Today, I got my hands on a very interesting smartphone from Sprint. Typically we don’t do unboxings and first impressions on mid-range smartphones, but with the Sharp AQUOS Crystal, we decided to make an exception. This is a 5-inch device, with no bezels. Well only at the bottom. It’s a mid-ranger with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor, 1.5GB of RAM, 8GB of storage, and a 8MP camera powered by a 2040mAh battery inside. The bezels aren’t the only reason why it’s an interesting device. It’s made by Sharp. I can’t recall ever seeing a Sharp smartphone here in the US. And we can probably thank Softbank for bringing this to Sprint, Virgin Mobile and Boost Mobile. Now the one I have here is the Boost Mobile variant, but it’s basically the same as the Sprint and Virgin Mobile models, aside from the bloatware.
The hardware is pretty nice actually, the front is glass, with the sides being metal and the back feels like it’s polycarbonate plastic. Which for a mid-range smartphone sitting at $250, that’s a pretty good build. The back is removable, which shows us the microSD and microSIM card slots. Although the 2040mAh battery is not removable, unfortunately. While we are on the back, we also have a 8MP shooter back there and a speaker. On the top is the headphone jack and power button with the volume rocker being on the left side. On the bottom is the micro USB port and a microphone hole. Now onto the front. We’ve got a near bezeless display here. The camera and other sensors are actually at the bottom, which is where you see the chin of the device. It’ll be a bit weird to have the camera at the bottom instead of the top, but we’ll see how that works out.
As far as the software goes, it’s stock Android, which is really nice. Especially on a Snapdragon 400 and 1.5GB of RAM. So far I haven’t seen any stutters or lag at all. So far, I’m really liking this thing, and it’s hard to believe that this is a 5-inch device. We’ll be working on our full review over the next week or so, so make sure you stay tuned.
