I don't game on my phone either, the most battery sapping situation I tend to be in is: streaming spotify over BT while navigating with google maps (screen on) while serving as a wifi hotspot for someone else in the car.
Browsing sessions should not cause or require peak performance by any means... that's just regular usage of a phone and it certainly shouldn't be running into throttling issues for regular web browsing.
GSMArena's review of this phone showed Chrome was less battery hungry than the ASUS Browser app. I own the TW version of this phone with the 2.3GHz Z3580. The CPU acts more like Intel speed step in that its reduces the CPU speed when its not needed to conserve power. Here is my top 6 CPUs break down over the last 20 hours. I was asleep for 8 of those hours: 500MHz 59.68% offline 30.85% 2.33GHz 4.51% 1.33GHz 1.61% 583MHz 0.93% 666MHz 0.37%
That's what they did with CherryTrail. They shrunk the die, kept the CPU largely unchanged, and jumped to Gen 8 graphics with more EUs. Surface 3 has a newer GPU than Surface Pro 3!
It's a Windows x86 device... with a new GPU. A major driver update could turn things around, especially combined with DX12. They still need to pick up the pace though. Case in point:
These Atom chips in question are powered by PowerVR graphics, not Intel. G6430 to be specific, so they should be reasonably quick. But Intel should be more aggressive in adopting the latest graphics cores from PowerVR - these should have been using GX6450, as seen in the iPhone 6. The G6430 was what Apple was using last gen.
Hi Alex. I agree with all you say, and wise to point out this isn't a graphic solution from Intel. That said, I'm not so sure about the second sentence. Driver updates certainly can help but as you say, it's last year's PVR silicon and there's a ceiling of headroom just as there is with the TDP of the CPU, the SoC's overall temp is governed by the GPU more often (as it's literally 'all display' ;)) than the CPU. However, seeing the advances Intel has managed on the desk and in the lap, I'm not betting against them, nor nVidia. While they 'missed the train' on its first stop, they've both got the resources to catch up. The knowledge, equipment and the know how to do so. Intel iGPUs over the life span of the core 'i' series since Core2Duo have gone from able to draw your desktop without mouse tracers to today's Iris Pro 6xxx series. While not 'monsters' in comparison to the discrete lineup of GPUs on the market ...today, they're certainly comparable to the discrete cards of yesterday. IE, I've got a 15" rMBP from 2012. It's a core i7/2.7GHz w/16GB of RAM, 786GB SSD and the Intel HD4000/nVidia 650m (kind of a 655/660 as Apple clocked with nVidia's tutoring, the 650m to near parity with the 660m). The latter with 1GB of dedicated VRAM, the integrated GPU shares ...I believe up to 3/4 of a GB of the system RAM. Possibly more. But I believe that's in the newer IP 5200 that gets 1.25GB on the iGPU, 2GB on the 750m discrete from 2013 & 2014. Today's 6xxx IP iGPU series without throttling on many of the passively cooled new core 'm' low power 4.5w chips currently being measured --- in an environment capable of keeping the GPU power sustained (& cooled) -- the current iGPU computationally equals that power of the 650m, in some cases bests it's abilities to manipulate large PS Raw batches, crunch genome projects ...even video rendering, trans or encoding. A couple of these cases, the newest Haswell iGPU is quicker than the current rMBP 15" flagship offering that's remained, the 2GB 750m. That's pretty amazing progress from the Sandy Bridge (28nm? Or was it 32?) HD3000 ---> HD4000 in Ivy Bridge's die shrink to 22nm, and truly blossoming in the 5xxx & 6xxx series. And @ 4.5watts to match beefy discrete cards from a couple years ago (I'm not ignorant to the fact Apple's using an ancient discrete solution of their flagship laptop BUT Intel's delay in the 35/45watt quads that fit into those rigs haven't appeared! Last of the batch apparently. But along with Haswell and the new core processor, I can only imagine the performance capabilities of the internal GPU alone. Remember the rMBP sold in 2014 as a $1999 option without discrete graphics - solely relying on the 5200 IrisPro. And it's incredibly fluent. They're making a helluva run 'catching up' integrating a nice graphic package on to their silicon as they continue reducing size to 14nm. I'd guess ...if I was a betting man, I'd wager within five years they're as dominant and influential in mobile SoC design as they're today in X86/desk and laptop chip design. But I don't think there will be only a single 'AMD' competitor. Imagine & Qualcomm, as you point out PowerVR series are still 'off the shelf' and perhaps the last piece to Apple's 'A' series 64bit design. Samsung's Exynos SoCs are fast as HELL, & seemingly they're the only chip manufacturer or OEM able to turn 64bit in a generation. Qualcomm, it's 810 woes and concurrent development of the 808 as a stop gap at 32bit showed just how off guard the A7 caught the,, now twenty months ago Tegra {nVidia} xxxTrail/Atom/Celeron - did I read 'Pentium' (the word as a descriptor) will also. E resurrected? ...anyway, Intel obviously has choices and Baytrail, Cherrys and I'm thinking the Dingleberry line that follows ;)---will continue to benefitting simply by decreasing silicon, increasing transistor Count and their differing solutions with trigate graphene or nano nanew (Mork man!) molecular silicon from organically ....whatever it is, Intel is now wise to the Massive exorcism of space wasting, power hungry desktops and heavy laptops that last 67 minutes unplugged folks are going through (we've ALL got one at the 'grind', right? Your job...you've got 'the box'. WTH do you need one at home when an iPad, Samsung Note pro 12.1" v5/7100trV model (could t resist, I've got the Xoom still and long for the days the tab had a unique name lol) or a two/three pound laptop with PCIe SSD storage that reads and writes at a Gb/s, lasts ten to 12 hours on a charge ( I routinely get 13-15 on my 2014 13" MacBook Air ), or an iPhone 6+, Note 4, Nex 6 a new HTC LG the S6 or HuawhyIcan'tspelltheUaii Chinese brands, Xiaomi (sp too?) as well --- having a 5"+ phone (I'm a Note user strictly for my business, iPhone for personal I've been ambidextrous since 2008) is nice, large and legible. Add to the recipe the display technology progression over the last decade. Sensor miniaturization of sensors; accelerometers, gyros, barometers and proximity ...GPS consumer access and phenomenal LTE speeds that surpass many folks' home ISP bandwidth --- 'Mobile', regardless of what you and I and the rest of us geeks 'need' for our task don't reflect on today's normal, reasonable person. Leave the computer at home along with the work it contains. Even if you're going on vacation your smartphone and/or tablet has the power, connect-ability and high speed, reliable and efficient speeds with any and every piece of what used to be referred to as software is now the 'app' I did my taxes on mine this year. On my iPad and I own a home, cabin and business. Plenty of 'stuff' that doesn't allow me to use the 1040EZ any longer ;). I can check email, Linked, Twit and FB, projects through MS's office suite, Adobe's creative suite or Apple's iWork. I can record an album. Draw a picture. Edit photos or motion/video and save, share or photoshop someone's face on the cop's. Read a book, surf, respond to texts and tweets and take calls ...even make calls if so inclined. Calendars and calculators ...a 'viewfinder' of 9.7" of pure perfect display to monitor your multi cam setup and adjust exposure - ISO - Shutter speed and aperture as well as 'mix' out your broadcast through Multicam editing and transitions of viewpoint to keep a viewer compelled. Write a novel. Fly a plane and file flight plan, diversion airports, real time weather and traffic -- gas necessary, weights and CG balances. (I fly for a living and have for almost thirty years in Alaska ...the iPads have changed everything....as significant a jump in technology it rivals the transition from steam gauges to glass 'pits. There's no END to what one can do with today's smartphones and tabs. They're not tablets. They're not phones. They're now pocket computers faster than the laptops we were using last decade just five years ago. Intel isn't standing idly by. They've got a lot Invested in the 'ultra book' sector. Some $300,000,000 to help boost sales. And we're still, at the genesis. Some may call the new Yoga or MacBook under powered or 'slow' in comparison to their previous machine. Truth is it's as fast as the machines we were very content with two years ago, using less than a third of the power @ 4.5watts. That's amazing dexterity and they'll continue to make in roads graphically to the point they'll be a major player IMHO.
i agree, a 5 inch version of this phone at this price would be a hot seller, far better specs than the rest of the pack in that price, the size its the only thing that pull me off.
