Asus Zenfone 2 Laser 6 – Sharp shooter phablet – Review
What I like
- The Zenfone 2 Laser 6 has got a sharp camera module. It’s dual SIM slots and dedicated microSD card are boon in this segment which has mostly seen hybrid SIM trays.
What I didn’t like
- The usual design and there is nothing to differentiate it from the other Zenfone models, not even the name.
Asus Zenfone 2 Laser 6! Yes, it’s yet another Zenfone 2. I tried hard to keep up with all the Zenfone 2 models, but I gave up. It’s really confusing. Here is a business idea for Asus. Make an app where the user input is their requirement and the output is the suggestion. Well, Asus has it all covered. They now have a Zenfone to cover each and every market segment. The Zenfone 2 Laser 6 is an extension of the Laser line up and the Laser 6 will cover the phablet segment. There is a 5 inch, 5.5 inch and now a 6 inch Zenfone Laser. The other Laser mobile was the Zenfone Selfie, which had a laser autofocus mechanism on the front as well. Now if you are still with me, lets dive in and check if the Zenfone Laser 6 is worth buying.
Design
The Zenfone 2 Laser 6 is a 6 inch phablet. It has the same design language of the other Zenfones. The curved back, metal brush finish removable back, volume buttons at the back and power button on top, we have seen it all in the other Zenfones. So nothing new here, except for the size. Its a huge phone and it barely fits in a hand. It is not slippery, yet it is very difficult to manage the Zenfone 2 Laser 6 in one hand. Under the back panel we have the 3000 mAh removable battery, dual SIM slots and a microSD card slot. The front has the large 6 inch display with thin bezels and a deep chin. The chin holds the off-screen navigation keys and they are not back-lit. The front facing camera is 5 MP and the rear facing camera is the 13 MP laser assisted camera with dual tone LED flash.
Below the lens is the volume buttons. I would have loved to see the power button also integrated with the volume buttons at the back, but in the Zenfone 2 Laser 6, the power button is placed at the top, making it very inconvenient to reach. The placement of volume buttons at the back is something you will get used to and once you are used to it, you would want it that way in all the mobiles. However that is not the story with the power button. The power button has feeble tactile response and you need a large hand to handle it with ease. Anyway the Zenfone 2 Laser 6 has tap to wake and tap to sleep function and make the power button redundant most of the time. The curved back is convenient to hold but when the device is operated while placed on a flat surface, it shakes and wobbles. Yet, the build quality and the design make me conclude that it is a sturdy device, with a stylish finish to it.
Display
The Zenfone 2 Laser 6 has a 6 inch IPD LCD display. It supports a resolution of 1920 x 1080. The screen produces decent black levels and brightness levels. Outdoor legibility was good, but under direct sunlight, the readability of the device is just average. Under normal conditions, the color reproduction is vibrant and the display has decent viewing angles. It is not among the list of brilliant displays we have seen this year, but it definitely a better display among the devices in this segment.
Hardware
The Zenfone 2 Laser 6 is powered by a octacore Qualcomm MSM8939 Snapdragon 615 processor with Adreno 405 GPU. It has 32 GB internal memory and has 3 GB RAM. The memory is also expandable using microSD cards by upto 128 GB. The mobile handles resource heavy applications with ease. There were a few hiccups and frame drops while playing some graphic intensive games, but it did not hamper the gaming experience. The mobile did not heat excessively. On continuous gaming for over 30 minutes, the temperature went upto 35 degree Celsius. The quality of graphics rendered is good. It runs on Android 5.0 with Zen UI on top. It handles the UI with ease and there is no lag.
