It seems that some companies believe that the mid-range is still around the $500 mark, and better, that two cameras can exist on a phone for not much cash.
Phone features come and go, but one thing that’s proving to be a solid battleground for smartphone is the area of cameras. Simply put, the better the camera, the more people are interested in a phone, and the more cameras you have, the more people perk up and listen to what a phone can do to replace the walkaround camera.
It’s an area HTC dabbled in first, then LG, then Huawei and Apple, and while we’ve seen a few different variations of it, the feature has always been reserved for the expensive end of the smartphone market. Unfortunately, if you wanted two camera on the back of a phone, you’ve needed to spend a bit of cash.
However, Huawei seems keen to change that, delivering a mid-range phone designed to bring two rear cameras to a sub-$500 price point.
Announced this week, the mobile is the Huawei GR5 2017, a metal smartphone bringing a 5.5 inch Full HD display, 4G, WiFi, Bluetooth, 32GB storage, room to move with a microSD slot, a rea fingerprint sensor, and two cameras in a phone that will cost $399 from Vodafone.
The two cameras are particularly interesting, because while Huawei has dabbled in the technology before, it’s previously been with two sensors: one in colour and one in monochrome.
For the GR5 2017, Huawei has taken an approach similar to what we’ve seen in the HTC M8 and M8s, providing both a 12 megapixel and 2 megapixel camera to work together for autofocus of 0.3 seconds, as well as depth of field control for soft background effects and wide angle shots.
At the front, you won’t get that technology, with an 8 megapixel camera for selfies instead.
The phone itself isn’t made to be a slouch either with Huawei running its own Kirin 655 eight-core processor here and Android 6.0 “Marshmallow”, an operating system that’s a little out of date but should still be fine altogether.
Even the battery has been made to offer a little bit of power, with the 5.5 inch phone providing a 3340mAh battery, larger than some other similarly sized phones on the market.
That should mean a good day of battery life will be offered at a minimum, something phones in the mid-range tend to aim for.
Pricing of the phone sits at $399 with Vodafone getting the GR5 from April 12, while other retailers will see it in the coming months.
