Qualcomm has accidentally revealed the existence of the Asus ZenFone AR, the first smartphone to be both Project Tango-enabled and Daydream-ready. Little is known about the ZenFone AR right now, as it was mentioned in a blog post that has since been taken down.
The ZenFone AR is powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 821 processor, which is why the company was so eager to get the news out the door. While the SoC is not exactly new, it is the first chip to end up being used in this kind of device.
From what we can tell, the ZenFone AR will focus on augmented reality applications. The Project Tango camera situated on its back allows the phone to measure the distance between objects; which means it is able to measure the dimensions of objects and sense its surroundings in three dimensions.
ASUS ZenFone AR (2nd Google Tango phone) pic.twitter.com/ctKQ9IKfeC
— Evan Blass (@evleaks) January 2, 2017
Daydream is Google’s VR certification programme. We’re not entirely sure what makes a phone Daydream ready, but it should have something to do with meeting certain performance criteria. Daydream is still a relatively new thing from the technology giant, and we should be seeing more Daydream ready devices turn up over the week.
Asus is still keeping quiet about the ZenFone AR, which leaves us with little else to go on. For now, it’s a matter of waiting until Asus’ press event at CES.
[Source: 9to5Google]
