The rugged-phone market is a niche market with only a few "adventurous" people opting for a rugged phone over regular smartphones. Many major smartphone manufactures keep away from producing such phones, except maybe Samsung, which produces a rugged "Active" variant of most of its flagships. But then again, they are available only in North America (and cost a bomb).
Rugged-phones are generally thick and do not come with the latest and greatest of hardware specs. Plus, they are as heavy as a brick and carry an equally hefty price tag. But a new smartphone from Chinese manufacturer Blackview seems to change all that. Meet, Blackview BV4000, a solidly-built rugged smartphone that is dust, water and shock proof, and this one doesn't burn a hole in your pocket.
Blackview BV4000 is the most affordable smartphone in the BV series of military-quality smartphones from Blackview which also includes Blackview BV6000, BV7000 and BV8000 smartphones. Blackview claims that like its elder siblings, the BV4000 is a tri-proof smartphone.
(Note: Tri-proof is a sales moniker used by Chinese smartphone makers such as Doogee and Blackview to market their rugged smartphones.)
Blackview BV4000: Key features, specifications and price
Blackview has employed a solid polycarbonate body construction for the BV4000, which is further reinforced by metal side bars to add rigidity and strength. The company claims that the phone is strong enough to withstand a drop from up to 2 meters high and function normally even after being submerged underwater for up to 20 hours. The smartphone is also IP68 certified water and dust resistant.
The BV4000 may be a rugged smartphone all in all, but it does come with a fairly decent spec-sheet. Blackview has equipped the BV4000 with a 4.7-inch 720p HD IPS display with Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection. The phone's solid-construction takes it weight all the way up to 215 grams. Powering the BV4000 is a MediaTek MT6580 Quad-core processor clocked at 1.3GHz under the hood with ARM Mali 400-MP2 GPU.
Rugged phones are a major let-down when it comes to photography, but the BV4000 features not one but two 8MP primary cameras on the back. The front camera though, is a not-so-impressive 2MP shooter with beauty mode.
Blackview BV4000 comes with 1GB RAM and 8GB of internal storage which can be expanded up to 32GB via a microSD card.The rugged smartphone also packs a massive 3,680mAh battery. It runs Android 7.0 Nougat out-of-the-box and comes in three different paintjobs- Sunshine Orange, Flora Green, and Rock Black- that add to the rugged appeal.
The dual-SIM smartphone is currently available on AliExpress.com for $79.99, which on conversion comes to around Rs. 5,200 in India excluding taxes and duties.
Meanwhile, Blackview plans to offer a 2GB RAM variant of the BV4000 with 16GB internal storage some time later, but all other specs will remain the same.