Asus Zenfone 2 Laser 6 ZE601KL Z011D
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CPU:
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RAM:
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Storage:
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Display:
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Camera:
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OS:
Specs
General
| Status | Available |
Display
| Display Type <strong>Display Technology => </strong> A number of display technologies and types used in mobile phones => TFT (Thin Film Transistor), IPS (In-Place Switching), OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode), AMOLED (Active-Matrix Organic Light-Emitting Diode), Super AMOLED (an even advanced version of AMOLED), Resistive Touchscreen (Resistive touchscreens contain two layer of conductive material with a very small gap between them which acts as a resistance), Capacitive Touchsceen (Capacitive touchscreen technology consists of a layer of glass coated with a transparent conductor) | IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen |
| Size | 6.0 inches |
| Resolution | 1080 x 1920 pixels |
| Pixel Density <strong>Pixel Density (PPI)</strong> is refers to the concentration of pixels on a particular display, measured in pixels per inch (ppi). Pixel density is calculated by dividing the diagonal pixel resolution of a display by its diagonal size, higher pixel density better display quality. | ~367 ppi |
| Display Protection <strong>Display Protection => </strong> Gorilla Glass is a special alkali-aluminosilicate glass shield with exceptional damage resistance that helps protect mobile displays from scratches, drops, and bumps of everyday use, It is always better to go for a smartphone with Gorilla Glass for that added protection and peace of mind. | Corning Gorilla Glass 4 |
Hardware
| Chipset <strong>Chipset</strong> is a group of integrated circuits designed to perform one or a more dedicated functions, often with real time computing constraints, Popular smartphones are equipped with more advanced embedded chipsets that can do many different tasks depending on their programming. | Qualcomm MSM8939v2 Snapdragon 616 |
| CPU <strong>CPU</strong> (Central Processing Unit) mostly known as processors, CPU processes instructions in order to carry out certain functions that make your device operate properly. Processors are often described as the brain of computers, smartphones and tablets, Smartphones and tablets rely on processors to carry out their every task, Processors are an incredibly important factor in selecting any type of computing device, including your smartphone. | Quad-core 1.7 GHz Cortex-A53 & quad-core 1.2 GHz Cortex-A53 |
| GPU <strong>GPU</strong> (Graphics Processing Unit) is a single-chip processor designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory to accelerate the creation of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display, This includes things such as lighting effects, object transformations, and 3D motion. | Adreno 405 |
| RAM (Memory) <strong>RAM</strong> (Random Access Memory) is a type of computer memory that can be accessed randomly, any byte of memory can be accessed without touching the preceding bytes that allows information to be stored and accessed quickly from random locations. RAM is the most common type of memory found in computer systems, smartphones, tablets and other electronic devices. | 3 GB |
| Internal Storage <strong>Internal Storage</strong> is a data storage space (flash memory) mostly used in smartphones, tablets and other electronic devices where operating system, apps, music, photos, videos, files and other user data Is stored. | 32 GB |
| Card Slot <strong>Memory Card Slot</strong> is a special slot for inserting a memory card. Memory cards allow you to expand the phone's built-in memory, A memory card (sometimes called a flash memory card or a storage card) is a small storage medium used to store data such as text, pictures, audio, and video, for use on small, portable or remote computing devices such as mobile phones, mp3 players, digital cameras. | Yes, Upto 128 GB |
Battery
| Battery Type <strong>Battery Type => </strong> Cell phones run on various kinds of batteries depending on the manufacturer, phone size or shape and features. There are basically four types of cell phone batteries => Lithium Polymer, Lithium Ion, Nickel Metal Hydride and Nickel Cadmium. | Li-Ion (Lithium Ion) |
| Capacity <strong>Battery Capacity</strong> is a measure (typically in Amp-hr) of the charge stored by the battery, and is determined by the mass of active material contained in the battery. The battery capacity represents the maximum amount of energy that can be extracted from the battery under certain conditions. | 3000 mAh |
| Fast Charging | No |
Camera
| Primary <strong>Camera</strong> is able to capture photographs and usually videos, The most important characteristics of a camera are the resolution (measured in megapixels), lens focus type (fixed or automatic), higher megapixel cameras are known to capture higher quality photos, but not always a good measurement of the photos quality. | 13 MP |
| Camera Features | Laser autofocus, |
| Secondary | 5 MP |
| Video | 1080p@30fps, 720p@60fps |
| Flash <strong>Flash Light => </strong> There is commonly two types of flash lights are used in camera mobile phones, LED Flash (LED flash offers lower power consumption with drive circuitry that takes up very little room, LEDs can be strobed faster than any other light source), Xenon Flash (xenon flash produces an extremely intense full-spectrum white light for a very short duration) | dual-LED (dual tone) flash |
Design
| Type <strong>Design Type</strong> called form factor refers to a mobile phone's size, shape, and style as well as the layout and position of major components of phone. There are three major form factors seen in mobile phones => bar phones, folding phones and sliding phones. | Bar |
| Dimensions | 164.6 x 84 x 10.6 mm |
| Weight | 190 g |
| Protection | Corning Gorilla Glass 4 |
Network
| SIM <strong>SIM</strong> (Subscriber Identity Module) is a small card that contains mobile network subscriber's account information. This allows the phone using the card to attach to a mobile network. The SIM card is most commonly associated with GSM and UMTS mobile networks. Moving a SIM card from one phone to another allows a subscriber to switch mobile phones without having to contact their mobile network carrier. SIM cards can also be used by a phone to store limited amounts of data, such as phone numbers and text messages. | Micro SIM |
| Dual SIM | Dual SIM |
Software
| Operating System <strong>OS => </strong> Every computer system run on a base software called Operating System (OS). Operating System controls all basic operations of the computer (such as smartphone, PDAs, tablet computers and other handheld devices). The Operating System allows the user to install and run third party applications (apps), apps are used to add new functionality to the device. | Android OS, v5.0 |
| User Interface <strong>UI</strong> or user interface of a device is the look and feel of the on-screen menu system. How it works, its color scheme, how it responds to button presses, all of these things are part of the user interface. | Zen UI |
Connectivity
| Bluetooth <strong>Bluetooth</strong> is a wireless communications technology for exchanging data between mobile phones, headsets, computers and other network devices over short distances without wires, Bluetooth technology was primarily designed to support simple wireless networking of personal consumer devices. | v4.1, A2DP, EDR |
| Infrared <strong>Infrared</strong> connectivity is an old wireless technology used to connect two electronic devices. It uses a beam of infrared light to transmit information and so requires direct line of sight and operates only at close range. | |
| Wi-fi <strong>Wi-Fi</strong> is a popular wireless networking technology using radio waves to provide high-speed network connections that allows devices to communicate without cords or cables, Wi-Fi is increasingly becoming the preferred mode of internet connectivity all over the world. | Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, Wi-Fi Direct |
| USB | microUSB v2.0 |
| GPS <strong>GPS</strong> The Global Positioning System is a satellite-based radio navigation system, GPS permits users to determine their position, velocity and the time 24 hours a day, in all weather, anywhere in the world, In order to locate your position, your device or GPS receiver must have a clear view of the sky. | Yes, with A-GPS, GLONASS, BDS |
| NFC <strong>NFC</strong> (Near field communication) is a set of standards for smartphones and similar devices to establish peer-to-peer radio communications with each other by touching them together or bringing them into proximity, usually no more than a few inches. |
Benchmarks
Reviews
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super phone
asus good product but battery discharge is very fast…camera also average….