Er...Asus may claim they've made it like a 5", but the LG G2 is waaay ahead on screen to bezel ratio. It's about 138mm tall by 71mm wide. The ZenFone 2 is about 152mm tall by 77mm wide. That's noticeably bigger than even the G3.
It's kinda funny that your standard became 5.1" under. It used to be in the range of 4"-4.5". Well, not to blame anyone though because I'm here waiting for something with google stock ROM and with 4.7" size.
Yeah, but the screen size is not the important factor in how easy these things are to hold. The bezel sizes and thickness have all gotten smaller since the days when I thought a 4.3 to 4.5 inch phone would be perfect. The 5.1 inch Samsung S6 is as easy to hold as my HTC One M7 at 4.7 inches. Granted, I wish mine was slightly smaller and I am also hoping for a 4.7 inch close-to-stock android to come out with smaller bezels. Oddly enough the Galaxy Alpha is almost such a phone (and is reasonably priced these days) but I really hate Samsung's UI on it. It is smaller than both the Moto's mentioned below.
I tottaly agree. The Moto G 2013 and the Moto E 2015 (4,5 inch) are the perfect size in terms of ergonomics, in my opinion. I have a HTC One M8 (5 inch) and it´s a bit too bit for one hand use, and I have big hands.
The 4.7" on my 1st Gen MotoX is more than large enough. I haven't upgraded because all the new phones from most manufacturers are way too large. Its a phone. If I wanted a tablet, I'd buy one.
this is an interesting development, I truly hope that phones do get cheaper in general (i.e. midrange phones get better). Everything hinges on the battery life I guess, can't wait for the follow-up.
For a while there it looked like they would... Between the Nexus 4 & 5, the OnePlus One and the price slashing on the first Moto X... The latter went larger and more upmarket tho, as did the Nexus. I was actually about to switch to a contract-less plan but I just realized it isn't worth it just to save $11/mo.
It's x86, but it doesn't have the BIOS and other functionality required to run desktop Windows. Moorefield is meant to run phone OSes like Windows Phone and Android.
A BIOS not needed to run Windows (neither 8.1 and certainly not Windows Phone) same as for Linux -- here in the incarnation of Android. I don't see anything that would prevent Moorefield (in comparison to say Bay Trail or Cherry Trail) from running Windows as only TDP and GPU are different but there're Windows drivers for PowerVR available so why not...
BIOS is not needed (UEFI can replace it) but I guess this phone has neither BIOS and UEFI, and probably lacks a bootloader capable of booting regular Windows.
The question was not whether the installed bootloader was capable of starting Windows but whether the CPU would allow running Windows and for me that's a clear yes.
Pretty sure this chip is targeted at mobile and android. The OS on the phone is 32 bit. The OS on the Zenfone 2 supports x86, armeabi-v7a, and armeabi instructions which leads me to conclude this intel chip supports these instructions (or emulates them?).
OK, could you or somebody knowledgeable PLEASE answer the following seemingly-simple question: Will it work with Verizon??
I just saw the live-stream of that huge dog and pony show that revealed nothing new about the phone (which has been on-sale overseas for several months) and they can't even be bothered to answer a rudimentary question like... does the phone actually work with different networks! Aggh!
Unless the phone is approved and white-listed by Verizon it will not function. The phone ROM must include the Verizon CDMA radio key as well. Basically only phones sold by Verizon work on Verizon (Except for the iphone 5s and above)
and thats why verizon sucks compared to GSM carriers.. They've been stuck on crappy CDMA for decades. CDMA sucks because you cant talk and lookup stuff on the internet at the same time.
Most likely not based on the specs I see. I don't see support for Verizon 2G(CDMA) or Verizon 3G(WCDMA). It may support Verizon on 4G(LTE) but then you have no fallback if there isn't LTE coverage.
Faulty assumptions. Something can be true x86 (ie, compatible with the x86 ISA) without having a firmware and drivers capable of running NT. This is the former, but likely not the latter.
There are some descent phones in Asian market at this price range. If this phone pics up in Asian market then it will be a big hit for the mid range makers like Micromax,lenovo,xiomee..
Asus has very good sales in Asia-Pacific region, they are targeted to reach 30 Million smartphones in 2015, giving good competition to Xiaomi, Lenovo, Moto and Micromax in India.
Thanks for the preview! In the full review please write about the 2 issues that arose thus far from users: 1. Battery performance. 2. Apps compatibility.
On a side note, ASUS CEO stated last month that the next Zenfone (already in production) will not use SOCs from Intel.
If you know of any apps that have issues please let me know. Apart from certain NDK apps there shouldn't be any problems. None of the apps I use regularly had issues on this or the venue 8 7000.
Wrong/misleading information about Intel SOC, Asus will mostly use Mediatek SOCs in their future low-end devices which will cost $100-$150, the mid-range ($200-$300) will use intel SOC as usual.
Just go to the zenfone website and there's a complete International listing of compatible carriers. Feel kind of weird having to say this on a tech website.
"Depending on which model you get, the ZenFone 2 will come with either Intel's Atom Z3560 or Atom Z3580 SoC. The former has a max boost clock of 1.8GHz, while the latter has a max of 2.33GHz. It's also important to note that the more expensive model with the Z3580 comes with 4GB of LPDDR3 1600 memory, with the Z3560 models only sporting 2GB."
I think this must depend on the market, since I have a ZenFone 2 here which is Z3560 based, but has 4GB RAM and 32GB storage...
Please test GPS as well! I'm very interested how this phone's hardware compares in that area to MediaTek's "China phones" (which usually suck in lock times and accuracy). Thanks! :)
Does anyone feel this would be a much more interesting phone if it had a high end ARM based SOC? I love Intel and ASUS and all but the thought of running into compatibility issues with software really isnt very appealing....
For the price, I would rather bitch at the developers and Google to support these Intel SoCs sooner.
Software compatibility is easier to fix than hardware. For Google, they don't care about who wins in the end (Intel vs. Arm), they just want Android to the best software.
That's why competition is great, these devices are something I can afford to give my whole family. Most of us are 2-3 year old devices and plan to stay another year. Can't wait for Zenfone 3 (also ZenBook Pro with Skylake/Cannonlake).
In what way would such phone be more interesting? There are plenty of very similar phones with high end ARM SOCs. This one has unique SOC and this is what makes it interesting. While we do not know for sure but the phone price is probably low in part due to Intel selling their SOCs dirt cheap.
With Intels contra-revenue program, Asus only pays 5 dollars per SoC, Intel takes a loss on each chip. No ARM chip costs that little, and definitely not at 5 bucks. It's part of what allows the good performance at such a low price.
You have to consider that you also get 64GB of NAND and 4GB of RAM. I would say it's worth it because of the storage, not the SoC. If you can live with 16GB I would get the base model.
The $199 version does NOT include the quick charger which is probably a $10 value right there. I think unless money is really tight the $299 version with more RAM, NAND, and included quick charger is worth the $100 difference.
for future proofing RAM and the extra storage? Yes. I would say it's worth it. Of course, if you know you're going to upgrade and the phone won't get used in 1-2 years, I wouldn't bother.
Regarding the placement of the power button, I'm more intrigued than doubtful: if the phone has double-tap to wake, I'll never use it to wake the phone anyway, and I barely ever use it to switch the screen off. Rather, it'll make it easy to adjust the volume while playing music with the phone in my pocket, though my fingers are getting good at remembering where those volume buttons are anway... not having the power button right next to them is probably good.
US is seemingly turning around on this issue as well. Nowadays it's not so much the carrier locking that is a problem as the use of legacy 3 networks (CDMA) by Verizon and Sprint.
Volume keys on the back are useless if the headphone jack is on the top. :(
With headphone jack on the bottom, you just slide the phone into your pocket upside down, and the volume keys are down where your fingers naturally rest, making it nice and easy to adjust the volume or skip tracks. It's also very easy to access without putting your hand in your pocket as you can just press through the outside layer of material.
