We got a glimpse at the ZTE “T-Mobile” Vivacity early this month, and lo and behold, it’s arrived on the UK branch of everyone’s favorite magenta-tinted carrier. The mid-range Gingerbread phone is available now from T-Mobile for a £10 monthly charge, or £99 on a contract-free plan. The device loses its manufacturer branding, like many OEM phones on T-Mobile.
For a hundred quid you get a 3.5-inch, 800 x 480 LCD screen on a body that’s unfortunately pretty bland-looking – if you were to look up “basic smartphone” in the Britanica, the Vivacity might just do as its boilerplate photo. (Of course, you’d have to wait for an update to the dead tree version, like some sort of Philistine.) Other than Android 2.3, GPS and a 5 megapixel camera, T-Mobile wasn’t all that forthcoming on official specs, but given the pricing you can probably expect a 800mhz-1ghz processor with 512-768Mb of RAM. The phone has a MicroSD card slot that’s apparently empty.
There’s something interesting about the Vivacity: an interface that seems to have left Gingerbread alone. On the launcher at least, there’s a distinct lack of manufacturer customizations, a la HTC, Samsung and Motorola. That alone may make the Vivacity worth a look if you need a new phone on a budget – a relatively “clean” Android phone is a sadly novel occurrence outside of the Nexus line. It looks like there’s also some T-Mobile branded apps, so you might want to try it at retail before making a decision. The Vivacity should show up at T-Mobile’s online and brick and mortar stores any time now, in black or white colors.
[via Android Central]
