Huawei reveals its first Firefox OS smartphone, the Huawei Y300 (hands-on)
Huawei takes an old Android phone and gives it a Firefox makeover, resulting in one of the better Firefox OS phones we've seen to date.
BARCELONA, Spain -- Huawei is showing off its first Firefox OS smartphone here at Mobile World Congress 2014, the Huawei Y300.
The 4-inch WVGA (800x480) handset is running Firefox OS v1.1, features a dual-core 1GHz Snapdragon 8225 processor, 512MB RAM, 4GB storage, 802.11n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.1, a 5-megapixel rear camera and a VGA front camera.
Careful not to confuse the Huawei Y300 with the Huawei Ascend Y300. It seems Huawei is using the same basic spec as the earlier Android smartphone for its Firefox debut, but a name change may have helped avoid a lot of potential confusion. Some references to the phone suggest it may be launched as the Y300 II, marking it as a successor to the original Y300.
The hardware feels basic, but that's what you get when delivering a smartphone at a feature phone price.
It doesn't take long in the hand for the Y300 to stand apart from most other Firefox OS phones we've seen to date. The screen looks crisp and clear, without the fuzziness common to phones running at lower resolutions. Alcatel One Touch's Fire S is probably going to look even better with its 960x540 screen, but it's not expected until the second half of the year.
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No final timing, though indications are for a release in the next couple of months. Final pricing is also yet to be confirmed, but as with all Firefox OS devices to date this can be expected to be an extremely affordable outright handset.
Compared to most of the other Firefox OS devices we've had working in our hands at this show, the Huawei Y300 is the closest we've seen to something that doesn't feel like a major compromise compared with entry level Android devices.