After the blurry, noisy image of the rumored Sony Ericsson Shakira we finally get to see it on a bunch of pretty nice looking shots. Apparently, the Android-running smartphone will actually be named XPERIA X8 but we’ll have to wait for its official announcement to see the full specs sheet of the device.

Meet the Sony Ericsson XPERIA X8

While we still have no clue what the XPERIA X8 will come with on board we do know how it will look like. Now, forget about the low quality image of the X8, which leaked a week ago, and enjoy those his-res photos.

More Sony Ericsson XPERIA X8 photos

XPERIA X8 will take the free spot right between the extra large Sony Ericsson XPERIA X10 and the super tiny Sony Ericsson XPERIA X10 mini. And as the images reveal, on top of the Android OS (version unknown) we’ll see an X10-mini-like UI. Sadly, we don’t know any other features of X8.

It seems Sony Ericsson Satio is geared for another major update, which should bring over WVGA (864 x 480 pixels) video recording update to the current VGA capabilities. There is some other new stuff as well including direct Facebook and YouTube uploads.

The list of changes continues with threaded messaging, DLNA support and various UI improvements. Unfortunately, there’s no word on the Vivaz homescreen getting officially to Satio.

The official Sony Ericsson blog just announced that the latest update to Sony Ericsson Satio will start rolling to users as soon as this weekend. Availability schedule is region-specific and will continue throughout the next week. Some operator versions might take even longer, but hopes are that the new software version will be available to ALL users within a couple of weeks.

You can get the update through the Sony Ericsson Update Service client.

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Shocking as it may sound, Sony Ericsson will be a little late with getting one of their phones on the market. The Sony Ericsson Vivaz was supposed to hit the shelves in February in a joint launch with the XPERIA X10 but apparently neither of them is going to make it in time.

The Symbian-running Sony Ericsson Vivaz is already available for preorder from Vodafone UK but will actually hit their shelves on 9 March. The phone will be available for free on a 2-year 30 GBP/month contract including 600 anytime minutes and unlimited texts.

There is no UK exclusivity about this deal and other carriers will get the Sony Ericsson Vivaz too, but it’s the first concrete date that we get.

In case you are still undecided about the eventual purchase of the Vivaz you can check out our review. A demo of its impressive panorama feature can be found in our blog as well.

Editorial: This one caused a storm. We guess we need to step up and clear something out. Regardless of what fans might be thinking, we don’t gather at night to burn Sony Ericsson flags and cast curses on the Swedish-Japanese joint venture.

If some of the said fans actually bothered to read the Sony Ericsson Vivaz review, they would know that we quite liked the little fella. Don’t you think that if we wanted to get one back at them, that would’ve been the best place to do it? Not to mention Nick’s blogpost the other day, which says it in plain language: that we are happy users.

But no, god forbid we write about another delay by Sony Ericsson. There might be a point in all this anyway: A Sony Ericsson delay is hardly news anymore.

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Introduction

Sony Ericsson is an alliance of two tech giants and with phones like the Vivaz it shows. It’s a gadget all the way, one that will galvanize geeks and charm the regular user.

Sony Ericsson Vivaz official photos

A whole bunch of point-and-shoot cameras today boast 720p video recording, but are they not an endangered species feeling enormous pressure on both sides? For one, there are compact video recording DSLRs pushing down with competitive price tags, and then cameraphones are eating into compact camera territory with comparable still image resolution and video capture.

Eight megapixel still images and 720p video with continuous auto focus make the Sony Ericsson Vivaz a predator of point-and-shoot cameras. The Vivaz is not just a cameraphone though, it’s a smartphone as well – a tricked out Symbian running on a 720MHz CPU with a 3.2” nHD display to show it all off. That’s all in a package more compact than any combination of a stand-alone camera and a phone you can think of.

High-end smartphones have a long history of trading compact size for cramming in one feature more than the competition. The Sony Ericsson Vivaz strikes a perfect balance between being compact and feature-full – great news for anyone who doesn’t appreciate the recent craze of smartphones the size of a table… umm… tablet.

Key features

• 3.2″ 16M-color resistive touchscreen of 640 x 360 pixel resolution
• 8 megapixel autofocus camera with LED flash, face and smile detection, geotagging and touch focus
• HD 720p video recording @ 24fps with continuous auto focus
• Symbian OS 9.4 S60 5th, topped with a custom-brewed homescreen and media menu
• 720 MHz CPU, PowerVR SGX dedicated graphics accelerator
• Quad-band GSM support
• 3G with HSDPA 10.2Mbps and HSUPA 2Mbps support
• Wi-Fi and GPS with A-GPS
• microSD card slot (up to 16GB, 8GB card in the box)
• Built-in accelerometer
• Turn-to-mute
• TV out
• Stereo FM Radio
• microUSB and stereo Bluetooth v2.0
• Web browser has full Flash support
• Preinstalled Wisepilot navigation software
• Office document viewer
• Decent audio quality

Main disadvantages

• No camera lens protection
• No auto mode for the flash/video light
• LED flash not powerful enough
• The S60 5th edition UI isn’t to the best in class standards
• No proximity sensor sensor to lock the screen during a call
• No DivX or XviD support out-of-the-box
• No smart or voice dialing
• No office document editing (without a paid upgrade)
• No stereo speakers
• No digital compass (magnetometer)
• Videocalling uses only the main camera (no secondary one)

The feature list leaves very little to complain about, so is it time retire your old compact camera and make the jump the Vivaz? That’s what we’ll try to find out. As for its performance as a smartphone the list of key features suggests smooth sailing most of the way.

How the Sony Ericsson Vivaz stacks up against he competition

Hold on to your hats folks, we’re jumping into the hardware part of this review.