ET Review: iBerry Auxus Nuclea N1

iBerry’s Nuclea N1 generated a lot of hype thanks to the specifications and features it offers. For starters, it has a 5-inch, full HD display (1920 x 1080 pixels) with Gorilla Glass 3 that makes it scratch resistant and sturdy. The viewing angles are great and the display is impressive — sharp, bright and natural colours. Though at 169 grams, we felt the device was a bit heavier than it should have been.

Hardware includes a 1.5Ghz Mediatek quad core processor with 1GB RAM and 4GB internal storage. Performance in gaming, HD video playback and day-to-day use was great — no sluggishness or frame drops. However, we did notice a delay between pressing the power button and the phone’s display waking up, which is odd. We hope iBerry fixes this with a software update.

Both the 13MP rear and 8MP front camera offer average performance. In daylight they give good results, but indoors a lot of noise is visible in the photographs. We also felt the default camera app was sluggish. Thankfully, video recording in full HD is good in quality.

iBerry includes four back panels in four colours in the box. You get the standard white and black as well as a hot pink and dark red panel — but all of them have a glossy finish. Both sides have a speaker grill design with a metal finish on the volume and power buttons that adds to the overall looks of the phone.

With a 2,800mAh battery, the phone lasted us easily over a day and a half. So is it better than the Canvas 4? In terms of display, audio output and battery life, yes. However, the Canvas 4 offers better build quality, better camera performance and various other software enhacements.