Karbonn S1 Titanium: A Specifications Review

We knew a time would come when quad-core SoCs would go mainstream; thing is, we didn’t expect it to happen this quickly. Micromax was the first to raise the bar when it announced the Canvas HD, a Rs. 15,000, quad-core handset. Cashing in on this new trend, we now have Karbonn Mobiles showing off its upcoming S1 Titanium. Bookings for this new handset seem to be open, but there’s no official announcement, tentative launch date or even a hint at the price available right now. The pricing should be very competitive with the Micromax Canvas HD A116, so we’re looking at anything between Rs. 10,000 and Rs. 15,000. Let’s breakdown the specifications that we know off so far and see how it stacks up against the A116.  OS – Android 4.1 Jelly Bean It’s nice to see even smaller OEMs bundling Android Jelly Bean. This means you no longer have to compromise on the OS, even if you’re shopping in the budget section. Our biggest issue with all these manufacturers, however, is that OS updates almost never make it out, which means you’re sort of stuck with the OS that comes out-of –the-box. Unless the handset is also being sold by some other carrier in some other country under a different name, there are chances of getting custom ROMs, else, even that’s not possible. Cellular network – Dual-SIM GSM and 3G  For whatever reason, the S1 is only a dual-SIM GSM handset and will support 3G on one of the SIM slots. The A21 was a tri-band handset so we wonder what made Karbonn ditch a quad-band radio for a dual-band. Display – 4.5-inch qHD Karbonn hasn’t mentioned whether the display is IPS. We guess not, else it would have certainly not left it out. The size of the display is also a lot smaller. It’s a 4.5-inch qHD of 960 x 540 resolution, which puts the pixel count at 244.7ppi. This is again quite less compared to the Canvas HD’s 1280 x 720 resolution on a 5-inch screen, raising the pixel count to 281.2ppi. Click here for full story