Tuesday, November 25, 2014

GADGET GIZMO SPECIAL review.........................Lenovo Vibe X2: Feature-rich smartphone

GADGET GIZMO SPECIAL Lenovo Vibe X2 review: Feature-rich smartphone


Lenovo's new Vibe X2 smartphone sports a 'multi-layered' design with its edges giving the impression of different coloured layers stacked together. 

It also ticks almost all the right checkboxes when it comes to hardware specifications and at a price less than Rs 20,000 is worthy of being referred to as a 'value for money' phone.

But is the phone a good buy? We try to find out in our review..

Build & design



Phones these days, are mostly rectangular glass slabs with some curves thrown in.

Lenovo tries to distinguish the Vibe X2 with the concept of coloured layers in a unibody form factor.

The phone's edges give an impression that several layers have been stacked on each other, to make the design interesting.

It surely is a good deviation as the phone looks pretty different with three coloured layers - golden, orange and red stacked below the black display panel layer.


Very light


The phone's edges are not rounded and even the rounding at the corners is very subtle, giving the phone a very sharp look with the dominant straight lines.

At 120gram, the Vibe X2 feels very light and the dimensions (68.6x7.27x140.2mm) make it ideal for one hand use. Despite the low weight, the phone doesn't feel flimsy or fragile.

The capacitive touch navigation keys are placed below the display and offer good touch sensitivity.

The right edge sports metallic keys for volume control and power. The keys bear the same colour as that of the layer they're placed on, have a brushed metallic finish and offer great tactile feedback.

Placement


The left edge holds the sim card tray that has both micro and nano sim card slots.

The top edge features the 3.5mm headphone jack while the micro-USB port is placed at the bottom edge. The back has a gold coloured matte finish which is not very prone to smudges and looks good.

The rear camera lens and LED flash are placed towards the left side and are flush with body of the phone. There's some Lenovo branding and a small speaker grill at the back.

Display


The phone sports a 5-inch full-HD IPS display that looks bright and vivid. The display offers wide viewing angles and decent outdoor legibility. Text and images look sharp and crisp and colours were accurate. Sunlight legibility was also good.

The display panel is protected by Gorilla Glass 3 to guard against minor scratches. Touch response was also good.

Software



The Vibe X2 comes with a heavily customized version of Android 4.4 KitKat. Lenovo deploys its own UI skin to offer enhanced features and customization options.

Just like Xiaomi's MiUI and Huawei Honor 6, the phone's default UI is devoid of an app drawer and app icons and widgets are spread across the home screens. The unified home screen-app launcher style may come across as user-friendly to people who have not used an Android phone before.

But it will take some time to get used to if you have already been using an Android smartphone. You can of course download and install an alternate launcher.


Text: Anupam Saxena,TOI Tech

No comments: