Nothing's first smartphone product was officially unveiled recently.Telephone (1)The author spent some time experiencing it to feel whether this phone is significantly different from other brands' designs, and whether it can, as Nothing said before, reverse the current "boring" mobile phone market situation.
At first glance, it looks like an iPhone, but it is one of the few Android phones that has a carefully designed appearance.
When you first see Phone (1), you will be attracted by its special back cover design.
Judging from the appearance, many people still think that Nothing Phone (1) is another phone that imitates the iPhone (intuitively, it actually looks quite like the iPhone 12...), but it is actually a solid Android phone.
In the past, Samsung used fashionable, imitation leather design elements on the back of the Galaxy S4 and Galaxy S5. Vivo applied leather elements to its mobile phones, and realme recently collaborated with Japanese design master Naoto Fukasawa to make the mobile phone more textured. In fact, not many companies are willing to invest in in-depth design of the appearance of their mobile phones.
Therefore, Nothing has integrated the transparent elements previously applied to the Ear (1) headphones into the Phone (1) it has created. Unlike Xiaomi’s transparent Explorer Edition, which only beautifies the back cover with transparency, Nothing has further integrated the intricate image of the New York subway, using white or black masks to cover the internal components that would originally be directly exposed, giving it a more unique transparent style.
On the other hand, the back cover also uses a Glyph light interface composed of 900 sets of LED lights to create different "interactive" effects. It is similar to the early days when many people would modify the flash on the back of their mobile phones and use third-party apps to make them show different brightness modes to judge the importance of incoming calls or text messages. At the same time, it can also be kept constantly bright as a fill light when taking photos or videos, and even as a light interaction mode in low-light environments.
In order to be environmentally friendly and reduce shipping costs, the Phone (1) packaging also adopts a flat design, and does not provide a connection cable and charger. At the same time, the body is also advertised as being made of highly recyclable materials.
Although the main camera has only two lenses, it is quite sufficient
According to Nothing founder Pei Yu, two lenses that are sufficient for use are always better than redundant lens designs.
從Phone (1)所配置鏡頭來看，視訊鏡頭採用Sony IMX471、1/3.1吋感光元件，搭配f/2.45光圈與1600萬畫素規格，而主相機模組則分別採用搭配Sony IMX766、1/1.56吋感光元件與f/1.88光圈設計，支援光學防震與電子防震的5000萬畫素廣角鏡頭，以及同樣採5000萬畫素設計，搭配三星ISOCELL JN1、1/2.76吋感光元件與f/2.2光圈，並且對應114°拍攝視角的超廣角鏡頭。
The lens does not use a telephoto lens with a 2x zoom design, but instead uses a wide-angle lens for digital zoom, and uses interpolation correction to maintain image clarity while retaining the original shooting resolution. Therefore, the actual design only requires two sets of lenses to streamline the internal space of the phone.
The shooting modes still offer Portrait mode, Expert mode, Slow Motion mode, Macro mode, and Time-lapse recording. Digital zoom is only available on the wide-angle lens, up to 20x digital zoom, while the ultra-wide-angle lens only supports fixed-focus shooting.
The default shooting mode uses 4 pixel binning to allow users to shoot at 1200 megapixels, but it can be manually adjusted to 5000 megapixels, but the amount of light entering may be reduced. In addition, when in a low-light environment, the system will automatically prompt you to enable the Night Shot mode option, which will extend the exposure time of the lens to obtain a brighter image.
Overall, the two lenses of the Phone (1) main camera do a pretty good job of capturing images, and even the imaging effect is good in backlight.
From left to right, the following are the ultra-wide-angle lens, wide-angle lens, and wide-angle lens 2x digital zoom shots:
Night mode is not enabled, Night mode is enabled:
Actual shooting:
Comparison with iPhone 13 Pro Max shooting:
It is inevitable to make a simple comparison between the shooting performance of Phone (1) and iPhone 13 Pro Max. It can be found that when previewing the shooting, Phone (1) can maintain a relatively correct white balance performance in the indoor environment in most cases, and it can also avoid overexposure when shooting. However, iPhone 13 Pro Max may misjudge the color tone in some cases, and it is also easy to overexpose when shooting.
For example, when shooting directly at the lights on the ceiling, the iPhone 13 Pro Max has obvious overexposure issues, while the Phone (1) can still maintain the clarity of the central fan mechanism.
The Glyph light interface does look eye-catching, but unfortunately it lacks some customization options.
