Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro: An In-Depth Look

Lenovo officially announced its new flagship smartphone, the Lenovo K290 - known as the Vibe Z2 Pro, last August 5. The flagship phablet boasts high-end features, with photography and imaging as its primary focus. Prior to the official announcement, Lenovo's Chief Marketing Officer for China Arthur Wei posted the features of the Vibe Z2 Pro on his Weibo account. Have a look at the most compelling features of this powerful new device.

Great First Impression

The Vibe Z2 Pro exudes minimalist elegance for a beast phablet at a first glance. It is a rectangular phone featuring a 6-inch 2KHD screen with a screen resolution of 2560x1440 px and pixel density of 490 ppi. There isn't anything on the front except capacitive keys for Menu, Home, and Back functions. The rest of the phone has a beautiful metallic finish, and the sides are decorated with thin bezels. Its thickness makes it easier to handle and to store in the pockets, coming in at just 7.7 mm. It comes in three colors: black, gold and white.

Under the Hood

The high-end features don't stop where the eyes can see. According to Phone Arena, the Vibe Z2 Pro boasts a 2.5 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 processor under the hood, an Adreno 330 GPU, with 32 GB internal storage and 3 GB of RAM. No word on memory expandability via microSD, but these internal specs are a good start. The phablet will have Wi-Fi b/g/n and Wi-Fi hotspot capability, 4G LTE connectivity, and the power to support these and its other giant features, with a non-removable battery at 4000 mAh. The Vibe Z2 Pro comes with Android KitKat 4.4.2 out of the box - a little bit behind the other flagships coming out with either 4.4.4 or Android L, but not too bad given its other features.

Made for Photography

Lenovo has outfitted the Vibe Z2 Pro to be a photograpic beast for a smartphone. Its main camera has a 16 MP sensor with a resolution of 3456x4608 px, optical image stabilization, autofocus, and dual-LED flash. Three modes will catch the consumers' interest in particular: the Smart mode auto-detects scenes and adjusts settings; the Ultra Night Mode lets users take photos in extremely low-light situations; and the Pro Mode gives its users full manual control over the camera's settings. It also features a secondary, front-facing camera at 5 MP.

Video capability on the Vibe Z2 Pro isn't so bad either. It is capable of taking 2160p and 1080p HD videos at 30 fps. The optical stabilization feature also ensures the videos are crisp and clear.

No Official Word on Release

Lenovo did not include an official release date in their announcement at their event in the Mobile Asia Expo in Shanghai last August 5. Reports including on GSM Arena's page peg the release date to be sometime in September 2014, along with the rumored release of some of its fiercest competitors, including the Galaxy S4 and the larger iPhone 6 phablet. One thing is certain: with the features that the Vibe Z2 Pro boasts, it is sure to give the competition a run for their money.