“Simple, peaceful, beautiful,” this apparently, is what Asus’s Zenfone 5 is designed to be. But can a phone really be peaceful? Can the constant notifications, buzzing and red light really allow for any sort of calm? Or is it just a marketing ploy set to fail?
The Zenfone 5 is an Android device, but Asus has plastered its own user interface (UI) on top, which includes a weather and time and date widget on the main screen. It is far less cluttered than the standard Android UI with quick access to phone, messaging, browsing and camera. The colour scheme is soft and all Zen-like with serene greens and cooling blues. The default wallpaper is of a snowy mountain range – light and breezy and I guess, peaceful.
But that’s where the Zen-ness stops.
It is a dual-Sim phone, but good luck trying to get even one inside. The phone feels like it is a unibody, only it isn’t. The back comes off, but only after a long struggle and a broken nail.
The back, home screen and multitasking buttons are on the lower bezel rather than the screen, as is the case with most Android phones. The only issue is that there is no backlight, so accessing them in the dark is frustrating. The lower bezel has a ridged ring pattern, which proved to be harsh enough to file my nails and exfoliate the skin off my thumb.
The matte plastic back feels nice to the touch but is prone to scratching, especially the white version. It provided a nice grip though.
The 5.0 inch smartphone has a 720p display which is OK, nothing spectuacluar. Full HD movies were a little grainy on the display. The Zenfone 5 has an 8MP rear camera with 1080p video recording capability and a 2MP front-facing camera with 720p video recording. Pictures and videos were pretty average.
It weighs 145g and runs the Android Jelly Bean, but upgradeable to KitKat.
So is it the simple, peaceful, beautiful phone that Asus claims it is? Not really. It is simple enough, beautiful in parts and like all other phones, it is peaceful only when it is switched off.
Q&A
Triska Hamid reveals more about the Asus Zenfone 5:
Asus makes phones?
Yes. The Taiwanese company has been making phones for a while now. It is better known for its laptops and tablets, but it has taken the Intel chips and processors it is so familiar with when making laptops and inserted them into a mobile phone. The result is decent, nothing incredible.
Is this the only phone Asus has?
No, there is the Zenfone 4 and Zenfone 6 which is the premium device, priced at Dh1,299. The Zenfone 5 is available in black, white, red, gold and purple and priced at Dh899.
Why is it so cheap compared to the other premium brands?
It is meant to be an affordable smartphone. It is still pricier than Obi phones or some of the Nokias, but it is in line with the pricing of Lenovo and Huawei’s handsets. The aim is to provide that high-end experience and feel for a mid-range price.
Anything else?
The screen can be used while wearing gloves. There are also two apps – what’s next and do it later, which aims to declutter the barrage of information. What’s next pushes the most important and relevant appointments, messages and calls to the user onto the home screen. Do it later allows the user to focus on the task at hand and pushes a reminder if a notification pops up, so if you’re in the middle of writing an email and receive a phone call, a single tap and the phone automatically creates a reminder to call that person back.
thamid@thenational.ae
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MATCH INFO
Uefa Champions League last 16, second leg
Liverpool (0) v Atletico Madrid (1)
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Kick-off: Thursday, March 12, midnight
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Engine: Electric single motor (96kW), twin motor (106kW) and twin motor performance (106kW)
Power: 333hp, 449hp, 680hp
Torque: 480Nm, 670Nm, 870Nm
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Price: Exact regional pricing TBA
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LAST-16 EUROPA LEAGUE FIXTURES
Wednesday (Kick-offs UAE)
FC Copenhagen (0) v Istanbul Basaksehir (1) 8.55pm
Shakhtar Donetsk (2) v Wolfsburg (1) 8.55pm
Inter Milan v Getafe (one leg only) 11pm
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Sevilla v Roma (one leg only) 8.55pm
FC Basel (3) v Eintracht Frankfurt (0) 11pm
Wolves (1) Olympiakos (1) 11pm
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- Premier League-standard football pitch
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- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
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- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Kumulus Water
Started: 2021
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
Based: Tunisia
Sector: Water technology
Number of staff: 22
Investment raised: $4 million
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Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
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The rules on fostering in the UAE
A foster couple or family must:
- be Muslim, Emirati and be residing in the UAE
- not be younger than 25 years old
- not have been convicted of offences or crimes involving moral turpitude
- be free of infectious diseases or psychological and mental disorders
- have the ability to support its members and the foster child financially
- undertake to treat and raise the child in a proper manner and take care of his or her health and well-being
- A single, divorced or widowed Muslim Emirati female, residing in the UAE may apply to foster a child if she is at least 30 years old and able to support the child financially
ESSENTIALS
The flights
Fly Etihad or Emirates from the UAE to Moscow from 2,763 return per person return including taxes.
Where to stay
Trips on the Golden Eagle Trans-Siberian cost from US$16,995 (Dh62,414) per person, based on two sharing.
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Director: S Sashikanth
Cast: Nayanthara, Siddharth, Meera Jasmine, R Madhavan
Star rating: 2/5
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
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Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
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