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Xperia Play Blooper Reel
Wednesday, May 25th, 2011SE Canadian E-Shop Attacked – 2,000 Customer Details Stolen
Wednesday, May 25th, 2011Another day another theft of data from Sony … well Sony Ericsson to be exact this time. Hacker have targeted Sony Ericsson’s Canadian e-shop and made off with the personal details of some 2,000 customers. It follows on from the PSN attack last month and then there was the attack on Sony’s Greek music service.
There was some good news, well not exactly good more like less bad really, in that Sony Ericsson are saying that the data stolen didn’t include credit card details and that stolen passwords were encrypted. For the moment though the Canadian e-shop is down.
Video: Sony Demos SmartAR
Thursday, May 19th, 2011Sony have posted up a video of their SmartAR technology on their official YouTube channel and it is definitely worth a look. I’ve not been terribly impressed by augmented reality in the past.Oh don’t get me wrong the concept is amazing, it’s more the implementation that sucks.
One rather large annoyance has been the rendering speed of the technology, often seeming a bit laggy when not being powered by some sort of Cray supercomputer. Equally the really cool AR demos all seem to rely upon external markers being used rather than simply ananchor object e.g. a poster, a picture, etc. I don’t know about you, but I don’t often walk around with coloured bands on my fingers or special objects to dangle a few feet in front of me.
Well take a look at this video. There are a couple of points to note, not the least of which is the sweet response times. It looks pretty fluid for the most part. Also note that there are no external markers in use, just an anchor point. Also keep your eyes peeled for the action continuing even when that anchor point is no longer directly visible to the phone’s camera!
Sony Not Bothered By Low Xperia Play PSone Game Sales
Monday, May 16th, 2011Sony are putting a brave face on low sales of PSone games for the newly released Xperia Play. Of the five original titles launched on the Android Marketplace for the handset none have managed to sell more than 1,000 copies since the early April launch.
The actual figures (courtesy of PlayStation LifeStyle) are as follows:
- Cool Boarders 2 – 100-500
- Destruction Derby – 500-1,000
- Jumping Flash – 50-100
- MediEvil- 100-500
- Syphon Filter – 100-500
In a seemingly contradictory statement to the above numbers Dominic Neil-Dwyer, Sony Ericsson’s head of market development, commented that the Xperia Play was ‘shaking up‘ the market.
I think there’s also an awareness thing for people that are getting their hands on the device and where they are choosing to purchase games. There’s only a few, at the minute, PlayStation One titles there, and there’s more coming on a regular basis, and there’s the whole PlayStation as a content provider exclusive to the device, the story about that, that will emerge and people will see.
So, there’s no concerns, it’s a revolutionary device, it’s shaking up the market, we’re very pleased with it. In terms of getting the PlayStation Certified program out, generally, we’re very happy. I think we’ll make a full assessment of if it has achieved our expectations fully, further down the line, so we’re very happy.
It’s perhaps a bit harsh of us to be pointing and shouting ‘FAIL’ this early on of course, but even though the device and its content are just out of the door those sales figures do look alarmingly low. Granted that Neil-Dwyer says more titles will be forthcoming and of course variety is the spice of life.
I did rather wonder at the arguably self-contradictory remark made at the end though where just after saying that ‘there’s no concerns’, Neil-Dwyer then says “… we’ll make a full assessment of if it has achieved our expectations fully, further down the line …“. Why are there no concerns if you are wondering whether or not it will live up to expectations?
[via CVG]
Need Help With Your Phone? O2 GuruTV!
Thursday, April 21st, 2011I know many of you are pretty smart chaps when it comes to working with your handset, but not everyone is and even the best of us can sometimes scrabble around trying to find how to do something relatively simple with our handset. Enter some very useful O2 videos from the O2 GuruTV channel on YouTube!
The channel was setup and is operated by the British arm of O2 and contains various video tutorials showing you how to do a variety of different things with your handset. It’s not uncommon to see on the forum people asking how to do this that or the other and it’s not always easy to find the answer, especially if it is something simple because others often just assume everyone knows how to download a ringtone or how to install ‘Chrome to Phone’, etc. The O2 Videos includes just that sort of thing, with tutorials covering a variety of topics.
For example, transferring contacts from a SIM card to the SE W995. Yes, some might know how to do it, but it’s just the sort of question that can often go unanswered on the forum!
It’s not just Sony Ericsson guides they have either, for example, there is a whole range of video guides devoted to iPhone problems and other handsets. You can also submit suggestions for other videos you’d like to see!
So if you need some quick helpful advice on just about any aspect of your phone make sure you check out it out!
