After officially unveiling the all-new LG X series of mid-range smartphones in June, one of the notable handsets from the series – the X Power – with lasting battery and a new processor will be up on sale this month. Sprint announced on Saturday that the X Power smartphone will be available starting 23 September, but Boost Mobile customers can purchase the handset immediately.
LG X Power is already available in the United States through US Cellular and Cricket Wireless, but the Sprint and Boost Mobile variant will be differentiated by a 1.8GHz octa-core MediaTek Helio P10 chipset instead of the regular 1.4GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon SoC. With this change, LG X Power is the first MediaTek-powered smartphone under Sprint's network.
"Collaborating with Sprint and LG to enable a WorldMode smartphone based on our MediaTek helio series chipset is an important milestone for MediaTek," Mohit Bhushan, MediaTek vice president and general manager of US Business Development, said in a statement on Saturday. "We are actively investing in advanced modem feature development for Sprint's networks and look forward to many more devices in 2017 and beyond."
Besides the processor, LG X Power's biggest highlight is the large 4,100mAh battery equipped with fast charging PE+ technology, which is said to charge the phone at twice the normal speed. Combining the new chipset with a large battery, the handset is expected to last for two full days.
LG X Power sports a decent spec-sheet to justify the $130 price tag attached to it. It has a 5.3-inch Full HD display, an 8MP primary camera, a 5MP front snapper and Android 6.0 Marshmallow OS. The handset also supports Sprint's LTE Plus two-channel carrier aggregation.
Sprint customers can purchase LG X Power under the carrier's instalment plan, which offers zero down payment and 24 monthly payments of $9.
