By Anuj Sharma
New Delhi, Nov 20 (IANS) Aiming to boost its prospects in the world of virtual reality (VR), Gionee has expanded its portfolio by launching the S6 Pro smartphone, the company's first offering that supports VR and comes pre-loaded with a Gionee VR app.
Positioned to woo the upper-mid segment, the Rs 23,999 S6 Pro takes the Xiaomi Mi 5, Moto Z Play, and ASUS Zenfone 3 Laser head on.
Here is what works for the device.
S6 Pro carries a sturdy metallic uni-body design that looks elegant, feels premium and, at the same time, is not too heavy to hold. The fingerprint sensor integrated into the home button worked smoothly and unlocked the device within seconds.
The Corning Gorilla glass coating on the screen makes it scratch-resistant so the smartphone is up for some rough use. The buttons on the side offer good tactile feedback and are evenly spaced, making the device ergonomical in use.
The 5.5-inch full-HD IPS panel projected good colours on the screen and gives tough competition to the display quality of Xiaomi Mi 5. However, the display of Xiaomi Mi 5 is brighter and more detailed.
The P10 octa-core processor paired up with a 4GB of RAM delivered a smooth performance and the Amigo 3.2 user-interface on top of Android 6.0 Marshmallow operating system felt fluidic with apps opening in an instant. Games were also smooth to play.
The 13MP rear shooter is capable of taking good-quality photos and captures decent amount of details. However, on the other hand, 16MP camera of Xiaomi's Mi 5 delivers finer pictures.
The f/2.0 large aperture allows more light to pass through the camera sensor, thus producing decent low-light images too. The 8MP front snapper with screen flash works better while capturing selfies and "groufies" than Xiaomi Mi 5.
The 3,130mAh battery in the S6 Pro is more than enough to keep a phone running for a day under normal-to-moderate usage for a 5.5-inch display. But for heavy users, the phone will not be able to last a day, which is admissible.
S6 Pro has several in-built features like video editor with themed and professional edits, desktop editor, Image+, video beautification, time lapse and text recognition.
What does not work?
The camera performance is not very great and the images captured by the front and back cameras were not very impressive, lacking depth in low light and, at times, in bright light conditions too. Given the price, camera performance should have been better.
Conclusion: Gionee S6 Pro is a beautifully-designed device, feels sturdy and has balanced configuration that offers decent overall performance, except falling short where camera expectations are concerned.
(Anuj Sharma can be contacted at anuj.s@ians.in)
