We’ve previously covered smartphones with a black and white e-Paper display usually placed on the back of the phone, while a traditional full-color display is placed at the front. Some models include Yotaphone 2 and Hisense A2, and the advantage of the e-Ink display is that you can extend battery life, quickly check notifications without unlocking your phone, reads book even in bright lights, etc.. but the cost goes up quite a bit since the manufacturers have to integrate two displays in their devices.
Hisense A5 does completely away with the traditional color display and replaces it with a 5.84″ e-Paper display with 1440×720 resolution. The display is black and white, and the slow refresh rate of such display will make it impractical to watch videos and play most games, but if all you do is check emails, browsing the web, reading e-books, accessing social networks, and making phone calls this may be an option.
Hisense A5 specifications:
- SoC – Qualcomm Snapdragon 439 octa-core Cortex-A53 processor @ up to 1.95 GHz with Adreno 505 GPU
- System Memory – 4GB RAM
- Storage – 32GB or 64GB eMMC flash and MicroSD card slot up to 256GB
- Display – 5.84″ multi-touch e-Paper display with 1440 x 720 resolution, adjustable front light
- Audio – 3.5mm audio jack, built-in speaker and microphone
- Connectivity
- Cellular
- Nano SIM card slot
- GSM – B2/B3/B5/B8
- CDMA – BC0
- TD-SCDMA – B34/B39
- WCDMA – B1/B2/B5/B8
- TDD-LTE – B38/B39/B40/B41/B34
- FDD-LTE – B1/B3/B5/B7/B8
- 802.11a/b/g/n WiFi 4
- Bluetooth 4.2
- GNSS – GPS
- Cellular
- Camera – 13.0MP rear camera with flash and 5.0MP front-facing camera
- USB – 1x micro USB OTG port
- Sensors – Ambient Light Sensor, Gravity Sensor, Proximity Sensor
- Battery – 4,000mAh non-removable battery that is said to last up to 10 days on a charge (See video below)
- Dimensions – 15.41 x 7.46 x 0.80 cm
- Weight – 158 grams
The device runs Android 9 sadly without Google Play, so you’d have to sideload apps, and ships with a charger, a user manual in Chinese, a screen protector, a SIM needle and a USB cable. Charbax shot a video a few months ago both about Hisense A5 phone and Hisense A6L E-Ink + Color display model. The part about A5 starts at 1:20.
If you’re interested in the phone, you’d have to check out the supported cellular bands, as Liliputing reports that for US users, AT&T coverage should be good for 2G and 3G network, but it will only support some of AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, and Verizon’s 4G LTE network bands.
Hisense A5 is much cheaper than dual-display phones, and is sold for $234 on Aliexpress, and even lower at $219.99 on GearBest.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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