Sony Xperia XZ Premium Phone with a needlessly good screen Nokia 3 A phone with basic instincts
Some people can’t tell the difference between 720p and 1080p on their TV. Many of us still watch DVDS, with only a fifth of the resolution of Full HD. So it’s questionable whether we really need 4K TVS, with four times more pixels again. Bearing all this in mind, the Sony Xperia XZ Premium is a phone with a 4K screen. A phone, for heaven’s sake.
There are calculations you can do to see how close to a screen you’d have to sit to see the pixels. For a 40in 4K TV, you’d need to be within five feet (1.5m). To distinguish the dots on the XZ Premium, you would have to put it inside your eye.
4K would be good for virtual reality (there are several compatible headsets), but a phone can’t run VR apps at that resolution. In fact, most apps run at Full HD scaled up, which is less sharp than rivals like the Samsung Galaxy S8. Although the XZ Premium has very good battery life in daily use, our video-playback test ran it down in just 10 hours. No doubt thanks to the power-hungry pixels.
This is a lovely phone. The HDR- ready screen looks wonderful regardless of resolution, the fast processor runs Android 7.1 and games smoothly. The cameras are excellent (though not the best in low light) and the fingerprint sensor is fast. But it spends your money badly. The Galaxy S8’s curved screen is more stylish, and is worth the extra £60 you’d have to spend.
CHOOSING MESH WI-FI
Since the turn of the year, half a dozen big-brand mesh Wi-fi products have arrived in the UK. In alphabetical order, we reviewed BT Whole Home Wi-fi in Issue 496; Devolo Gigagate (Issue 501); Google Wifi (Issue 502); Linksys Velop, (Issue 503); and Netgear Orbi (Issue 498). So which should you pick?
There are certainly differences between them, but it’s hard to say ay what they will mean to you. All are simple to set up. The Gigagate only creates a 2.4GHZ wireless network from its satellites, omitting the faster 5GHZ. But in our tests that didn’t make much difference to the speed. Velop creates a separate network even if you keep your existing base router, which will mean changing some login details. Tp-link similarly says its Deco is intended to replace your existing router (though for cabled broadband you’ll need to keep your modem). So the obvious buying factors are number of boxes and price. A threethree-box system will reach more cocorners of a big property, but for smaller homes two boxes sh should be fine. BT’S aggressive prpricingpr is encouraging others to di discount, so do shop around.