Infocus, the American smartphone brand has been selling smartphones in India for over a year now. The brand has unveiled several low-cost Android smartphones under its Bingo brand. And a few months ago Infocus had launched Infocus Epic 1 smartphone which is the first in the Indian market to come with Mediatek’s Helio X20 deca-core processor. So does the number of cores matter? Does it make performance any better? To find out do give a read to out review of Infocus Epic 1.
Design
The Infocus Epic 1 has a unibody design with metal casing which gives it a premium appearance. The device has a curved back that makes the device not only comfortable to hold but also easy for one-handed operation. At the front we have a rounded earpiece at the top below that is a 5.5 inches FHD display with Corning Gorilla Glass protection. The smartphone uses on-screen navigation buttons, which means that the wide space below the display is empty. At the back the rear camera and fingerprint sensor are symmetrically aligned with the dual-tone LED flash sitting in between the two. The USB Type-C charging port along with speaker grill are placed at the botom. And at the top there’s a 3.5mm audio jack and an IR blaster.
Hardware
- Dimensions: 153 x 76 x 8.4mm; Weight: 160g
- 5.5-inch Full HD LTPS display with Corning Gorilla Glass protection
- Deca-Core MediaTek Helio X20 (MT6797) processor (Dual-A72 2.0GHz + Quad-A53 1.9GHz + Quad-A53 1.4GHz) with Mali-T880MP4 GPU
- 3GB RAM, 32GB internal storage ( expandable memory with microSD )
- Android 6.0 (Marshmallow) with InLife UI 2.0
- Hybrid Dual SIM (nano + nano/microSD)
- 16MP rear camera with dual-tone LED Flash, f/2.0 aperture, PDAF
- 8MP front-facing camera, f/1.8 aperture, 82-degree wide-angle lens
- Fingerprint sensor, Infrared sensor, 4G VoLTE, USB Type-C
- 3000mAh
Whats Good?
The “Epic” smartphone is powered by a MediaTek’s MT6797 deca-core processor, combined with 3GB RAM. Interestingly the processors are arranged in a tri-cluster formation. Which means that instead of having two clusters of processor cores, the Helio X20 adds another cluster, thereby adding in more granularity. With so much goodness on the hardware side, the device is bound to perform well on day to day moderate tasks as well as graphic intensive tasks. While playing some graphic intensive games like Need for Speed: No Limits and Asphalt8 we didn’t observe any performance issues and the device stayed cool.
The InFocus Epic 1 runs Android Marshmallow out-of-the-box with InLife UI 2.0 skin on top. The UI is clean, almost similar to stock android with moderate tweaks and minimal bloatware. Although the UI is not attractive in terms of visual appearance but its fast and does not stutter, so it’s acceptable. Also if you don’t like the visual appearance you can always install a custom launcher.
Whats Bad?
The 16-megapixel snapper on the Epic 1 with dual-tone LED Flash, f/2.0 aperture and PDAF. The camera specifications look good on paper but that does not help here. The daylight shots captured from the rear camera are average and under low light conditions the photographs are equally mediocre. The camera UI looks stale and the camera interface seems like you are using a smartphone based on Android KitKat. The device features a 360-degree fingerprint sensor on the back which is an active scanner. You can add
Infocus Epic 1 device features a 360-degree fingerprint sensor on the back which is an active scanner. You can add up to 5 fingerprints for unlocking the device. However, the fingerprint scanner is slow. It takes a while to register the fingerprint and then to unlock the device.
The Infocus Epic 1 is backed by a 3000mAh battery which although offers good battery backup and the manufacturer also claims that it comes with quick charge technology. But the device took more than 2 hours to charge from 5-100 % everytime we charged the device using stock charger.
Our Verdict
The Infocus Epic 1 created a buzz in Indian smartphone industry by launching the first smartphone in India to feature a deca-core processor. Although the number of cores doesn’t matter. Lets take an example of Apple iPhone which still runs on a dual core processor and I need not to say more how well it performs. The heart of the device lies in the software and not in the hardware. The Epic 1 with a Helio X20 Deca-core processor seems just like a marketing gimmick. The performance of the device is average, the camera is mediocre and the fingerprint sensor is lightning fast slow. The only positive about the device is its build and curved design, which makes the device easy to hold. I really like the inclusion of USB Type-C and an IR blaster on the top.
The Epic deca-core smartphone from Infocus might not be a perfect smartphone but if offers decent value at the price at which it is available. The device directly competes with XIaomi Redmi Note 3 and LeEco Le2, and to be honest the device doesnt stand out ahead of these two “Epic” smartphones in any department. However if you want to flaunt a deca-core processor the Infocus Epic 1 is for you.
Pricing and Availability
The InFocus Epic 1, comes in Gold color, is priced at INR 12,999 and is exclusively available from Amazon.