It's something I've really come to like about the LG G2 and the keys on the back.
But it didn't work as well if the headphone jack is on the top.
Yeah, but they'll be up higher in your pocket (requiring a bit of a bend in the arm/wrist), and the buttons will be "upside down" in relation to the way your fingers move and the way you press the buttons while holding it normally.
Silvermont and Airmont are the same core, just shrunk down. So what if intel doesnt offer a 14nm SOC yet, when their 22nm TriGate FinFET is more advanced than Samsungs 14nm FinFET+ process.
If Microsoft was smart, they'd provide a Windows 10 implementation for this phone (and all phones made on this SOC) with a full telephony/LTE data stack. The result: instant elimination of the "lack of apps" problem on Windows phone. See full analysis: http://piaw.blogspot.com/2015/01/2015-will-see-deb...
Even as it is, $299 for a phone with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage is incredible.
If anyone reading these comments has a sarcasm meter, please unplug it before reading the following otherwise it might explode...
Gee, I sure am glad they saw fit to slap there own worthless UI elements on Android like every other OEM. Plain vanilla android is so hard to use and without those questionable enhancements, updates might come to quickly for me to keep up with.
Hahahaha. Oh man. The fact that these manufacturers are spending large sums of their money to actually make Android WORSE in every possible way (Touchwiz, etc.) and waste our storage space with bloat apps that are inferior to the stock Android implementation (Asus browser lol) still baffles me.
If stock Android looks better, runs better, and is less confusing than your UI and bloatware then you're doing it wrong.
I remember reading someplace that tablets using PowerVR wouldnt/couldnt get custom ROMs developed. Does that hold true for these as well? That would be a real shame to be at the mercy of ASUS for OS updates.
The major downside of Intel devices is that they're really locked down with that annoying security stuff so there's very little one can do to get an alternative OS or at least a more optimized Android onto those devices and if the vendor decides to not provide OS updates then you'll either have to get a new device or live with the security breaches piling up. I happen to have an Asus device with Intel CPU and I'm stuck with the horrible inefficient KitKat and abysmal battery life until (and only if) Asus decides to pull the stick out of their backsides and provide a Lollipop update -- at least some of the bloatware can be disabled thanks to an exploitable bug in their demo application.
At the moment I'm really less than thrilled by the idea of having another Intel based Android device; luckily I've just gotten a new phone and thanks to a Qualcomm processor and an unlocked bootloader it's going to have a really long life...
I bought a cheap Asus Intel powered tablet for under $100 on a deal and it is brillant for the price. Great battery life, smooth, all apps work. I wouldn't hesitate to buy another.
Me too, a ME176C. However despite it's crunching power it's rather sluggish, some apps don't run properly (thanks to the Intel CPU I'd guess) and some of the ZenUI apps tend to evict current foreground applications out of memory which makes for a horrible browsing experience. Also the battery used to be good for only 2 hours of ebook reading and after disabling lots of crap it has improved to over 4 hours (GPS and WiFi disabled and on lowest brightness) -- according to CPUSpy I managed to make it deep sleep regularly which is a good thing.
I think with a proper CyanogenMod 12.1 ROM this might be a crazy good device but with the KitKat based Asus ZenUI ROM and the energy hungry Intel CPU it's not really a good device for untethered operation.
Well you dont need the CyanogenMod,Lollipop is on the way for all of Asus tablets that came out in 2014.ME572 already has 5.0.1,and soon the rest of their lineup will get 5.0 and above(ME176,ME70,ME181,FE170 etc)
Why the iPh6 and not the 6+? Screen sizes are even the same! I'm glad Asus and Intel have teamed up. I really hope they continue to develop their partnership!
I´ve read on other reviews that while it has a nice performance it´s filled with Asus BLOAT, just like their notebooks. Do you confirm this? For me, at least, thats a big letdown.
Looks great on paper! Not keen on the brush aluminum plastic case. But the price is outstanding and it 5.5" which is huge for me since I carry my phone in my front pocket and keep it there sometimes even sitting position. Not sure if you can do that in jeans like in a car seat! Looks thin enough to the iPhone 6 too! But I just purchase the Nokia Lumia 735 because of the 4.7" OLED screen and the look of the over phone. I purchase the accessories for it too; additional wireless QI battery cover, wireless charger, glass screen protector everything totaled around $400. Half the price of an iPhone!
I'd really like like an analysis of how the PCmark got to be so good. The possibilities I see are the ARM big-LITTLE switch is very slow or the fast ARM's are not activated in the race to sleep the test is for, the phone has much better media for read/write and those parts of the benchmark dominated, the large memory helps the tests somehow by buffering data and not needing things compressed. There's various possibilities and the sub-parts of the test might give some indication.
Found the results. The gain seems mostly to be from video editing. That has probably been heavily optimized for the test I guess! There is also a sizable gain in web browsing which might be explained by the extra memory or perhaps it is just better implemented.
I looked this up on Newegg, it is described as **No LTE Support in US, Canada and Mexico**. Can anyone elaborate? I'm on T-Mobile, in an area they describe as '4G LTE', so I wonder if this phone is compatible.
World be interesting to know if there's really a difference in battery life between the 2GB and the 4GB models, as some people suggest on various forums.
I've got this phone - the 4GB 2.3Ghz model and the battery drains pretty quick. Apparently the 2GB/1.8Ghz model is much better - battery isnt the biggest issue for me so I decided to go with the extra power.
If I could have got the 4GB/1.8 I would have but the LTE bands that it supports weren't optimal for my region.
Still hoping Asus will do something to improve the battery life a bit in a future update though
ffs another computing product with 'zen' in the name. I wonder if you go to Japan, do they have 'catholic' computing products? Instead of ZenDesk do they use 'Confessional'? Labeling like this isn't just cultural plundering. It also belies an unimaginative marketing dept.
Great Preview. I saw a post from an intel engineer once saying that their should be no problem with app compatibilty since android 5.0 , since ART compile any java apps to work in native code, and native apps that uses the NDK are translated to the desired architecture with minimal overhead (x86, arm, MIPS ...). So in theory their should be no app compatibilty problem. can you confirm this in your review?
I was so happy to see this in my inbox. FINALLY a phone with no compromises that has a 1080p screen!!!!!!
Also, can we praise Asus here for actually increasing included storage for the first time in FAR too long? You guys have talked about it here on Anandtech, NAND manufacturers expected NAND to sell more as smartphone capacities increased. Because, ya know, that's what computer hardware has done since it's conception, gotten better for less money. Frankly at this point the fact that any phone is being sold with less than 32GB of internal storage is ridiculous. We should be seeing flagships with 256GB+ by now. I'm glad Asus is at least increasing the standard to 64GB at $300!!!
F2.0 camera on the front and back! Includes SD slot! $300!!!! In terms of bang/buck this phone blows everything else on the market away, they're not even close. I look forward to picking this up next year, or the next iteration assuming it doesn't get ruined like the LG G series got destroyed.
----On screen resolution. If phone makers wanna have resolutions over 1080p for early adopters, fine. But I am in the majority when I say I don't care about resolutions beyond 1080p. More than that I actively avoid them until the price differential reaches 10% over the cost of 1080p. The same way we achieved "good enough" performance with the Core 2 Duo CPU's 1080p is "good enough" resolution that the effect of diminishing returns for pushing beyond that makes the "upgrade" worth less and less money. 4 times the resolution? Ok, I'm willing to pay about 10% extra to get that, let me know when the prices have reached that point. That's all without even considering the performance hit you're going to take, and how much battery life will suffer from the extreme resolution. So it's not just the screen technology that needs to mature to make that viable for mainstream, but the APU and battery technology as well. To put it simply, if going beyond 1080p is going to mean less battery life by anything more than 3%, slower performance, compatibility, stability, by anything at all, then I'm not interested. More power to the early adopters, but LG and Samsung and even HTC need to provide an alternative to obscene resolutions without handicapping the other specs of the phone. 5" form factor, top of the line APU and camera, regardless of the resolution of the screen.
