We unbox Starmobile’s Up Snap!

Last year we got to spend time with Starmobile’s Up Snap, the first ever locally-branded smartphone to use UltraPixel technology in its camera. We finally got our hands-on a review unit of the device after getting that first look many moons ago and today we’ll be unboxing the device and giving you a second impressions of sorts for the device. But first, let’s take a look at the specs:

Starmobile Up Snap specs

• 1.2GHz quad-core Broadcomm BCM23550M processor
• VideoCore IV GPU
• 1GB of RAM
• 5-inch FWVGA IPS display with scratch resistant glass, 480 x 854 resolution
• 8GB of storage, expandable via microSD up to 32GB
• 8-megapixel rear camera with Ultrapixel tech, f2.0 aperture
• 5-megapixel front camera with AF
• Dual SIM
• 3G, HSPA+
• WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, A-GPS, USB OTG
• Android 4.4 KitKat
• 2900mAh battery
• 147 x 73 x 9.5mm

Packaging and Contents:

It’s always a pleasure to unbox Starmobile’s products, simply because the company doesn’t skimp on marketing and packaging. The Up Snap is no exception, and comes in a flat, rectangular light orange box that’s reminiscent of international brands.

Inside is the phone as well as the charger, flat USB cable, headphones and two freebies: a transparent plastic case as well as a micro mesh cloth to wipe the front of the device when it gets smudged.

Initial Impressions: really good camera, but hardware is a bit of a letdown

We’re not going to go in-depth about the externals of the device as we already covered that during our extended hands-on last year. The phone does feel really good in the hands and has excellent build quality, which is pretty much par for the course for Starmobile.

We had an opportunity to test out the Up Snap’s camera prowess during an outing in Manila where Starmobile handed us the Up Snap and we went wild taking photos.

There’s a lot of good things to be said about the Up Snap’s camera – the amount of Bokeh we were able to get in some of the photos as well as the overall detail captured by the camera was pretty impressive. While the camera’s performance looks pretty solid, we haven’t throughly tested the phone enough in low-light to be sold on the whole UltraPixel technology.

Probably the biggest Achilles heel of the Up Snap is the hardware behind the camera. We’re not overly fond of Broadcom’s SoCs, and the one in the Up Snap struggles to find its footing against MediaTek’s venerable MT6582 budget offering if the benchmarks are anything to go by.

That’s it for this unboxing, watch out for the review of the Up Snap in the days ahead.