Asus has unveiled a latest variant of the best-selling ZenFone 5, known as ZenFone 5 (A501CG-2B509WWE), with a price tag of Rs. 7,999. The latest ZenFone 5 variant is exclusively available for purchase on Flipkart, starting from today.
Interestingly, there are few differentiating features of the latest ZenFone 5 variant, such as, it is powered by a 1.2GHz dual-core Intel Atom Z2520 processor with Intel Hyper Threading Technology. On the contrary, the original ZenFone 5 (A501CG) was powered by a 1.6GHz dual-core Intel Atom Z2560 processor.
Until now Asus has launched four ZenFone 5 models in India (including the latest launch), the other three were ZenFone 5 (A501CG), ZenFone 5 (A500CG), and ZenFone 5 (A502CG) - Although they were similar in terms of outlook, but were a little different in terms of specifications, mainly in chipsets and screen resolutions.
The Asus ZenFone 5 (A501CG-2B509WWE) includes 2GB of RAM, which proves to be the highlight of the device, given the price. It has 8GB of internal storage. Rest of the specifications of the new variant are almost similar to the 8GB model of the original ZenFone 5 (A501CG).
The ZenFone 5 (A501CG-2B509WWE) comes with a 5-inch HD (720x1280 pixel) IPS display with an 8-megapixel rear camera and a 2-megapixel front facing camera. It has an inbuilt storage of 8GB, which can be further expanded up to 64GB via microSD card. The device is backed by a 2110mAh battery, which is touted by the company to provide up 18 hours of talktime and 353 hours on standby mode. Following the legacy of the ZenFone series phones, the ZenFone 5 (A501CG-2B509WWE) runs on Android 4.3 Jelly Bean (upgradable to Android 4.4 KitKat) with Asus’s in-house ZenUI. The connectivity options include, Dual SIM card slots, 3G support, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth,
At the starting of this month, Asus had announced a price cut of its ZenFone 5 (16GB model) in India to Rs. 9,999, the launch price was Rs. 12,999. The price cut comes as desperate measure by Asus for competing against the likes of Xiaomi’s Redmi Note 4G and Micromax’s Yu Yureka, which are priced below Rs 10,000.
Moreover, towards the end of the year 2014, Asus also launched the Zenfone 5 Lite variant in India for a price of Rs 8,999. The Lite variant of the Zenfone featured a 5-inch qHD IPS display and was powered by a 1.2GHz Intel Atom Z2520 dual-core processor coupled with 1GB of RAM and 8GB of expandable internal storage. The dual-SIM capable phone supported connectivity options such as 3G and Wi-Fi. It had an 8-megapixel rear camera with LED flash and a VGA front camera. It was backed by a 2,500mAh battery. It was based on the Android 4.4 KitKat Os with Zen UI on top.
In all its glory, with enhanced specifications and lesser price, the new Zenfone 5 (A501CG-2B509WWE) variant seems much better than the Zenfone 5 Lite.
Asus Zenfone 5 (A501CG-2A508WWE) specifications:
- 5-inch (1280 x 720 pixels) capacitive multi touch display with Corning gorilla glass 3 protection
- 1.2 GHz dual-core Intel Atom Z2520 processor coupled with 2GB RAM
- 8GB internal memory, expandable memory up to 64GB via micro SD
- Dual SIM with dual standby (micro SIMs)
- Android 4.3 (Jelly Bean) with Zen UI, upgradable to Android 4.4 (KitKat)
- 8MP rear camera with LED flash and 2MP front-facing camera
- 10.34 mm thick and weighs 145g
- 3G HSPA+, WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.0, GPS
- 2110 mAh battery