Member • Feb 6, 2015
Aquarius E4.5: The First Ubuntu Smartphone Announced!
Going straight to the Ubuntu features, one USP for the phone will be Scopes. Scopes are reinvention of mobile interface. They are like a full-screen card which will show details about the relative services on phones or the apps that you are using. For instance, a Social Scope will show all the apps that will come pre-installed with the OS like Facebook and Twitter and the one the user has manually installed, for example the Telegram app. The user can go in-depth into each app via Scopes. Also, the user can set any Scope as the default screen which will show up when the user uses the phone. By using Scopes, Canonical wishes to attract developers because it said that developing Scopes by using its toolkit will be easier than developing the apps.
Canonical has assured that the phone will support the all traditional apps like Facebook, Twitter, eBay, Yelp, Amazon etc. The only negative here is that right now there is no support for the market dominant WhatsApp. There have been no promises by Canonical about its availability and right now will try to replenish the gap by the Telegram app. The phone will run on Ubuntu Touch and Ubuntu 15.04. Canonical are trying to implement the same OS both across PCs and phones as they said that in the imminent future, there might come a time when both the desktop app and the phone app will run on same code.
Now for the specs of the phone. The phone has a 4.5 inch wide IPS-LCD screen with a resolution of 960x540 pixels. It will work on 1.3 GHz Quad Core ARM Cortex-A7 processor. The phone will have 1 GB RAM and 8 GB of flash storage which can be expanded using the available microSD card slot. It will have an 8 MP rear camera with flash and autofocus and a 5 MP front camera. It will have the ability to record full HD videos. The phone will be dual sim both of which will be unlocked allowing the users to connect to their current networks easily. The only colour it is available in right now is black.
In a market inundated with smartphones belonging to big players like Android and Apple, Aquarius E4.5 has to do something different to get noticed. Canonical has naturally realized this and they will sell the phone via a website called #-Link-Snipped-# in multiple flash sales in upcoming months. With only a limited number of sales at a time, it is obvious that Canonical is trying to go for the word-of-mouth publicity. Right now, the phones will go on sales just in parts of Europe at the price of â¬169.90. It is possible that the price will vary with time. For more updates about the release, you can follow Ubuntuâs #-Link-Snipped-#page.
Source: #-Link-Snipped-#| Via: First Ubuntu smartphone, Aquaris E4.5, launches into cluttered mobile market | ZDNET