No wonder Sony Ericsson's XPERIA X1 is so good: HTC makes it

The company that once designed the Treo for Palm (and countless other amazing white-label devices) is apparently back in the ODM game. That's right, if you were wondering how the hell Sony Ericsson pulled the XPERIA X1 rabbit out of its hat, look no further than HTC. While we don't think they did any of the special software, we heard it through the grapevine that the X1 is all HTC-built, which kind of explains a lot if you ask us.

[CUBSWILLWIN @ Feb 10th 2008 10:20PM]

go figure is all I have to say

[derX @ Feb 10th 2008 11:37PM]

Wow, this really is one of those moments where you just sit back and say "oh."


----

I am suddenly much less excited...though still very excited, phone sounds awesome, still...*prays for drivers*

[rafa @ Feb 11th 2008 12:46AM]

I don't really get any of the sentiment in this reply or the OP. Sony's phone hardware has always been pleasing to the eye.

What I can't believe is that HTC came out with something so nice and curvy; the rest of their handhelds look like generic bricks.

[michael @ Feb 11th 2008 1:05AM]

Where's Engadget getting this from? There's no reliable read link or anything.

Is this just another one of those 'rumors' that Engadget likes to post up every so often?

I hope not. I love WinMo.

[DelSource @ Feb 11th 2008 7:09AM]

SE would have designed it and will be in control of QC so quit the pathetic taunts.

And so what if SE are using another manufacturer for this model? Every single Apple product in existence is made by another company (no-one complained about iPods being made by ten year old Chinese kids....). Apple don't own a single manufacturing plant.

Just another excuse to pile the hate on Sony.

[CUBSWILLWIN @ Feb 11th 2008 7:38AM]

I myself have a link that engadget could use as a read link:http://mobilephoneonline.blog.co.uk/2007/09/21/sony_ericsson_moves_to_windows_mobile_wi~3015713

[SirPasta117 @ Feb 10th 2008 10:21PM]

I hope i can use my T-mobile sim in it...cause if I can....EBAY!!!

[aaron @ Feb 10th 2008 10:34PM]

You will be able to. It will even use the upcoming 3G from T-Mo.


Why sell it on Ebay?

[SirPasta117 @ Feb 10th 2008 10:37PM]

won't be selling...but buying :) I dont talk too much so I use pre-paid phones...currently im using a pre paid t-mobile

[Dave @ Feb 10th 2008 10:56PM]

youre on prepaid & don't talk a whole lot yet you are going to spend $700+ on a phone on ebay because it "looks cool"? you sound more like an iphone user...

[danny @ Feb 11th 2008 12:15AM]

@aaron:

Wait wait. T-mobile is rolling out 3G? WTF?? Please say you are right...

[Tony @ Feb 11th 2008 12:55AM]

@ danny

Yes, welcome back.

[Justin B @ Feb 10th 2008 10:22PM]

Oh good, now the keyboard will be shitty and unresponsive.

[Isaac @ Feb 10th 2008 10:22PM]

I think you would be more worried about the camera.

[Yankees368 @ Feb 10th 2008 10:25PM]

Dont forget about missing video drivers!

[DelSource @ Feb 11th 2008 7:11AM]

SE will be in charge of quality control, morons. It's their product. You know, just like Apple are in charge of quality control for the ten year old Chinese kids who make the iPhones in anonymous state-owned "factories".

[Isaac @ Feb 10th 2008 10:22PM]

This made me more excited, I love HTC.

[DT @ Feb 10th 2008 10:25PM]

This bodes well for the graphics drivers :rolleyes:

[Dave @ Feb 10th 2008 10:50PM]

what would be REALLY ironic is when we find out that the exact same Qualcomm MSM7500 chips in the Touch Cruise are in this, except these magically DONT have disabled drivers...honestly if this turns out to be the case HTC can burn in hell.