As mentioned earlier, the Glyph light interface is composed of 900 sets of LED lights. The Phone (1) has 10 built-in lighting modes by default. Although different ringtones can be customized, the available Glyph light signals are relatively limited. It is even impossible to customize the light signal details, which is a bit regrettable.
On the other hand, if users want to fully illuminate the Glyph lights, or even keep them constantly lit, this currently seems to be achievable only by switching the fill light mode in the camera interface. This seems to greatly reduce Nothing's emphasis on creating a new interactive experience through the Glyph light interface. Perhaps different adjustments will be made in the future based on usage needs.
Reflections on Hardware Specifications
According to Pei Yu, the current processor computing performance of smartphones is often in excess. Therefore, the Snapdragon 1+ 778G processor, which was customized in cooperation with Qualcomm and has additional wireless charging and wireless power sharing functions, was chosen for Phone (5). The overall computing performance is quite sufficient. Although it is not as good as the currently mainstream Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 processor, it can meet most daily usage needs and even maintain a balance between performance and battery life.
However, many people may think that since they are going to launch a new phone, why not directly adopt a higher-specification processor? This obviously involves considerations such as the cost behind the phone's price.
For example, when a mobile phone uses a high-end flagship processor, it will inevitably streamline certain detailed costs in order to be sold at a more "affordable" price. This is obviously not the development direction that Nothing wants to choose. Otherwise, it will become a price-cutting competition. Therefore, it is better to use a processor design with sufficient performance in all aspects, paired with sufficient screen specifications and battery design, and improve the camera shooting function that everyone often uses, so as to increase the user experience of this phone. This may be the situation that Nothing hopes to present.
In terms of hardware specifications, the Phone (1) features a 6.55-inch OLED screen that supports 10 billion colors and HDR10+ display effects. It also supports a 120Hz refresh rate. The body is made of 100% recycled aluminum, and more than 50% of the plastic parts are made of bio-based and recyclable materials. It also has an IP53-rated splash-proof design. The communication function supports dual SIM card usage.
The battery is designed with a capacity of 4500mAh and supports 33W PD3.0 wired fast charging, 15W Qi wireless charging and 5W reverse charging. It can be fully charged to 30% in 50 minutes via wired mode. The battery can correspond to approximately 18 hours of use time, or maintain power usage for 2 days in standby mode.
The operating system uses the Nothing OS interface based on Android 12. The actual design is not much different from the native Android operating system. The main changes are the use of customized widgets, fonts, sound effects and wallpaper designs. In addition, a Glyph light interface is added to the settings, as well as an interactive top project corresponding to Tesla car models, and adjustments to the camera function interface. Perhaps in the future, with cooperation with more third-party software and hardware companies, more linked operation functions will be added to Nothing OS.
The Nothing OS interface automatically adjusts memory and other computing resources based on app usage frequency, allowing apps to launch faster and reduce battery consumption. The pre-installed NFT Gallery app also allows users to collect and display NFT content and track its prices. According to Nothing, it guarantees three years of Android system version upgrades and four years of bimonthly security updates.
summary
From my point of view, Phone (1) is not suitable for those who are obsessed with hardware specifications. On the contrary, it can attract users who pay more attention to the appearance of the phone or the effect of the camera. Coupled with its relatively affordable price, it will obviously attract a larger group of young users, as well as consumers who hope to attract attention among many unchanging mobile phones through the special Glyph light interface design.
Although the overall hardware specifications of the Phone (1) are not outstanding, it can indeed meet the needs of most markets. At the same time, it has a very eye-catching performance in terms of topicality and marketing effects. On the other hand, it also echoes Google's idea of improving the Android operating system and hopes that OEMs can focus more on hardware design.
Although the Phone (1) has a unique transparent back cover and a special Glyph light interface that attracts attention, and its camera design does have good shooting performance, it is obvious that it will attract many users. However, if the phone is not further improved in terms of fun (for example, by providing more ways to play with the Glyph light interface), it will obviously become "boring". Therefore, it depends on how Nothing can make this phone continue to be interesting.
目前Phone (1)分別推出黑色與白色兩款配色，分別推出搭載8GB記憶體與256GB儲存容量，以及配置12GB記憶體與256GB儲存容量兩種規格。建議售價部分，Phone (1)將以399英鎊價格於英國市場銷售，而在台灣市場則將以新台幣13900元起跳價格銷售，預計在7月22日起透過PChome、ESLITE誠品書店及GQ Shop (Taiwan)公開發售。
