Sony Xperia Z3+ Preview – A very modest update
For a moment it seemed that Sony Mobile had moved away from the release schedule it has adhered to so tightly in recent years; for a moment it seemed that it would not release two flagship devices in a year, but would stretch the period between releases. After all, the Xperia Z3 had been released in September and we hadn’t heard a peep from Sony at major tech fairs, such as CES in January and Mobile World Congress in February. So it seemed to focus on an autumn release of the Xperia Z4, until it was announced at the end of April that Sony introduced the Xperia Z4 in Japan.
It was a device that is largely the same as the Xperia Z3 in terms of appearance and hardware, but with a Snapdragon 810 octacore soc instead of a Snapdragon 801 quadcore, an improved front camera and a slightly thinner housing. This device is now also coming to the Netherlands, but because the similarities with the Xperia 3 are so great, it is called Z3+ here.
We were recently able to view and try the device. It was noticed that the phone also looks like two drops of water on the Xperia Z3 in real life. It’s 0.4mm thinner and 8g lighter, and it comes in other colors, but that makes little difference to how it looks and feels in the hand. That’s not a problem, because the slightly rounded edges still feel great. The back is again covered with glass. That looks luxurious, but also makes the Xperia Z3 +, just like its predecessors, quite a fingerprint magnet.
The biggest change on the outside is the USB port; no longer do you have to pry open a cover to get to it; the port is open, while the water and dust resistance of the previous Xperias has been preserved. It is a small adjustment, but one that will be very nice in practice. Because you can now plug in the charger more easily, Sony has omitted the magnetic contacts on the side for its alternative charger.
Screen and camera
The screen in the Z3+ looks identical to the one in the Z3, which in turn was pretty much the same as the screen in the Xperia Z2. It is a 5.2″ LCD with a resolution of 1920×1080 pixels. We do not mind that the Japanese manufacturer has not yet switched to a screen with a quad-HD resolution, as Samsung and LG did, for example, because the resolution difference is barely visible. As with previous Xperias , we again have the idea that the screen is set very blue. Sony has been opting for this for some time, probably to make the white look brighter, but we would prefer it to be less heavy .
There’s not much new to report on the camera front, other than that the front camera is now based on a five-megapixel Exmor RS sensor that can take electronically stabilized selfies. The rear camera still uses the same 20.7-megapixel sensor as we know from the Xperia Z2 and Xperia Z1. So that chip has lasted for almost two years now, which is a long time in a market where developments are going so fast. Samsung and LG have both taken a big step this year, with sensors from Sony, of all places, and we wonder whether the Xperia Z3 + with older technology and without optical image stabilization can offer any competition.
Hardware
More has changed under the hood, because instead of the Snapdragon 801 we now find the 64bit Snapdragon 810 octacore. On paper, this chip has considerably more computing power than the Snapdragon 801, but we know from practice that it gets quite warm and therefore often uses lower clock speeds than you would expect. This was the case, for example, with the G Flex 2 from LG and the HTC One M9. The speed gain turned out to be minimal in practice.
We didn’t have time to run extensive tests during the hands-on session, but five consecutive runs of GeekBench dropped the score by about 15 percent overall. So there is some throttling , but the extent to which that happens seems to be not too bad. The phone also felt smooth and graphics-heavy apps also seemed to run fine at first glance.
Just like the top models from Samsung, LG and HTC, the Z3+ is also equipped with 32GB of storage memory as standard. Because the phone also has a micro SD slot, you probably won’t run out of space anytime soon.
What we are still a bit concerned about is the battery life. The aforementioned phones with a Snapdragon 810 scored far from well in that area, and Sony has also made the battery a fraction smaller than that in the Xperia Z3; the capacity is now 2930 instead of 3100mAh. Hopefully, the engineers at Sony and Qualcomm have found a way to keep power consumption down, because good battery life is something Sony phones have been known for until now. It would be a shame if they had to give up on that front now.
Price, audio and extras
The Xperia Z3+ seems to be a very modest upgrade of the Xperia Z3 and we can hardly imagine that Sony will not come up with a ‘real’ successor later this year. Until then, it will have to convince users that the Z3+ is an attractive choice within the current smartphone landscape. That will be quite a challenge, because it costs 699 euros and that is considerably more than the just under 500 euros that you have to pay for the Xperia Z3 at the time of writing. For the money of the Z3 + you also buy a Galaxy S6 or LG G4.
In addition, Sony has already reduced the potential target group in advance. The Xperia Z3+ can initially only be purchased with a T-Mobile subscription, although it is also possible to purchase a separate copy. Customers of other providers who want to buy the device in combination with a subscription are therefore excluded.
How does Sony want to market the device? With many extras and an emphasis on audio functionality, because the Z3+ can play so-called high-res audio just like the Z3 . These are 24-bit 96 kHz audio files, which, unlike MP3s, are not compressed.
Those who pre-order the phone in the first four weeks will therefore receive a pair of headphones worth a good 200 euros as a gift. In addition, Sony will also pre-install several albums in high quality. Users also get access to the Xperia Lounge Gold, an app in which Sony gives away free content from time to time and gives users the chance to win business.
Finally
All this together can make the Xperia Z3 + an interesting buy, although the innovations compared to the Z3 are minor. If you were already planning to buy a headset, the Xperia Z3+ will effectively only cost you 499 euros and that is certainly a competitive price.
Outside of that pre-order offer, however, the Z3 + will not have an easy time in retail sales. Not only does it have strong competition from devices from Samsung and LG, among others, the biggest competitor is perhaps the Xperia Z3 from Sony itself. In addition, it is questionable whether the devices with the Snapdragon 810 will not deteriorate in terms of real-life performance and battery life. So we have plenty of questions about the Xperia Z3+ and hope to be able to answer them in a full review soon.