Asus ZenFone Zoom: A new camera-phone you should check out

Asus came in big yesterday at CES 2015, with two major confirmations: the Asus ZenFone 2 and the Asus ZenFone Zoom. The camera on the Asus ZenFone Zoom certainly plays a central role, as it occupies almost 1/3 of the rear. Not that camera phones are something out of date, in fact they’ve become quite the trend in the past weeks. And guess what? The Asus ZenFone Zoom is not just bragging all the way, it has something to show for itself.

If one were to look in depth, they would understand that Mega Pixels are not everything there is to a good camera. The new Asus ZenFone Zoom is quite the feat as it packs a 3x optical zoom, and yeah it’s only a phone, but one that Asus seems to be quite fond of. The company decided to make its device look a lot like the Lumia 1020, even though expectations were high that it would come up with something like the HTC One M8, with dual cameras.

The rear camera on the Asus ZenFone Zoom is a 13 MP snapper, marshaled with 3x optical zoom and optical image stabilization. We get laser auto-focus on this handset, a feature we first saw on the LG G3 and dual LED Dual Tone flash that the Asus ZenFone 2 packs. The selfie-camera is quite impressive; 5 MP with wide-angle lens. But is the camera all there is to the Asus ZenFone Zoom?

The specs of the handset are definitely something Asus can be proud of. The Asus ZenFone Zoom features a 5.5 inch display, at 1920 x 1080 Full HD resolution, with a pixel density of 403 ppi (pixels per inch), much like its brother, the ZenFone 2.  A quick peek under the hood reveals a nice, 64-bit Intel Atom Z3580 chip. There are two memory variants to the handset, 2/4 GB of RAM. As for the storage, we are pretty content with four offers: 16/32/64/128 GB, plus a microSD card slot just to make things beefier.

The Asus ZenFone Zoom is running out of the box with Android 5.0 Lollipop with  ZenUI included. The battery on this device should have been a bit larger considering the display and powerful camera that munch up a considerable amount of energy. We are talking about 3000 mAh; it’s not that bad, but it could have been better.

The release date on the Asus ZenFone Zoom should come around March or April 2015, most likely joined by its brother, The Asus ZenFone 2. As for the price, we are looking at roughly $400 full retail price for the 2 GB RAM variant. Not bad indeed! Excellent camera, good specs, good-ish battery, all for a nifty price. Good job Asus, I am sure you will have a lot of enthusiasts looking up to these handsets.