Sony

IFA will officially be starting on September 1, and throughout the event, we’re anticipating a lot of new device announcements/launches. One company’s presence that we’re looking forward to seeing is Sony, and a new batch of renders for the Xperia XZ1 has us salivating over the device more than ever.

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Yesterday, CompareRaja partnered with OnLeaks to provide full device specifications and renders for Sony’s upcoming Xperia XZ1 flagship smartphone. Today, OnLeaks has buddied up with 91Mobiles to showcase the XZ1’s little brother, the Xperia XZ1 Compact.

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One of Google Home’s best features is the ability to throw content from Netflix and YouTube to Google Cast devices, and Amazon is finally catching up in this department. After introducing Alexa control for the Fire TV last week, Sony has revealed that users will be able to use their Amazon Alexa devices to control the company’s Android TVs, something Google Home cannot yet do.

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Sony has never had a strong presence in the Western smartphone market, but that doesn’t mean its phones aren’t worth your time. The Japanese company was one of the first to introduce water resistance on a smartphone, as well as a two-stage camera button (at least on the Android front), and now it’s the first and only manufacturer with a 4K phone.

These days, 1080p is still perfectly fine for the vast majority of users, and a lot of people can’t even tell the difference between 1080p and QHD on such a small screen anyway. So why is Sony cramming even more pixels into its latest superphone? Well, simply put, because it can.

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As part of E3, Sony today announced it will launch a new collection of games branded “PlayLink” that will support cross-platform gameplay experiences between PS4 and mobile devices including Android devices. The games will be built with a second screen experience and group play in mind, meaning they’ll take full advantage of opportunities for touchscreen controls, cameras on mobile devices, multiple devices and more.

The games will work together with smartphones and tablets via a companion app that Sony confirmed will be available for both iOS and Android. For the most part, the games appear to use mobile devices as controllers, offering a second screen experience while playing games with others on a PS4 in the living room:

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Sony’s Android smartphones tend to fly under the radar, but some have proved quite popular in certain regions. The company’s Xperia XZ was very popular last year, and upcoming flagships look very promising. However, in an effort to refine its smartphone efforts, Sony is apparently planning to ditch some of its less popular lines which it calls “premium standard.”

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I want to put a disclaimer at the very top of this post: I have used the Xperia XZ Premium for about twenty minutes in one of Sony‘s booths at Mobile World Congress, and everything that follows is just a brief recap of my experience combined with my quick chat with the company’s reps. It therefore isn’t meant to give a final judgement by any means — but we know that the product may be of interest for more than a few, so I’m here to tell you what my very first impressions were…

The thing that immediately struck me about the Xperia XZ Premium is… Sony’s philosophy behind it. There were other OEMs are trying to push design boundaries (like LG and most likely Samsung) or deliver overall compelling packages with a few standout features (like Huawei‘s P10 or even BlackBerry‘s KeyOne). Sony, reluctantly, is simply keeping its own path, seemingly looking at the competition uninterested, from afar.

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Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain has been in full gear all week, and that means almost all of the biggest Android OEMs are getting together to show off their latest phones, tablets, and other gadgets. Now that things are winding down here in the last couple days of the show floor being open, let’s take a look at all the devices that were announced by Samsung, LG, Sony, Huawei and others…

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Between all the “X” and “Z” phones released in the past year or so, we all got a little confused. Sony‘s strategy, in particular, seemed everything but clear in regards to its devices’ hierarchy. However, using Barcelona’s MWC as a platform, the Japanese firm announced what it explicitly labels as its “flagship”: the Xperia XZ Premium.

More info after the jump…

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Barcelona’s famous fair, the Mobile World Congress, is just around the corner. As always, (almost) all the big names in mobile will join the party to show the latest and greatest coming out of their R&D. And while Samsung’s absence may represent a hit for the general vibe of the coming days, there will certainly be no shortage of new products and announcements.

So let’s dig through them a bit…

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Android TV hasn’t seen much popularity since its release a few years back, but the platform is slowly gaining ground yet again. Recently, it showed up in LeEco’s collection of affordable 4K TVs, and just last month, Nvidia unveiled its powerhouse Nvidia Shield TV, also powered by Android TV. Now one of the platforms earliest supporters, Sony, is back with a new collection of 4K HDR TVs, all with Android TV under the hood.

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