Xolo 8X-1000 Quick Specs

Display Size: 5 Inch  IPS LCD, 720 x 120 HD resolution, Ashai DragonTrail Glass ProtectionProcessor: 1.4 GHz MT6592 Octa Core processor with Mali 450 GPU clocked at 600 MHzRAM: 2 GBSoftware Version: Android 4.4 KitKat based Xolo Hive UICamera: 8 MP Exymor R, F2.0, 1.4 micrometer pixel, 1080P Video recordingSecondary Camera: 2 MPInternal Storage:  16 GBExternal Storage: 32 GBBattery: 1920 mAhConnectivity:  HSPA+, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0 with A2DP, aGPS,  Micro USB 2.0, GPS

Design, Build and Display

Xolo Play 8X-1000 feels quite sturdy and slightly heavy in hand. The rear side is covered with Corning Gorillas Glass 3 which makes it resistant to scratches, but also a fingerprint mangnet. Side edges are made of plastic with plastic hardware keys.

Both MicroUSB port and Audio jack are present on top, while side edges house MicroSD slots and a SIM card slot which accepts 2 micro SIM cards. The device isn’t rounded around edges which makes it look like a plastic slab, but the design languages goes well with the new Hive UI.

The display is a good quality IPS LCD panel. Viewing angles are good and it felt like a full HD display when we first laid eyes on it. Color reproduction, sharpness and brightness seemed fine on this 5 inch IPS LCD display panel in our initial time with the device. We would still like to examine it further under better lighting conditions. The display is protected by Asahi Dragon trail glass. Gorilla Glass 3 at the front would have at least offered better marketing advantage.

Processor and RAM

The processor used is 1.4 GHz MT6592M with 8 cortex A7 cores with Mali 450 MP4 GPU support. Xolo hasn’t gone for the 2 GHz variant in this device and that is a good thing, considering the humble battery capacity. Coupled with 2 GB RAM the chipset can handle Hive UI very smoothly without any lag. We are optimistic about the long run performance of the device based on its initial performance.

Camera and Internal Storage

Xolo is using an 8 MP Exymor R rear camera with wide F2.0 aperture and 5 piece lens to counteract aberrations due to this wide aperture. The pixel size is also quite large at 1.4 micrometer which means the camera can absorb more light under low light conditions. In our initial testing we were impressed by the camera performance of Xolo8 X-1000. It looks like one of the best 8 MP shooters available in this price bracket. The front 2 MP shooter is average.

Internal storage is 16 GB and out of this 3.5 GB has been allocated for apps, which is more than what we conventionally see. Micro SD card support is also present for secondary storage and you can also transfer apps to SD card.

User Interface and Battery

Hive User interface is the highlight in this device. Xolo has included a new Fusion X player, Apps for interaction with Hive team and voting for the changes you wish to see, new gallery app, new camera app (with pro mode and filter, no extraordinary fun feature), chameleon widget, option to download themes and more.

The custom ROM based on Android KitKat will get timely updates and will follow Xiaomi MIUI approach. Xolo Hive isn’t quite heavy as we initially expected and you can clearly discern that it’s in nascent stages. Whether you like it or not will be a matter of personal taste. Battery capacity is 1920 mAh and as you can see its not awful lot and leaves much to be desired. With web browsing time of 4 hours, talk time of 7.6 hours, standby time of 321 hours (according to Xolo) the battery doesn’t seem impressive at all. Charge time of 4 hours is also more than what we usually see on Xolo phones. we will comment more on this after full review but numbers don’t appear very promising.

Conclusion

Xolo X8-1000 is a well built device you can get for 13,999 INR, but it is definitely not the best. We would have liked camera app to be more feature rich and innovative and slightly bigger battery would have made this a much better proposition. In case you are tired of pursuing Mi3 as an option and are considering it as an alternative, we would recommend you to wait some time before Xolo Hive has been better explored.