Sony Xperia Z1 and Z2 uses camera oversampling, which means they are binding the pixels from the 20 MP sensor into one 8 MP picture, resulting in less noise. Nokia uses the same technique in their Pureview phones. So that's why the auto mode is 8 MP.
In those days we didn't have touch screens on phones, or HD screens even, that were pretty to look at. A big phone back in the day meant it was bulky, ugly, with lots of plastic/metal. Now a big phone means big screen (since that's mostly what phones are now-a-days...a big interactive screen) which attracts lots of people like myself.
I remember having Siemens phone ( the one which came out after the first nokia phone) and it was HUGE with only 2" screen lol most of its size were dedicated for its internal parts which were gigantic at that time. Lucky they manage to shrink those sizes and put a large screen on phones today as im also a big fan of large screens :)
I know im randomly asking but does anybody know a trick to log back into an Instagram account?? I was stupid forgot my password. I appreciate any assistance you can offer me
@Javier Miguel Thanks so much for your reply. I got to the site through google and I'm in the hacking process now. Takes a while so I will get back to you later with my results.
Definitely josh was comparing this to the z1 too much. He needs to compare it to the s5, m8, g3, etc. Compared to other flagships the z2 is best. Biggest battery, highest megapixel, highest image sensor size, most RAM, fastest processor, waterproof, micro SD.
Anton Beasley I love Samsung, but somehow, I preferred the Z2 to the S5 this time :) (I realised that the S5 copied many features from other brands and put them together)
Anton Beasley www.dxomark.com/Mobiles/Sony-Xperia-Z2-overview-Revised-model-takes-first-place-in-Mobile-rankings Looking at this Z2 has officialy the best camera in a mobile phone...
Dude the g3 has the same ram and processor and the same battery lol and btw the nokia lumia 1020 has a 41 mega pixel camera which is the most on a phone and if you want the best battery life go for the nokia 3310 i think its called lol you will be surprised xD
The supersampling of the 21mp down to 8mp results in ridiculous levels of detail on my Xperia Z1 with very little noise of any kind. It's DESIGNED to oversample to 8mp - that's what makes it such a good camera. With respect, AA, you're treating a deliberate design choice as a flaw. I never use my XZ1 at 20mp - it's too soft and too much noise. 8mp images are always outstanding, especially with the latest software. I've never seen a review that said "Oh, the Lumia 1020 defaults to 5mp - what a dissapointment" because it's understood that the phone oversamples. Why do reviewers ignore this for the Sony?
Absolutely keep it at 8mp. I've got some eye shatteringly good shots from my Z1. It has a superb camera. Examples; www.flickr.com/photos/167622...7635983420745/
Tim Austin Cheers Tim, can't seem to get that link to work though? Also, I take it your advice is still the same concerning the 15.5megapixel option that's also available? (i.e. still keep it at 8?)?
William Paterson try this flickr.com/photos/16762205@N04/sets/72157635983420745/ take a gander at the last 5 shots in the set, especially the Bee and Ladybird ones. New firmware. And no, don't bother with the 15mp shots, it's just a crop of the raw 20mp.
Come on Joshua, this is not like you. Don't rush reviews, you have a loyal fan base that doesn't mind waiting for a thorough review with a proper testing period. 2 days is NOT a proper testing period. A week at the very least.
Yeah, I've been a fan of Josh's reviews so I feel Josh was too excited to have this review done. The time gap between unboxing and the review was the shortest I've seen from him. Not like the Z1 Compact where he did play around the device longer. The review would have been positively moving if Josh gave enough time. Still your fan though! :) Hope the feature focus review gets better focus on the capabilities of Z2.
I agree. He used the HTC One M8 for about a week it seems before posting the review. The same should have been done for this phone. Decent review anyway, though.
I'm here watching this in 2020 cause i miss this phone WAYYY too much 😂😭 absolutely loved this phone and found it WAYYY better than an M8 back in the day
yes,i want to buy the lg g3..but i have problems when the phone gets overheat. z2 looks more compelling to me..lg g3 is cheaper,so i guess it's lg g3 lol
I just got a Z1 and I must say I am mostly contented of my phone, but partially, a kinda felt bad for not waiting for the Z2. Still, it's only a minor upgrade in all areas and updating mine to KitKat would slightly put it on par with the Z2, but I won't for now seeing all the negative feedback. Anyway, nice review as always Josh! Hoping more content from you.
