Aimed to deliver improved sound quality, the HTC Sensation XE with Beats Audio™ comes with a set of Beats Audio headphones, and a refined interface delivers specially tuned audio.

Looking much like the current model, the HTC Sensation XE has flashes of red to distinguish the updated handset – around the speaker and the buttons below the screen to the front of the handset.

At 126.1mm x 65.4mm x 11.3mm, the HTC Sensation XE is a large handset, but this means you get a large 4.3 inch (or 109 mm) touch screen with qHD (540 X 960) resolution. This reproduces images and movies in excellent colour and quality, which makes full use of the 1080p HD quality video recording and 8 mega pixel camera. The autofocus and dual LED flash means your photos should be bright and clear and the instant capture feature means that there is no delay between you pressing the shutter button and the picture being taken.

Under the hood, the 1.5 GHz dual core processor now comes with a total storage capacity of 4GB, although only 1GB seems to be available to the user. Upgrade with through the microSD port, up to 32GB, with an 8 GB card included. There is 768 MB of RAM in addition to this.

Connections include the 3.5 mm stereo audio connection and micro-USB 2.0 (5-pin) port with mobile high-definition video link (MHL) for USB or HDMI connection, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, and DLNA for wireless streaming.

There is an internal GPS antenna with HTC Locations for maps.

Battery life is dependent on the applications ou are running but quoted a:

Talktime:

• WCDMA: Up to 445 minutes
• GSM: Up to 550 minutes

Standby time:

• WCDMA: Up to 540 hours
• GSM: Up to 310 hours

Like many smartphones this will probably mean you are charging your HTC Sensation XE overnight, most nights.

broad strategic partnership that combines the respective strengths of our companies and builds a new global mobile ecosystem

in effect stating that new Nokia smartphones will run on the Windows Phone 7 operating platform and not the Symbian or MeeGo platforms Nokia have been favouring to date.

Have Nokia jumped out of the frying pan into the fire? The Nokia CEO, Stephen Elop refered to Nokia standing on a “burning platform” only days ago and indeed Nokia’s share of the smartphone market fell from 38% to 28% in 2010, according to monitoring firm IDC.

But the Microsoft platform was the worst performing in a similar period. So can a meeting of these two companies produce a product to rival Google Android and Apple iPhone?

There are no product announcements to coincide with this news, so consumers will have to wait and see what new devices will be brought to market this year.

Here is a bit more from the press release:

There are other mobile ecosystems. We will disrupt them.

There will be challenges. We will overcome them.

Success requires speed. We will be swift.

Will they be swift enough though?

The 3.2 inche TFT screen is has 360 x 640 pixels, and 16 million colours, is scratch resistant and has handwriting recognition. At 107 x 51.7 x 12.5 mm the body of the Vivaz sits nicely around the screen with three buttons at the base and other dedicated buttons to the side (for taking pictures, for example)

The phone has 75 MB built-in storage which can be expanded to 32 GB through the microSD card (there is an 8 GB card included)

Connect the Vivaz to the outside world through 3G (HSDPA, 10.2 Mbps; HSUPA, 2 Mbps), WiFi, Bluetooth or the micro USB connector.

The camera has autofocus and a built-in flash and provides reasonable pictures – sharp with good colour definition, although a little darker than say the Nokia N8. Other features include touch focus, geo tagging and face and smile recognition.

With a built-in FM radio and MP3 player the Vivaz offers an interesting alternative to other phones but is running on the old (but tried and tested) Symbian S60 operating system.

As we said in the introduction, there are some good offers available if you want a mobile with a good resolution camera. Colours available are Pink, Silver Moon, Cosmic Black, Galaxy Blue and Venus Ruby.

Over at Engadget, new photos of the likely candidate show a device that could form part of the new Xperia range, expected to be announced by Sony Ericsson on 13 February, with names such as the Sony Ericsson Xperia Play or Zeus Z1 being suggested.

The photo shows the familiar Playstation buttons on an Xperia based frame, with a 4.1 inch screen, running the Android OS.

With Microsoft integrating Xbox gaming into the new Windows Mobile OS, Sony must be keen to launch a handset that allows dedicated gamers to stay on brand.

Here is what you need to do:

1 login or sign up by visiting this link

2.Upload your photo or photos. New customers will now see the free print credit in their account.

3.Create your gift and add to the cart, and use the code STUFF25 when you checkout.

This offer is valid until midnight on 16th December.

Here are some of the top offers fro Orange PAYG, but the 15% off is only valid 8th and 9th December, so go on and buy now. Click the a phone image to head over to Orange:

Sony Ericsson W995, with 8 megapixel camera and Walkman Music Player.

With free Christmas Gift Box

Offer price £109.95

Nokia 5230, with 2 megapixel camera and media player

Free Christmas Boax and Offer Price of £67.15

Orange Rio, with QWERTY keyboard and 2 megapixel camera and MP3 player.

