Now whether you are a tech reviewer or not, a totally different form factor from a typical smartphone is surely very appealing indeed.
With options like a sliding T-shaped like design for the LG’s Wing, the huge bezel “foldable” Microsoft Duo or the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 2, smartphone makers are coming up with NEW Ways to spice things up in the smartphone market, but yet, NO ONE did what Oppo did by creating a rollable display!
Hey guys, Adam Lobo here from Adam Lobo TV and here is my first impressions and my hands-on experience with the Oppo X 2021.
Design & Build
Starting from the design and build, when the phone is not extended it feels like a regular smartphone, very similar feeling to the premium Oppo Find X series, where it did feel great on the hands and I have to say that I love how the finish at the back of the device was, with a white glossy finish, where again, it looks like just a “regular smartphone”.
The cameras are placed in a vertical position towards the top left of the phone, with no camera bump which I really appreciated and there is silver to a gold colour strip design that goes through at the camera array’s side as well with the Oppo logo towards the bottom right.
Ports & Buttons
In terms of the ports and buttons, there is the USB-C port down below with the speakers down there as well and that tiny little rounded thing towards the right is the rollable mechanism which is a 6.8mm Axis to ensure there is no visible traces or creases on the screen.
Then on the side, you will find the side button, which Oppo calls the Magic Side Button that you can use to swipe up or down to extend and retract the rollable display.
In front, it is a full-screen display without any selfie cameras since the main focus of the phone is the screen’s viewing experience which I really appreciated as well.
Screen & Display
All right, now to the coolest and unique feature of the Oppo X 2021, which is of course the screen!
It is the world’s first rollable smartphone which goes from a 6.7-inch to a massive 7.4-inch screen where it uses a flexible and beautiful OLED panel.
And based on me looking at the screen in real life, since it’s not a foldable phone, there is no worries of seeing any creases and the transition between the smaller screen to the bigger screen and vice versa was super smooth, where your BRAIN would take a while to process it, especially if you are looking at it for the first time.
And where you can kind of understand how this rollable action works is when you look at how the mechanism moves at the back, where you will find a motorised sound too, which is a very similar sound to the pop-up camera which we used to get on smartphones previously, by the way, I still love the pop-up camera.
So of course, the question is – How durable is the rollable screen?
While there is no official testing, it can apparently go up to 200 thousand times with the 2-in-1 plate display support but I have to say that even when the pop-up camera was released in smartphones, people, in general, were so worried about that, but eventually, it was totally fine and I am confident that it will be totally fine on this Oppo X 2021 as the company never skims on having a great build for all of their smartphone range.
And for this case, they have two roll motor, one of each side which can sustain a sudden push or pull and like the pop-up camera if you force close the phone, it will automatically go back, but of course this is not advisable.
And speaking of which, if you ever own this phone, you have to make sure the screen is locked before putting it in your pocket to prevent accidental screen extension that could, in a long run, ruin the phone’s motor.
Now there are no official specs for the screen’s resolution but based on Gizmochina’s site it has 1080 by 2400-pixel FHD+ resolution with 405 PPI density and Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection as well.
Camera
The camera specs are:
- a 48-megapixel main lens
- an 8-megapixel ultrawide lens
- a 2-megapixel macro lens, and
- a 2-megapixel TOF camera, which kind of makes sense since it does show at the back of the phone as well.
And you can get a larger screen real estate to take photos and with the TOF camera, you will have great coverage of AR indoors as well.
Specifications
There is no official spec list for the processor, GPU and variants available but again it apparently comes with 6 gigs of RAM and 128 gigs of storage, where to be honest, since this is not the official spec list, I would take this info with a pinch of salt.
Battery
And finally, in terms of the battery, it apparently has 5,000 milliamps of battery with 30 watts fast charging and that’s it.
Conclusion
So with this, my question to you all is – What do you think of a rollable smartphone compared to a very successful foldable smartphone like the Z Fold 2? Would you guys get it?
As for me, because of the thin form factor, I would love to use the Oppo X 2021’s rollable technology since as mentioned it has a typical form factor of a smartphone, but I would love to know your thoughts as this phone is not commercially available yet, so let’s just wait and see when I get to use this phone as my daily driver, hopefully, really soon!
