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BLU's Life Pure smartphone delivers 1080p, a 13-megapixel camera and 32GB of space for $349
BLU Products can offer a lot of smartphone for the money, but its devices seldom come with the sharp screens and ample memory that you'd expect from rivals. The company is closing that gap with its new Life Pure, however. The $349 unlocked handset carries the same 5-inch, 1080p screen that you've seen on flagships from the past year, including the HTC Droid DNA; it even stuffs in a 13-megapixel rear camera, a 5-megapixel front camera and 32GB of storage, giving it more overall media prowess than a similarly-priced Nexus 5. With that said, you won't want to chuck your reference Google phone out the window just yet. The Life Pure is running on a slower 1.5GHz quad-core MediaTek chip (albeit with 2GB of RAM), doesn't include LTE and uses Android 4.2. This isn't an early adopter's phone, then. Still, we can see some buyers trading performance for features when the Life Pure goes on sale in the near future.
Lenovo Vibe X stuffs 5-inch 1080p display, quad-core chip into slim and light body (update: video)
While Lenovo's Snapdragon 800-powered phone has yet to make an official appearance, the Chinese company's gone ahead and unveiled its other quad-core flagship device: the Vibe X aka IdeaPhone S960. Much like most of its recent siblings, this Android 4.2 slate is powered by a MediaTek SoC -- the quad-core 1.5GHz MT6589T, specifically, with 2GB of RAM and 16GB of built-in storage. There's also a 5-inch 1080p IPS display and a 2,000mAh internal battery, along with a 5-megapixel, 84-degree front-facing camera plus a 13-megapixel main imager on the back. As you'd expect, the camera app will come with face enhancement features for your bad skin days, and Lenovo also teases a "full-featured" photo app that lets you organize your photos (with tags and folders), as well as making puzzles with them. Thanks to Gorilla Glass 3 and the "premium polycarbonate body" (with "fabric-like surface" and side chrome accents), the overall package weighs 121g only and is just 6.9mm thick -- the same thickness as the slightly larger but metallic, Intel-powered K900. Also, while the Vivo X3 with the same MediaTek chip and battery capacity is way thinner at 5.75mm (sorry, Huawei!), do bear in mind that its 5-inch display only has a 720p resolution. There's no price nor a date just yet, but as with most Lenovo phones these days, we've been told that the Vibe X will not be entering either Europe or the US. As the Chinese saying goes: you can quench thirst by thinking of the plums. By "plums" we mean the press release and our first impressions after the break. Follow all of our IFA 2013 coverage by heading to our event hub!
Vivo X3 smartphone stuffs air gestures and high-end audio into a 5.75mm-thick shell (video)
Did you think Huawei's Ascend P6 was a slim smartphone? It has nothing on BBK's just-unveiled Vivo X3. Despite a 5-inch (if 720p) screen, an 8-megapixel rear camera, a front 5-megapixel shooter and a 1.5GHz quad-core MediaTek processor, the X3 measures a wafer-like 5.75mm thick in its blue variant. There's plenty of party tricks under the hood, too -- the Android 4.2 device has both an infrared sensor for touch-free gestures and a dedicated audio chip from ESS. It also preserves much of the better hardware from its slower and thicker X1S cousin, including the 16GB of non-expandable storage and the 2,000mAh battery. The Vivo X3 ships to China on September 1st for the same ¥2,498 ($408) as the X1S. If the device proves tempting, you can check out the Engadget Chinese hands-on; their English-language video is available after the break.
