Lunch break is over and I got my 10 minutes hands-on time with the white Xperia S, running Gingerbread.
I love the design and I think it's wonderful to look at. The slightly curved glass is nice and so is the back. But I have to admit, the phone is a bit to too big for me. The Xperia P has the perfect size, imo, but the specs are not really appealing for a phone in 2012 (not a surprise, considering it's about 150 bucks cheaper).
Using the phone itself was offensive. Good god, I have no idea how people were able to use Gingerbread (with a skin on top) and not wanting to shoot themselves in the head. I know I wanted to. My 2010 phone with 2009 hardware in it was able to outpace it in everything I tested. Everything was laggy and felt so slow. Even the live wallpaper lagged when I scrolled through the home screen. Surprisingly enough, though, pinch-to-zoom in the browser was more responsive than on the One S, which had quite a bit of lag (at least on the full Verge website).
If I was responsible for Sony's retail experience, I'd send everyone new display models with ICS on it, ASAP.
I was also able to play a bit with the One S, but after 3 minutes I had enough of Sense. While it felt more responsive and smooth, the design is just not for me. Ew.
Since they didn't have a working display unit of the Nexus, I'll try another store after work.