Gionee Elife S7 With 5.5mm Thickness, Octa- Core SoC Launched at Rs. 24,999

Gionee on Saturday launched the Elife S7 in India
at an event in Hyderabad, its latest slim
smartphone offering with a thickness of 5.5mm.
The Elife S7 has been priced at Rs. 24,999, and
will hit shelves in a week in Black, White, and Blue
colours.
The Gionee Elife S7 was unveiled at MWC 2015,
where the company president William Lu had
explained why the smartphone was not slimmer
than its predecessor, the Gionee Elife S5.1. "We
believe Elife S7 will bring the future of slim
smartphones to the next level. To make ever-
slimmer phones, compromising on performance
and function is pointless. Manufacturers should
offer more features benefiting user experience
other than just slimness," Lu had said.
( Also see : Gionee Elife S7 First Impressions: Slim
Yet Sturdy )
Gionee claims the U-shaped design of the
aviation-level aluminium magnesium alloy infused
frame around the phone helps in maintaining the
structural integrity of the body. At the Hyderabad
launch, Lu also revealed the Elife E8 flagship
would be launching soon, and that Gionee would
be launching M-series and P-series smartphones
in India.
( Also see : Gionee Elife S7 vs Vivo X5Max+ )
Lu added 80 percent of upcoming launches in the
country would be LTE-enabled. As previously
announced , Lu also reiterated support for the
'Make in India' campaign, and that it would soon
start manufacturing smartphones in India. Gionee
India CEO and MD Arvind Vohra added the firm
was looking at locations and factories, and
production could kick off from mid-2015.
The Elife S7 is a dual-SIM smartphone that runs
the company's Amigo 3.0 UI on top of Android 5.0
Lollipop. It features a 5.2-inch full-HD (1080x1920
pixels) Super Amoled display with a pixel density of
424ppi, and Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection. The
Elife S7 is powered by a 1.7GHz octa-core
MediaTek MT6572 SoC coupled with 2GB of RAM.
( Also see : Gionee Elife S7 vs Gionee Elife S5.5 )
The camera options on the Gionee Elife S7 include
a 13-megapixel autofocus rear shooter with LED
flash (claimed to be the thinnest module of this
resolution), and a 8-megapixel front facing camera.
The 16GB of inbuilt storage on the device is not
expandable via microSD card. The dual-SIM
smartphone is also Gionee's first with 3G+4G card
(Nano-SIM) support.
Connectivity options on the Gionee Elife S7 include
4G LTE (TDD Bands 38, 39, 40; FDD Bands 3, 7),
Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Wi-Fi Direct, Bluetooth 4.0,
GPS/ A-GPS, USB OTG, and FM radio. It packs a
non-removable 2700mAh battery, which according
to Gionee enables the Elife S7 to last whole day.
An 'extreme mode' on device is also said to enable
the last 10 percent of battery power to potentially
last for another 33 hours 45 minutes of standby
time. The handset measures 139.8x67.4x5.5mm,
and is certainly slimmer than it was expected to
be, and weighs 127 grams.
We'd managed to spend some time with the Elife
S7 at MWC 2015, and thought it was probably the
right direction for Gionee considering it is not
concentrating on making the slimmest smartphone.
While we were quite satisfied with the build quality
and the software tweaks, do stay tuned to NDTV
Gadgets for our comprehensive review.
Disclosure: Gionee sponsored the correspondent's
flights and hotel to Hyderabad.