In recent months, we have seen numerous smartphone makers trying their best to differentiate their products and grab the headlines but very few have been lucky to make substantial inroads. There is now a new entrant called LeEco, a Chinese internet company formerly called LeTv and widely known as the Netflix of China, which is trying to make inroads in the Indian market. Recently, it launched an affordable smartphone, Le 1s, in partnership with e-commerce portal Flipkart. The three flash sales it has conducted so far seems to have created a decent amount of buzz; the company claims to have sold 70,000 units in two seconds, 95,000 units in 20 seconds and 55,000 units in 9 seconds respectively.
Le 1s is a good blend of software, hardware, specs, camera and battery life. It is priced at Rs 10,990. Out of the box the first thing you notice about this phone is its design which has certain similarities with Apple iPhone. The body, made of metal with plastic strips running along the top and bottom of the rear, looks premium and stylish. Also, with a thickness of 9.50 mm and weight of 169 grams, the device is neither too thick nor too heavy. It is comfortable to hold and operate.
The front is dominated by 5.5-inch screen which offers IPS LCD display with a resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels. The front is also home to a selfie-camera and sensor window that have been arranged symmetrically on either side of the earpiece on the top. Three capacitive touch keys are placed in the bottom, but interestingly they are hidden until you tap them to light up.
The power and volume rocker keys are placed on the right edge while left has space for tray with cutouts for one nano-SIM and one micro-SIM. Also, a 3.55 mm audio socket, accompanied by a very non-standard IR emitter are on top edge, while the Type-C USB port between two speaker grilles are in the bottom edge.
Although LeEco is ahead of the curve in terms of introducing it first in the market but for users the disadvantage is that they won’t be able to use any of the micro-USB cables. The company claims that the fast charging features of the Le Type-C connector are supported by its two charging paths, 24W charger, 3A data cable and a high density, super-fast charging battery.
LeEco 1s runs on Android 5.0.2 and its entrails are powered by 2.2GHz octa-core MediaTek Helio X10 processor with 3 GB RAM. The device comes with non-expandable 32 GB of storage.
On the camera front, Le 1s comes with a 13 MP rear camera and 5 MP front camera. Both the cameras are able to bring decent pictures and video in natural light, however same could not be repeated in low light conditions. The device comes with all necessary connectivity options. It support 2G, 3G, 4G, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.
With Le 1s, LeEco seems to have made substantial inroads in its maiden attempt in the burgeoning smartphone market in the country. We used this phone for over two weeks and we could not find any solid reason to suggest, not to buy it.
** Estimated street price: Rs 10,990