Orange Santa Clara Smartphone with Intel Hands On

[MWC 2012] After the Intel press conference last night we got a few demos of the new Intel Medfield devices including the newly announced Orange Smartphone codenamed Santa Clara. Intel touts its Medfield platform to provide blazing speed and high fluidity to the user interface, internet browsing, HD video playback and 3D gaming.

To prove his point, Paul Otellini, CEO, Intel, showed off a few benchmark charts (picture in the full article) and the demos were dedicated to these key features. We got our own benchmarks that we tried at CES back in January, you can see them here.

The specifications are on par with the latest smartphones, the screen resolution (1024x 600) and size (4-inch) is not even the largest available right now (4+ inch and 1280×420). Yves Maitre, SVP, Orange, could not give us a price point, however he stated that the phone will be a “mass market’ device. Knowing that the display is one of the most expensive components, we suppose that could be the reason why the Santa Clara does not get the high end screen.

I was not utterly impressed with the self-claimed super fast browsing speed, I have seen this kind of fluidity in other devices before, again we could refer to the benchmarks, however no benchmark specifically measure that, except for the Vellamo by Qualcomm that no one uses because it has not been approved by the community to be unbiased.

Two features caught my attention: the ability to fast forward or fast rewind in real time while playing a HD video and the 360 degree video. This is not necessarily directly related to the power of the CPU or GPU, we suppose that  this could be provided by a proprietary video encoding, we need to check with the product manager at Intel.

It look likes all the mobile manufacturers have decided to push the envelope on the camera side this year, and Intel Medfield has an 8 MP camera that offers a cool burst mode feature (see the demo in the video).

The 3D car game available on the demo unit was very fluid and provided a good 3D rendering, operating the car tilting the device was easy and accurate.

I like the design which is minimalistic and offers a soft paint on the body, a texture that feels good in the hands. The rectangular shape provides a good visual break from the overused curvy bodies that are flooding the Smartphone market right now.

Specifications: 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor Z2460, 4.03″ (1024 x 600) display (with Gorilla Glass), 1GB of RAM, 16GB internal storage, 8-megapixel rear camera (1080p HD video capable), 1.3-megapixel front facing camera, HSPA+ 21Mbps, 1,460mAh battery, WiFi, Bluetooth, and GPS.

Eliane Fiolet
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: Intel, medfield, MWC 2012, orange