrelled name underneath it. Now, though, there’s a rumour going about (according to the Wall Street Journal) that Sony are about to buy out Ericsson, taking full control of the company.

If this is true, what would it mean for the manufacturer? Would it mean there names would become that bit less unwieldy, with the Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc becoming just the Sony Xperia Arc (side note: I hope so, ‘cos damn that’s a whole lot easier to type)? (more…)

Ever since I got my grubby paws on the HTC HD2, I’ve been a huge fan of the Qualcomm Snapdragon processor. I remember the first time I ever had a fiddle about with a phone with 1GHz under the hood, and marvelling at how mobile phones were getting to be as powerful as low-spec laptops. And then, as these things usually go, phones like the Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc and the HTC Sensation turned up, and blew the performance of earlier phones out of the water.

History is soon going to repeat itself, according to Pocket-Lint, because a new class of Snapdragon processor is due to arrive by the end of the year. And as the title says, it’s running at a monstrously fast 2.5GHz… (more…)

Medfield. What’s that then? Well, without getting technical, it’s an Intel processor, that’s designed to give speedy performance, with low power draw, thus making it perfect for use in mobile phones. There’s been talk of Medfield-powered Android phones being on the cards for ages, but according to Engadget, we’ve now seen the first actual phone rocking the new processor.

As for actual performance of the phone, presumably it was quite impressive, since no-one’s saying that it ran like a three-legged dog, and ye’d expect them to, if it did. The most intriguing bit, though, was that Google’s Andy Rubin was there for the unveiling, hinting at some closer ties between Google and Intel, in future… (more…)