Sony Xperia Z3 and Z3 Compact announced at IFA

Chuck_Norris

cormie wrote: »

Brilliant, thanks a lot for that. I added a torch button through creating a lock screen widget with widgetsoid

Was testing the audio in that car again and the audio isn't clear with either aux or bluetooth, but it's fine with other audio players, but then the Z3c is playing now with no problems on my speakers at home so I wonder what's going on there

Another issue I've noticed is while I'm on calls, I have to hold the bottom of the phone very close to my mouth for the caller to hear me. I'm guessing this is something to do with the background noise cancellation feature? When I hold it closer to my mouth, I can be heard ok.

Have to say, not had any issues with streaming music via Bluetooth on the car kit, but am familiar with the interference you speak of. Used to get it on an iPhone 3GS, when I had it charging, as well as using aux in. And only with one van in the 5 we had in my old job. Could never figure it out.

No issues with call quality that I've discovered yet.

There is the torch app on the quick settings menu as well though.

cormie

Thanks Chuck, did that interference only come when charging? I have that issue in a few different vehicles and I've grown to accept it unfortunately, but I'm having interference even when it's not charging at all and I don't get it at all, it's really annoying as that vehicle had no interference when charging with other devices before so now I'm perplexed!

Chuck_Norris

cormie wrote: »

Thanks Chuck, did that interference only come when charging? I have that issue in a few different vehicles and I've grown to accept it unfortunately, but I'm having interference even when it's not charging at all and I don't get it at all, it's really annoying as that vehicle had no interference when charging with other devices before so now I'm perplexed!

Literally only when it was charging. And pretty much in perfect synch with the turbo. Seen as it was only that one particular can, I put it down to that

Ironically enough, the call quality via Bluetooth on the car kit has improved with the Z3. Upgrading the last iPhone to ios 8 seemed to have worsened it, even.upgrading the software on the kit afterwards. But no issues at all with the Z3.

cormie

Yep, the charging whir sound is a problem in a few vans and it always seems to be related to the accelerator/revs.

I'll have to check the Z3 out a bit more, I just hope I don't have a dodgy one. My friend has one so I'll check hers if I can.

Now for a positive problem: Going to bed, battery at 64% after a days use, impressive, but I don't know whether I should charge it or not as I heard before it's best to let a battery run down low before charging.

Chuck_Norris

cormie wrote: »

Yep, the charging whir sound is a problem in a few vans and it always seems to be related to the accelerator/revs.

I'll have to check the Z3 out a bit more, I just hope I don't have a dodgy one. My friend has one so I'll check hers if I can.

Now for a positive problem: Going to bed, battery at 64% after a days use, impressive, but I don't know whether I should charge it or not as I heard before it's best to let a battery run down low before charging.

Wouldn't be as concerned with discharging modern batteries completely every time.

I took mine off charge at 7 this morning, and was completely drained at ten this evening. That was with about 3 hours music listening, probably 5 hours browsing, email fetching, various notifications being sent, and screen at full brightness. Have yet to get over 24 hours.

Just a little Samba

Chuck_Norris wrote: »

Wouldn't be as concerned with discharging modern batteries completely every time.

I took mine off charge at 7 this morning, and was completely drained at ten this evening. That was with about 3 hours music listening, probably 5 hours browsing, email fetching, various notifications being sent, and screen at full brightness. Have yet to get over 24 hours.

I was having issues with my battery but them seem fixed now. My battery usage graph was showing that WiFi had been on, non stop, despite my wifi being "off" in the settings. So I checked again. When location based wifi is on, your wifi card is still active and as well as that in the advanced wifi settings there's an option to allow google services to still use wifi when wifi is turned off. I disabled both of those options and 4g and it's much, much better today.
4g coverage in Ireland is generally so flaky that the phone has to use a lot of energy constantly establishing a solid connection. 3g coverage is massively better and honestly, most of the time, it's more than enough speed.

cormie

I had been using mine with both 4g and wifi constantly on since I started using it a week ago and the battery has been brilliant, I switched to location based wifi when I was out to check it out, got home and it didn't recognise and connect

The battery life didn't seem to change from what I remember but I don't think I've given it much analysis.