Free Christmas Gift Box

Offer price £33.15.

Finally, a PAYG Touch Screen mobile, with 2 megapixel camera, for under £30!

The Orange Miami, MP3 player, Bluetooth, 2 megapixel camera with video.

Offer Price £25.50

Remember the 15% off is only available on 8th and 9th December.

Blackberry 9800 Torch
Orange network Dolphin £30 Blackberry Data (24mths) – 500MB data allowance, 500 mins, Unlimited texts
8 Months ½ Price by redemption – Effectively £25.00 monthly with cashback

Nokia C3 – £10, 100 mins, 500 texts – 24 month

HTC Wildfire

HTC Wildfire

Now £20.

HTC Desire HD

HTC Desire HD
Orange network Dolphin £30 (24mths) – 500MB data allowance, 500 mins, Unlimited texts
6 Months FREE by redemption – Effectively £22.50 monthly with cashback

If you are prepared to pay top price, you can expect to get a really high-resolution camera in your mobile phone.

Going into 2010, the Sony Ericsson Satio, was looking like a trend setter with a 12 megapixel camera phone that looked more like a camera than a phone. Unfortunately technical difficulties meant that by January the handset had been discontinued and retailers were offering to swap the phone for those customers who had purchased it.

Next up from Sony Ericsson was the Xperia X10, with an 8 megapixel camera that had a good range of editing features and proved to take reasonable pictures. The Xperia X10 suddenly showed that the Android platform could support camera phones with good cameras.

HTC Desire HD

Not to be left out, HTC updated their popular Desire, with the HTC Desire HD, adding an 8 megapixel camera with autofocus and LED flash. Video comes in 720p HD quality and there are other camera features such as face recognition, geotagging, depth of field, vignette, and more. With Android applications allowing you to customise your photos even further, and the seamless way in which HTC implement the Android platform, the Desire HD has been and remains, a very popular camera phone.

As usual, Nokia released a number of mobiles throughout 2010, and the one that stands out in the camera stakes is the Nokia N8. With a 12 megapixel camera and optics from Carl Zeiss, including a wide-angle lens and the ability to shoot in high-definition video (720p resolution) and connect via HDMI to your home theatre this camera phone is comparable in specs to many digital cameras on the market today. The photos are good and the video capabilities are assured, with Nokia producing a professional quality film only using the N8.

Finally, if neither Symbian or Android are your operating system of choice, the Windows Mobile OS was revamped and brought a rush of new handsets. The HTC Mozart is one of the best specced camera phones of the bunch and comes with 8 megapixel colour camera with auto focus and xenon flash. Capable of recording video up to 720p HD it also has built-in scene settings including candlelight, landscape and portrait. The lack of microSD card expandability may be a bit of a problem, but with 8GB of memory onboard, this should only worry a few.

Blackberry, always leaders in this market have released a number of new models towards the end of 2010. The Blackberry Torch 9800 is a combination of touch screen, with a full slide out Qwerty keyboard. Packing a 5 megapixel camera, flash and autofocus, easy integration of Facebook and Twitter, web browsing with pinch to zoom, this phone is comparable to anything in the Qwerty marketplace, but with a touch screen and graphical menus, provides a significant advantage over a number of the competitors. It is also at the top of the price range and for those looking for a more cost conscious option, the older 8520 (with a full keyboard but a 2 megapixel camera) is available for under £11 per month on contract.

Nokia also have a selection of models to choose from, including the top of the range business mobile the E72 and the more consumer orientated C3.

Both are robust performers but the similarity ends with the external appearance. Whilst the E72 can handle social media through a variety of apps, it is email and business communication that are to the fore, with seamless handling of Microsoft Exchange email through Nokia’s Mail for Exchange.

The C3-00 (not to be confused with the C3-01 touch and type which does not have the full form keypad) offers many of the features of the E72 but at a lot smaller price. Ok, there is less memory and only a 2 megapixel camera compared with the 5 megapixel on the E72, but the screen is good and there is full access to social media including Facebook and Twitter updates to your home screen, and it is these features that the majority of users will get this handset for. Email and texting are a breeze with the full keyboard, and the music player and easy call functions make this a great mobile for the social networker.

Whist not the most up to date model, for real value, the Samsung Genio QWERTY provides the benefits of a full Qwerty keyboard, perfect for younger mobile users, but still packed with a 2 megapixel camera, web browsing, Bluetooth and social networking applications including Facebook, MySpace, Flickr, Picasa, Friendster and Photobucket. There is a MP3 player and FM radio, but no Wifi and now available on Pay as you go for under £60.

The growth in popularity of other operating systems, especially Android, and the manufacturers, particularly Samsung and Sony Ericsson, abandoning Symbian in their favour are thought to be largely behind this move.

Whilst this probably means more Symbian mobiles from Nokia, it is yet to be seen if they will be competitive against Apple, Blackberry and Android.