5G cell phones under their own brand come from Telekom. Starting next week in Austria and eight other European markets, next year in Germany.
Deutsche Telekom (DTAG) wants to attract more customers to its 5G networks with its own smartphone brand and cheaper terminal device prices. The increasing data consumption fills the 4G networks (LTE), which is more expensive for the network operator in the long run than the more efficient 5G. Suitable mobile phones under 300 euros should now accelerate the switch to 5G. Appears T Phone and T Phone Pro.
Both are Android devices with a Mediatek chipset (Dimensity 700) with two cores clocked at 2.2 GHz and six more at 2 GHz. No wonder, since the cell phones are based on the REVVL 6 PRO 5G sold by T-Mobile USA, which in turn is a Mediatek development. The Taiwanese chip developer and Google have been working closely since 2017 to speed up the certification of new Android devices. This program is called Google’s Mobile Services Express (GMS Express). Google provides pre-tested Android builds.
Other things that T Phone and T Phone Pro have in common are Android 12, a 3.5 mm headphone jack, SD card slot for up to two terabytes of additional storage, USB-C (charge up to 15 watts), Bluetooth 5.1, fingerprint sensor, face recognition for Unlocking of the device and splash protection limited to IP52/IPX2. Surely GPS and WLAN are also part of it, even if that is not yet clear from the documents published on Thursday. The US model supports WLAN according to IEEE 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac. The fingerprint sensor is apparently integrated into the power button on the side.
Difference between T Phone and T Phone Pro
The differences between the smaller T Phone (6.52 inch screen diagonal, 1600 x 720 pixels) and the larger T Phone Pro (6.82 inch, 1640 x 720 pixels, 395 ppi, probably 60 Hz refresh rate) include the main memory (4 6 GB respectively), mass storage (64/128 GB), battery capacity (4500/5000 mAh), weight (195/214 g) and external dimensions (rounded 167 x 76 x 9 mm or 174 x 78 x 9 mm). NFC and wireless charging are reserved for the Pro version.
Both models have a 50-megapixel main rear camera that records 2k resolution video at 30 frames per second, LED flash, a 2-megapixel depth evaluation camera and a 2-megapixel macro camera. The Pro model also has a 5 megapixel camera for wide-angle shots. For selfies, recording modules with 5 or 16 megapixels are installed at the front. Magenta has sample photos both models put online.
The prices
From October 5, the Austrian DTAG subsidiary Magenta will be selling the T Phone at a price of EUR 229 (including 20% ​​sales tax), and the T Phone Pro for EUR 279. Magenta customers with invoicing have to add three euros in copyright tax, but may benefit from a lower sales price (from zero euros).
At the same time, the two smartphone models will also be sold by the DTAG subsidiaries in Croatia, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. In Germany, Telekom wants to launch its T Phones in early 2023.
With the computing power of the Dimensity 700, which we know from the Realme 8 5G, among other things, the T phones end up in the lower midfield, but this is completely sufficient for telephony and the use of e-mail, messenger and news apps. You shouldn’t be dazzled by the expansive camera area, but the main camera is certainly usable.
Why the whole thing
In the USA, T-Mobile has been selling cell phones for price-sensitive customers under its own REVVL brand for years. This is not entirely new in Europe, the mature reader may remember the T-Mobile G1, but we haven’t seen such devices for a long time.
The Austrian subsidiary Magenta explains why Deutsche Telekom is now showing up again: Although it introduced 5G in 2019, by the end of 2021 only three percent of customers had both a 5G-capable cell phone and a suitable tariff. All current Magenta tariffs now include 5G access. So the proportion has tripled in the nine months of the current year, but is still in the single digits.
“With the market launch of the T Phone, Magenta wants to significantly increase the proportion of 5G users,” reveals the company. “The aim is for a third of all Magenta mobile customers to experience the advantages of 5G by the end of 2023.”