Chuck_Norris

Just a little Samba wrote: »

I was having issues with my battery but them seem fixed now. My battery usage graph was showing that WiFi had been on, non stop, despite my wifi being "off" in the settings. So I checked again. When location based wifi is on, your wifi card is still active and as well as that in the advanced wifi settings there's an option to allow google services to still use wifi when wifi is turned off. I disabled both of those options and 4g and it's much, much better today.
4g coverage in Ireland is generally so flaky that the phone has to use a lot of energy constantly establishing a solid connection. 3g coverage is massively better and honestly, most of the time, it's more than enough speed.

Thanks for the heads up on those.

Gonna try all of that bar the 4G for today to see if it makes a difference. 4G coverage at home and work are pretty damn good. If no major.difference, I'll try knocking 4G off tomorrow and see what the impact is.

antodeco

Just a little Samba wrote: »

I was having issues with my battery but them seem fixed now. My battery usage graph was showing that WiFi had been on, non stop, despite my wifi being "off" in the settings. So I checked again. When location based wifi is on, your wifi card is still active and as well as that in the advanced wifi settings there's an option to allow google services to still use wifi when wifi is turned off. I disabled both of those options and 4g and it's much, much better today.
4g coverage in Ireland is generally so flaky that the phone has to use a lot of energy constantly establishing a solid connection. 3g coverage is massively better and honestly, most of the time, it's more than enough speed.

Thanks for that! I didnt realise about the wifi always in use! Ive turned that off now! Will be interesting to see what sort of power difference I get! (my wifi is on 80% of the time anyway, but the 20% its off, may give me a little while longer on the battery).

In relation to the battery, its excellent on this phone anyway! But every little helps!

Beefy78

This might sound stupid but does anyone have an issue with how... slidy & smooth the surfaces on the phone are? Mine throws itself off of seemingly flat tables all the time. A couple of nights a week I'll get woken up by the thump of it hitting the floor from my bedside table.

It's like a lemming.

Midfield9

My battery usage graph is showing my phone is always awake. Anyone any idea what causing this? I still had 40% battery going to bed last night.
I uninstalled a few of the apps I downloaded recently to see if they were the problem but no change.

cormie

I've had mine in a case before I even started using it, I'd be very reluctant to even touch it without a case!

Midfield9

Beefy78 wrote: »

This might sound stupid but does anyone have an issue with how... slidy & smooth the surfaces on the phone are? Mine throws itself off of seemingly flat tables all the time. A couple of nights a week I'll get woken up by the thump of it hitting the floor from my bedside table.

It's like a lemming.

Ya it's very slidy alright. Madness not to have a cover on it. I have a crack on the back of my phone while waiting for a cover from casemate. It slipped off the bed. Wasn't even a week old.

Anyone do a diy repair on the back glass. Watched a YouTube video and I reckon I'd manage it. Have one ordered anyway but think I'll work away as it for a while

quarryman

What kind of screen on time are people getting on the z3c?

I managed 7hrs 15m of screen time on my last charge. I might start using stamina mode to get more out of it.

Just wondering though, what does extended usage actually do? It says it "reduces performance" but it's not clear what that means.

long_b

Any bricks and mortar shops stocking the charging dock at all?

antodeco

I have mine on Stamina mode all the time. Haven't noticed any difference performance wise anyway!

Just a little Samba

So since those little teaks I have definitely had massively better batt life.

Today I've been using my phone since roughly 8am and my batt is still at 64% where as it would have been around 25ish before the tweaks with roughly the same usage.

Chuck_Norris

Just a little Samba wrote: »

So since those little teaks I have definitely had massively better batt life.

Today I've been using my phone since roughly 8am and my batt is still at 64% where as it would have been around 25ish before the tweaks with roughly the same usage.

