If you remember, I said, when it was still firmly in the realm of rumour, that the Nexus One would cause problems for other manufacturers, if Google actually released it themselves. Y’know, ‘cos it’s the actual Googlephone, so people might see that, and think it’s better than any other Android phone out there. You may also remember that I name-checked one upcoming phone, in particular: the Sony Ericsson X10.

And that got me thinking. Maybe the Nexus One will cause problems for the X10, but when you get right down to it, which one is the better phone?

Well, if you look at the hardware, first of all, you may well be inclined to say the Sony Ericsson X10 is the better phone. It’s got the same 1GHz Snapdragon processor, but on top of that, it’s got a bigger screen, and a substantially better camera. Fair enough, the screen on the X10 isn’t an AMOLED screen (which the Nexus One is), but it is nearly half an inch bigger, and anyone who tells you that size doesn’t matter is lying (as confirmed by a lady friend… don’t ask).

And as for the camera, well… it’s 8 megapixels, instead of 5, and it’s following on from the legacy of Sony Ericsson’s Cyber-Shot series. In other words, it’s impossible for it to not be better than the Nexus One’s camera. When it comes to software, though, things aren’t quite as cut and dried. Y’see, the Nexus One has version 2.1 of Android, whereas the X10’s running version 1.6, and there are quite a few differences between the two, most notably that the Nexus One can run Google Earth, and has proper turn by turn navigation in the Maps app. To mitigate against that, the Sony Ericsson X10 uses its own interface on top, and that’s one of the areas is garnered a fair bit of praise.

Y’see, they’ve installed a social-networking-friendly interface on top, called Timescape. And although it looks very different, it’s a similar concept to the MOTOBLUR UI you find on the Motorola DEXT, with the emphasis being on aggregating your social networking feeds into one big, centralised lump. So, in all honesty, it’s a bit of a Mexican stand-off in terms of the interface.

And so we come to the usual bit I do at the end of these handset battles, where all pretence of objectivity goes completely out the window. In other words, it’s the “which one would I have” section. Well, that’s an easy one. Bigger screen, better camera, thinner body, and it just looks cooler. It’s the Sony Ericsson X10.

Of course, I’ll never actually have one, because I prefer Windows Mobile/Windows Phone to Android, but the result still stands. Advantage, X10…

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