ViewSonic is not a company known for its smartphones. In fact, its small attempt at the smartphone market with its ViewPad range has been less than impressive. However, the company is not giving up so easily. It is said that ViewSonic is developing a brand new smartphone which will have something that will put even fingerprint sensors to shame.
The ViewSonic V55 smartphone is said to have the next generation Iris recognition technology, which will essentially scan your unique random eye patterns for biometric identification. Just like fingerprint, everyone’s iris patterns are unique which makes iris recognition a very secured mode of identification. So, with this technology, only the owner of the device, whose iris patterns are recorded pre-recorded can unlock and access information from the smartphone. This makes third party information access practically impossible.
The ViewSonic V55 will have an Iris scanner on the top right corner of the phone. Unlike fingerprint sensors which are always exposed, this Iris scanner will be hidden from view. When the user wants to unlock the phone via Iris recognition, he or she will have to slide the small piece concealing the scanner. When they slide it open, a light will turn on indicating that the iris scanner has been activated.
The user can not only unlock the phone using this scanner but also protect files and folders inside the device. The scanner can also secure important files that lie inside it, so even if a third party has unlocked the phone, getting that information would be extremely hard with this additional security. To access those information protected by the Iris recognition sensor, just scan your eye into the sensor and the information will be unlocked. It is said that the Iris recognition tech can be used for a number of additional authentication functions, but we’ll probably hear more about that at its official announcement.
Apart from the Iris sensor, the ViewSonic V55 smartphone will also come with a number of interesting lenses that can be fitted on to the phone’s camera. The user can mount different types of lenses on the rear camera like fish-eye, Macro, wide-angle etc to achieve unique results, not possible with an ordinary smartphone camera. We have already seen smartphone cases which bring this functionality to the phone, but the V55 has this inbuilt!
Even the specifications of the phone are high end. The ViewSonic V55 will reportedly come with a 64-bit Snapdragon 410 quad-core processor clocked at 1.4GHz with 2GB RAM and 16GB/ 32GB ROM options onboard. It will have Adreno 306 GPU for stellar graphic performance. On the front, there will be a 5.5-inch OGS 1920 x 1080p display. At the back, there will be a 13MP Sony camera which like we mentioned above, takes external lenses too. It will also support 4G LTE networks for high speed browsing.
The phone looks like its made of plastic with a metal frame surrounding it. The bezels are extremely thin and overall, the device looks well built and premium. As of now, we don’t know the battery capacity but we do hope that its large given the Iris sensor and the 4G LTE support which can drain a lot of power from the phone.
ViewSonic was reportedly planning to launch the device by the end of the year, but given that its almost 2015, we expect it to be sometime in January. The company has not released a price as of now, but it has to be aggressive to compete with other smartphones with better specs.
[socialpoll id=”2242446″]Meanwhile, check out the teaser video of the ViewSonic V55 showing off the Iris recognition technology and the external lens support features.
