Sharp Officially Enters Philippine Smartphone Market with the SH530U

Popular Japanese consumer brand Sharp has officially entered the robust Philippine smartphone market with the official unveiling of the SH530U.

The Sharp SH530U has a 5-inch WVGA display, which makes this model the company’s entry into the increasingly popular “phablet” segment of the market. The 480 x 800 screen has a pixel density of 187ppi. works smoothly thanks to the dual core Mediatek MT6577 processor that powers it. The phone has a 512MB RAM and has a PowerVR SXG531T GPU that makes video playback and gaming with high resolution graphics lag-free. Speaking of videos, the SH530U has a 20GB HD, which provides ample room for different kinds of media. On the camera front, the phone as a 5MP camera with autofocus, face detection and touch focus.

The Sharp SH530U sports Sharp’s own user interface, the Feel UX. The interface, which was designed by renowned design firm Frog, is very simplified in that it removes the usual Android Home Launcher in favor of a new three-line home screen. The screen has three tabs — designated for the Apps, Widgets, and Shortcuts. All of the apps are already on the screen and can be rearranged and grouped together with just a simple swipe of two fingers. It’s an intuitive interface that focuses on the user experience on screen. The lock screen has also been enabled so that there is one-touch access to new messages, the camera, or for making a phone call, which are the most common uses for a smartphone. Sharp has also decided to eliminate any bloatware.

There are no additional proprietary apps that come with Feel UX. One distinctive feature of the Feel UX interface is a button in the display settings that would give the user the ability to turn off Feel UX and revert to the stock Android interface. This is a feature that is unique to all Android smartphones. Previously, a user will have to either buy a phone that only offers a stock android OS or have their phones rooted to revert to stock Android – a very technical process that would not only void the phone’s warranty but also likely brick the phone.

According to officials from Sharp, the company is committed to its presence in the Philippines. It will initially release four different models between October and the end of 2012. But the officials teased that 2013 is going to be an “exciting year” for smartphone fans as the company will announce new top of the line phone models.

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