Alongside the Sony Xperia M5 Sony unveiled the Xperia C5 Ultra, a phone with slightly lower specs, but a bigger 6.0-inch screen.
It’s a true phablet then and though its specs aren’t quite as impressive as the Xperia M5, let alone flagship phones, they’re still very much at the upper end of the midrange. So is this the phablet for you? Read on for our first impressions.
The Sony Xperia C5 Ultra has a massive 6.0-inch 1080 x 1920 screen. That gives it a pixel density of 367 pixels per inch, which isn’t the sharpest around but it’s still pretty crisp and certainly won’t leave you wishing for a higher resolution display.
Thanks to IPS LCD technology coupled with the Mobile BRAVIA Engine 2 it delivers great contrast and good viewing angles and there’s even a Super vivid mode for more vibrant, albeit less realistic colours.
The size makes it great for watching videos and viewing photos. It’s probably not the handset to buy if you like to operate your phone with one hand though as that vast expanse of screen could really test your reach.
Having said that there is a mini mode, which shrinks the display down to 4.0 inches for easier one-handed use when you don’t have both free.
With an aluminium frame and a screen that has almost no bezel at either side the Sony Xperia C5 Ultra looks high end, but not only that, it also stands out a little from Sony’s other phones, as the massive, borderless slam of glass on the front gives it a slightly different look.
It also has a slightly curved back, so it’s fairly comfortable to hold, though the large size means it doesn’t fit in the palm as well as it could. The only major mark against it is that unlike many Sony phones it’s not water or dust resistant, so be careful about using it in the rain.
The Sony Xperia C5 Ultra has a 1.7GHz octa-core MediaTek processor and 2GB of RAM, so while it doesn’t have flagship power it’s not overly lacking in it either.
You can expect fairly smooth performance from the phone, especially as it’s coupled with Android Lollipop, which is the latest and most efficient version of Android.
The Sony Xperia C5 Ultra has a slightly unusual camera setup, in that both the rear and front-facing snappers are 13 megapixel. That’s a fairly high spec for a rear camera and a very high one for a front-facing one, so you’ll be able to take sharp, detailed selfies with the phone.
There are of course a number of camera modes and features too, such as Superior Auto mode, which will pick the best scene mode for any situation and SteadyShot to keep your videos shake-free.
The front-facing camera meanwhile has a 22mm wide-angle lens, so you can fit big groups in a single shot and with a soft LED flash photos will look as flattering as possible.
Aside from its massive screen, good camera and stylish, fairly unique design there are a few other features of note. There’s its lengthy battery life for one thing, which we’ll cover below, but there’s also its speaker.
The Sony Xperia C5 Ultra has a speaker capable of 95 decibels, so you can listen to loud music without using headphones. It also features ClearAudio+ technologies to help it avoid distortion and xLOUD enhancements for impressive bass.
There’s a fairly large 2930 mAh battery in the Sony Xperia C5 Ultra which can supposedly keep on going for up to 2 days of use, depending on what you use it for of course. Sony reckons it can cope with up to 7 hours of HD video or 74 hours of music, all of which sounds pretty impressive.
Beyond that there are also a couple of battery saving modes to help you keep it going even longer.
The phone only comes with 16GB of storage but it also has a microSD card slot which supports cards of up to 200GB, which is a rarity on smartphones.
Connectivity options include Wi-Fi, 3G, 4G, Bluetooth 4.1 and NFC, so it’s not lacking for options.
The Sony Xperia C5 Ultra looks set to be a great midrange phablet. It’s got a massive 6.0-inch screen and while it’s not as sharp as a flagship it’s still got more than enough pixels.
It’s also got an eye-catching design with a truly edge-to-edge display and its camera skills are almost up there with the best around.
An octa-core processor ensures it’s plenty powerful and good speakers, coupled with its big screen, make it a media powerhouse.
There are many ways it could be better. It could always be more powerful, have a sharper display or more megapixels in its camera, but assuming it has a midrange price then it’s likely struck a good balance between specs and features.
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Dimensions: 164.2 x 79.6 x 8.2mm Weight: 187g Screen size: 6.0” (1080 x 1920) Screen Resolution: 1080 x 1920 display resolution Pixels Per Inch (PPI): 367 Processor: Octa-core application processor RAM: 2GB On-board Memory: 16GB (microSD card supported) Camera: 13MP (rear) 1080p@30fps 13MP (front-facing) Operating system: Android 5.0 3G / 4G LTE: Yes / Yes Bluetooth / NFC: Yes / Yes Battery capacity: 2930mAh Colours: Black, White, Mint Launch Date: August Price: TBC |
