Nokia Asha 308 vs Sony Xperia Tipo: Dual-SIM Newbies Market Release Collision

As the low cost dual SIM Chinese handsets were successful in the budget conscious Indian market, the handset manufacturers have slowly adopted themselves to taste success in the country by releasing dual SIM smartphones at affordable price tags to quench needs of the Indian consumers.

Consequently, on Tuesday, Nokia unveiled Asha 308 – a dual SIM smartphone based on the proprietary OS of Nokia – Series 40 alongside its single SIM and Wi-Fi variant – Asha 309. The Finnish handset manufacturer has estimates the retail price for the new members of Asha family to be about $99 (approx. Rs 5,300), excluding taxes and subsidies.

At the same time, Sony the Japanese tech giant has finally released its latest mid-range Xperia Tipo handset in the Indian market. The smartphone is available in two variants, single-SIM and dual-SIM, while the former is available at a price tag of Rs 9,999, Xperia Tipo Dual, got previously listed for pre-order on Flipkart at Rs 10,299.

As both the smartphones have been announced with wallet-friendly price tags, and their debuts in the market have collided with each other, and many of you would also be thinking to buy one of them, hence, Gizbot has come up with a spec comparison between the two entry-level dual SIM smartphones, to observe how they stack up against each other.

Dimensions & Weight: Measuring 109.9 x 54.0 x 13.0 mm in dimension and weighing around 104 grams, the Asha 308 is slightly on the thicker and heavier side as compared to the Xperia Tipo Dual boasting a dimension of 103 x 57 x 13 mm and a weight of around 99.4 grams.

Display: In terms of dipslay, Asha 308 sports a 3 inch capacitive multipoint touchscreen display with 400 x 240 pixel resolution while Xperia Tipo Dual houses a 3.2 inch multi-touch capacitive touchscreen display with 320 x 480 pixel resolution.

Further, both the smartphones have scratch resistant glass protection on the display.

Processor: In this segment, both the smartphone fare equally with an 800MHz processor.

Operating System: When it comes to operating system, Asha 308 is based on the Nokia's Series 40 OS while Xperia Tipo Dual is flavored with Android 4.0.3 Ice Cream Sandwich OS.

Camera:On the camera optics front, Asha 308 has a 2MP rear camera with fixed focus.

On the other hand, Xperia Tipo Dual has a 3.15MP rear camera with geo-tagging feature.

However, the lack of a front facing camera for video calling in both the handsets is quite disappointing.

Memory:Nokia Asha 308 has 20MB internal memory and 64MB RAM while Xperia Tipo Dual has 2 GB internal memory and 512MB RAM.

However, both the handsets have a micro SD card slot, which supports expandable memory up to 32GB.

Connectivity: In terms of connectivity, Asha 308 has features like Bluetooth 3.0 and micro USB 2.0.

On the other hand, Xperia Tipo Dual is packed with features like Bluetooth 2.1 with A2DP, 3G with 7.2Mbps HSDPA, and 5.76 Mbps HSUPA, Wi-Fi features and micro USB 2.0.

Battery: Asha 308 is powered by a 1,110 mAh BL-4U battery offering 6 hours talk time and 510 hours standby.

In comparison, Xperia Tipo Dual is powered by a 1,500 mAh Li-ion battery which offers up to 6 hours talk time and 360 hours standby.

Verdict

Both Sony Xperia Tipo Dual and Nokia Asha 308 are entry-level smartphones with decent specifications. However, the Nokia offering lacks many features which are present in the Xperia Tipo Dual.

As the Sony smartphone runs on Android ICS operating system, it will have Google's latest OS features including simple and smooth UI for easy multitasking, rich notifications, customizable home screens, resizable widgets, rich and versatile camera capabilities, Face unlock and more.

Hence, if software features of Android, Wi-Fi connectivity, better camera optics and more memory capacity are your concern, the Sony Xperia Tipo Dual should be the right one for you.

On the other hand, if you are looking for a cheaper smartphone without much concerns on the software features, the Nokia Asha 308 could be a decent option for you.

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