Taiwanese smartphone manufacturer HTC has released the first round of units for its new Exodus 1s phone, a new and cheaper revision of its previously released Exodus 1. Exodus phones are somewhat unique not only amongst the HTC lineup, but in the smartphone market in general.
The first series of 1s phones were sold exclusively at a private event. They come with the claim that they are the first ever mobile phone that can run a full bitcoin node and like its predecessor, it comes with the HTC Zion wallet which utilises a so-called ‘trusted execution environment (TEE). This is for the protection of sensitive information such as private keys.
They are marketed as devices for the blockchain conscious community, and the project is backed by none other than Charlie Lee – creator of Litecoin and managing director of the Litecoin Foundation. Lee has previously described the Exodus project as being a stepping stone towards the mainstream adoption and usage of cryptocurrency.
Exodus 1 was originally launched earlier this year and, initially, was sold exclusively in cryptocurrency tender. It also included the revolutionary implementation of the crypto-friendly, privacy oriented Brave browser configured as the default web browsing app.
Upon release the phone received mixed, yet mostly positive feedback. As of writing, the 1s has receieved mostly positive responses.
Specifications for the phone have been released as well…
Display: 5.7” HD+ 18:9 display
Battery: Nominal: 3075mAh; Rated: 3000mAh
Camera:
- 13MP main camera with PDAF
- 13MP front camera with LED flash light
Performance:
- Android Oreo 8.1
- Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ 435
- 4GB RAM
- 64GB Storage
SIM Card And Mobile
Networking
- Nano SIM
- 4G+3G Dual standby
- SIM card manager. Setup mobile data connection
- without swapping SIM cards in existing SIM slots
- 2G/2.5G – GSM/GPRS/EDGE/
- 850/900/1800/1900 MHz
- 3G UMTS
- 850/900/1900/2100 (B1/B2/B5/B8); HSDPA 42, HSUPA 5.76
- 4G LTE
- FDD: Bands 1, 3, 5, 7, 8, 20, 28
- TDD: Bands 38, 40, 41
- Support Cat.6 download up to 300 Mbps, upload up to 50Mbps