[josh @ Feb 11th 2008 10:33AM]

And up next, lets bitch about the iPod not providing drivers to utilize the WMA decoding that is provided on their chipset! Do you even own any of the phones with the chipset or are you just jumping on the "Bitch about it because we can" wagon? How about you go look up the battery life of the TyTN II and Touch Cruise; notice that they suck balls. Now go and look up the power draw of the ATI Imageon. Its average power draw is much greater than the average power draw simply doing all of the graphics in software (by average I mean painting the home screen and most apps, rather than media or game playback). When the devices are actually used for video playback I suspect the battery dries up quicker than the macbook air's.

Gasp! It isn't cut and dry. HTC may have actually been weighing tradeoffs and tried to provide an optimal solution for the most amount of customers. This is a company that continually provides free upgrades to new version of WM, even on some of their older handsets, which is something almost no other WM OEM does (samsung, moto, etc only do so very sporadically). They seem to be committed to actually supporting their customers, so one could hypothesize based off of their past behavior that they may be holding off on the drivers for a reason other than just laziness.

[Jesse S @ Feb 10th 2008 10:26PM]

That makes me want it less. HTC doesn't have that great of a track record in regards to build quality.

It still isn't CDMA, though, so I won't be getting one anyway.

:(

[aaron @ Feb 10th 2008 10:28PM]

Hmmm I will have to disagree with you. I have had a few HTC built phones and the build quality was fine.

[Sean O @ Feb 10th 2008 11:55PM]

I agree with you. HTC is all bells and whistles, but shoddy quality. I've had three. First was an Audiovox, before anyone even knew what HTC was. Battery sucked, and WM Smartphone edition 2003 was a joke. 2nd was an HTC Wizard (Cingular 8125). Touchscreen would die occasionally (a very common and known issue with that model). And although I should have learned my lesson, I went ga-ga over the first 3G PDA-Phone for the us, the the 8525. The blutooth radio would turn itself off constantly for no reason. This was a known issue that lasted over a year before they finally fixed it with the WM6 firmware update. Just a few weeks ago, the LCD stopped working and now only displays garbage (probably stress on the ribbon cable from repeated use of the slider).

These were not inexpensive phones. Far from it. I paid top dollar. The 8525 cost me $650.00 because I was already on a contract with Cingular. People should understand these products are not rugged at all.

I'm not an iPhone owner or Apple fan or anything like that. But if a 3G iPhone comes out soon, that will be my next purchase.

[Spyvie @ Feb 11th 2008 12:46AM]

Wow, my T-Mobile Wing has been rock solid, aside from the crappy camera.

[Patrick @ Feb 10th 2008 10:26PM]

Crap phone made by third rate company. HTC is sinking.

[sinjinn @ Feb 10th 2008 10:31PM]

how do you know its a crap phone?

[Einhanderkiller @ Feb 10th 2008 10:35PM]

He's a psychic.

[Frank @ Feb 10th 2008 11:18PM]

I got money on he's a IPhone owner.

[Patrick @ Feb 11th 2008 12:00AM]

Actually I am a Tilt owner.

[James @ Feb 11th 2008 12:09AM]

Actually he's a Tilt owner.

[riggs @ Feb 11th 2008 8:51AM]

makes you and your comment seem even more idiotic.

[MonteVale @ Feb 10th 2008 10:33PM]

Well if it takes for them as long to get this thing out to the market as it takes HTC Shift to propagate...
then who cares.

[Evan @ Feb 10th 2008 10:35PM]

XPERIA + ANDROID = SOLD

[michael @ Feb 11th 2008 1:12AM]

Ok, just honestly wondering, but:

What would Android provide that my WinMo phone couldn't provide?

I'm tired of hearing some users cry "Does this come equipped with Android?" in a lot of phone posts.

As far as I can figure out, the only thing worth noting is that it's free. But aside from that (not sure how much WinMo cost on its own), I can pretty much do exactly the same thing on my phone. There's tons of add-ons and ways to extend your WinMo phone. It's very versatile, and it syncs up computer files pretty good for the most part.