It's not blowing anything out of the water... The pictures you get with those specs are unbelievable, utterly crap. You can see them on gsmarena.com.
Quote:
"Image quality left us wanting. On one hand, when viewed to fit the screen, photos show pleasant colors and accurate exposure. White balance is also spot-on, and dynamic range is decent.
Zoom in to pixel level though, and things go south real quick. Images exhibit a very pronounced watercolor character, with detail smeared by broad brushstrokes. The image corners have a very pronounced softness too.
There's little detail in demanding subjects like the railing of the building across the street in the fifth sample, for example. Where other cameras resolve the separate vertical bars, the Zenfone 2 irons them out into a semi-transparent patch. Meanwhile areas of uniform color are rendered into a noisy mess."
Belive me you have to see the pictures with your own eyes. The guys were a to nice in the review regarding the quality...
I hope Intel doesn't focus on GPU performance. Right now it's easily good enough to run any games available in the Play Store at pretty high res. Aside from people that play demanding Android games, I think most users will be more concerned with CPU than GPU performance.
Am I the only one that noticed that the 2nd SIM slot is 2G only?? And that 2G will be out of service by the end of next year? This makes the 2nd SIM slot useless.
I was really excited to see this from Asus, but the battery is too small, display is too big. That and stock android out of the box is a big selling point for me.
I can't wait for the full review to be posted. The battery is the most inconsistent thing I've seen in almost all the reviews I have looked at, and that may have something to do with the times these reviews were made, the updates they were on, apps that were runnings, and the hardware version of the Asus Zenfone 2. There are a lot of versions branded under the name "Zenfone 2".
I hope Anandtech gives a detailed review of how well the battery performs so I can decide whether to get this phone or not.
One can always tell when a man wrote a review, even though these newfangled "modern men" are meant to be both men and telepaths. Of course, my dear Brandon, your understanding of all things smartphones was never meant to include the importance of an app like Mirror, or such factors as case color, what the phone is like to lose at the bottom of one's handbag, and other aspects that should not matter to you.
I can see from your review that you have never left your home for an evening of bingo among one's friends, only to realise half-way through the journey, when one's driver is stuck in traffic, that one cannot remember when one last went to the powder room and applied one's lipstick. Modern cars, like modern men, are not what they once were, and much can be said about the lack of amenities, rear-seat mirrors being a casualty of the financiers meddling with things they shouldn't.
For a lady in such a predicament, the first question will invariably be whether she should at all present herself in this state, to which the only possible reply would be: "the horror, the horror!". Enter the Mirror app: this will save our heroin from disgrace and opprobrium by letting her apply the appropriate amount of cosmetic, without the ghastly left-right inversion of a less thoughtful video app would present, thus causing confusion and possibly more damage than was there in the first place.
Hence we would easily be drawn to consider the Mirror app as possibly the most appealing aspect of this telephone, wouldn't we?
I'm sorry, but bingo? Surely said lady would be on her way to play a hand of bridge, no? Also, having a driver, one would assume said lady would have a Vertu concierge at hand who would send an appropriate stylist to her location.
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mfred - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Neat!chrone - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
looking forward for the consistent performance overtime and not the burst peak cpu/gpu clock speed. :Dtestbug00 - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
but, that's not what phones are for???????????kspirit - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Really? Because gaming and a long browsing session do fall under "performance over time". And that is partially what smartphones are for.Spoelie - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Long browsing session? Very peakyI don't game on my phone either, the most battery sapping situation I tend to be in is: streaming spotify over BT while navigating with google maps (screen on) while serving as a wifi hotspot for someone else in the car.
messyOwl - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
You can already get QC 2.0 chargers for the car. This should help mitigate at least that scenario.Flunk - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Yup, because any sort of long session will run down the battery.niva - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Browsing sessions should not cause or require peak performance by any means... that's just regular usage of a phone and it certainly shouldn't be running into throttling issues for regular web browsing.messyOwl - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
GSMArena's review of this phone showed Chrome was less battery hungry than the ASUS Browser app.I own the TW version of this phone with the 2.3GHz Z3580. The CPU acts more like Intel speed step in that its reduces the CPU speed when its not needed to conserve power. Here is my top 6 CPUs break down over the last 20 hours. I was asleep for 8 of those hours:
500MHz 59.68%
offline 30.85%
2.33GHz 4.51%
1.33GHz 1.61%
583MHz 0.93%
666MHz 0.37%
AnotherGuy - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
I wish they made phones of regular size... meaning 5.1" and under, my current Galaxy S5 at 5.1" is more than big enough.lilmoe - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
I wish Intel would focus more on GPU in all of their lineup of silicon.MonkeyPaw - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
That's what they did with CherryTrail. They shrunk the die, kept the CPU largely unchanged, and jumped to Gen 8 graphics with more EUs. Surface 3 has a newer GPU than Surface Pro 3!lilmoe - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Yea they did, but it's not enough though. It falls short of smartphone SoCs ATM.http://www.anandtech.com/show/9219/the-surface-3-r...
Alexvrb - Thursday, May 21, 2015 - link
It's a Windows x86 device... with a new GPU. A major driver update could turn things around, especially combined with DX12. They still need to pick up the pace though. Case in point:These Atom chips in question are powered by PowerVR graphics, not Intel. G6430 to be specific, so they should be reasonably quick. But Intel should be more aggressive in adopting the latest graphics cores from PowerVR - these should have been using GX6450, as seen in the iPhone 6. The G6430 was what Apple was using last gen.
akdj - Saturday, May 23, 2015 - link
Hi Alex. I agree with all you say, and wise to point out this isn't a graphic solution from Intel. That said, I'm not so sure about the second sentence. Driver updates certainly can help but as you say, it's last year's PVR silicon and there's a ceiling of headroom just as there is with the TDP of the CPU, the SoC's overall temp is governed by the GPU more often (as it's literally 'all display' ;)) than the CPU.However, seeing the advances Intel has managed on the desk and in the lap, I'm not betting against them, nor nVidia. While they 'missed the train' on its first stop, they've both got the resources to catch up. The knowledge, equipment and the know how to do so. Intel iGPUs over the life span of the core 'i' series since Core2Duo have gone from able to draw your desktop without mouse tracers to today's Iris Pro 6xxx series. While not 'monsters' in comparison to the discrete lineup of GPUs on the market ...today, they're certainly comparable to the discrete cards of yesterday. IE, I've got a 15" rMBP from 2012. It's a core i7/2.7GHz w/16GB of RAM, 786GB SSD and the Intel HD4000/nVidia 650m (kind of a 655/660 as Apple clocked with nVidia's tutoring, the 650m to near parity with the 660m). The latter with 1GB of dedicated VRAM, the integrated GPU shares ...I believe up to 3/4 of a GB of the system RAM. Possibly more. But I believe that's in the newer IP 5200 that gets 1.25GB on the iGPU, 2GB on the 750m discrete from 2013 & 2014.
