Last month at Google I/O, Google announced a “Nexus” version of the Samsung Galaxy S4. Shortly after that, Google also announced a “Nexus” version of HTC’s One. According to Android Geeks, Google will announce a “Nexus” version of the Sony Xperia Z in July. Their evidence? “A Sony insider who wanted to remain anonymous.”
Is such a device plausible? Absolutely, Sony is a pioneer when it comes to Android hacking. They’re one of the few, if not only, companies that releases stock ROMs for developers to fiddle with on their devices. Now granted, several things don’t work, most notably the cellular modem, but this “Nexus” Xperia Z will fix that.
Should you buy it? Probably not. I’ve played with the Xperia Z on several occasions, and the screen is just off. Yes, on paper it looks good. Who wouldn’t want a 5 inch 1080p panel? But the viewing angles are practically non-existant. That and there are no black levels, everything looks gray.
Will companies make stock versions of their flagship phones from this point on? Hard to say, though some people obviously want that to happen. With stock versions you lose a lot of the functionality that OEMs bake into their hardware. Goodbye Galaxy S4 camera interface. Goodbye Sense 5 UI (some of you actually like it). And as for Sony, maybe it’s a good thing they’re going stock since their Android skin was never that useful to begin with.