So what's with all the Android-love going on here?

[Iain @ Feb 11th 2008 2:50AM]

@michael: how about more than 65k colours?
With a screen like that, it deserves better than just 16-bit support.

[JLTate @ Feb 11th 2008 3:03AM]

"So what's with all the android love going on here?"

...

Why am I suddenly reminded of Futurama?

[Bob @ Feb 11th 2008 8:26AM]

Electro Gonorrhea: The Noisy Killer

[BluesK1d @ Mar 10th 2008 11:07AM]

Couldn't agree more. I am cautiously hopefull since HTC is a member of Google's Open Handset Alliance.

[MonteVale @ Feb 10th 2008 10:37PM]

it is not a hanful of samples, but rather an inexpensive (well somewhat reasonable) device that can be mass produced. HTC is knows to have this things done right but totally stumbled on the Shift, hopefully they can get back on track.

[jason L @ Feb 10th 2008 10:49PM]

i would want that if it was for anyone EXCEPT tmobile
cdma would be even better

[Mark @ Feb 11th 2008 8:29AM]

CDMA would suck. Does Sony Ericsson even make CDMA phones anymore? I think they discontinued making CDMA phones for the North American market.

[dBs @ Feb 10th 2008 10:54PM]

Question now is, will I trust them this time given their drivers debacle?

Vindictive side says "no way, let them lose your money"
Geeky side says "Ohhhhh! gimme gimme gimme!"

[Dave @ Feb 10th 2008 10:56PM]

Retrospective side says "oh shit, HTC jipped me again!"

[Virtuous @ Feb 10th 2008 10:54PM]

Sony Ericsson probably knows next to nothing about Windows Mobile.

[Mr.X @ Feb 10th 2008 10:54PM]

I hope that [b]S[/b].[b]E[/b].[b]X[/b] is not using the same MSM7200 or MSM7500 chipsets from Qualcomm which HTC failed to provide an appropriate driver resulting in poor video playback, games, taking pictures, etc...

[url]http://htcclassaction.org/[/url]

[Mr.X @ Feb 10th 2008 10:57PM]

I hope that S.E.X is not using the same MSM7200 or MSM7500 chipsets from Qualcomm which HTC failed to provide an appropriate driver resulting in poor video playback, games, taking pictures, etc...

http://htcclassaction.org/

p/s: sorry for the "[" & "]"

[kcmanuel @ Feb 10th 2008 10:58PM]

I'd like to know what processor it'll be using. I'm quite content with the speed of my Kaiser, although I give credit for it's speed to custom windows mobile builds and tweaks....the original windows mobile that came with it was a bit slow. I'm hoping this one will have the newest processor available, and that its just not a pretty skin over Windows Mobile 6.1, but a full blown improved UI.

[The_Steven @ Feb 10th 2008 11:37PM]

And with the proper VIDEO DRIVERS this time?

[Nick @ Feb 10th 2008 10:59PM]

Lets get things streight, the reason this is not CDMA is because USA is Sony's second of third market. Having a GSM phone meains that they can sell the phone to about 86% of global mobile phone users (source: http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2008/02/06/3253928.htm)

Yeah, HTC has had some pretty bad press lately but there's a reason they have been the top WM OEM for years. I have owned HTC phones for the past 4 years and i can tell you that their build quality if a lot better than the nokia and motorola phones I have owned. And just because they have not released the video drivers for the past few phones does not mean they will be doing the same for this Sony device. Sony has a reputation that they want to keep up and I can assure you that this WM device will be quite nice.

[Sam Winter @ Feb 10th 2008 11:04PM]

HTC build quality better than Nokia? Are you kidding? I'm no fanboy of either as I still have an old Treo, but after I played with an N95 and N800 and every HTC model I have to call BS on that.