Sony Xperia Z Ultra 6.4" phablet in Bangkok

[monekyface]

Can you get one here? What do they cost?

[mcyachty]

Saw them last night in Siam Paragon Sony shop.

Sorry, can't remember the price but I think about 22k.

Waterproof!

[pilou]

Bought mine in Chiang Mai on 22nd. they are everywhere here now, so I guess Bangkok must have them too.

I paid 21990 bahts for it, really nice phone, but indeed a bit difficult to carry around. I am waiting for the bluetooth set SBH52, not announced yet. Magnetic charging dock ( DK30 ) is also on my shopping list.

Phil

[monekyface]

Bought mine in Chiang Mai on 22nd. they are everywhere here now, so I guess Bangkok must have them too.

I paid 21990 bahts for it, really nice phone, but indeed a bit difficult to carry around. I am waiting for the bluetooth set SBH52, not announced yet. Magnetic charging dock ( DK30 ) is also on my shopping list.

Phil

Thanks for the info, both of you! Pilou, what does the DK30 cost? Also, how long have you had it and what are you impressions? I am thinking about this and the Galaxy Note 3 when it comes out. The Sony has no stylus built in, correct?

[monekyface]

Also is purple available here? I would be the coolest!

[pilou]

Thanks for the info, both of you! Pilou, what does the DK30 cost? Also, how long have you had it and what are you impressions? I am thinking about this and the Galaxy Note 3 when it comes out. The Sony has no stylus built in, correct?

The DK30 is around 1800 bahts on eBay, but I'll wait it's available here, which hopefully won't be too long from now.

I just have the Z ultra for 3 days, and I love it, really fast and sleek, and the screen is really nice. Camera just so-so, no flash, but it's OK as I don't take many pictures with my phone anyway. I bought the white version, it is also available in black and purple , although the latter was not available in the shop I bought my phone . There has been an update to the software already, probably to correct the problem of dead screen that some customers had been experiencing lately.

It is truly big, but that's why I chose it.There is no stylus with it, but you can actually use any pencil or metallic tip to "write" on it, and it's working pretty well ( many videos on Youtube )

The battery life seems OK so far, especially if you activate the Stamina Mode, which switches OFF wifi when the screen is off.

I also have a Galaxy Note 8, which has a S Pen, good device too, but I much prefer the Sony. My last phone was ( I still have it ) an Asus Padfone, which you can insert in a docking tablet , and this tablet in a keyboard, brilliant device as well, but more difficult to lug around, and even with the help of the tablet battery, it was running quickly out of juice...

Phil

[monekyface]

Thanks Phil! I found a dealer with the phone today- wow. It is very sleek and classy looking. Not too big for me either I don't think. I only wish purple was available here! I still have to think about the Note III. I am on the fence.

[monekyface]

OK I broke down and bought it today. The sheer amount of real estate on this screen is unbelievable. Wow. The quality of the picture is stunning. So far it seems very sleek and fast and fun. No drawbacks that I can see yet. It is SO much easier to use a touch screen keyboard on this compared to sub-5 inch screens if you have fat fingers or are a little bit motor-skill challenged. Mistakes are almost non-existent for me on this phone. I love that.

[Shurup]

I still have to think about the Note III. I am on the fence.

OK I broke down and bought it today.

LOL, didn't take long. Should have refrained going looking at it until the Note 3 arrival.

I am still waiting for the Note 3, been waiting ever since Note 2 came out. I have a Galaxy S2 and thought it would be too early to upgrade to Note 2 but now it's been over 2 years since I got an S2 so it's time for a new phone.

I'm also considering this Sony phone, but I will look at both at the same time.

[pilou]

OK I broke down and bought it today. The sheer amount of real estate on this screen is unbelievable. Wow. The quality of the picture is stunning. So far it seems very sleek and fast and fun. No drawbacks that I can see yet. It is SO much easier to use a touch screen keyboard on this compared to sub-5 inch screens if you have fat fingers or are a little bit motor-skill challenged. Mistakes are almost non-existent for me on this phone. I love that.

Did you find the purple version ?

[monekyface]

I did not get the purple version- had to choose between black and white and I picked black. Indeed, I should have waited until the Note 3 came out but that seemed like too long a wait. I have wanted a smartphone for a long time- I was still using an old Motorola flip phone from 6-7 years ago and I couldn't stand to wait any longer.

Today I think I got that glitch where the screen stays black. Pushed the power button ten times or so and it finally came on. Weird. I figured that would be straightened out in these phones by now but maybe not. Anyone else have this happen?

[pilou]

Today I think I got that glitch where the screen stays black. Pushed the power button ten times or so and it finally came on. Weird. I figured that would be straightened out in these phones by now but maybe not. Anyone else have this happen?

Although I had read about this screen problem before purchasing it, it did not happen to me since I bought the phone. But there has been an update ( built14.1.B.0.475 ) that was probably meant to fix that , and another update should arrive soon ( 510 ) with a few more features...

I have ordered a flip case from eBay, as I still cannot find one anywhere. Docking charger and bluetooth handset still not here either..

Phil

[monekyface]

I got a free case with mine! How do I install the updates?