Likewise. Knocked off everything bar 4G yesterday, no major impact. Knocked off 4G today...dramatic difference. Phone had a lot more use today from 06:30, to home time at 21:20 and still had 43% left. Well impressed.

lucstar

Hi everyone. Can somebody who bought the Z3c in CPW as ''unlocked'' in Meteor check is this working with tesco or lycamobile sim as well? I know thy are ok with o2 or three. Thanks very much.

cormie

Once they are unlocked, they are unlocked to all networks


A few more little annoyances I've discovered:

• I use Dialer One as my phone app, when I get a missed call, it asks what app I want to hand it, I click dialer one and "always" but every missed call I get still asks the same thing
  
• I'm having callers say they can't hear me until I hold the bottom of the phone right next to my mouth, I've a habit of just letting it hang in line with the shape of my ear which pushes it out from my mouth, is this the background noise cancellation kicking in?
  
• When I take the phone away from my head, it doesn't light up the screen like it should and it takes me a while to hang up on somebody
  
• There doesn't seem to be an option for conference calls?

lucstar

Thanks for help. All works fiine. My wife loves the z3 compact. She left iphone 4s. Z3C just perfect size and weight. What is annoying for me is the scren touch. Feeling of plastic wnen I tap something like empty under it. Myself I'm using galaxy s4, maybe that's why. All over nice speakers, good quality microphone, fast response on apps.
What music player do you recommend instead of Walkman? Bit hard to manage the music.
Also I've checked the wifi on baterry usage. Using stamina mode, but the wifi is always on, specially during the night. Is there an option to manage manually just wifi? I know I can use ultra mode but it will turn of the wifi totally.
Thanks

mooseknunkle

Has anyone had any issues with this being waterproof?,i was at the beach today and decided to try out the camera underwater just to take a few photos but as soon as i came in it shutdown and has been turning on and off most of the day since, i took out the sd card and it was a little bit wet and also there is condensation under the camera lens,so much for it being 100% waterproof.

timetogo

mooseknunkle wrote: »

Has anyone had any issues with this being waterproof?,i was at the beach today and decided to try out the camera underwater just to take a few photos but as soon as i came in it shutdown and has been turning on and off most of the day since, i took out the sd card and it was a little bit wet and also there is condensation under the camera lens,so much for it being 100% waterproof.

It's sold as waterproof so I'd imagine taking it back with a water problem would be covered under the warranty / statutory rights.

I've submerged mine a couple of times and have no problems with it.

mooseknunkle

timetogo wrote: »

It's sold as waterproof so I'd imagine taking it back with a water problem would be covered under the warranty / statutory rights.

I've submerged mine a couple of times and have no problems with it.

It was the first time i used it underwater and i could see straight away that the screen wasn't right,i even had a case on it and made sure all the slots were closed maybe i just got a bad one unfortunately

D'Peoples Voice

lucstar wrote: »

What music player do you recommend instead of Walkman? Bit hard to manage the music.

BS Player Free to play music rather than manage music (to manage music maybe upload up to 25,000 songs to Google music player and play them offline)
[url] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.bsplayer.bspandroid.free[/url]

lucstar wrote: »

Also I've checked the wifi on baterry usage. Using stamina mode, but the wifi is always on, specially during the night. Is there an option to manage manually just wifi?

Notification Toggle is great for that.
[url] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=de.j4velin.notificationToggle[/url]

lucstar wrote: »

I know I can use ultra mode but it will turn of the wifi totally.
Thanks

Did you try LeanDroid? It can turn off WiFi automatically after screen turns off, then turn on for a few seconds at regular intervals to check for any incoming messages/mails
[url] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.teqtic.leandata[/url]

D'Peoples Voice

D'Peoples Voice wrote: »

Did you try LeanDroid? It can turn off WiFi automatically after screen turns off, then turn on for a few seconds at regular intervals to check for any incoming messages/mails
[url] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.teqtic.leandata[/url]

Does that actually save battery? That's exactly what Juice Defender does (was all the craze a few years back), and it was pretty much shown to make battery life worse, even though the app says how much battery it has saved you.