Today's 6xxx IP iGPU series without throttling on many of the passively cooled new core 'm' low power 4.5w chips currently being measured --- in an environment capable of keeping the GPU power sustained (& cooled) -- the current iGPU computationally equals that power of the 650m, in some cases bests it's abilities to manipulate large PS Raw batches, crunch genome projects ...even video rendering, trans or encoding. A couple of these cases, the newest Haswell iGPU is quicker than the current rMBP 15" flagship offering that's remained, the 2GB 750m. That's pretty amazing progress from the Sandy Bridge (28nm? Or was it 32?) HD3000 ---> HD4000 in Ivy Bridge's die shrink to 22nm, and truly blossoming in the 5xxx & 6xxx series. And @ 4.5watts to match beefy discrete cards from a couple years ago (I'm not ignorant to the fact Apple's using an ancient discrete solution of their flagship laptop BUT Intel's delay in the 35/45watt quads that fit into those rigs haven't appeared! Last of the batch apparently. But along with Haswell and the new core processor, I can only imagine the performance capabilities of the internal GPU alone. Remember the rMBP sold in 2014 as a $1999 option without discrete graphics - solely relying on the 5200 IrisPro. And it's incredibly fluent. They're making a helluva run 'catching up' integrating a nice graphic package on to their silicon as they continue reducing size to 14nm. I'd guess ...if I was a betting man, I'd wager within five years they're as dominant and influential in mobile SoC design as they're today in X86/desk and laptop chip design. But I don't think there will be only a single 'AMD' competitor. Imagine & Qualcomm, as you point out PowerVR series are still 'off the shelf' and perhaps the last piece to Apple's 'A' series 64bit design. Samsung's Exynos SoCs are fast as HELL, & seemingly they're the only chip manufacturer or OEM able to turn 64bit in a generation. Qualcomm, it's 810 woes and concurrent development of the 808 as a stop gap at 32bit showed just how off guard the A7 caught the,, now twenty months ago
Tegra {nVidia} xxxTrail/Atom/Celeron - did I read 'Pentium' (the word as a descriptor) will also. E resurrected? ...anyway, Intel obviously has choices and Baytrail, Cherrys and I'm thinking the Dingleberry line that follows ;)---will continue to benefitting simply by decreasing silicon, increasing transistor Count and their differing solutions with trigate graphene or nano nanew (Mork man!) molecular silicon from organically ....whatever it is, Intel is now wise to the Massive exorcism of space wasting, power hungry desktops and heavy laptops that last 67 minutes unplugged folks are going through (we've ALL got one at the 'grind', right? Your job...you've got 'the box'. WTH do you need one at home when an iPad, Samsung Note pro 12.1" v5/7100trV model (could t resist, I've got the Xoom still and long for the days the tab had a unique name lol) or a two/three pound laptop with PCIe SSD storage that reads and writes at a Gb/s, lasts ten to 12 hours on a charge ( I routinely get 13-15 on my 2014 13" MacBook Air ), or an iPhone 6+, Note 4, Nex 6 a new HTC LG the S6 or HuawhyIcan'tspelltheUaii Chinese brands, Xiaomi (sp too?) as well --- having a 5"+ phone (I'm a Note user strictly for my business, iPhone for personal I've been ambidextrous since 2008) is nice, large and legible. Add to the recipe the display technology progression over the last decade. Sensor miniaturization of sensors; accelerometers, gyros, barometers and proximity ...GPS consumer access and phenomenal LTE speeds that surpass many folks' home ISP bandwidth --- 'Mobile', regardless of what you and I and the rest of us geeks 'need' for our task don't reflect on today's normal, reasonable person. Leave the computer at home along with the work it contains. Even if you're going on vacation your smartphone and/or tablet has the power, connect-ability and high speed, reliable and efficient speeds with any and every piece of what used to be referred to as software is now the 'app'
I did my taxes on mine this year. On my iPad and I own a home, cabin and business. Plenty of 'stuff' that doesn't allow me to use the 1040EZ any longer ;). I can check email, Linked, Twit and FB, projects through MS's office suite, Adobe's creative suite or Apple's iWork. I can record an album. Draw a picture. Edit photos or motion/video and save, share or photoshop someone's face on the cop's. Read a book, surf, respond to texts and tweets and take calls ...even make calls if so inclined. Calendars and calculators ...a 'viewfinder' of 9.7" of pure perfect display to monitor your multi cam setup and adjust exposure - ISO - Shutter speed and aperture as well as 'mix' out your broadcast through Multicam editing and transitions of viewpoint to keep a viewer compelled. Write a novel. Fly a plane and file flight plan, diversion airports, real time weather and traffic -- gas necessary, weights and CG balances. (I fly for a living and have for almost thirty years in Alaska ...the iPads have changed everything....as significant a jump in technology it rivals the transition from steam gauges to glass 'pits. There's no END to what one can do with today's smartphones and tabs. They're not tablets. They're not phones. They're now pocket computers faster than the laptops we were using last decade just five years ago.
Intel isn't standing idly by. They've got a lot Invested in the 'ultra book' sector. Some $300,000,000 to help boost sales. And we're still, at the genesis. Some may call the new Yoga or MacBook under powered or 'slow' in comparison to their previous machine. Truth is it's as fast as the machines we were very content with two years ago, using less than a third of the power @ 4.5watts. That's amazing dexterity and they'll continue to make in roads graphically to the point they'll be a major player IMHO.
Sorry for the novel. My bad
J
javier_machuk - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
i agree, a 5 inch version of this phone at this price would be a hot seller, far better specs than the rest of the pack in that price, the size its the only thing that pull me off.Hrel - Wednesday, May 20, 2015 - link
It IS a 5" phone. They used a very thin bezel to put a 5.5" screen in a 5" chassis. Compare the device dimensions to the 5" LG G2, it's smaller :)If you go to Asus's website they explain this in more detail on the product page for this phone.
asfletch - Wednesday, May 20, 2015 - link
Er...Asus may claim they've made it like a 5", but the LG G2 is waaay ahead on screen to bezel ratio. It's about 138mm tall by 71mm wide. The ZenFone 2 is about 152mm tall by 77mm wide. That's noticeably bigger than even the G3.SoC-IT2ME - Thursday, May 21, 2015 - link
Hrel - your post is full of fail. This is a much larger phone than G2.blzd - Thursday, May 21, 2015 - link
Um no. LG G3 is a small 5.5" phone, this is a larger 5.5" phone.WorldWithoutMadness - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
It's kinda funny that your standard became 5.1" under.It used to be in the range of 4"-4.5". Well, not to blame anyone though because I'm here waiting for something with google stock ROM and with 4.7" size.
kleos44 - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Yeah, but the screen size is not the important factor in how easy these things are to hold. The bezel sizes and thickness have all gotten smaller since the days when I thought a 4.3 to 4.5 inch phone would be perfect. The 5.1 inch Samsung S6 is as easy to hold as my HTC One M7 at 4.7 inches. Granted, I wish mine was slightly smaller and I am also hoping for a 4.7 inch close-to-stock android to come out with smaller bezels. Oddly enough the Galaxy Alpha is almost such a phone (and is reasonably priced these days) but I really hate Samsung's UI on it. It is smaller than both the Moto's mentioned below.Badelhas - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
I tottaly agree. The Moto G 2013 and the Moto E 2015 (4,5 inch) are the perfect size in terms of ergonomics, in my opinion. I have a HTC One M8 (5 inch) and it´s a bit too bit for one hand use, and I have big hands.frag85 - Wednesday, May 27, 2015 - link
The 4.7" on my 1st Gen MotoX is more than large enough. I haven't upgraded because all the new phones from most manufacturers are way too large. Its a phone. If I wanted a tablet, I'd buy one.jann5s - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
this is an interesting development, I truly hope that phones do get cheaper in general (i.e. midrange phones get better). Everything hinges on the battery life I guess, can't wait for the follow-up.Impulses - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
For a while there it looked like they would... Between the Nexus 4 & 5, the OnePlus One and the price slashing on the first Moto X... The latter went larger and more upmarket tho, as did the Nexus. I was actually about to switch to a contract-less plan but I just realized it isn't worth it just to save $11/mo.jann5s - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
On a side note, is it true x84, so you can put regular windows on it?DCide - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Yes, of course it's a true x83. It runs regular Windows, just like Microsoft phones.Ryan Smith - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
It's x86, but it doesn't have the BIOS and other functionality required to run desktop Windows. Moorefield is meant to run phone OSes like Windows Phone and Android.DCide - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Thanks Ryan - you put me to shame. I should've answered straight.Daniel Egger - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
A BIOS not needed to run Windows (neither 8.1 and certainly not Windows Phone) same as for Linux -- here in the incarnation of Android. I don't see anything that would prevent Moorefield (in comparison to say Bay Trail or Cherry Trail) from running Windows as only TDP and GPU are different but there're Windows drivers for PowerVR available so why not...danbob999 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
BIOS is not needed (UEFI can replace it) but I guess this phone has neither BIOS and UEFI, and probably lacks a bootloader capable of booting regular Windows.Daniel Egger - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
The question was not whether the installed bootloader was capable of starting Windows but whether the CPU would allow running Windows and for me that's a clear yes.ZeDestructor - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Hmm.. Now I'm wondering if you could hack together a chainloader or shim of sorts from the virtual BIOS/EFI in open-vm-tools...More interesting would be if it supports stuff like ACPI...