[pilou]

I got a free case with mine! How do I install the updates?

Only freebie with mine was a film...

Install Sony PC Companion ( a bit like iTunes for iPhone, or Kies for Samsung's) on your PC, connect through USB, if any update detected, you can click, et voila...

You can also try Over The Air, by going in your phone to Settings/About phone/Check for update.

How do you like the phone so far ? Must be quite a change from your old Motorola...

Phil

Edited August 29, 2013 by pilou

[Shurup]

I did not get the purple version- had to choose between black and white and I picked black. Indeed, I should have waited until the Note 3 came out but that seemed like too long a wait. I have wanted a smartphone for a long time- I was still using an old Motorola flip phone from 6-7 years ago and I couldn't stand to wait any longer.

Today I think I got that glitch where the screen stays black. Pushed the power button ten times or so and it finally came on. Weird. I figured that would be straightened out in these phones by now but maybe not. Anyone else have this happen?

I know that feeling, I've had an old Nokia N95 8GB and I wanted a smartphone, was waiting for this thing to die on me and it just kept going and going like that Energizer bunny, so I got tired or waiting and got a Galaxy S2.

[jpinx]

I did not get the purple version- had to choose between black and white and I picked black. Indeed, I should have waited until the Note 3 came out but that seemed like too long a wait. I have wanted a smartphone for a long time- I was still using an old Motorola flip phone from 6-7 years ago and I couldn't stand to wait any longer.

Today I think I got that glitch where the screen stays black. Pushed the power button ten times or so and it finally came on. Weird. I figured that would be straightened out in these phones by now but maybe not. Anyone else have this happen?

I know that feeling, I've had an old Nokia N95 8GB and I wanted a smartphone, was waiting for this thing to die on me and it just kept going and going like that Energizer bunny, so I got tired or waiting and got a Galaxy S2.

The N95 will probably still be going long after the S2 has died

As an aside -- Anyone got user reports on the Samsung Grand or Mega 5.8 or Mega 6.3 ?

[monekyface]

I got a free case with mine! How do I install the updates?

Only freebie with mine was a film...

Install Sony PC Companion ( a bit like iTunes for iPhone, or Kies for Samsung's) on your PC, connect through USB, if any update detected, you can click, et voila...

You can also try Over The Air, by going in your phone to Settings/About phone/Check for update.

How do you like the phone so far ? Must be quite a change from your old Motorola...

Phil

Thanks for that info! I will look to see if PC Companion has an Ubuntu version. I pushed Windows into exile two years ago and forced the wife to learn Linux. I'd had enough!

I checked for the update but it said software was already up-to-date. I hope that glitch doesn't come back! We will see.

As far as the phone- I'm losing sleep. I started downloading apps last night and three hours later it was 5am! My wife loves to play games on it so I wanted to give her some choices, and I ended up filling up two entire pages in the phone with them. I added a 32GB microSD card yesterday which looks like it will be a wise investment. I didn't shop around at all, just walked into the first retailer I could find and ended up paying about 1,000 baht for a class 10 card. Seems reasonable.

The screen is really superior to anything else that I have seen. I figured the whole Triluminos thing was marketing hype but it is very crisp and the colors are vivid but not overblown. My wife has an SIII mini and she loves my phone. Or "my phone" as she calls it! LOL. I might have to buy one for her too.

It's big- no doubt about that. I don't think it is too big though- we will see as time passes.

The battery life is very good for my lifestyle. All I need is a battery that gets me through the day with calls and texts and some web surfing when the taxi is stuck in traffic. Yesterday I needed to take a tuktuk and the rain was no sweat- how nice is it to have a waterproof phone? This is a huge convenience. It just gives you peace of mind.

If you are a movie buff I am not sure there is a better phone out there. To me, a 5" screen is just too small. Now that I own this phone, I doubt I will have any incentive to pick up a full-size tablet. But that is the fight here- do you own two devices like a 5" phone and a 10" tablet, or do you own one 6.4" phablet? In most areas of life I prefer the tighter niche, purpose-built devices. The less you ask something to do, the better it will perform. This Xperia dumps that idea on its head. It's not so big that it is a lousy phone, nor so small that it is a lousy tablet.

[monekyface]

Oh and by the way, I found that the Sony software is not available for Linux but gMTP solves all of the problems with file transfer. When I plug in my phone it looks like flash memory to gMTP and it is very easy to move music, movies, etc.

[Shurup]

I got a free case with mine! How do I install the updates?

Only freebie with mine was a film...

Install Sony PC Companion ( a bit like iTunes for iPhone, or Kies for Samsung's) on your PC, connect through USB, if any update detected, you can click, et voila...

You can also try Over The Air, by going in your phone to Settings/About phone/Check for update.

How do you like the phone so far ? Must be quite a change from your old Motorola...

Phil

Thanks for that info! I will look to see if PC Companion has an Ubuntu version. I pushed Windows into exile two years ago and forced the wife to learn Linux. I'd had enough!

I checked for the update but it said software was already up-to-date. I hope that glitch doesn't come back! We will see.

