There’s no denying that 1080p displays are fast becoming the best screens you can get inside a smartphone these days but, when it comes down to price there’s going to some that just won’t be able to afford it. However, with the Sharp Aquos SH930W there may be some hope for those that want a crystal clear picture without paying the price of diamonds. It’s also a well known fact that Sharp are really quite good at getting the battery usage down on these displays. With their new and innovative IGZO technology it’s said that the battery drain of their displays is up to half that of a normal display panel, certainly something of a boon for those looking for more battery life without having to compromise.
Sharp’s Aquos SH930W is a phone that’s recently hit Russia a little before it’s scheduled to go on release and is said to come with a 1080p display for just $694 US, unlocked, that sounds like a whole lot of cash but when you think that most other phones with displays around the 720p mark come in at a whopping $789 it starts to look like an impressive price tag. It’s not all good news though as you’ll discover from taking a look at the specs below:
- 5″ Sharp LCD at 1920 x 1080 giving 441 ppi
- Dual-Core 1.5 Ghz Snapdragon S3
- 1GB of RAM
- 32GB of non-expandable internal storage
- Android 4.1
- No LTE
- Undefined battery size but, don’t expect much
What’s interesting here is that they’ve gone with last year’s S3 processor, and while the term “last year’s” might not sound all that bad it’s when they put a chip that struggles with 1080p video on a 1080p display that raises concerns. To put things into perspective, it’s the same chip that was used in the HP TouchPad and it’s not suited for anything other than web-browsing and 720p video alongside general use. There’s no sign of Sharp’s Feel UX here and the phone that was showed off looked like it was running vanilla Android but it did seem to be a little buggy. It’s also interesting to note that while it might be coming to the US any time soon, it’s headed to Russia where Sharp haven’t gone before and will launch there before it does in Japan. If this does to come to the US I think it’d make a great phone for some of the lower-tier carriers like MetroPCS or even Cricket, if they could get the price down low enough.
[Source: Engadget]