It was pretty darn exciting when Oppo first revealed that it is coming with a smartphone with 10x “lossless” zoom at MWC 2019 which was later revealed to be called Reno. I have to admit, the excitement was a little doused by Huawei P30 Pro which came onto the market also touting 10x hybrid zoom. Nevertheless, as promised, Oppo Reno was unveiled on April 10.
Now, we all know it has 10x “lossless” zoom, but what did not expect was this novel feature: a front-facing camera that flips up on the top. Make no mistake, though. This isn’t quite the pop-up camera we have seen previously on the likes of Vivo Nex and V15Pro. It kind of pivot (at a “golden angle” of 11-degree) from the right of the device to reveal a single-lens camera to the left.
Oppo claims that it takes just 0.8 second for the camera to pop up. It is a novel approach, but as with such design, the phone thickness is inadvertently bumped up and in the case of Oppo Reno 10x Zoom Edition, it is a solid 9.3 mm thick. There are actually two versions of the Reno, btw. One standard Reno and other is the obvious star, the Reno 10x Zoom Edition.
With the pivoting camera, it allows Oppo to show off the device’s 6.6-inch FHD+ (1,080 x 2,340 pixels) FHD+ AMOLED display in its full notch-less glory – protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 6. Like so many new China’s handsets of today, the expansive, edge-to-edge display boasts Germany’s TÜV Rheinland Low Light Eye Care Certification.
As expected, it is powered by the latest chip from Qualcomm, Snapdragon 855 Mobile Platform, backed by Adreno 640 GPU, 6 or 8 GB LPDDR4x 2133 MHz dual channel RAM and 128 or 256 GB UFS 2.1 storage. The storage is expandable with microSD card, though it is not known the maximum supported capacity. The star feature here is, obviously, the triple-camera setup:
48 MP main camera
Sony IMX586 1/2.0-inch sensor
f1.7 aperture
6P lens
Autofocus
13 MP “periscope” telephone camera
f3.0 aperture
Anti-shake (stabilized) prism
8 MP super wide-angle camera
120-degree, f2.2 aperture
The triple-camera further boasts 10x hybrid optical zoom, backed by a suited of imaging technologies including dual Optical Image Stabilization (OIS), laser focus, PDAF, contrast focus, and dual LED flash. As for the front, it gets a 16 MP item, paired to a f2.0 aperture, 79.3-degree wide-angle lens, and a soft illumination.
Strangely, Oppo decided to embed the rear LED flight into the back of the pivoting selfie camera unit. This means, if you need flash, the pivoting camera unit will be activated even you are not using the selfie camera. Now, that’s a totally bizarre move. A less weirder but still odd design feature is the third microphone. It is located right under the triple-camera unit.
The spec sheet does not list any IP rating and so, I am going assume it is not dust and waterproof. Reno 10x Zoom Edition comes outfitted with a 4,065 mAh battery with support for VOOC Fast Charge 3.0 and it comes standard with an under display fingerprint sensor.
The rest of the specs are pretty rudimentary for today’s flagship. You know. The garden variety of Bluetooth 5.0, NFC, and whatnot, with the exception of the WiFi which has a tri-band configuration supporting 2.4G, 5.1G as well as 5.8G, and the presence of dual frequency GPS. And no, it has no headphone jack. The lesser standard Reno does have a 3.5 mm audio headphone jack, though.
Oppo is taking pre-order for both the Oppo Reno 10x Zoom Edition and the standard Oppo Reno now in China. Prices start at 3,999 yuan and 2,999 yuan (around US$595 and US$447) for the Reno 10x Zoom Edition and Reno, respectively. Official availability in China is set on April 19, 2019.
Oppo also announced, via Weibo, that it will be picking 200 people to test (or buy?) out the 5G version of the Oppo Reno 10x Zoom Edition in May (in China, of course).
All images courtesy of Oppo China.