Make no mistake. ASUS wants a piece of the lucrative premium smartphone segment, currently dominated by Apple, Samsung and Huawei. With that ambition in mind, it took a brave step to not only create its most impeccably built device yet, but also one of the most powerful smartphones in the world. The ZenFone 3 Deluxe is beautiful, powerful, and comes with a stiff price tag that may be off-putting for ZenFone fans. Like it or not, it’s finally available on Malaysian shores, after its debut earlier in August.
The ZenFone 3 Deluxe (ZS570KL) moves away from the curves of the previous ZenFone, now sleeker and more rectangular overall. Its aluminum alloy unibody features ASUS’ signature concentric circle motif, and boasts an invisible-antenna design. It measures 4.2mm at its thinnest edge, and it looks stunning.
While there are two variants, we currently get the 5.7-inch version that packs a Super AMOLED Full HD display. Housed within a super thin 1.3mm bezel, it boasts a range-topping 79% screen-to-body ratio.
Under the hood it packs some monster specs. The top-of-the-line variant comes powered by the quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 821 (@ 2.4GHz), a world’s first. On the other hand, the lower variant packs a quad-core Snapdragon 820 (@ 2.15GHz). Both are served by 6GB of RAM, with 64GB and 256GB of storage respectively.
Similarly, both support Cat 13 all-band LTE, Wi-Fi 802.11a/b/g/n/ac with 5GHz 2×2 MIMO Support. They run Android M out of the box with the latest Zen UI.
Keeping it juiced all day is a 3,000mAh fast charging built-in battery that supports Quick Charge 3.0 through its USB-C 3.0 port.
ASUS is proud to show off the 23MP whopper of a camera, with the 6P Largan f/2.0 lens coupled with the Sony IMX 318 sensor. The lens is protected by sapphire glass. The impressive camera can record 4K video and comes with 4-axis OIS and 3-axis EIS. What’s impressive is the 0.03s TriTech autofocus technology – a combination of laser, phase detection and continuous autofocus.
Let’s not forget audio. The ZenFone 3 Deluxe boasts SonicMaster 3.0 and Hi-Res Audio certification. The five-magnet speaker is mighty impressive.
Pricing and availability
The ASUS ZenFone 3 Deluxe is available now. Prices are as below:
- ZenFone 3 Deluxe (ZS570KL-2G005WW) – Shimmer Gold & Glacier Silver – MYR2,599 (incl. GST).
- ZenFone 3 Deluxe (ZS570KL-2J025WW) – Shimmer Gold & Glacier Silver – MYR3,299 (incl. GST).