You should've reviewed the Z5, I didn't like the review that Android Authority did with the Z5 mainly because it didn't seem like she understood anything about Sony.
I don't know why Sony is behind Samsung in the android market! Samsung makes cheap phones with all the gimmicky features, and charge a fortune! Sony atleast gives a thought to the design n built quality! For me Sony and HTC would any day be placed over Samsung!
It's actually simple Removable battery. You can say whatever you want but to me a phone can have all the metal/glass you want but if my battery dies, i don't whant to send it in repair to change the battery. If it is removable you can do int in 5 seconds, you just have to buy a new one.
I have only one complaint about the review Josh. Which is on the stereospeakers. First of all its in waterproof body, if it wasn't the speakers would be 2x better. When compared to HTC it indeed had more bass, but lost on clarity, but still with Clearplus audio setting it's amazing. Secondly was xloud even on, because it makes a big difference. Lastly look at the size of the holes which the sound comes from, it's very tiny, so it's still very impressive having stereospeakers in watercoated device.
I just got my white xperia z2 today. Coming from the galaxy s4, I can immediately say that the z2's camera is definitely a huge improvement over the s4. Low light pics are actually clear with detail and tolerable noise. Comparing this review with the review of the HTC m8, it seems to be slightly biased against the z2. No mention about built in noise cancelation? But one point I really disagree on is the speaker. Speakers on this phone is amazing. Try playing something with clearaudio+ mode turned on. It's really loud and clear with deep bass. Pretty amazing audio output for a waterproof device really.
Lordie. I was waiting this WHOLE time for the Xperia Z2 to come to the US (which it only NOW has..) and while I waited for forever, I got the LG G3 instead. Damn it. Don't get me wrong, LG G3 is pretty nice. :]
I enjoyed mostly all the reviews you done to several devices, but this review didn't show the best of the phone. You didn't mention double tap to wake, didn't show 4K recording, noise cancellation and many features added to xperia Z2, that is completely different than Z1's. Anyway, I hope to that you make a video about these stuff. Great job anyway, Thanks for spending your time to show us important info when it comes to buying a new phone.
The camera improvements are impressive, and your complain of scene modes seems a little unnecessary. Who really shoots with scene modes. Learn to adjust the settings on your camera instead of trying to rely on the camera to get it right.
1301407gl than you can use auto mode even if its 8mp its gonna be way better than htc m8 and the only thing you cant change is scene mode its realy not hard to change some stetting to how you like it you only have to do it once
Poor review. The overall attitude towards this phone was very negative from the beginning and goes against all the other initial impressions of other reviewers. Will discount this "review".
I have been using this handset for two years now and I'm still happy with this. It has already been updated to Android Marshmallow 6.0.1 and it still functions pretty well. Camera is awesome that's why I don't want to give up this handset. :-)
What should I get? Z2, One E8 or G3? All have near identical specs, but leaning more towards the G3 since it has a 1440p display and expandable storage.
e8....its so much cheaper and quite frankly speaking, sony packs in too much bloatware in its phones. Also, the e8 is close enough to the nexuses price and is also better in all aspects
Question: If you set the Sony Camera with 20.1 megapixels to shoot at 8 megapixels, does it still utilise the entire sensor? It only reduces the resolution of the photo, therefore not as much sharpness when cropping, because of losing the finer detail.
I've had an IPhone for the past 2 years, it is the most overrated pile of crap I've ever had! It's 16gb but 10gb of that is wasted by the shitty IOS updates, the camera is shit and it is really slow! It's time to renew my contract and I'm leaving Iphone for this amazing device!
***** why you insult others people couse they got iphone?everybody buy what he likes..couse you dont like iphones it doesnt mean they suck,.stupid logic
Rikardo Trevino You suck,iphones works better even with low specs and you know nothing about cellphones you just another apples hater,if you dont like just say it not that a phone 500 euros and over are bad..
hello! just an advice! if you want that device go for it but I want to tell that I had one and now it's dead because of some water, it's not really waterproof, and also you can't make phone calls or internet connection unless using wifi, but generally it's a good phone, finally, if I were you I would skip this shit and go for the note 4. goodluck.
