More on Olive Telecom's OliveSmart V-S300

So we found out yesterday about Olive Telecom launching their first smartphone in India, the Gingerbread-powered OliveSmart V-S300 at a price of Rs. 19,999. Naturally, this piqued a lot of interest among the community and people do want to know more about the device. So if you’re one of them, you’ve come to the right place.

The OliveSmart V-S300

First off, the OEM – we know Olive don’t manufacture their devices themselves, so what exactly is the true form of the OliveSmart? The most likely answer, like many of our readers commented, seems to be the Huawei Ideos X6, which has… wait for it… an identical specsheet. Qualcomm Snapdragon MSM8255, Adreno 205, the works. Only, there’s a slight hitch; the Huawei Ideos X6 comes pre-loaded with Android 2.2 Froyo, not 2.3 Gingerbread.

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That seems to be confirmed by the mockup image Olive sent us and the hands-on preview posted over at Gigejts, which both show the phone running on Froyo (2.2.1). Olive still went all out in announcing Gingerbread for the phone, so we hope both for their sake and ours that they don’t mess it up between now and the release date next month.

Look, it's Froyo

Another aspect worth talking about is Viewsonic. You’ll remember the ViewPad 7 and the OlivePad – Android tablets which were launched last year – were identical devices. That situation seems to be repeating itself again, this time with the OliveSmart V-S300 and the ViewPad 4. Both devices look extremely similar, and I’m in no doubt hilarity would once again ensue if Viewsonic decides to price their version of the phone higher, like they did with the ViewPad.

The Viewpad 4 - Image Source

While all this information is well and good and might pricking the enthusiasm bubbles of some, the fact remains that Olive have promised a Gingerbread phone with excellent specs at a very attractive price. I, still maintain this move will do the Indian smartphone market a world of good, and I hope you guys do too. Now I just hope this device lives up to its specs and performs well.