Tech

With Nokia 7.1, HMD sets eyes on bigger footprint in budget phone market

Nokia 7.1

HMD Global, the manufacturer of Nokia phones has released its latest smartphone, Nokia 7.1, targeting budget smartphone buyers.

HMD Global is currently among the 10 top mobile phone manufacturers, and with the new strategy, observers say, it could enlarge its market share.

Nokia 7.1 is an Android One device. The unfortunate news, however, is that it will be launching with Android 8.1 Oreo and not Android 9 ‘Pie’.

Android 9 ‘Pie’, released to the public on August 6, 2018, is the latest Android OS update, and some of the latest smartphones like Honor 10 Lite, which is in the same price range as Nokia 7.1 have been rolled out with it.

7.1 is currently selling for $349.99 (about Shs1.4 million) on Amazon.

The reviewers who have used the Nokia 7.1 have praised it for its alluring Aluminum frame, considering its price point; having USB Type-C cable, which can recharge the phone up to 50% in 30 minutes.

7.1 contains a non-removable Li-Ion 3060 mAh battery which can last up to 408 h (3G) when on stand-by and it can last up to 19 h 30 min (3G) when in use.

The phone also has a great display that can compete well with phones within its price range.

Its 5.9-inch LCD screen (1,080 x 2,280 resolution) is bright and shows crisp text and images.

The Nokia 7.1’s uses the Snapdragon 636 processor and it supports AI and depth-based imaging. The latest processor, however, is Snapdragon 845.

Some of the reviewers like Lewis Hilsenteger of Unbox Therapy did not like the speakers of 7.1. He also seemed unimpressed by the automatic photographic filters.

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HMD Global partnered with Zeiss to give Nokia 7.1 Zeiss-tuned optics. The 7.1 has a dual camera on its rear, 12MP (f/1.8) and 5MP (f/2.4) and it uses bokeh to control the background and blur in your shot.

On the front, there’s an 8-megapixel lens with an f/2.0 aperture, also capable of a portrait-style blur effect.

According to a review published by Noted, the Nokia 7.1 camera performs better in daylight than the Huawei Mate20 Pro, which is 4 times more expensive.

On the storage side, Nokia 7.1, which weighs 160g, has a standard storage capacity of 64GB but you can expand it up to 400GB with a MicroSD card.

That MicroSD slot also doubles as a dual-SIM, giving you easy switching if you have multiple SIMs. Nokia 7.1 has a RAM of 3GB.

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