GADGET GIZMO REVIEW ............ LENOVO VIBE S1

GADGET GIZMO REVIEW

 LENOVO VIBE S1

Phone makers have been concentrating efforts on camera technology off late. That is the primary reason your camera phone can now compete very well with small point-and-shoot cameras. They also offer similar features including optical image stabilisation, laser autofocus, a dual LED flash and so on.However, the front camera has not evolved with the same speed. With the Vibe S1, Lenovo has delivered a selfie-focused smartphone that features twin front cameras.

The Lenovo Vibe S1 boasts of an 8MP front camera with f2.2 aperture and a secondary 2MP front camera solely to analyse and captures depth of field. By default, the dual camera mode is not active in the camera app. Once you manually enable this feature, both cameras will work in conjunction to capture image.And the benefit of the second camera? It makes editing images easy -the phone can differentiate between the subject in the foreground and the background. This allows the built-in software to instantly select a precision cut-out of the foreground. You can then chose to swap the background with another image or blur the background. This results in much better effect on the selfies than a standard camera. In our usage, we found the camera took great selfies and the cut-outbackground swap feature was a lot of fun to play with. The focus speed was impressive but the capture time increases by a second when you use the dual camera mode. On screen, the image quality looks great, but we noticed that when the same image was viewed on a larger display (like a TV), the details are not very crisp. Since this is a selfie focussed phone, a front flash for low light selfie capture is sorely missed -its something we've found useful on other smartphones.

The phone stands out from the crowd with its curved glass rear panel, slim bezels and rounded corners. The sleek design makes it easy to use with one hand while the volume and power key are ergonomically placed on the right side. On the other side is the hybrid SIM slot: one slot for a SIM card while the second slot can house a nanoSIM or microSD card depending on your requirement. At 132 grams, we found the phone to be well balanced in terms of size and weight. Since the all glass rear panel is a fingerprint magnet, Lenovo has included a hard plastic clear transparent case in the box -a smart move, we think.The 5-inch IPS display has a resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels giving it a pixel density of 441 ppi. The display instantly impressed us with rich colours, wide viewing angles and excellent brightness. However, sunlight readability could have been better.You get the option to adjust the colour temperature of the screen in settings which is a welcome addition. Under the display are the three capacitive touch sensitive buttons, but to our disappoint However, sunlight readability could have been better. You get the option to adjust the colour temperature of the screen in settings which is a wel come addition. Under the display are the three capacitive touch sensitive but tons, but to our disappointment, they are not backlit.

The specifications are great for the price.

You get an octacore Mediatek processor with 3GB RAM, 32GB storage and a 2,420mAh battery. We had no issues playing full HD videos as well as games like Shadowgun and Asphalt Nitro. Even with more than 15 apps running in the background, the phone still had around 700MB RAM free. Essentially, performance did not suffer. One issue we noticed was that the phone tends to start heating up after 10 minutes of gaming -it never got too hot to hold, but it felt like a gaming session lasting longer than 30 minutes would have pushed the phone to its limit.

Software-wise, the phone comes with the Vibe UI based on Android 5.0. The interface is zippy and loaded with features. There is no app drawer, so all app icons as well as widgets are placed on dif ferent home panels. Lenovo has even customised the quick launch drop down tray to hold more icons compared to the standard Android interface -this can save quite a bit of time in daily use.Other handy features include brightness protection, a high sensitive touch mode, p o cke t d i al p reve n ti on mode, a double press of the volume key to take a photo with the screen off, double tap to wake, one touch short cut access and a custom task scheduler. What we did not like was the amount of bloatware preloaded -you get apps like Evernote, Kingsoft Office, Route 66, UC Browser, Tap the Frog, Asphalt 8, Spiderman Ultimate power and so on -all of these eat up a significant amount of space.

While front camera is excellent, the rear camera is no slouch either. The 13MP camera has phase detection autofocus with dual tone flash and delivers some great results. We were surprised by the low noise in the images taken indoors with the Vibe S1. Similar to the front camera, the focus and capture speed are great. However, the lack of a full manual mode is a let-down. Audio quality from the phone is topnotch. The in-ear volume as well as the loudspeaker volume is impressive.

Battery life is about average as expected -the phone managed to work one full day with 10-12% battery remaining. We were im pressed with the battery charging speed of the phone to. With the supplied charger, it can go from a 10% charge to 70% in 45 minutes.

Overall, the Lenovo Vibe S1 is one of the bet ter options if you want something stylish that is not a phablet. There are a few quirks, but they can be ignored thanks to stellar per formance and style. At roughly the same price, you can also consider the Asus Zenfone Selfie. This phone has a 5.5-inch full HD display and a 13MP front camera equipped with dual LED flash for all those selfies that you want to take in low light. inch full HD display and a 13MP front camera equipped with dual LED flash for all those selfies that you want to take in low light.

Karan.Bajaj@timesgroup.com