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GFive A7 has all the complication of a rotating camera and non of the benefits!

Ying HuaMarch 31, 2014

There are times when we look at a new product, stop everything we are doing and ask ourselves “Why?”. Looking at recent photos of the new GFive A7 with motorised rotating camera is one of those times.

I am completely sold on the idea of a rotating camera on an Android smartphone. I have had tons of fun with the Oppo N1 and imagine the Gionee Elife E7 mini will be equally as good, but something was lost in translation when GFive decided to develop their own smartphone with rotating camera.

The Oppo N1 rotating camera

You see, with the Oppo N1 and Gionee Elife E7 we are able to manually rotate the camera through a limited range which gives us the freedom to take photos at angles which just weren’t possible before. Great fun and great photos can be had with this set up.

Gionee Elife E7 mini rotatin camera

The GFive A7 however has a motorised rotating camera function, the first they claim, however the system is all internal with glass only on the front and back of the phone. So basically you can rotate your A7’s camera on but you can only take photos when the sensor face the front or rear…. So like any other Android smartphone on the planet!

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I could have understood the idea had GFive decided to do this by reducing the cost of their phone. A phone with one single rotating 13 mega-pixel sensor could (in theory) be cheaper than a phone with two sensor, but the motorised mechanism negates this.

So the rotating camera is a bust on this phone but at least the rest of the hardware is good right? Well yes there is that F2.2 13 mega-pixel camera, 2GB RAM, quad-core MT6582 processor, and 5.5-inch 720p display so similar to the specs on the 799 Yuan Huawei Honor 3C, only the GFive A7 will cost around 2000 Yuan!

So Gfive! Are they pioneers of new technology or have the just produced an over priced smartphone with a ridiculous feature?

[ Image Source ]

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About the author
Ying Hua
I'm an avid gamer and a bit of a Ninja when it comes to gadgets and technology. When I'm not busy with the latest Android and iOS games and I can be found writing at Gizchina.com.

Non sense

Brooklyn701
April 1, 2014
Well I guess the goal wasn’t saving cost on a second sensor. I presume that the thought was to have the same image quality front and back as well as having that feature automatically (ergo the mechanically rotating camera).
I guess they have looked into these features so hard that they overlook or think they can outweigh the disadvantages.
I personally don’t really see the use of taking pictures at other degrees. Yes maybe if your professor has prohibited you to take pictures of sessions or you want to spy at a presentation of some sort. But I don’t see a majority going ” oh I need to take pictures as 102° because its so cool…” sorry. So I can’t see the sense in a manually rotating camera. But please correct me if I have overlooked any facts.
So ninja of technology or not, its a very one sided view of things and that is exactly what inhibits people and companies of going all out crazy. I personally think its a great move from Gfive. Not that I personally need the feature, but its progress. Maybe something will result from this experiment which we all might want to have some day. I would refrain from condemning something before its been publicly used/tested. Real life will prove if it has the justification to survive or not. I don’t think opinions should prematurely stop that.

iANDROID8.1
April 1, 2014
Non sense
Guest
April 1, 2014
Well I guess the goal wasn’t saving cost on a second sensor. I presume that the thought was to have the same image quality front and back as well as having that feature automatically (ergo the mechanically rotating camera).
I guess they have looked into these features so hard that they overlook or think they can outweigh the disadvantages.
I personally don’t really see the use of taking pictures at other degrees. Yes maybe if your professor has prohibited you to take pictures of sessions or you want to spy at a presentation of some sort. But I don’t see a majority going ” oh I need to take pictures as 102° because its so cool…” sorry. So I can’t see the sense in a manually rotating camera. But please correct me if I have overlooked any facts.
So ninja of technology or not, its a very one sided view of things and that is exactly what inhibits people and companies of going all out crazy. I personally think its a great move from Gfive. Not that I personally need the feature, but its progress. Maybe something will result from this experiment which we all might want to have some day. I would refrain from condemning something before its been publicly used/tested. Real life will prove if it has the justification to survive or not. I don’t think opinions should prematurely stop that.