From well-established players like BlackBerry to new names like Gionee, this year's Mobile World Congress was all about new and exciting smartphones. Here are five most interesting devices that will shape this year's phone world.
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The new star on the Chinese smarptphone sky, Gionee, presented probably the most interesting phone around. Clearly guided by Apple'd design, with a bit of Chinese competitors, Gionee Elife S7 is just 0.21 inches thick. There's a 13-megapixel Sony IMX214 image sensor, the thinnest available, and under the hood there are an octa-core, 64-bit MediaTek 6752 processor with a Freescale sensor hub, a 2,750mAh battery for up to 34.56 hours of usage (they calculated it very precisely), and the display is a 5.2-inch, 720p Samsung Super AMOLED panel covered in Gorilla Glass 3.
The BlackBerry Leap is a successor to BlackBerry's Z3. It has a 5-inch, 720p screen with an old Qualcomm MSM8960 processor and an 8-megapixel camera. BlackBerry's idea is that many business people don't need high-end phones. The dual curved display is curved on both sides and we can probably expects new UI features which would involve looking or swiping on the curved edges. Users can go to the on-board BlackBerry World app store for business and productivity apps and the Amazon app store for consumer apps.
ZTE presented the Nubia Z9 Max, a very interesting phablet with Qualcomm Snapdragon 810-powered processor. The device sports a 5.5-inch, 1080p LCD screen and a 16-megapixel Sony camera. The Z9 Max is a big glass-and-metal device, definitively for serious users and not for those who prefer one-hand operations. The Z9 Max's best feature is a highly customized camera app with many manual functions. The phone's version of Android is heavily outside modified with ZTE's Nubia UI which changes the look of the built-in apps.
The HTC One M9 is a smaller version of the M8, also a metal model, with rounded corners and BoomSound speakers above and below the screen. The 5-inch 1080p LCD screen is much brighter than that of the M8, and it features 20-megapixel camera with 4K video recording. There is a MicroSD card slot for up to 128GB, 3GB of RAM and the Qualcomm's Snapdragon 810 processor. The new Sense 7 comes with Android 5.0.1 Lollipop and it will be heavily theme-optimized, from productivity theme to kids' interfaces.
And there is, of course, the king. If we don't count iPhone. The Samsung Galaxy S6 is made of metal and Gorilla Glass 4. The basic model comes in white, black, gold, and turquoise, very classy. It's 2.75 inches wide and 4.8 ounces, narrower than the Galaxy S5 and more suitable for one-handed use. The screen is extremely sharp and with 5.1 inches and 2,560 by 1,440, it has 577 pixels per inch. Add to that curved-edges Edge and we can say Samsung is back in the game. Big time. ■