Daniel Egger - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Not sure that's even necessary. I see two possible approaches:- Poach the bootloader from one of the existing Windows 8.1 Tablets
- Run a hypervisor and start Windows from that
messyOwl - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Pretty sure this chip is targeted at mobile and android.The OS on the phone is 32 bit. The OS on the Zenfone 2 supports x86, armeabi-v7a, and armeabi instructions which leads me to conclude this intel chip supports these instructions (or emulates them?).
jann5s - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
I meant x86,der - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Hi. Its nice to see a preview of it. 3rd commentoCajunArson - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
OK, could you or somebody knowledgeable PLEASE answer the following seemingly-simple question: Will it work with Verizon??I just saw the live-stream of that huge dog and pony show that revealed nothing new about the phone (which has been on-sale overseas for several months) and they can't even be bothered to answer a rudimentary question like... does the phone actually work with different networks! Aggh!
stab244 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
No. It doesn't have the CDMA radios needed to work. Very rarely will an unlocked phone work with Verizon.Gunbuster - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Unless the phone is approved and white-listed by Verizon it will not function. The phone ROM must include the Verizon CDMA radio key as well. Basically only phones sold by Verizon work on Verizon (Except for the iphone 5s and above)Morawka - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
and thats why verizon sucks compared to GSM carriers.. They've been stuck on crappy CDMA for decades. CDMA sucks because you cant talk and lookup stuff on the internet at the same time.Einy0 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Most likely not based on the specs I see. I don't see support for Verizon 2G(CDMA) or Verizon 3G(WCDMA). It may support Verizon on 4G(LTE) but then you have no fallback if there isn't LTE coverage.SarahKerrigan - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Faulty assumptions. Something can be true x86 (ie, compatible with the x86 ISA) without having a firmware and drivers capable of running NT. This is the former, but likely not the latter.Ktracho - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Anyone know if there's any chance they might offer a Windows version of it?kspirit - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
I want this to happen so muchsyxbit - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Very impressive. If Asus commits to keeping the software up to date, this would be a fantastic choice even me.JatkarP - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
There are some descent phones in Asian market at this price range. If this phone pics up in Asian market then it will be a big hit for the mid range makers like Micromax,lenovo,xiomee..BMNify - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Asus has very good sales in Asia-Pacific region, they are targeted to reach 30 Million smartphones in 2015, giving good competition to Xiaomi, Lenovo, Moto and Micromax in India.Shinshin - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Thanks for the preview!In the full review please write about the 2 issues that arose thus far from users:
1. Battery performance.
2. Apps compatibility.
On a side note, ASUS CEO stated last month that the next Zenfone (already in production) will not use SOCs from Intel.
Brandon Chester - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
If you know of any apps that have issues please let me know. Apart from certain NDK apps there shouldn't be any problems. None of the apps I use regularly had issues on this or the venue 8 7000.Shinshin - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
I don't have any certain apps but I read a while ago this report:http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/05/02/arm_test_r...
If you could somehow replicate the tests it would be awesome.
Thanks!
Gondalf - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
This is wrong :). Only the cheaper Zenfone will sports a slow and dirty cheap 6xx SOC from Qualcomm. Other Zenfones will have Intel SOCs inside.Brandon Chester - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
This is what I've heard as well, and the move to s615 for some lower end devices is not actually confirmed from what I understand.Shinshin - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Thanks to you too!blzd - Thursday, May 21, 2015 - link
Funny since Intel is practically giving away these SoCs. They're that desperate to get any design wins.BMNify - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Wrong/misleading information about Intel SOC, Asus will mostly use Mediatek SOCs in their future low-end devices which will cost $100-$150, the mid-range ($200-$300) will use intel SOC as usual.testbug00 - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
that makes a lot more sense.bleh0 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
This phone is a definite buy for me. It could be smaller but I'll get used to it I guess.gijames1225 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
What networks/carriers is this going to support? Sounds like a great deal so far.gijames1225 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
More precisely, is there any chance this will work on Sprint? Verizon normally blocks most phones from their network anyway.Ryan Smith - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
It's a GSM/LTE phone, so it will work on any carrier that uses those standards. In the US that would be AT&T and T-Mobile.gijames1225 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Thanks*curses Sprint*
appliance5000 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Just go to the zenfone website and there's a complete International listing of compatible carriers. Feel kind of weird having to say this on a tech website.Ketzal - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Is the LGG4 review coming?Ryan Smith - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Yes.Thorburn - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
"Depending on which model you get, the ZenFone 2 will come with either Intel's Atom Z3560 or Atom Z3580 SoC. The former has a max boost clock of 1.8GHz, while the latter has a max of 2.33GHz. It's also important to note that the more expensive model with the Z3580 comes with 4GB of LPDDR3 1600 memory, with the Z3560 models only sporting 2GB."I think this must depend on the market, since I have a ZenFone 2 here which is Z3560 based, but has 4GB RAM and 32GB storage...
kenansadhu - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
It is true. And there is even an even LOWER end zenfone model, around $170, which uses a 720p screen (16gb storage, 2gb ram, z3560)sandy105 - Wednesday, May 20, 2015 - link
Nope both the z3580/3560 based models have a 2gb/4gb ram version. but the z3580 comes only in the 1080p variety.basically there's 3 z3560 models :
2gb ram , 720p
2gb ram ,1080p
4gb ram , 1080p
and 1 z3580 model with 4 gb ram and 1080p screen
alin - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
I heard that both cameras take some crappy pictures. It's biggest weakness...appliance5000 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
You do have to aim them.LuxZg - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Please test GPS as well! I'm very interested how this phone's hardware compares in that area to MediaTek's "China phones" (which usually suck in lock times and accuracy). Thanks! :)danielfranklin - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Does anyone feel this would be a much more interesting phone if it had a high end ARM based SOC?I love Intel and ASUS and all but the thought of running into compatibility issues with software really isnt very appealing....
MikhailT - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
For the price, I would rather bitch at the developers and Google to support these Intel SoCs sooner.Software compatibility is easier to fix than hardware. For Google, they don't care about who wins in the end (Intel vs. Arm), they just want Android to the best software.
That's why competition is great, these devices are something I can afford to give my whole family. Most of us are 2-3 year old devices and plan to stay another year. Can't wait for Zenfone 3 (also ZenBook Pro with Skylake/Cannonlake).
MikhailT - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Blah, I wish I can edit my posts.Arm > ARM
best software > best mobile OS platform.
kenansadhu - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Next zenbook pro ftw!lilo777 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
In what way would such phone be more interesting? There are plenty of very similar phones with high end ARM SOCs. This one has unique SOC and this is what makes it interesting. While we do not know for sure but the phone price is probably low in part due to Intel selling their SOCs dirt cheap.Frihed - Wednesday, May 20, 2015 - link
This one is x64 and have 4gb RAM (with mean future proof for android 6), also it's dual chip, with at least for me is a big deal.tipoo - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
With Intels contra-revenue program, Asus only pays 5 dollars per SoC, Intel takes a loss on each chip. No ARM chip costs that little, and definitely not at 5 bucks. It's part of what allows the good performance at such a low price.yangsta - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Is the 2.3mhz version worth paying the extra $100 for over the 1.8mhz version? What do you guys think? That's 50% more!Brandon Chester - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
You have to consider that you also get 64GB of NAND and 4GB of RAM. I would say it's worth it because of the storage, not the SoC. If you can live with 16GB I would get the base model.tipoo - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
They all have MicroSD though - if storage is your only concern, you could aways get the 16GB and get a big cheap microSD cardStormyParis - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Same as other answer: the RAM and Flash may make it worth it, the MHz don't.MarkLuvsCS - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
The $199 version does NOT include the quick charger which is probably a $10 value right there. I think unless money is really tight the $299 version with more RAM, NAND, and included quick charger is worth the $100 difference.testbug00 - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
for future proofing RAM and the extra storage? Yes. I would say it's worth it. Of course, if you know you're going to upgrade and the phone won't get used in 1-2 years, I wouldn't bother.StormyParis - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Regarding the placement of the power button, I'm more intrigued than doubtful: if the phone has double-tap to wake, I'll never use it to wake the phone anyway, and I barely ever use it to switch the screen off. Rather, it'll make it easy to adjust the volume while playing music with the phone in my pocket, though my fingers are getting good at remembering where those volume buttons are anway... not having the power button right next to them is probably good.StormyParis - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Reading the comments, I feel lucky to live in Europe where all phones work with all carriers :-pBMNify - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Not only France/Europe, Most of the world works in the same way, unlocked phones which work with all telecom operators.lilo777 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
US is seemingly turning around on this issue as well. Nowadays it's not so much the carrier locking that is a problem as the use of legacy 3 networks (CDMA) by Verizon and Sprint.Peanutsrevenge - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Does it come with a mini JJ? :)phoenix_rizzen - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Volume keys on the back are useless if the headphone jack is on the top. :(With headphone jack on the bottom, you just slide the phone into your pocket upside down, and the volume keys are down where your fingers naturally rest, making it nice and easy to adjust the volume or skip tracks. It's also very easy to access without putting your hand in your pocket as you can just press through the outside layer of material.