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Zenfone Laser Z011D
The Zenfone seems to do as I want in terms of the necessary daily functions. It also has a reasonable size screen with plenty of features that I really like to use. The actual colours are very radiant and ring the pictures to life. Overall I do recommend this phone if your looking for a reasonable phone to use which is very used friendly. I rate this phone an 9/10 . I'm not so sure about the accessories for the ,engine Laser but I'm hoping that there will be some great covers to protect from the daily use and away from the dust and dirt. Thank-you Asus .
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ASUS Zenfone
Good phone from ASUS but while calling u can not see & display goes black a draw back.The camera is ok but with tint and requires much clarity. costwise a very good phone.call listening quality low .Though 6 inch light in weight.Overall a very good phone from ASUS compared to other costly phone.Let's see how it works as purchased recently.
The call quality was clear and the signal reception was consistent. However, the rear facing speakers are weak. It lacks audio quality and finesse when it come to sound range. The mobile does not include headphones in the package. I tried it with various headphones and earphones and found out that the audio performance was good.
Camera
Asus Zenfone 2 Laser 6 has 13 MP sensors at back and 5 MP on the front. The rear camera lenses are 5 element lens and has f/2.0 aperture. It has dual tone LED flash and laser assisted focus system. The laser assisted focusing is precise and has grown to become more accurate than its predecessors. The quality of images produced have also improved. It performs well in low light and day light conditions. The Zen camera UI is simple and powerful. In the auto mode, the UI controls are simple. Though there are different preset modes, the HDR and Low light mode are automatically suggested based on the light conditions. The gear button reveals the menu for both camera and video. In the ZenFone the manual mode can control the White balance, Exposure compensation, ISO, shutter speed and focus. As for the image quality, under normal or well light conditions the images seems to be good. Under low light conditions, the Zenfone performs well. It produces good details and usable images even under extremely low light conditions. In total, the Zenfone 2 Laser 6 has a fast and accurate camera that impresses.
Software
The Asus Zenfone 2 Laser 6 runs on Android 5.0 out of the box with the Zen UI on the top. The Zen UI has a long list of pre-installed applications. Most of these apps have better alternatives in the Google Play store and these apps cannot be uninstalled. So I would call them bloatware sitting on the mobile and eating up the space. I like the Zen Mini movies and Super Note apps out of all these bloat wares. Asus has also tried to reinvent the Notifications UI. But this has already been done by the Native android lollipop and I don’t see a pressing need to redesign it. When the Native android experience is really good these days, I don’t see a need to force fit a skin on top of it. Do you need an app and an icon for a function like torch-light, or permission manager or auto start manager? Asus must really have gone the Motorola way, which gives “Close to pure android” experience with a few custom apps preinstalled. Zen UI has very little customization possibilities. But overall the UI is fast and snappy. It does not lag and definitely smoother than the likes of Touch Wiz or SenseUI. In total, the Zen UI is a mixed bag.
Battery
Like most of the mid and top end Zenfones, the Asus Zenfone 2 Laser 6 is also powered by a 3000 mAh battery. The battery usage is much better optimized when compared to ZenFone 2. It does not have the turbo charging feature like the ZenFone 2. It takes well over 2:15 hours to charge from 0 to 100%. My average usage would mean a few minutes on call everyday, constantly checking social media updates, 4G always on, connected to WiFi 10 hours a day, watching video clips and listening to music for a few hours. With my average usage, the mobile lasted for 28 hours on a single charge.
Verdict
The Asus Zenfone 2 Laser 6 is a mix and match between the Zenfone 2 and the Zenfone Selfie. Zenfone Laser has been the best mobile that I recommend to anyone looking for a mobile under 15k. The Asus Zenfone 2 Laser 6 has all the features of a Zenfone Laser combined with the power packed specs of the Zenfone Selfie. If you are looking for a phablet and comfortable with using a 6 inch device, then you must consider the Asus Zenfone 2 Laser 6. It has a great camera along with a tried and tested formula of design and specifications. If you have small fingers, go for the 5 inch of 5.5 inch Zenfone Laser. If you want a great battery life in a 6 inch phablet, check out the Oppo R7 plus.
