Hands On: Kyocera's Massive Phablet, Unique Flip Phone

LAS VEGAS—AT&T and Kyocera accept three tough new phones for three different tastes: one unproblematic, one powerful, and 1 prepaid. Nosotros spent some time with two of them here at CES.

CES 2022 Bug Art Waterproof and rugged phones accept get a Kyocera specialty in recent years. There'south still a lot of call for tough, push button-to-talk phones for field workers in this post-Nextel era, and Kyocera'southward tight relationship with carriers gives information technology an advantage over competitors similar Sonim and CAT with corporate customers.

The DuraXE certainly looks like a blast from the by. It's a rugged, flip feature telephone. It has large buttons for gloved hands, a 2.6-inch 32-by-240 main screen, a 5-megapixel photographic camera, dual front speakers for outdoor use, and push-to-talk capabilities. It'south waterproof and resists dust, shock vibration, salt fog, and other nastiness.

Kyocera DuraXE

In that location's something interesting going on nether the hood here. The DuraXE is running a gimped version of Android five.one.ane on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 210 processor with a gig of RAM. Information technology has no affect screen, and it doesn't have an app store. (It does have music and video players.) But using Android lets Kyocera run AT&T's vox-over-LTE and push button-to-talk applications, besides as bringing other features like running as an LTE hotspot.

I couldn't make calls on the DuraXE, but I played some ringtones, and they were loud. One business organization: the loud ringtone made the whole keypad vibrate, which was a trivial odd from a tactile perspective. I besides dunked the phone in a pint of cider and washed it off, which caused no problems.

Reflecting the DuraXE's corporate market, it will cost $270 up forepart. Yep, you tin get a very nice Android smartphone for considerably less. Merely it won't be this tough. The DuraXE'southward major competitor, AT&T'southward Sonim XP5, costs $300 total, and the last-generation DuraXV+ on Verizon still costs $192.

Duraforce XD
The Duraforce XD is a large, rugged Android phablet. Information technology has a 5.7-inch screen that works with wet or gloved easily, dual front speakers, and a large 3700mAh battery. While Kyocera doesn't seem to exist calling it waterproof, it's ruggedized against dust, stupor, vibration, blowing pelting, and a bunch of other things, and then it's probably effectively waterproof. Information technology appears to apply a 1.6GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor, which isn't fast by any ways, only this telephone is primarily well-nigh ruggedization. It'll price $360.

This one goes upwards against the Sonim XP7, which is slower and considerably more expensive, but is even more rugged and has a three-year, no-questions-asked warranty.

The biggest easily-on impression of the XD is that it'due south comically huge. I could barely fit information technology in one hand; it's not only a five.7-inch phablet, it'south a phablet that's basically in an Otterbox. (The phone's case fifty-fifty protrudes a piddling over the front to protect it from face up-on drops.) But the i,280-by-720 screen was super bright and quite readable. Yous're not going to be getting this telephone for the specs. You're going to be getting it because it's loud, and information technology can take a chirapsia.

Those are Kyocera's "pro" models for this prove, but ordinary people similar rugged phones, too. I still remember my baby daughter killing a beloved Motorola E815 by drooling into it. For the tough mother/Tough Mudder demographic, Kyocera and AT&T's prepaid brand Cricket is rolling out the Kyocera Hydro View, an affordable waterproof, somewhat ruggedized telephone for $79.99 up front end.

Kyocera didn't have one of those to bear witness usa. The Hydro View isn't ruggedized to bullet-stopping levels, but you lot can wash information technology in the sink, and the impact screen nonetheless works with wet hands. The View runs Android 5.1 on a depression-end, ane.1GHz Snapdragon 210 processor and has a five-inch 960-by-540 screen. Like the other phones, it'due south well-nigh toughness and affordability rather than speed and specs.

All iii new phones will be available Jan. 8.