It's something I've really come to like about the LG G2 and the keys on the back.
But it didn't work as well if the headphone jack is on the top.
Gigaplex - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Just put the phone in, top side up. The volume buttons on the back will still be accessible.phoenix_rizzen - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Yeah, but they'll be up higher in your pocket (requiring a bit of a bend in the arm/wrist), and the buttons will be "upside down" in relation to the way your fingers move and the way you press the buttons while holding it normally.Shadowmaster625 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Wow they arent even airmont cores. Epic fail. Intel cant give that ancient crap away.SunLord - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
The SoC is only 6 months old but your correct the silvermont cores its based on are oldish but at the same time there is no airmont phone soc yetlilo777 - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
It is not clear what you call a "fail" here. Does it matter how old the chip is if it is the one of the fastest phones around?LukaP - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Silvermont and Airmont are the same core, just shrunk down. So what if intel doesnt offer a 14nm SOC yet, when their 22nm TriGate FinFET is more advanced than Samsungs 14nm FinFET+ process.Fidelator - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
I'm very tempted to pass on full price flagships and buy this phone, it looks very, very promising to say the leastWaiting for the full review! I hope it's as good as it seems.
piaw - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
If Microsoft was smart, they'd provide a Windows 10 implementation for this phone (and all phones made on this SOC) with a full telephony/LTE data stack. The result: instant elimination of the "lack of apps" problem on Windows phone. See full analysis: http://piaw.blogspot.com/2015/01/2015-will-see-deb...Even as it is, $299 for a phone with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of storage is incredible.
smartthanyou - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
If anyone reading these comments has a sarcasm meter, please unplug it before reading the following otherwise it might explode...Gee, I sure am glad they saw fit to slap there own worthless UI elements on Android like every other OEM. Plain vanilla android is so hard to use and without those questionable enhancements, updates might come to quickly for me to keep up with.
blzd - Thursday, May 21, 2015 - link
Hahahaha. Oh man. The fact that these manufacturers are spending large sums of their money to actually make Android WORSE in every possible way (Touchwiz, etc.) and waste our storage space with bloat apps that are inferior to the stock Android implementation (Asus browser lol) still baffles me.If stock Android looks better, runs better, and is less confusing than your UI and bloatware then you're doing it wrong.
pierrot - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
I remember reading someplace that tablets using PowerVR wouldnt/couldnt get custom ROMs developed. Does that hold true for these as well? That would be a real shame to be at the mercy of ASUS for OS updates.Daniel Egger - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
The major downside of Intel devices is that they're really locked down with that annoying security stuff so there's very little one can do to get an alternative OS or at least a more optimized Android onto those devices and if the vendor decides to not provide OS updates then you'll either have to get a new device or live with the security breaches piling up. I happen to have an Asus device with Intel CPU and I'm stuck with the horrible inefficient KitKat and abysmal battery life until (and only if) Asus decides to pull the stick out of their backsides and provide a Lollipop update -- at least some of the bloatware can be disabled thanks to an exploitable bug in their demo application.At the moment I'm really less than thrilled by the idea of having another Intel based Android device; luckily I've just gotten a new phone and thanks to a Qualcomm processor and an unlocked bootloader it's going to have a really long life...
Speedfriend - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
I bought a cheap Asus Intel powered tablet for under $100 on a deal and it is brillant for the price. Great battery life, smooth, all apps work. I wouldn't hesitate to buy another.Daniel Egger - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Me too, a ME176C. However despite it's crunching power it's rather sluggish, some apps don't run properly (thanks to the Intel CPU I'd guess) and some of the ZenUI apps tend to evict current foreground applications out of memory which makes for a horrible browsing experience. Also the battery used to be good for only 2 hours of ebook reading and after disabling lots of crap it has improved to over 4 hours (GPS and WiFi disabled and on lowest brightness) -- according to CPUSpy I managed to make it deep sleep regularly which is a good thing.I think with a proper CyanogenMod 12.1 ROM this might be a crazy good device but with the KitKat based Asus ZenUI ROM and the energy hungry Intel CPU it's not really a good device for untethered operation.
Zentastic - Friday, May 22, 2015 - link
Well you dont need the CyanogenMod,Lollipop is on the way for all of Asus tablets that came out in 2014.ME572 already has 5.0.1,and soon the rest of their lineup will get 5.0 and above(ME176,ME70,ME181,FE170 etc)Zentastic - Friday, May 22, 2015 - link
And problem with ME176C is not the Intel procesor(per se),it's the Intel graphic card.Brakken - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Why the iPh6 and not the 6+? Screen sizes are even the same!I'm glad Asus and Intel have teamed up. I really hope they continue to develop their partnership!
tipoo - Monday, May 18, 2015 - link
Develop? It's longstanding. one of the reasons Asus is going against the grain putting Intel in phones is that pre-existing relationship.The other reason being Intel is practically giving them for free, lol. 5 dollars after the contra-revenue program, so I hear.
testbug00 - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
well, the cost is about free. The extra stuff you get that's totally not related to the Atom's you bought...Badelhas - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
I´ve read on other reviews that while it has a nice performance it´s filled with Asus BLOAT, just like their notebooks. Do you confirm this? For me, at least, thats a big letdown.Harry_Wild - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Looks great on paper! Not keen on the brush aluminum plastic case. But the price is outstanding and it 5.5" which is huge for me since I carry my phone in my front pocket and keep it there sometimes even sitting position. Not sure if you can do that in jeans like in a car seat! Looks thin enough to the iPhone 6 too! But I just purchase the Nokia Lumia 735 because of the 4.7" OLED screen and the look of the over phone. I purchase the accessories for it too; additional wireless QI battery cover, wireless charger, glass screen protector everything totaled around $400. Half the price of an iPhone!Dmcq - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
I'd really like like an analysis of how the PCmark got to be so good. The possibilities I see arethe ARM big-LITTLE switch is very slow or the fast ARM's are not activated in the race to sleep the test is for, the phone has much better media for read/write and those parts of the benchmark dominated, the large memory helps the tests somehow by buffering data and not needing things compressed. There's various possibilities and the sub-parts of the test might give some indication.