Seriously guys. This is the best phone now considering everything. Its got it all. Love all the features. Used for few days switching from iphone and couldnt b more happy. Everythings just perfect
Dustin Tran Ah okay, apologies I wasn't aware of how long he had with the phone. It does seem strange to post it a few hours after he got it. Suggests he's rushed it to try and get the review out before other channels upload theirs.
itstimmehc Speakers are up pair with the new HTC One... he forgot to turn on xLOUD or something and maybe he should show us how its sounds! Battery life review is nothing... he should test it for a day at least for a judgement! I saw 7-8h screen on time on xda! He missed the noise cancelling headphones too!
Nitsuga Shoj oh yeah! I forgot about that whole printing thing honestly. I do like to print my photos, but I usually only do that from my actual camera because of the aspect ratio thing
This review could've been a bit more thorough. Does the display show accurate colours out of the box? How's the battery life? How's the camera's low light performance? How are the noise cancelling earphones? Plus we haven't actually heard the speakers. Btekt said and showed they were nearly on par with the M8
***** Muhammad Aldhafiri I felt like Josh has somewhat rushed the review. He did indeed kept the Z1 in mind when reviewing this phone, which I felt is not good. He should at least review the phone on its own without judging its previous models When it comes to the Z2, There's a lot of big changes that happen to the phone, He didn't acknowledge the fact that the viewing angles were now improved better than they were before. And also the fact that they are focusing on fixing their mistakes and the negatives that they had from the Z1. There were new hardware and software features that were added it as well.
My Z1 is still looking fine and I'm pre-ordering the Z2 as soon it opens up in my local stores. Yes, Josh mentioned that the bezels have improved the overall phone when its dropped. These little design features really do improve the durability overall of the phone
I used yo be a samsung s4 user ...but when i dropped it the screen shattered and the plastic design sucks ..! Got my hands on the z2 earlier today and it is the beast !No doubt about it! Forever a sony user
Have you tried seeing the 4 'ultrapixel' shots from the M8 on a high-res laptop? On Facebook and Instagram it works mighty well, but it's hopelessly average for Flickr. And besides, you know something is amiss with priorities on HTC when the front camera can capture CLEARER shots in some situations than the rear camera(s)...
Paolo Ariedo in my opinion both cameras are bad. U can have 1000mpixels, but that wont give u accurate white balance, good colors etc. Nokias have best cameras/camera apps(manual controls are much better). I wouldt buy sony or HTC being a photogeek. Also from what i ve seen, sony's photo samples have very poor details. Maybe its a software problem that ll be fixed...
If it is indeed a software non-optimisation, mlsterlous then it may be improved, the same went for the Nexus 5 for instance. I wouldn't be so harsh to down quickly Sony and its imaging capabilities. It's one of the better ones in the Android space for the moment, specifically wit the Z2 (we do have to wait for the GS5 though)
I own a Xperia Z and it's a great phone, glad to see that Sony has fixed most of the issues with the original Z in just two iterations. Front facing speakers, IPS+Triluminos display, thin bezels and the latest hardware make it a must have. However the aluminium sides and flaps might be a cause of concern, because the original Z has tempered glass sides and flaps that have a layer of semi-hard rubber that makes the device water proof but using the side flaps a lot causes the rubber to come off (this happened to flap on my phones 3.5 mm jack) the same can happen to the Z2 as it probably uses 2 different materials on the sides that can let go of each other. I liked the Sony's implementation on the Xperia Z1 that had only 1 material for the flaps. I hope I am wrong though and that Sony managed to address the issue while reverting back to the original design design, other than that I am sure the Xperia Z2 is a great phone. Can't wait for the Z2 compact.
Exactly. HTC Sense looks better. Sense 6.0 is better. But this has water and dust proof, better camera, 3gb RAM, noise cancellation earphones, and a smart band (In India).
for the dust proof + water proof, im not the kind of guy to even have my phone near any liquids. better camera is true but htc's m8 does really have a bad camera and 2gb RAM is already fast on my m7, how about the m8. i already have noice cancelling earphones
Ali, But that's it ???............. You've more or less just admited this phone is a level above with features. How can you not want an underwater camera in your phone? Imagine how much fun the next 24 months will be compared with your last one. It's by far the most future proof and worthwhile on the market - and thats why i chose mine today without even seeing one in real life.
Really stuck between this and the One M8, Both have amazing screens, the best build quality, amazing specs, good ish cameras and both have good Android skins. I'm slightly more towards the One M8 though, just for the face that the speakers are slightly better and the build is unmatchable.
