Smartisan has officially announced its second smartphone – Smartisan JianGuo or Smartisan U1. The device would go on sale in China by September 1st; it is available in different back covers in the rainbow colours (ROYGBIV) – Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo and Violet.
The Smartisan U1 features a 5.5-inch IPS display with a resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels (Full HD), a pixel density of 403ppi and is protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 3. Under the hood, it is powered by an a 64-bit octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 MSM8939 processor with Adreno 405 GPU.
On the back there is a 13MP Samsung made camera with f/2.2 aperture and LED flash; the front camera is a 5MP camera with f /2.2 aperture. The device is available in two storage variants – 16GB and 32GB; but there is no mention of a microSD card slot for storage expansion.
Connectivity options on the device includes – NFC, Bluetooth, 4G LTE (LTE Cat.4) , Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Wi-Fi Hotspot and OTA Sync. The Smartisan U1 measures 152.9 x 76.9 x 9.0mm in dimensions, weighs 155 grams, Dual SIM slots and is backed by a 2900mAh battery.
The Smartisan U1 runs on Smartisan 2.0 which is a customised version of Android. The device can set the colour of the UI to match the back cover of the smartphone and there are volume keys on both sides – one controls the volume, the other controls brightness and pressing both while the phone is asleep takes an instant photo.
There are also features such as an integrated business card scanner, a DJ-ish app for music scratching and different ways to sort apps. The 16GB variant costs CNY 899 ($140) while the 32GB variant costs CNY 999 ($160).
