The X Reality Engine: A New Chapter in Mobile Displays

Hey everybody, this is Erica, the technology nerd who likes to film stuff, and I'm here today to talk about Sony's latest mobile display technology, X reality for mobile. In my last video, I discussed Triluminous, specifically Triluminous for Mobile, where I explained what Triluminous was, how it worked, and its intended purpose of expanding the range of colors that the display can show. The Bravia TVs, in particular, have been able to take this technology a step further, but unfortunately, my recent measurements revealed that X reality for mobile doesn't quite live up to its expectations.

When I first tested the display, I was excited to see if it would expand on the color gamut of current flagship phones, which are mostly limited to sRGB. Unfortunately, my measurements showed that X reality for mobile is only slightly wider than sRGB. What really makes this technology stand out, however, is the processing power behind it, specifically Bravia 2 processing. This added a lot of saturation and manipulated colors, making the display look much more vibrant and engaging.

But here's the thing: I went back to measure the display again after applying the X reality engine, and I was surprised to find that nothing had changed. The processing is still exactly the same as Bravia 2, which means that this technology is essentially just an updated version of what we already know and love. And while this might not be a bad thing in itself, it does mean that Sony has added some new features to enhance the display experience. For example, they've introduced sharpening and grain, which are meant to improve the display's ability to handle low-quality content.

The purpose of these new features is twofold: on the one hand, they're designed to make low-quality content look like it was rendered in HD, which can be quite impressive. On the other hand, they also introduce a potential risk of over-processing, which can result in some rather...interesting effects. I noticed that when looking at faces, especially if the quality wasn't decent to begin with, the sharpening and grain effect could make certain features look rather blocky.

Fortunately, Sony has made it easy to disable these features if you don't want them, but what would have been nice is if they'd included a simple toggle or setting to do so. As it stands, I'm left with the feeling that X reality for mobile is essentially just Bravia 2 with some added bells and whistles.

In fact, I've encountered another issue with this new technology: Sony's DRM (Digital Rights Management) system seems to be having some issues. For me, at least, this means that unless I have the X reality engine enabled or Bravia 2 processing running in the background, Netflix won't load videos on my device. And while I've asked around and tried to confirm this with other users, it's not clear if this is just a problem specific to my device or if it's something more widespread.

When I try to access Netflix while X reality engine is disabled, it sits on the loading screen indefinitely, refusing to play the video. But as soon as I enable the X reality engine again, the video starts playing without issue. This has happened three times now across three different firmwares, which suggests that there might be a deeper problem at play.

I also noticed that Google's content delivery system can't seem to fetch the license for this device, resulting in an "couldn't fetch license" error message. This is frustrating, especially given that video content on high-definition devices like mine can become quite large and demanding on resources.

Overall, while X reality for mobile does show promise as a display technology, I'm left with mixed feelings about its performance. The sharpening and grain effects are interesting but potentially overdone, and the DRM issues seem to be causing problems with content delivery. As always, I hope that Sony will take these concerns seriously and address them in future updates.

The Future of X Reality Engine

So what does the future hold for this new display technology? Will Sony continue to iterate and refine it, or will they leave it as is? One thing's for sure: with great power comes great responsibility. As a user, I want to be able to trust my device's performance, and right now, that's not exactly the case.

While X reality engine does offer some impressive benefits, including improved color gamut and enhanced low-quality content handling, it also introduces some potential drawbacks, such as over-processing and DRM issues. To truly take advantage of this technology, Sony will need to address these concerns and ensure that future updates are comprehensive and well-tested.

In the meantime, I'll continue to monitor X reality for mobile and provide feedback on its performance. As a user, it's my job to hold companies accountable for their products, and I'm not afraid to speak up when something isn't quite right. So, Sony, take note: we're watching, and we expect more.

Conclusion

X reality for mobile is an exciting new display technology that offers some impressive benefits, but also introduces some potential drawbacks. As a user, it's my job to weigh these pros and cons and provide feedback on its performance. While the sharpening and grain effects are interesting, they're not without risk, and I hope that Sony will take steps to mitigate these issues in future updates.

Ultimately, X reality for mobile is just one part of the larger story of display technology advancement. As companies like Sony continue to push the boundaries of what's possible, we can expect even more impressive innovations in the future. But for now, let's take a closer look at this technology and see where it takes us.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhey everybody this is Erica the technology nerd who likes to film stuff and Sony has released X reality for mobile so now is time for an update video in my last video I talked about triluminous especially triluminous for Mobile in that video I explained what triluminous was how it worked how it was supposed to expand the range of colors that the display is able to show now the Bravia TVs really are able to expand the amount of colors that they are able to show but what I found when I measured this display is that it really isn't much wider of a gamut than srgb all Flagship phones right now more or less have srgb gamut so I found that with this display it's just a tad wider than srgb but what really makes it pop is the processing Bravia 2 processing added a lot of saturation and it also manipulated colors so what I'm seeing with X reality for mobile I went and did all the measurements again and I'm actually finding that nothing has changed it's behaving just like Bravia 2 so the processing is exactly the same so this is essentially Bravia 2 but they have also added sharpening and grain the whole purpose of that is to be able to take lowquality content and be able to fake it so it looks like HD content so they're adding grain and they're boosting sharpening on some things it actually looks pretty cool it almost looks like it could be HD but I think that the processing overdoes it at points especially when you're looking at faces the best comparison that I could make make is to take an image and bring it into Photoshop and really boost sharpening it ends up making some features look really blocky so that is what I am noticing with the X reality for mobile is that some things look nice if the quality was decent to begin with but if you have really low quality content it actually makes some things like faces look pretty blocky that's not an effect that I really wanted to see so if you do not like the sharpening and grainy effect you can simply disable it but what would have been nice is if they had added a subset to go into to disable that grain and sharpening effect because as I had shown for myself it's essentially just Bravia 2 like was on here before but with this added grain and sharpening capability an odd thing that I am noticing right now is it seems that Sony is having some DRM issues so that's basically talking about licensing or licensed content so for some reason for me and I want others to confirm this as well I kind of want Sony to see this is that unless the X reality for mobile is enabled or Bravia 2 because it's been doing this the entire time since they got this phone unless this processing engine is enabled Netflix won't load videos I've asked around at XDA but it seems like everybody there is not from the United States or from the United Kingdom where you are allowed to use Netflix so I haven't had anyone be able to really confirm this for me if this is just my device or if this is something that really is a problem going on so the X reality engine is on and I have Netflix starting up and you can see that it starts in immediately but as soon as I go into settings and turn off the X reality engine or Bravia Engine 2 when I go back into Netflix and try to play the video it just sits at the Netflix screen it just doesn't want to load and again we can go ahead and turn on X reality or Bravia 2 play it again and you can see that it starts right up so that's one of the darnest things that I have seen please fix this Sony this is three different firmwares that you have released and it's still having this problem also after three releases I'm seeing that it still can't play content from Google you can see it says couldn't fetch license a43 it's been doing this ever since the beginning as well that's kind of a big deal when video content is very huge with this particular device and for now that means that I haven't been able to disable the X reality engine so I'm stuck with the sharpening effect and it's causing my less than 1080p video stream to look pretty grainy and I don't like it it really ruins the experience if you are watching content that isn't already filled with a bunch of artifacts or was rendered terribly I think that the X reality engine makes things actually look quite interesting but otherwise I'm really hoping that Sony is able to fix those few things that I'm talking about\n"