Smartphone Wars: Sony Ericsson Satio versus Apple iPhone 3GS (1)

According to Sony Ericsson, Satio is a "game changer," a smartphone that combines the best of Sony Ericsson's Cybershot and Walkman series and boasts of a fine marriage between design and technology.

"With Satio you can enjoy any form of entertainment anytime, anywhere. Whether its music or movies you will never be more than a tap away from your favourite tracks or shows," said Fredrik Mansson, Market Business Manager at Sony Ericsson UK.

But, of course, we shouldn't just judge Satio based on the company's boasts and hence we have thrown Satio and iPhone 3GS into the ring to find out which smartphone's the true winner.

[1] Size and Weight: Satio measures 112.0 x 55.0 x 13.0 mm and weighs 126gm while iPhone 3GS measures 115.5x62.1x12.3mm and weighs 135gm.

Winner: Tie. There is not much difference between the form factor of the two smartphones except for the fact that iPhone is slightly, but unnoticeably, heavier and bigger.

[2] Display: Satio boasts of a 3.5-inch resistive touchscreen with 360x640 pixel resolution display while iPhone has a 3.5-inch capacitive touchscreen with 480x320 pixel resolution display.

Winner: Satio. Despite both the phones having screens of same size, Satio offers better resolution, which means better viewing of videos without pixelation or distortion. Of course, some may complain that Satio's resistive touchscreen is a dumb idea. But believe me folks. Unlike the resistive touchscreen in other smartphones, Satio's touchscreen can actually pass off as capacitive touchscreen except for the fact that for managing some applications you would need the stylus and in typing the keyboard, you would need to exert more pressure on the screen than is necessary in a capacitive one.

Actually, capacitive screens are only advantageous when all you have deft fingers. But if you're a pro with a stylus, nothing beats resistive screens.

[3] Camera and video recording: Satio boasts of a whopping 12.1-megapixel camera with up to 16x digital zoom, image stabiliser, auto-focus, face and smile detection, red-eye reduction, geo-tagging, xenon flash and a secondary video LED flash. Satio can also capture video at a decent 30fps. On the other hand, iPhone has a 3.15-megapixel camera with autofocus and video recording (@30fps) but no flash or zoom. The iPhone 3GS also packs VGA recording @ 30fps for a very smooth experience.