Tuesday 8 January 2013

Slimmest Smartphones on the Market

Slimmest Smartphones on the Market

Being slim has been a goal for millions of people and a trend followed by mobile device manufacturers who are always trying to miniaturize and reduce the bulk of their products. There is good reason to want to do so. The smaller the device, the lower the power usage, smaller the battery and the thinner/lighter the device will be. In a mobile environment, portability is a crucial design factors so the lighter and thinner the item, the more portable it can be.

Gorilla protection

The iPhone 5 came out with much acclaim with users wowed by the slim profile and probably even more by the amazing display. One of the reasons this device is so thin is that it uses the latest gorilla glass 3 on the front which is extremely tough stuff and allows the device to be thinner while still retaining strength and resisting cracking. Since the iPhone came out, a number of other manufacturers (also all using this new gorilla glass) have brought out some very sleek designs indeed. One or two have been at the expense of other dimensions – the new HTC has a 5” screen so the phone itself very thin but also is pretty wide x long. The downside to a really thin phone is mainly strength so those prone to sitting on their phone by accident might look for a more robust design profile.

The coin drops and for Apple

Apple made a big deal about them having the ”world’s thinnest phone” (their words at the launch – which turned out to be a bit embarrassing for them when it was shown that there were in fact other contenders who had already released thinner phones – oops!

Here are the latest phones that fit the bill for the worlds slimmest: Note that the manufacturers’ measurements are usually taken at the thinnest point.

ZTE NUBIA Z5          7.6 mm

APPLE iPhone 5       7.6 mm

DROID RAZR            7.1 mm

VIXO X1 (OPPO)     6.65 mm

OPPO FINDER          6.2 mm

This trend continues as Chinese phone makers beat their Apple competition hands down when it comes to the slimmest phone. No doubt the number requiring data recovery services will also go up as more phones get damaged. A lot of smartphones are now relatively large and despite new Gorilla glass technology protecting many models, breakages are easier than ever. This is not such a problem for data on SD cards but internal data is hard to recover. So if you go with a slim model that may be more fragile, you might want to back up your contacts and images etc. more frequently. Losing your saved games alone might break your heart!

Conclusion

At the end of the day it is personal preference but before you rush out and buy the slimmest phone on the market simply because for a day you will look cool with it, think back about how you treat your phone. For anyone who uses their back pocket regularly to keep their phone in, a slim phone might not be a great idea – might look less obtrusive but much more likely to break. One day they will probably be completely flexible and only a millimeter thick so it won’t matter – until then be careful out there!

Author Bio - This post is contributed by Raymond Ray. He is a data recovery engineer with an extensive background in researching about technology and gadgets. He enjoys sharing his tips and insights about technology and gadgets on various blogs.