Whilst we’re not quite sure what happened to Xperia’s 3 to 9 (held up in the postal strikes perhaps), Sony Ericsson have officially announced the phone we all knew was coming; the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10. With the X10 a firm favourite on the internet rumour mill, let’s separate the fact from the fiction as we take a look at the Xperia X10 in detail.

Let’s get the obvious stuff out the way first; the X10 is a touchscreen phone running on the Android operating system. Due out early next year, the X10 will ship with Android 1.6 (Donut) though expect it to be fully upgradeable to version 2.0 (Eclair) when the update is available. The touchscreen itself is a whopping 4.0 inches and even better still uses Capacitive technology (hooray!) meaning the X10 can multi-touch and finger swipe with the best of them. Inside we find the 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor and 256MB of RAM earning the X10 the accolade of most powerful Android phone yet. Running multiple applications should be a doddle whilst general navigation and the apps themselves are certain to run smoothly and open and close effortlessly. Perfect timing as the Android Market begins to pick up pace and catch up with the App store.

On board memory for the X10 is more adequate than impressive at 1GB but with the option to expand it up to 16GB via a MicroSD card (and with an 8GB card expected to be bundled in the box) there’s plenty of storage space for all your media. And media is something Sony Ericsson are keen to promote when it comes to the X10. The Xperia X10 features a new multimedia user interface called Mediascape which puts all your media; music, photos and videos, in one place and lets you grab them from multiple sources such as Sony Ericsson’s PlayNow music hub, YouTube and of course media saved on the phone’s memory. How this will work in practice remains to be seen but it certainly sounds promising. Sony Ericsson have a similar approach to communication. Following in the footsteps of it’s rivals (Palm Pre, HTC Hero, Motorola Dext etc.), the X10 uses Timescape to aggregate all your communications into one place. From Facebook and Twitter to emails, photos and text messages, all are gathered so you don’t have to open loads of different apps to see what’s going on. Though not the first (and definitely not the last) to implement such an application, its appearance on the X10 is still a major bonus.

Not only is it the power and touchscreen that puts the X10 head and shoulders above its Android compatriots, the phone also features an impressive 8.1 Megapixel camera that’s absolutely loaded with extras. Multiple Face Detection can focus on up to five faces in a photo and even has the ability to save them as friends so the camera will recognise and focus those faces in future snaps. Smile detection and autofocus do pretty much what they say on the tin, the image stabiliser compensates for shaky hands and eliminates blur, Touch Focus makes a triumphant return after its excellent appearance in the Satio and the camera is rounded off by high quality video capture, an LED flash and video light geo-tagging. Sony Ericsson have also seen sense and included a 3.5mm jack and micro USB port (turning their back on the proprietary ports that have blighted so many Sony’s of old).

Connectivity continues the X10’s hot streak with HSDPA and Wi-Fi both present whilst GPS supports Navigation software and various Android apps that utilise GPS. All the above features plus all the stuff we love about Android such as support for Google services and the aforementioned Android Market. Not only is the X10 the most complete Android phone ever released, it’s one of the best smartphones we’ve ever seen to boot. If Sony Ericsson can deliver on their promises and the Xperia X10 lives up to the considerable hype, the company can quite comfortably put their troubles behind them and could emerge as the smart phone manufacturer to watch in 2010. Expected to launch early next year, fill in your details below to keep up to date on the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 and click here to check the full spec.

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Sony Ericsson officially announce the Xperia X10!