The Xperia Z3+ might not be the flagship smartphone everyone was waiting for from Sony. Its design resembles uncannily the one of its predecessor, to the point where it’s hard to distinguish one from the other. Sure, the new phone includes a shinier finish in the metal frame and it’s actually slimmer, its stereo speakers are now hidden within the phone’s edges, but that’s about it when it comes to the changes Sony has made and these would be largely unnoticed by most consumers. Its internals remain pretty much the same, as well, the main camera is still the 20.7-megapixel sensor from the past three generations, the front facing camera was slightly upgraded to a 5-megapixel sensor and the display keeps the same size and resolution. One component that has been changed is the processor for the newer but controversial Qualcomm Snapdragon 810.
We first started hearing rumors about some production problems that Qualcomm was having regarding this particular processor last year, the problem was that it got really hot inside of the devices that used it. This was one of the rumored reasons that Samsung used its own processor in the new flagships. The overheating rumors were denied not only by Qualcomm, but also by the companies that started using this processor in their devices, the LG G Flex 2 was one of the first devices to use it and the company stated that the processor was working properly.
Qualcomm has even created a variation of this processor focusing on reducing its temperature and the so-called version 2.1 is the one that’s actually included in the Xperia Z3+, but a few days ago we started reporting about this problem in the new handset, closing some apps and letting know the user that the reason is that the temperature is too high. Now, Sony has acknowledged the issue but their response is that this phone, being a high-performance 64-bit octa-core device with advanced camera technology, additional heat can cause some apps to stop and that the heat felt on the back glass of the device is no cause for concern. Browsing and social media apps seem to work just fine, but the camera or watching Netflix in HD seems to make the apps stop. Apparently a software update is coming in the summer that will address the problem, much like in the case of the HTC One M9 which seemed to reduce its temperature. Anyway, if the user is not completely satisfied with the performance of this device should contact Sony’s service center to work out any concern.