I don't think you'll get much better than Stamina mode for performance and functionality.

antodeco

timetogo wrote: »

It's sold as waterproof so I'd imagine taking it back with a water problem would be covered under the warranty / statutory rights.

I've submerged mine a couple of times and have no problems with it.

Its waterproof for fresh water, not salt water! Using it in the sea will void your warranty!

AstraMonti

antodeco wrote: »

Its waterproof for fresh water, not salt water! Using it in the sea will void your warranty!

Really? Then it's surprising that they have filmed their ad under water:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6VeXf0KaLM

cormie

Yeah that's very bad if that's the case!

AstraMonti

AstraMonti wrote: »

Really? Then it's surprising that they have filmed their ad under water:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6VeXf0KaLM

It says at the bottom during the underwater part of the ad that it can be kept in up to 1.5m of fresh water for up to 30 minutes.

I would only really say they say fresh water because of corrosion caused by salt water. In the case of the SD card getting wet, then you'd expect that the flaps didn't seal as they should, so a totally different issue.

More info:

http://support.sonymobile.com/ie/xperiaz3/dm/water-and-dust-resistance/

MiCr0

check the text @ 0.21 in the video

can be kept under 1.5m of fresh water for up to 30 mins

lucstar

mooseknunkle wrote: »

Has anyone had any issues with this being waterproof?,i was at the beach today and decided to try out the camera underwater just to take a few photos but as soon as i came in it shutdown and has been turning on and off most of the day since, i took out the sd card and it was a little bit wet and also there is condensation under the camera lens,so much for it being 100% waterproof.

I had a chat with sonymobile customer service uk and the man said there is no warranty if the phone gets wet inside unless there is phone fault. You can send under warranty but if they prove it was your fault, and I imagine they will, you have to pay for repair. Its hard to know what kind of test they do when examine, if the waterproof slots were closed properly there might be other way to get wet like headphones jack or speakers.
Wish you will get repaired under warranty. Please let us know your case was solved.

devnull

I've managed to crack the back glas of mine, it has a weird crack with a curve in it, I don't remember dropping it but I do remember leaving the flashlight on for a while by accident, normally when I use it for any more than a few minutes it's really hot from the light.

But after leaving te flashlight on for 10 minutes it was really cool, so I suspect that it is cool because the heat is escaping due to the back, and the heat may have cracked the glass, the crack seems to be slowly widening as well which is not good.

Also the charger cover door no longer stays in position and holds in properly when pressed in, you can see it raised a little bit out of the slot a few sseconds after pushing it back in and it gradually works it's way out again.

Anyone have any recommendations for what I should do about the glass and the cover?

Daith

devnull wrote: »

Also the charger cover door no longer stays in position and holds in properly when pressed in, you can see it raised a little bit out of the slot a few sseconds after pushing it back in and it gradually works it's way out again.

This happened to me but I ended up getting the unit replaced under warranty.

I never use the charger now, use a charge dock. I really like the phone but the flaps are a nuisance.

cormie

Daith wrote: »

This happened to me but I ended up getting the unit replaced under warranty.

I never use the charger now, use a charge dock. I really like the phone but the flaps are a nuisance.

I guess it wouldn't be waterproof without the flaps though.

I might get one of these: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Magnector-Performance-Universal-Charging-Adapter/dp/B00H2EE5ZS/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1421148858&sr=8-2&keywords=micro+usb+to+magnetic

but just not sure how it would work with a case on the phone, removing the case to charge each time would be more hassle than opening the flap.

devnull

I ahve a charge dock, but it's a nusiance toi keep taking the case off to use it, since even with the charge dock, the phone doesn't sit snuggly in the dock when wearing a case which ironically is an official sony one that the phone has been wearing the whole time.

(yes I was a mug and bought the official style window case, which is probably the lowest quality Item I've eveer bought for any phone, it costs about 45 euro and resembles a €5 knock off from China)

wandatowell

What good quality cases are people using?

I'm using a rubber plastic one which is great for scratches but no protection from a fall.



Unreal phone btw.