Dmcq - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Found the results. The gain seems mostly to be from video editing. That has probably been heavily optimized for the test I guess! There is also a sizable gain in web browsing which might be explained by the extra memory or perhaps it is just better implemented.theMC5 - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
I looked this up on Newegg, it is described as **No LTE Support in US, Canada and Mexico**. Can anyone elaborate? I'm on T-Mobile, in an area they describe as '4G LTE', so I wonder if this phone is compatible.Bob Todd - Wednesday, May 20, 2015 - link
If you go to the Asus product page they list the exact bands for the USA model in the specifications. All TMo and AT&T LTE bands are supported.Glock24 - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
World be interesting to know if there's really a difference in battery life between the 2GB and the 4GB models, as some people suggest on various forums.YoloPascual - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
But these intel processors drain the batteries of my zenfone 5 so fast.Michael Bay - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
In their defence, you`ve got an old pre-BayTrail Atom there, and a lot has change since then.YoloPascual - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Yes I hope so that this is not an architecture problem.rosege - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
I've got this phone - the 4GB 2.3Ghz model and the battery drains pretty quick. Apparently the 2GB/1.8Ghz model is much better - battery isnt the biggest issue for me so I decided to go with the extra power.If I could have got the 4GB/1.8 I would have but the LTE bands that it supports weren't optimal for my region.
Still hoping Asus will do something to improve the battery life a bit in a future update though
Michael Bay - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
I had an ASUS-some navigator firm WinMo smartphone for a time.It was INCREDIBLY horrible.
CalaverasGrande - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
ffs another computing product with 'zen' in the name.I wonder if you go to Japan, do they have 'catholic' computing products?
Instead of ZenDesk do they use 'Confessional'?
Labeling like this isn't just cultural plundering. It also belies an unimaginative marketing dept.
Roaringriku786 - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Which would be a better buy One Plus One 64GB or Asus Zenfone 2 64GB? I am planning to make the switch from an Iphone 4s to one of these phones.speconomist - Thursday, May 21, 2015 - link
I am actually pondering the purchase of these sames phones (but the 16 GB versions). Let's wait a few days for the review.From what I have read battery life is ok (important for me), and the camera is a disaster (it's a phone, so I'm willing to compromise).
zaza - Tuesday, May 19, 2015 - link
Great Preview. I saw a post from an intel engineer once saying that their should be no problem with app compatibilty since android 5.0 , since ART compile any java apps to work in native code, and native apps that uses the NDK are translated to the desired architecture with minimal overhead (x86, arm, MIPS ...). So in theory their should be no app compatibilty problem. can you confirm this in your review?Hrel - Wednesday, May 20, 2015 - link
I was so happy to see this in my inbox. FINALLY a phone with no compromises that has a 1080p screen!!!!!!Also, can we praise Asus here for actually increasing included storage for the first time in FAR too long? You guys have talked about it here on Anandtech, NAND manufacturers expected NAND to sell more as smartphone capacities increased. Because, ya know, that's what computer hardware has done since it's conception, gotten better for less money. Frankly at this point the fact that any phone is being sold with less than 32GB of internal storage is ridiculous. We should be seeing flagships with 256GB+ by now. I'm glad Asus is at least increasing the standard to 64GB at $300!!!
F2.0 camera on the front and back! Includes SD slot! $300!!!! In terms of bang/buck this phone blows everything else on the market away, they're not even close. I look forward to picking this up next year, or the next iteration assuming it doesn't get ruined like the LG G series got destroyed.
----On screen resolution.
If phone makers wanna have resolutions over 1080p for early adopters, fine. But I am in the majority when I say I don't care about resolutions beyond 1080p. More than that I actively avoid them until the price differential reaches 10% over the cost of 1080p. The same way we achieved "good enough" performance with the Core 2 Duo CPU's 1080p is "good enough" resolution that the effect of diminishing returns for pushing beyond that makes the "upgrade" worth less and less money. 4 times the resolution? Ok, I'm willing to pay about 10% extra to get that, let me know when the prices have reached that point. That's all without even considering the performance hit you're going to take, and how much battery life will suffer from the extreme resolution. So it's not just the screen technology that needs to mature to make that viable for mainstream, but the APU and battery technology as well. To put it simply, if going beyond 1080p is going to mean less battery life by anything more than 3%, slower performance, compatibility, stability, by anything at all, then I'm not interested. More power to the early adopters, but LG and Samsung and even HTC need to provide an alternative to obscene resolutions without handicapping the other specs of the phone. 5" form factor, top of the line APU and camera, regardless of the resolution of the screen.
alin - Wednesday, May 20, 2015 - link
It's not blowing anything out of the water... The pictures you get with those specs are unbelievable, utterly crap. You can see them on gsmarena.com.Quote:
"Image quality left us wanting. On one hand, when viewed to fit the screen, photos show pleasant colors and accurate exposure. White balance is also spot-on, and dynamic range is decent.
Zoom in to pixel level though, and things go south real quick. Images exhibit a very pronounced watercolor character, with detail smeared by broad brushstrokes. The image corners have a very pronounced softness too.
There's little detail in demanding subjects like the railing of the building across the street in the fifth sample, for example. Where other cameras resolve the separate vertical bars, the Zenfone 2 irons them out into a semi-transparent patch. Meanwhile areas of uniform color are rendered into a noisy mess."
Belive me you have to see the pictures with your own eyes. The guys were a to nice in the review regarding the quality...
johnny_boy - Wednesday, May 20, 2015 - link
I hope Intel doesn't focus on GPU performance. Right now it's easily good enough to run any games available in the Play Store at pretty high res. Aside from people that play demanding Android games, I think most users will be more concerned with CPU than GPU performance.blzd - Thursday, May 21, 2015 - link
Because Android needs more CPU performance? I'm pretty sure we're well ahead of any CPU requirements Android and its apps require.Actually what they need to focus on is power efficiency.
More CPU and GPU performance is the easy part. Making them use less power is the hard part.
Peroxyde - Thursday, May 21, 2015 - link
I hope that the Zenfone2 will be easy to root. BTW, would that be hard to root because of Intel CPU?MarkDMadman - Saturday, May 23, 2015 - link
Am I the only one that noticed that the 2nd SIM slot is 2G only?? And that 2G will be out of service by the end of next year? This makes the 2nd SIM slot useless.meacupla - Saturday, May 23, 2015 - link
If you travel a lot, it's a handy way to store your international SIM card.sicyo - Sunday, May 24, 2015 - link
I was really excited to see this from Asus, but the battery is too small, display is too big. That and stock android out of the box is a big selling point for me.re2onance - Sunday, May 24, 2015 - link
I can't wait for the full review to be posted. The battery is the most inconsistent thing I've seen in almost all the reviews I have looked at, and that may have something to do with the times these reviews were made, the updates they were on, apps that were runnings, and the hardware version of the Asus Zenfone 2. There are a lot of versions branded under the name "Zenfone 2".I hope Anandtech gives a detailed review of how well the battery performs so I can decide whether to get this phone or not.
speconomist - Monday, May 25, 2015 - link
I'm waiting to pull the trigger as well. When it comes to data, AT's is the one I trust the most.I can live with a weak single speaker on the back and a mediocre camera, but not with poor battery life.
Mrs. Peacock - Sunday, May 31, 2015 - link
One can always tell when a man wrote a review, even though these newfangled "modern men" are meant to be both men and telepaths. Of course, my dear Brandon, your understanding of all things smartphones was never meant to include the importance of an app like Mirror, or such factors as case color, what the phone is like to lose at the bottom of one's handbag, and other aspects that should not matter to you.I can see from your review that you have never left your home for an evening of bingo among one's friends, only to realise half-way through the journey, when one's driver is stuck in traffic, that one cannot remember when one last went to the powder room and applied one's lipstick. Modern cars, like modern men, are not what they once were, and much can be said about the lack of amenities, rear-seat mirrors being a casualty of the financiers meddling with things they shouldn't.
For a lady in such a predicament, the first question will invariably be whether she should at all present herself in this state, to which the only possible reply would be: "the horror, the horror!". Enter the Mirror app: this will save our heroin from disgrace and opprobrium by letting her apply the appropriate amount of cosmetic, without the ghastly left-right inversion of a less thoughtful video app would present, thus causing confusion and possibly more damage than was there in the first place.
Hence we would easily be drawn to consider the Mirror app as possibly the most appealing aspect of this telephone, wouldn't we?
icwhatudidthere - Monday, June 1, 2015 - link
I'm sorry, but bingo? Surely said lady would be on her way to play a hand of bridge, no? Also, having a driver, one would assume said lady would have a Vertu concierge at hand who would send an appropriate stylist to her location.