The device will be on show at this week’s IFA 2016 electronics show ahead of the first deliveries in September. Priced at 99 Euros, the budget device will be available across Europe starting in October. Along with their Helium phones, they are also planning to come out with the Archos 50 Saphir smartphone that comes with a few special features. French brand Archos is one of those and they will actually be announcing several new Helium Android phones. As for the rugged look and feel of this new device, Archos has achieved an IP68 rating for the 50 Saphir, which guarantees that the device will survive submersion up to 1 Meter for as long as 30-minutes, which is similar to the Galaxy S7 and Galaxy Note 7 lines of devices. It runs Android Android 6.0 Marshmallow operating system and is powered by a 1.5GHz quad-core MediaTek processor. There is also an 8MP camera on the front which is mainly for the selfie lovers as the name of the device itself suggests it.
Advertisement
The rear camera is a 16MP autofocus unit with LED flash. According to Archos, the size is large enough to get users through two days of usage, though the company did not say how it arrived at such a metric. The smartphone offers 2GB of RAM and 16GB internal storage which can be expanded up to 128GB via microSD cards. Connectivity options include 4G LTE, 3G, GPRS/ EDGE, GPS/ A-GPS, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n.
It is the thickness of the Archos 50 Saphir that might be disturbing because the phone has a 13.9mm thickness. The French brand will be releasing the 50 Saphir sometime in October, and while it will be readily available in Europe, getting a hold of it in the U.S. or further afield might prove a little tricky.
Advertisement
The specs of the upcoming smartphone from Archos doesn’t really impress as compared to most new devices.
