Firefly Mobile Allure Price is Php 7,999 : 64-Bit Octa Core LTE 5.5-inch HD Lollipop Phablet with Fingerprint Sensor

Local handset brand Firefly Mobile has been in the industry for a number of years now -- but for one reason or another, it's spent most of that time being in the shadows of its bigger and more popular rivals - namely, Cherry Mobile, MyPhone, and Starmobile.

Firefly Mobile Allure

Well, with the release of the powerhouse Firefly Mobile Allure, it appears that the brand is finally determined to stand shoulder to shoulder with its above-mentioned rivals and to 'play with the big boys' so to speak.

Firefly Mobile Allure

Quoting the people behind Firefly Mobile, "We love and respect all competition, we just believe we can do it better." Gotta love the chutzpah.

Firefly Mobile Allure

Firefly Mobile Allure represents the very best of what the company has to offer - in terms of the device's looks, technical specifications, and value-added features.

Firefly Mobile Allure

As you can see in these press photos of the phone, Allure looks largely similar to the Apple iPhone 6 Plus, having an anodized aluminum frame, a circular home button, and rounded corners.

Firefly Mobile Allure

The handset flaunts a 5.5-inch HD IPS OGS display with 2.5D curved Gorilla Glass 3 panel that gently tapers down the edges. (Having such a large screen puts this model in the phablet category.)

Firefly Mobile Allure

While it's hard for me to call Allure's design identity 'highly original' because of all the borrowed elements, the phone is undeniably good-looking.

Firefly Mobile Allure

Firefly Mobile Allure's top-notch technical specifications - I would say - perfectly complement its attractive exterior. The device runs vanilla Android 5.0 Lollipop operating system with its 64-Bit Octa Core ARM Cortex A53 and Mali-T760 based MediaTek MT6752 chipset, handles multitasking with - get this - 3GB of RAM, and has 16 GB of internal storage that you can augment via the microSD card slot that supports up to 128 GB or using the phone's USB-OTG capability. These set of internal hardware, I believe, is currently the best that you can get in this price echelon.

Firefly Mobile Allure

Allure's imaging capabilities are also great. You get a 13 MegaPixel autofocus camera at the back with Sony Exmor RS IMX 214 sensor for improved low light performance and an 8 MegaPixel camera with soft LED flash for selfies.

Firefly Mobile Allure

If - at all - there's a point for improvement that I'd note, it would have to be the Firefly Mobile Allure's not-all-that-large 2,900 mAh battery pack (which is removable, mind you.) Nonetheless, according to the company, "Keep in mind that our ARMv8 CPU is about 20% more power efficient than the typical ARMv7 CPUs in the market now. In other words, the name of the game is not the size of your gas tank, it's all about fuel efficiency." I guess, for now, we'll take their word for it.

Firefly Mobile Allure

Dual SIM, LTE-enabled Firefly Mobile Allure is now available at all Firefly authorized retail partners across the country. You can get it in Matte Grey and White (based on press photos) for only Php 7,999, which makes it an absolute steal.

Off hand, I think Allure is an amazing release that will have people talking and will surely make Firefly Mobile's giant competitors think twice about belittling the capabilities of the company. I'm looking forward to seeing more models of this caliber from Firefly as well as other local brands for the benefit of all Pinoy consumers.