MWC 2013 – Sony Xperia Tablet Z review roundup

The Sony Xperia Z is the world’s thinnest tablet and has been groped and dunked in water countless times by all manner of tech journalists this week at Mobile World Congress. Here’s what we all made of the 1080p, quad-core powered slate.

Stuff‘s very own Will Dunn had the pleasure of giving the Xperia Tablet Z a relaxing bath, but not before running his gadget-weathered hands over the 6.9mm thin slate – “unlike some Ultrabooks which can feel disconcertingly knifey under the wrists, the Xperia Tablet Z has nice little rubberised bits that soften the edges. It actually feels solidly built, but it’s also very light at 495g.”

Verity Burns from What Hi-Fi found that the Xperia Z’s 10.1in screen “looks gorgeous when viewing content, with its 1920×1200 resolution powered by the Mobile Bravia Engine 2 for improved colour reproduction.”

TechRadar‘s Gareth Beavis praised the Xperia Tablet Z’s water and dustproof powers by stating that “the ability to use the device when in the kitchen is an excellent move.” However, while he praises both the Xperia Z and Tablet Z as great pieces of kit, he reckons there’s still no need to own both.

Brent Rose from the Gizmodo camp praised Sony’s minimal interference with the stock Android skin – “Sony is finally stepping back a bit and letting Android shine. The Xperia Tablet Z does have a third-party skin, but it’s light and mostly only noticeable on the desktop.”

SleashGear‘s Chris Davies didn’t find the Xperia Tablet Z to have the “same premium touch as an iPad,” nor did he find it to be “as grippy as the coating on the Nexus 10.” He also couldn’t get the tablet to lag during his playtime, showing that Qualcomm’s quad-core S4 Snapdragon Pro processor is up the the job.

Check out all of our Mobile World Congress 2013 coverage

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Dan Grabham Editor-in-Chief

About

Dan is Editor-in-chief of Stuff, working across the magazine and the Stuff.tv website.  Our Editor-in-Chief is a regular at tech shows such as CES in Las Vegas, IFA in Berlin and Mobile World Congress in Barcelona as well as at other launches and events. He has been a CES Innovation Awards judge. Dan is completely platform agnostic and very at home using and writing about Windows, macOS, Android and iOS/iPadOS plus lots and lots of gadgets including audio and smart home gear, laptops and smartphones. He's also been interviewed and quoted in a wide variety of places including The Sun, BBC World Service, BBC News Online, BBC Radio 5Live, BBC Radio 4, Sky News Radio and BBC Local Radio.

Areas of expertise

Computing, mobile, audio, smart home