14 DAY TRIAL // The Xperia E1 is one the budget-friendly smartphones announced by Sony Mobile back in January at Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2014 trade fair.
The Android handset made it to market a few months later in March, but Canada was skipped from the initial rollout of the Xperia E1 until today.
The first Canadian carrier to add the Xperia E1 to its portfolio is Bell, which is now offering the smartphone for free on 2-year contracts. In addition, customers who do not wish to commit to a long-term contract can also grab the Xperia E1 for just $150 (€100) on no-term.
Keep in mind that this is the single-SIM version of Xperia E1, not the dual-SIM variant that Sony announced simultaneously back in January.
The good news is that customers who decide to go for the Xperia E1 will get a Jelly Bean device, along with the promise of a KitKat upgrade in a few months.
Although Xperia E1 now ships with Android 4.3 Jelly Bean operating system out of the box, Sony confirmed last month that it would offer an Android 4.4.2 KitKat update sometime in July.
A KitKat smartphone at such a price point is always a good deal, especially if the hardware configuration is decent as well. However, that is for everyone to decide, so here is what you get for the $150 (€100) price tag.
First of all, the Xperia E1 is powered by a 1.2GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 200 processor, an Adreno 302 graphic processing unit and 512MB of RAM. It also packs 4GB of internal memory, along with microSD card slot for memory expansion (up to 32GB).
The budget-friendly smartphone sports a decent enough 4-inch capacitive touchscreen display that supports 480 x 800 pixels resolution and features scratch-resistant glass coating.
On the back, Xperia E1 features a sub-par 3-megapixel photo snapper with video recording. The bad news is that the handset lacks a secondary front-facing camera for video calls or selfies.
When it comes to connectivity options, the Xperia E1 is an all-rounder. The phone offers HSDPA (21Mbps), Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0, microUSB and Wi-Fi, along with GPS with A-GPS support.
Don’t forget that aside from the internal storage that comes with the phone, you can also get 50GB of free cloud storage for life via Box service.
Sony Xperia E1 is powered by a 1700 mAh battery, which should provide up to 500 hours of standby time or up to 8 hours of talk time.