Vivo India finally cuts the ribbon to showcase its flagship smartphone of the year, the Vivo V7+. The brand is built on the philosophy of selfie camera and music. Vivo V7+ does deliver the same (at least on paper).
Just like the 99 out of 100 smartphones that are priced INR 10,000 or higher, the V7+ offers metal unibody design in black and Gold colour variants. The device looks premium due to the materials and colour scheme used in the device. According to the Vivo India, this device basically impresses those, who take a lot of photographs (selfie and normal photos) and for those audiophiles who enjoy music on the go.
However, at this price point, it is unfair not to offer dual camera setup (or high-quality monochrome setup with OIS and larger aperture). The device is equipped with 24 MP rear-facing camera (no OIS, no flash, no PDAF). According to the brand spokesperson, this is the best front-facing camera which offers features like software face beauty, which enhances the photos by making them look more vivid. This feature is now incorporated into live video calling as well. The selfie camera does support live bokeh effect (portrait mode) which automatically blurs the background and just focuses on the subject. Reconsidering the device price tag The 16 MP rear-facing camera with F/2.0 aperture and support for PDAF is a further disappointment, the camera comes with dual tone dual LED flash, but does offer either 4K video recording neither slow motion video recording.
According to Vivo India, the device is powered by the most powerful processor in the world. Don’t get confused, the device is not powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 836, instead, a new entry-level chipset Snapdragon 450 Octa-core solution (which is basically an underpowered Snapdragon 625 with same Adreno 506 GPU) paired with 4 GB LPDDR3 RAM and 64 GB onboard flash storage. The device does offer a dedicated micro SD card slot (up to 256 GB). FYI, a 256 GB SD card is priced around INR 10,000.
The only feature, that differentiates this device from other mid-tier smartphones is its display. The device features 5.99-inch (diagonally) IPL LCD HD display with 18:9 aspect ratio. Considering the screen size and the resolution, the device just offers less than 300 pixels per inch, which makes it slightly pixelated screen. The display is covered with a sheet of glass manufactured by Corning Gorilla (Glass 3) with 2.5D curved edges.
In terms of connectivity, the device offers dual nano SIM card slots with 4G LTE and VoLte support on both the slots. As they have music in their subtitle, the device offers a dedicated AK4376A Hifi audio chip, which is expected to improve the audio quality via speakers as well as headphone jack. Like Lenovo or Nokia phones, the devices don’t offer either Dolby digital sound or Dolby Atmos sound signature.
In terms of operating system, the device runs on a highly customised version of Android Nougat 7.0, unlike MiUi which offers intuitive features, Vivo V7+ comes with a bundle of 3rd party apps (some of them are non-removable). Even in terms of operating system, Vivo doesn’t have good track record, so don’t expect Android Oreo.
The only best thing about this device is, its “Full Vision display”, even for that we have LG A6 and Micromax infinity, which are priced less than INR 16,000. The only way to sell this device is marketing. The device will be available across the country via offline retail stores as well as the online E-commerce website. Pre-order starts from today and the devices will be available from 15th September.