I just bought my dream phone here :) props to android authority for giving me an absolute honest review. There is not one flaw which I found in the phone that wasn't reviewed here. However I noticed that the phone is only capable of increasing the volume of the headset to maximum when the official Sony headsets are connected. Other than that, brilliant phone and so worth every penny!!
Gusti Muhammad Khairul Akbar yes , I have the Z2 since its release and it's a great phone , no problems whatsoever , still fast as ever , no lags , gorgeous screen , great camera even by todays standards , stereo speakers , and the phone doesn't have a single scratch !!!
Its normal for the camera to overheat in the Xperia Z2 as it is a Waterproof phone that doesnt allow the phone to "breath" through holes. This only occure while using the camera above a specific "time limit" for e.g having the camera turn on for over 8minutes can overheat the sensor.
Agree with Sean beans. There's obvious subtle differences in the UI and feature set, but both are great phones. I'll probably go with the m8 because it's camera is good enough for me and the metal design and headphone jack on the bottom are something that peaks my interest a bit more.
Just want to point out that any phone that has that many apps open at once WILL eventually start to lag. Learn to be OCD with closing your apps after you're done with them, and only use a few things at a time (I always use one app at a time for maximum speed) and it will never lag. Coming from a longtime Xperia user.
Jefrey BB UltraPixels is only marketing term used to trick idiots like you in thinking it's better thsn 8mp or 20mp cameras. Ive own the m7 since day one and the 4mp camera is fucken shit when compared to the z1, 5s n s4 cameras. The m7 n m8 use the exact same camera but the m7 camera is better because it have ois and m8 doesn't. HTC removed ois in favor of second useless 4mp lol
Jefrey BB UltraPixels is only marketing term used to trick idiots like you in thinking it's better thsn 8mp or 20mp cameras. Ive own the m7 since day one and the 4mp camera is fucken shit when compared to the z1, 5s n s4 cameras. The m7 n m8 use the exact same camera but the m7 camera is better because it have ois and m8 doesn't. HTC removed ois in favor of second useless 4mp lol
Awesome Review. I may upgrade my after all. Really loved the Z1 and it's currently my phone in daily routine, but I think it will be worthwhile in the long run
have you suffered any screen scratches yet? the protectiv plastic film has been removed from the Z2 :) (many user has been complaining about it on the Z1)
They keep it simple and fast. I loved Sony's ui from the first device I got in my hands. The z2 keeps it fast and simple not only in software, but in hardware, too. Little upgrades here and there to make sure they'll remain on the top.
ive had an s3 for almost 2 years of my contract and ive already changed to a custom version of 4.4 so im pretty sure i want a change as they are so slow to update their phones.
thats just stupid.. the whole point of a mobile phone is to be..Mobile. That thing is damn near a tablet. Defeats the purpose. and can you imagine the douchebags holding that thing to their ear?
that not close to a tablet? the ultra has a 6.4 inch screen. now thats almost a tablet. i have big hands to i think that 4.5-5.5 inch is the perfect screen size. and this is the best looking design on a mobile phone of then the iphone, and the htc m8. plus its water proof.
I already owned my Z2 but I just notice that lots of people including me having a heat problem with the camera when shooting a 4K video. The camera apps just turn off after give a warning.
Ok , there is the thing .... I want to sell my iPhone and buy this phone . Can I still download instagram and other applications ? If someone an help me it would be lovely
***** I know that , but every thing in the M8 ,except the camera, is fantastic. The design, the processer , the new update of sence 6 , and the boom sound
I love this channel and the reviews you do but to be honest I felt like this one was not as good because I felt like you embraced this phone with too many thoughts about the z1. Keep up the good work though!
*Sony Xperia Z2 review* Read full review: goo.gl/1KPqCj Does Sony's bi-annual release cycle work, or will it be a disadvantage for its latest high-end offering? We find out in this detailed Sony Xperia Z2 review! By *****
Why in the world would someone be complaining that Sony is upgrading their flagship every six months... more power to the consumer whether that means a discounted older model or the newest specs. I can't complain.
Honestly. The back of my xperia Z2 is shattered to hell. Its missing the flappy port and the screen had some cosmetic scratches. Yet the damn thing works like a BEAST still since day one. Fast and smooth and superb responsive. PREMIUM AS FAWK.
Yea I used to have a nexus 4 and spent quite a bit of money trying to get it looking half decent but never was happy! Android is ugly straight out the box unlike iOS and windows phone. only thing is they are hardly customisable, but maybe that's not a bad thing!