AstraMonti

I hate big cases, so I am using a casemate barely there, this one: http://www.case-mate.eu/devices/sony/xperia-z3/barely-there-case-for-sony-xperia-z3.html

I am also using a tempered glass protector front and back.

TheChevron

Went from a HTC One M7 to the Z3c and I'm pretty disappointed tbh. The only thing it has going for it over the HTC is the battery life.

Pros:
Unbelievable battery
Good Camera

Cons:
The screen is not as clear.
The gallery is terrible - all your photos show up from every location in the phone, not just the photos you have taken.
The Sony apps are a bit crap...and there are loads of them.
The keyboard is small and I find myself making frequent typos.
There is no way to get into the phone settings from the Quicksettings tab.
Notification sounds are very low.
Loudspeaker call volume very low.
Only 8 gig of Internal memory.


If someone comes up with a fix for the gallery problem let me know.

billbond4

Update to the latest version of the Album app (use the Update Center App to do it), and in that there is a setting to hide pictures

TheChevron

billbond4 wrote: »

Update to the latest version of the Album app (use the Update Center App to do it), and in that there is a setting to hide pictures

When I go to the update centre it says I am up to date.

Where is this setting in the album app that I can change?

billbond4

So when you open the album app and you goto home and you see all your photos, scroll down to a photo you dont want , select it and on the ... select hide
If you goto folder view you could select photos in a particular folder and hide them that way also

cormie

I was hoping that wasn't the only solution, that's far too tedious, there doesn't see to be an option to hide an actual folder, just photos within a folder, if a folder has 1,000's of photos that will take forever, and as soon as the photo is populated again, the new photos will show and you'll have to keep doing it

TheChevron

billbond4 wrote: »

So when you open the album app and you goto home and you see all your photos, scroll down to a photo you dont want , select it and on the ... select hide
If you goto folder view you could select photos in a particular folder and hide them that way also

Thanks for the effort, but that's not what I was looking for. I would have to go in and hide images every time I got a viber or whatsapp photo message. I don't know why they show up by default and there is no way to stop them, except retrospectively. Really bad feature flaw imo.

On all other phones, when you enter the gallery, it just brings up the photos you have taken with your camera and not every piece of crap from the phone.

cormie

Probably best just to get another album app I guess? I have the same issue and don't want every photo showing up.

Also I notice photos from the camera aren't saved to /camera like before, but seen to be saved to 100Android or something.

Also with the walkman app, if you are playing a song and keep it playing while opening another app, exiting out of the walkman app and go back to open the walkman app to change song, pressing back will exit out of the app again rather than going "up" a folder and there doesn't seem to be any way to go to the containing folder of the folder/files you're viewing.

timetogo

TheChevron wrote: »

Cons:
The screen is not as clear.
The gallery is terrible - all your photos show up from every location in the phone, not just the photos you have taken.
The Sony apps are a bit crap...and there are loads of them.
The keyboard is small and I find myself making frequent typos.
There is no way to get into the phone settings from the Quicksettings tab.
Notification sounds are very low.
Loudspeaker call volume very low.
Only 8 gig of Internal memory.

1: Can't help you with. The screen on mine is as good as an S5. Haven't had it beside any other top end phone.

2: Try Quickpic. You can Exclude / Hide folders.

3: You can uninstall many of the apps that came with the phone (well I could on mine). For those that can't be uninstalled they can be disabled. For those that can't be uninstalled / disabled I turn off Notifications in the App and hide the app using Nova Launcher. I found the Sony pretty free of bloat after I uninstalled the apps I didn't want. I've come from a Samsung though so I'm probably more used to my phone being stuffed full of crap.

4: Play Store - search for keyboard. Loads of them. I use Swiftkey. I've been using it for years. It's one of the first installs on any new phone.

5: Don't understand this. Swipe down. Go to Quick Settings, press Settings.

6 & 7: Can't help you with. I hadn't noticed it. Not because it doesn't exist but because I like my notifications quiet and when I'm on loudspeaker I'm in quiet areas so the volume hasn't bothered me.

