After an exciting last year, Indian smartphone market has gone off to a flyer with some prolific product launches! The battle of budget phones has become bigger than ever, and new players are steeping in with an exemplary package of good looks and superb performance. That being said, LeEco,the renowned internetconglomerate popularly known as LeTV, has also unleashed it’s first-ever budget phone in India, the Le 1s. This beauty forms a part of company’s premium “Superphone” range, and is set to hit the shelves via Flipkart’s flash sale model, starting from February 2.
Featuring a combination of stunning form-factor and top-notch features, Le 1s incorporates all essential qualities of a tempting budget phone. The handset has been priced effectively to take on leading budget players, but in our opinion, the biggest competitor for Letv (LeEco) will be Xiaomi’s latest Redmi Note 3.The powerful phablet features very similar specs, and will be creating some serious problems for Le 1s right away!
Though picking the best from these two is no easy task, we’ve compared their specs to mark out the smallest line of difference. Here’s how they weigh in:
Design and Build
The design language of Le1s is enriched with a bunch of tweaks here and there. The handset flaunts a stunning all-metal body crafted from aircraft-grade aluminium, and features a sleek form-factor with smooth edges and sides. It gives a seamless look with invisible screws, and incorporates a fingerprint sensor on the rear panel, just like the new Nexus 5x and 6P. Overall, the handset looks highly premium, especially with its unibody design, USB Type-C port,7.6mm thickness!
The new Redmi Note 3 also packs an all-metal unibody, but with more curves and enhanced thickness. The handset looks stunningfrom all angles and incorporates rounded corners with a snappy fingerprint on the rear panel. Itships inSilver, Gray, Gold colour options, and continues exactly from where Redmi Note 2 left off. But on whole, it’s a big let-down against Le 1s.
Display and Sunlight Visibility
In terms of sunlight legitimacy and colour-detailing, Le 1s and Redmi Note 3 are real performers! Both budget beauties incorporateanidentical 5.5-inch 1080p display, and offer rich visual experience with true-to-life colours and fine details.They both stand out in the category, and go head to head against each with no major difference.In fact, the only thing that marks a very small difference between the two phones istheir negligible bezel size. Letv Le1s has a “nearly” bezel-less display, while its competitor Redmi Note 3 has an increased bezel-size.
Performance and Hardware Setup
Just like display, there’s a tie on the hardware front as well. Redmi Note 3 and Le 1s both incorporate the same MediaTek MT6795 Helio X10 eight-core processor clocked at 2.2 GHz coupled with 3GB RAM and 32GB inbuilt memory. They both offer an ideal ecosystem for seamless work and play, and cater heavy users with subtle perfection.However, the downside is, neither of the two phones include microSD card slot for expanding memory above 32 gigs!
You can play heavy games without any lags, but keeping a big collection will be a problem for gamers, and movie-buffs!
Software
As for software, both smartphones feature their own custom skins with several tweaks here and there. The new Redmi Note 3 runs Xiaomi’s latest MIUI 7 based on Android 5.0.2 Lollipop, and offers a slick user-experience with of intuitive features, customizability, and updated theme collections.It looks like a major upgrade over previous versions, and continues impress users with less bloatware and all-app icons on the home-screen.
On the other side, the new Letv Le 1s runsAndroid 5.1 Lollipop based EUI out-of-the box.The custom interface from Letv looks fairly clean, and runs on the same “all apps on the home-screen” concept. There’s no app-drawer, but the overall experience of the interface is as good as MIUI or any other custom Android skin. It offers plenty of customization options and includes refreshed icon sets as well!
Camera Performance
Even the camera setup packed with Redmi Note 3 and Le 1s is very similar. Both phabletspromise an excellent photography experience with their 13-megapixel rear and 5-megapixel front-facing shooters. They produce sharp images in all conditions, and manage decent frames without any shutter lags or focus delays.Though specs keep them on the same place, in depth analysis reveal Le 1s to be better than Redmi Note 3. It’s prolific rear camera with Samsung’s ISOCELL technology and blue glass filternot only captures 4k video but also stands out with better images in the dark.
Battery Backup
Out of allcategories,battery capacity isthe only one where Redmi Note 3 outperforms Le 1s and all budget phones. The handset incorporates a humongous 4000 mAh non-removable battery and offers sufficient juice for seamless work and play. It claims to give up to 60 hours of music playback, and looks quite strong to cater on-the-go users, gamers, and movie-buffs. No doubt, it justifies the enhanced thickness of the phablet!
On the other end, the new Le 1s retains its sleek profile with a small yet decent 3000 mAh non-removable battery.The battery of this handset is not as powerful as the one with Redmi Note 3, but it still gives you an entire day of moderate usage with the added option for fast charging.
The Bottom-line
Though Redmi Note 3 is a powerful handset, we’ll prefer going with the new Letv Le 1s. Apart from battery backup, the power-packed handset from rebranded LeTV stands out in all categories. It offers a perfect package for on-the-go users, and delivers top-notch performance with stunning form-factor, improved camera quality, and fast charging technology.
Therefore, if you’re looking for a strong budget phone with high-end specs, Le 1s is the best option to count on. The handset is priced at a Rs. 10,990, and is hitting the shelves exclusively via Flipkart.com.