Yes, downgraded.
Even though the XXC cost me 70 dollars more than the Z1C and is 2 years newer, it's a downgrade. I was under the impression that the XXC was the successor to the compact premium phones of the flagship Z line. Boy was I wrong.
I'm hoping to prevent other from making the same mistake. You're probably better off with a Z5C or even older.
I'm not sure which of these are Sony's fault and which are Google's fault, but the complaints still stand.
This is my comparison/list of complaints. I'm comparing the X Compact vs the Z1 Compact.
- Construction is all plastic. It feels cheaper, it has less grip, and it scratches more easily.
- The camera is slower now. When holding down the shutter and moving the phone, the image lags noticeably. Pictures take longer to save (even at lower res) on internal storage or a new, fast SD card - it makes no difference.
- Video has its own menu now, for some reason, and can't be accessed from Manual or Auto camera modes. So if I want to quickly go from Manual photo to Manual video, which used to be very easy in the old GUI, I have to slide through the Auto menu and every slide takes time. It was MUCH easier when I had both photo AND video in the manual interface. I only ever used manual mode for both video and photo. I really don't understand why Sony would make this unnecessary change that only slows things down for the user.
- The mini apps are entirely gone. I used them every single day. Particularly calculator and screenshot. When my Z1C's power button started failing (failing very, very badly, by the way) the only way for me to make a screen capture was through the mini app because the power button menu was inaccessible. Right after making the capture, I could crop and save/send the image. Super quick and easy. Now I have to go to Album, open the picture, open in editor, select crop tool, save it, open it again, and then share it. So many extra steps, so unnecessary. The calculator also was useful because it could float on top of another app so you could make calculations without having to switch between a standalone calc app and the app with your information, like I have to do now with my XXC.
- While we're talking about screen capture, native video capture from the power button menu is also gone. Super useful function, incomprehensibly removed from my new "better" phone.
- Volume buttons are very close to the dedicated camera button, have similar size and identical structure, so if you're not looking, it's sometimes hard to quickly find the button you're looking for. Because they are positioned so low now, it's also very hard to press the volume buttons when holding the phone with one hand. It requires my thumb to bend more than 90º which is impossible. That low position also means that many times I hit the volume up button when I was aiming for volume down. I guess I have to start always aiming lower than I think I should aim at first.
- This is a tiny detail, but the surface at the bottom of the phone, around the USB-C input, has a strange property that when scratched with the USB-C connector (as one might do when trying to plug in the phone in the dark) makes a sound that gives me goosebumps like nails on a chalkboard do, albeit a lot less annoying.
- I was forgetting a big one. PHONE IS NOT WATERPROOF. I would say that's quite a step down.
- Screen is bigger (which I actually didn't want) but resolution is still a mediocre 720p (I expected 1080p by now) so the pixel density is lower.
- Adding to the unnecessary deletion of the mini-apps, there's no native Notes or Calendar app, so I can't port my notes from the old phone, I literally have nowhere to jot something down unless I open a gmail draft, and I have to add my events to Google Calendar if I want to write them somewhere, or download a third party app. Sure, there are apps to do that in the store, but not having a native Notes app is insane. I've had one in every phone since like 2010.
- The new phone has a lot less phone signal than the old one. It's always 0-2 bars now.
- In the pull-down menu where you used to be able to turn wi-fi and cell data on and off with one tap it now takes two taps. Wi-fi has a one-tap button when you pull down once, but not cell data. In the second pull-down menu they require 2 taps. Additionally, the date is not visible in the first pull-down so you have to pull twice to see it.
- My headphones no longer work with my new phone. Thanks for the backwards incompatibility. There's a thread for this specifically.
- The data menu requires an extra tap to see the data usage graph, and a per-app graph is no longer available, you can only see the total data usage graph.
The home screens are no longer simetrically listed from with a center screen and two screens to each side. Instead, additional screens are placed to the right of the home screen. That means I can no longer have two screens that can be accessed with one single swipe (left or right). The third screen, instead of being one swipe to the left, is two swipes to the right. Another unnecessary complication. Nevermind, I just realized you can add a screen to the left. I hope other users notice this as well.- There's no dedicated Stamina button in the pull-down menu/notification tray to quickly toggle it on and off. There's no ultra-low battery mode as a distinct option other than Stamina, only the latter is left.
Well, that's all I can think of right now.
tl;dr: No, I would not "recommend this to a friend."