As far as the phone- I'm losing sleep. I started downloading apps last night and three hours later it was 5am! My wife loves to play games on it so I wanted to give her some choices, and I ended up filling up two entire pages in the phone with them. I added a 32GB microSD card yesterday which looks like it will be a wise investment. I didn't shop around at all, just walked into the first retailer I could find and ended up paying about 1,000 baht for a class 10 card. Seems reasonable.

The screen is really superior to anything else that I have seen. I figured the whole Triluminos thing was marketing hype but it is very crisp and the colors are vivid but not overblown. My wife has an SIII mini and she loves my phone. Or "my phone" as she calls it! LOL. I might have to buy one for her too.

It's big- no doubt about that. I don't think it is too big though- we will see as time passes.

The battery life is very good for my lifestyle. All I need is a battery that gets me through the day with calls and texts and some web surfing when the taxi is stuck in traffic. Yesterday I needed to take a tuktuk and the rain was no sweat- how nice is it to have a waterproof phone? This is a huge convenience. It just gives you peace of mind.

If you are a movie buff I am not sure there is a better phone out there. To me, a 5" screen is just too small. Now that I own this phone, I doubt I will have any incentive to pick up a full-size tablet. But that is the fight here- do you own two devices like a 5" phone and a 10" tablet, or do you own one 6.4" phablet? In most areas of life I prefer the tighter niche, purpose-built devices. The less you ask something to do, the better it will perform. This Xperia dumps that idea on its head. It's not so big that it is a lousy phone, nor so small that it is a lousy tablet.

Haha, now you should definitely wait for the Note 3 if your wife liking this one, I'm in the same boat, my GF finally realized that Android phones are superior to iFruit and she wanted to swap her 4s for a Note 2, but I told her to wait, we will go shopping for the new phones together. Might just end up getting both.

[Shurup]

I did not get the purple version- had to choose between black and white and I picked black. Indeed, I should have waited until the Note 3 came out but that seemed like too long a wait. I have wanted a smartphone for a long time- I was still using an old Motorola flip phone from 6-7 years ago and I couldn't stand to wait any longer.

Today I think I got that glitch where the screen stays black. Pushed the power button ten times or so and it finally came on. Weird. I figured that would be straightened out in these phones by now but maybe not. Anyone else have this happen?

I know that feeling, I've had an old Nokia N95 8GB and I wanted a smartphone, was waiting for this thing to die on me and it just kept going and going like that Energizer bunny, so I got tired or waiting and got a Galaxy S2.

The N95 will probably still be going long after the S2 has died

As an aside -- Anyone got user reports on the Samsung Grand or Mega 5.8 or Mega 6.3 ?

Yeah, N95 still runs.

There are some other topics here about the phones you've mentioned, just check a few more pages in this forum.

Of those you mentioned, the Mega 6.3 is the best as it's got better DPI screen, the Grand and Mega 5.8 are really bad screens but both are dual SIM, mega 6.3 is not. If it was a dual SIM as well, I would have really considered it.

[monekyface]

Now that I have had the Xperia for several days I thought I would weigh in once again. I have not seen the dark screen issue again, it just happened on that first day of use. I'm not certain if this was truly a failure of the screen to turn on, or if something else was going on. It seems like it would have happened again if it was the dark screen glitch.

The picture quality is really flippin' good. I know this because a number of my colleagues have nice phones, but when I show off one of the high definition videos that come pre-loaded on my Xperia they are mesmerized. I have gotten a number of comments on how vivid the colors are and how sharp the picture is.

I have taken a few snapshots with the camera and these turned out very well. I haven't used it in a variety of lighting situations though so I can't give a good review of quality.

The size has become a total non-issue. The 6.4 inch screen is massive especially for games and videos, but it is not unwieldy at least for me.

Keep in mind that real price of this phone is not 22,000 baht but 44,000 baht. Your wife/girlfriend/SO will need one too. My biggest problem is keeping it away from my wife. She suggested the other day that I leave it at home and take her Samsung 3 mini. I laughed, scoffed, and made a break for the door with my Xperia in hand. Close call.

I think I don't like Chrome. Is there a better browser that I should try?

Bottom line, this is an amazing phone. My only real complaint so far is that I have not found a way to turn on my phone ringer and my email and text message alerts so they are easy to hear in noisy environments. Any ideas?

[pilou]

I think I don't like Chrome. Is there a better browser that I should try?

Bottom line, this is an amazing phone. My only real complaint so far is that I have not found a way to turn on my phone ringer and my email and text message alerts so they are easy to hear in noisy environments. Any ideas?

After one week I am still glad I bought this phone too... No lag whatsoever, and I yet have to see it hang. Battery life is enough to last through the day. I don't feel like putting a brick to my ear when I answer the phone, people said that when the Dell Streak ( which I owned too, 5 inches only...) came out, now it is the norm...

I do like Chrome, and its ability to sync on your account for bookmarks, but I read a lot of good about Dolphin, which I have never tried...

On Google Play, there are lots of sound boosters which may help you hear your phone ringing, not tried these either...

Phil

Edited August 31, 2013 by pilou

[pilou]

Phone updated this morning to last firmware version (510) ... Has anyone spotted the dock charger ?

Phil