Is Sony Ericsson For Sale?
Wednesday, April 20th, 2011Rumours about Sony Ericsson usually centre around new handsets or when a particular handset will get an update, etc, but Mobile-Review’s Eldar Murtazin, in a personal blog entry, has unleashed a new rumour … that Sony Ericsson might be for sale!
The jist of the speculation centres around an alleged conversation between Sony Ericsson and two Chinese companies back in March where Sony Ericsson is said to have “casually and completely “randomly” asked not whether they are interested to buy the rights to the brand, take all the commitments for the maintenance of offices around the world and content staff.” One of the companies involved is said to have been Foxconn, an electronics company that many of you will probably know better as one of Apple’s suppliers for the iPhone.
You can read Eldar’s full blog entry here.
Xperia Mini Pro II Leaks Again
Wednesday, April 13th, 2011
Dungeon Defenders Xperia play Exclusive & Ad ‘Making Of’ Video
Friday, April 8th, 2011
Some Xperia Play news for you! First up is the news that Dungeon Defenders will be winding its way to the Xperia Play as an exclusive and as the press release describes:
Dungeon Defenders: Second Wave includes all of the content of First Wave, along with an entirely new player versus player multiplayer mode. Offering over 30 hours of gameplay, persistent characters, a pet system and multiple multiplayer modes, Dungeon Defenders: Second Wave is the largest and most-fully featured game available on the Android Market to date! Furthermore, all of Dungeon Defenders’ multiplayer modes can be enjoyed over WiFi or 3G.
So Yay! more games!
You reemmber those adverts they released for the Xperia Play? No, not those adverts, the other ones! Well here’s a ‘making of video’. Enjoy!
Xperia arc – First Thoughts
Friday, April 8th, 2011
The other day Sony Ericsson were kind enough to send me an Xperia arc (wish they’d let me keep it!) so I thought I’d share some thoughts on it with you. I’ll be writing up a full review of course, but for now I’ll be touching on some areas that have jumped out at me over the last day or two so you can get a flavour for the handset.
I really have to say something about the battery life of the Xperia arc because this really has been the major issue for me since the handset arrived. In a word the battery life is … amazing! Yes folks this isn’t the X10 with its 6 hours of battery life, the Xperia arc has stamina and it will last you a day. In fact since first charging my test handset the battery is still going with 7% after thirty four and a half hours. Let me make that clear that’s 34.5 hours of usage (and I was watching YouTube videos, browsing the web, making a few calls, sending/receiving a few texts, downloading & installing a couple of apps, etc). I am really quite impressed by the staying power here.
The handset itself is very responsive, menus pop up without lag, apps open nice and snappy, etc. Ok so I have only had the handset for a day or two and haven’t spent the months clogging it up with apps and data that is normally the case for Android handsets, but even so there is a very real sense that this is a responsive device.
The screen has impressed me too; at the risk of sounding gushy the bright vivid colours and the large size makes watching videos and viewing pictures a dream. Back in February at MWC I watched the entirety of Toy Story 3 on an Xperia arc (great film by the way) and it was not only ‘do-able’, but enjoyable. The screen really is one of the highlights of the Xperia arc.
It’s all been glowing praise so far so there must be something that’s annoying me about the Xperia arc right? Well yes there is and though some might say it’s a minor issue I disagree. The onscreen keyboard has proved a bit of an irritation and I say it’s not a minor issue because it’s your source of data input for many things. Yes I realise you can replace the default keyboard with other options, but the point still remains that shipping a decent default option shouldn’t be an optional luxury. So what’s up with the keyboard? Well for starters it seems to not recognise pressing the space key sometimes, which is obviously annoying, but if you have a fast typing speed it really doesn’t hold up terribly well.
All in all the Xperia arc has been impressive and I’m looking forward to putting it through its paces. Look out for the full review soon!
Sony Android Tablet By End Of Summer
Monday, April 4th, 2011Sony have been notable by their absence in the tablet market, but that looks to be changing as they plan on releasing their first tablet device this year according to CEO Howard Stringer. In comments to the Nikkei newspaper he said that the company would be putting out a Honeycomb (Android 3.0) powered tablet by the end of the summer in the U.S.
There was no mention as to when (or whether) the device would hit other markets. There was also no word as to who would be releasing the tablet, Sony or Sony Ericsson. Some might say that it doesn’t matter, which in a sense it doesn’t, but Sony themselves might be better placed to release this device given their brand recognition. At any rate whether it’s Sony or Sony Ericsson there is still the likliehood that Timescape will feature on the device. What you think Sony will release a vanilla Android tablet with no tweaking? Ha!
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