What if every smartphone were to cost a bomb?
What if every smartphone claimed to have all high-end features?
What if every smartphone looked the same?

Fortunately, this isn’t the case… and so the teeming masses can breathe easy. There are smartphones that don’t cost a bomb… and give all the vital features at a cost that suits every pocket. I will rate the Xolo ONE in this fascinating category. 

What do most of us do with a smartphone? I mean, do we do sit down and write a blog post of a thousand words and then attempt to upload it on our site? Do we attempt to play memory intensive games for hours? Do we enter a semi-darkened room with an intention to click some gorgeous photographs? The answer to all these is a big resounding NO.

We want our voice calls to be clear. We want to be a part of the social media race and be able to upload to Facebook, tweet, regale friends with forwards on Whatsapp, and send SMSes… besides clicking pictures that help us document our time. And if I go ahead a bit more, I would want to record my interviews… so I need a voice recorder. Some of my friends cannot do without their mandatory obsession with listening to music and want a music player, an FM radio, and video playing facility.

Good enough!

The Xolo ONE in my hands gives all these features and comes with a back panel made to give it a leather look-alike finish… obviously in multiple colour options. The dual SIM powered by MediaTek 1.3GHz MT6582 quad core processor is the one that most other Android phones come with… and this is similar to the Mali 400 MP2 GPU that this one has.

I was able to use the touch screen without the drag and the lag that one expects in phones that aren’t in the top league of the price chart. By the way, this phone allowed me to use my Wacom stylus that I use on my iPad, and I was able to execute a fascinating drawing too. So yes, go ahead and be an artist with Xolo ONE… be a DJ too with the right app… or just edit your pictures well on a 4.5 inch IPS screen with a 854 x 480 pixels resolution. The 9.3 mm thickness of the handset gives it a rather sleek look… and the storage of 8 GB with a 32 GB expansion slot makes it far better than many other that don’t give this facility.

Now listen, things like 3G and wi-fi are things without which I would not even have called it a smartphone… and the trio of a proximity, accelerometer, and light sensor gives it that added tech charm.

The front camera is 5 MP and has an LED flash… the rear is a VGA but then at an MRP of 6599/- you couldn’t really have asked for more. But then the Xolo ONE does surprise you when you’re informed that this phone will get the Android 5.0 Lollipop upgrade. And to add more, the removable battery is 1700 mAh and lasts for 1140 minutes.

Now the questions that pop in my mind are:

What if I gift the Xolo ONE to my 83 year old father? Will he be happy with the way the phone functions or will he have any problems? So I called him up and asked, ‘What sort of smartphone are you looking for?’

He simply said, ‘One that doesn’t have a small screen. One that has a radio. One that allows me to click pictures sometimes. One where I can download Sudoku and play that game. One that allows me to write my messages on Whatsapp. One that doesn’t need to be recharged every few hours.’

I happily said, ‘Well, then the one that you want is Xolo ONE.’ So I will soon be sending him a Xolo ONE and I’m sure he is going to be a happy man in the sort of tech world that he wants.

Now I’m just wondering:

What if my youngest brother says, ‘I think I want this one.’

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Xolo ONE reviewed

Xolo ONE reviewed

Xolo ONE reviewed

Xolo ONE reviewed

XOLO ONE reviewed

XOLO ONE reviewed

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Article published in ‘The Education Post’ dated 29 December 2014:

2014_12_29_The Education Post_Tech Review_Xolo

2014_12_29_The Education Post_Tech Review_Xolo

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Arvind Passey
05 December 2014