Asus’ current flagship smartphone, ZenFone 2, recently gave its buyers more options when the Taiwanese smartphone maker offered consumers three handset variants to choose from. Recently, another device has been added to the Asus ZenFone 2 lineup, this time, as an AT&T exclusive. AT&T’s prepaid mobile phone service has offered the Asus ZenFone 2E as the latest addition to its GoPhone roster.
Many might get confused with the Asus ZenFone 2 and the Asus ZenFone 2E, but there is a big difference between the two smartphones. As per Phone Reviews UK, for a very affordable price of $120, the entry-level Asus ZenFone 2E isn’t really built to burn up the benchmarks but it will surely do give users what they paid for, nothing less, nothing more.
The Asus ZenFone 2E is smaller in size compared to the Asus ZenFone 2 but actually presents a similar design. The handset shows off Asus’ colorful custom Zen user interface skin much like its base model. Many users have also claimed to have better handling experience with the device compared to its larger sibling. It displays a curved back made entirely of plastic with the power button on the top just like the ZenFone 2. The volume buttons are placed below its 8-megapixel rear-facing camera with LED flash and f/2.0 aperture while its front camera is 2-megapixel.
It is equipped with a 5-inch IPS LCD screen and supports a 720x 1280 resolution at 294ppi, a lower resolution compared to other models hence overall quality is largely noticeable when compared to the Full HD and Quad HD the ZenFone 2 models sport. Despite this, users won’t have much to complain as far as performance is concerned. It has a thickness of 10.9 mm and runs on Android 5.0 Lollipop straight out of the box. It sports an internal storage of 8GB, expandable up to 64GB via microSD slot and is equipped with 1GB of RAM.
The latest GoPhone model is powered by a dual-core 1.6 GHz Intel Atom Z25600 processor backed by the PowerVR SGX544MP2 GPU, a 2500 mAH battery and supports 4G LTE, Bluetooth, GPS, and Wi-Fi capabilities. For a smartphone that’s less than $150, there always has to be some catch. After all, quality comes with a price especially with gadgets nowadays.
Many interested buyers will also be happy to know that Android Headlines says that the device isn’t actually the worst performer they’ve seen in the market and it’s definitely worth giving a shot especially when one is the kind of user that isn’t particular with the specs and is working on a tight budget.
The insignificantly low memory capacity is probably the phone’s major letdown. Although the major step down for the choice of processors compared to the ZenFone 2 is the reason for the phone’s not-so-ideal performance, the model running on 1GB of RAM potentially causes frustration to most of its users.
The more powerful and more expensive Asus ZenFone 2 was announced in January during the CES 2015 and was made available in May. At $299, it is one of the brand’s proud releases, boasting a great design and overall performance at a mid-range price. The flagship phone even made more news when it came out in three variants namely ZE551ML, ZE550ML, and the ZE500CL, all running on Android 5.0 Lollipop and features a customized Zen user interface and a Gorilla Glass 3 display.
The brand’s flagship model, ZenFone 2 ZE551ML, boasts of being powered by Intel Atom Moorefield SoCs with a whopping 4GB of RAM. It also features a 5.5-inch full HD IPS display, a 3000 mAH non-removable battery, and dual microSIM card slots. Asus is really proving its name’s worth in creating great smartphones with its flagship models, if not the best to date, an impressive storage feature allowing memory expansion up to 128GB through a microSD card slot.