8: Might be related to 3. My internal storage is 11.57Gb. I've a **** tonne of apps installed and have 4.96Gb internal free. I do use a SD card though. Maybe some apps automatically install some data to the SD card to leave some space free internally.

My phone was from Vodafone so I suppose uninstalling / disabling apps might be vendor controlled (most of the apps I couldn't uninstall were the Vodafone ones).


A tip I'd recommend any brand phone is to install an app like Nova Launcher. My reasons for this are
1: Allows me more space on the home screens as I can have a grid of icons of 5 X 4 (or more) rather than the 4 X 4.
2: You can turn off the app names on the home screens. I can recognise 100% all of my apps by their icon. Don't need to see their labels.
3: You can hide apps from the app drawer.
4: You can categorise apps into different tabs in the app drawer (e.g. I put all of my games into one tab so I don't see them when I'm scrolling through other apps).

I've attached a screenshot of one of my busier screens to show what I mean by 1 & 2 there.

cormie

Nice post timetogo, I remember installing a decent gallery app for someone on their tablet after doing a bit of research and remember being able to exclude folders etc too. I think it might be quickpic, I'll double check next time I'm with them

I'm using nova launcher too, does everything I need in the free version and is very versatile!

A few more little annoyances I've discovered:

• I use Dialer One as my phone app, when I get a missed call, it asks what app I want to hand it, I click dialer one and "always" but every missed call I get still asks the same thing
  
• I'm having callers say they can't hear me until I hold the bottom of the phone right next to my mouth, I've a habit of just letting it hang in line with the shape of my ear which pushes it out from my mouth, is this the background noise cancellation kicking in?
  
• When I take the phone away from my head, it doesn't light up the screen like it should and it takes me a while to hang up on somebody
  
• There doesn't seem to be an option for conference calls?
  
• On my old phone you could open the gallery through the camera, pinch out and you can see/delete photos and videos easy and it only showed files in the actual camera folder. It doesn't seem possible to get an overview of all media taken with the camera easily from within the camera app and you need to open "album" or other gallery app separate for this, does anyone know is this the case or am I missing something?

timetogo

cormie wrote: »

[*]I'm having callers say they can't hear me until I hold the bottom of the phone right next to my mouth, I've a habit of just letting it hang in line with the shape of my ear which pushes it out from my mouth, is this the background noise cancellation kicking in?

[*]When I take the phone away from my head, it doesn't light up the screen like it should and it takes me a while to hang up on somebody

I don't know about the other ones but these two are worrying. For the first give your phone to someone and get them to ring you so you can see what the other callers are talking about. I've never had somebody say they couldn't hear me.

If you can reproduce the problem with other people using your phone then I'd be thinking about taking it back to the shop.

For the second one, that doesn't happen on mine at all. I just made a call and waved my hand over the screen a few times. Screen goes blank immediately when my hand is over the sensor and lights up immediately when I take my hand away. That sounds like there's something wrong with yours.

If you take it back to the shop I'd recommend backing up & formatting first (it's a pain in the ass) but you'd have to do it anyway. It's worth formatting to rule out the software and see if the issues above go away. They probably won't but the guys in the repair will probably wipe your phone anyway so it's worthwhile you doing it in the off chance (5% probably) that it fixes those issues.


Edit: Actually Quickpic has one annoyance. It can't write to the SDCard since Google messed up the Android permissions so you can't delete pictures from some folders. It's a pain, but fine for giving to somebody when you just want them to see certain pictures.

billbond4

cormie wrote: »

I was hoping that wasn't the only solution, that's far too tedious, there doesn't see to be an option to hide an actual folder, just photos within a folder, if a folder has 1,000's of photos that will take forever, and as soon as the photo is populated again, the new photos will show and you'll have to keep doing it

Just select all when your in the folder

billbond4

5: Don't understand this. Swipe down. Go to Quick Settings, press Settings.
--->
Swipe down with TWO fingers and your in the quick settings, then click settings

BTW for notifications install Light Manager so you can set the LED to flash difference colours (and difference speeds ) for different notifications.