Lenovo had a host of smartphones at its booth today, but the star of the show had to be the Vibe Z, the company's newest smartphone under its Vibe banner.
Following on from the unveiling of Vibe X at IFA 2013, the Vibe Z was confirmed late last week ahead of CES. The phone was at Lenovo's booth at CES Unveiled on Sunday night, so we had a chance to go hands on with the device.
The Vibe Z is basically a bigger version of the Vibe X and is based on Qualcomm's Snapdragon 800 CPU. The Vibe Z boasts 2 GB of RAM, a 5.5-inch display, and is Lenovo's first phone to feature LTE support. It also packs support for dual SIMs, so you can swap in and out between carriers to your heart's content. Measuring just 7.9 mm thick, the Vibe Z is very slim, and the device felt sleek to hold. It boasts the same laser-etched silver back that we saw with the lower-end Lenovo phones (the S650 and S930) but feels like more of a premium device. If we were to find issue with its form factor, it would be that the squared off edges make it a little awkward or uncomfortable to hold. Other phones in Lenovo's range don't have that issue because the edges are slightly curved.
The Vibe Z packs a full HD 1920 x 1080 IPS display (400.53 PPI) and runs on Qualcomm's quad-core Snapdragon 800 clocked to 2.2 GHz with 2 GB of RAM. There's also up to 16 GB of internal storage, a 13-megapixel rear-facing camera with f1.8 aperture and a 5-megapixel camera up front. The whole thing runs on Android 4.3 Jelly Bean.
Pricing is set at $549, but no word on international availability (Lenovo China is taking pre-orders soon). The lack of U.S. availability is a shame, since the Vibe Z is a gorgeous phone. Here's hoping Lenovo warms up to the idea of selling phones in North America ASAP.
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