Fronix Star, a low cost tablet from Fronix Technology comes with 1.2 GHz processing power, 8GB internal storage and 512MB RAM. The ICS (Android 4.0) OS that is installed can be upgraded to Jelly Bean (Android 4.1) all this for a price of Rs. 5,400.
The Fronix Star is light weight (330 grams) and slim (10.5 mm thickness). The Allwinner A13 (ARMv7) Cortex A8 processor powers this tab with a 1.2GHz frequency. These A13 powered tabs perform better than the Allwinner A10 processors and consumes less power. However HDMI port is missing on the A13 tabs.
Box Pack
Inside the box there is the tablet, user manual / warranty card, USB to micro USB cable for connecting with PC, OTG cable (the smaller one, used for connecting 3G dongle / pen drives etc.), earphones ( they are of a cheap quality) and the battery adapter (charger).
Design
There are two films the protective film that users have to remove and the finger print resistant film which really helps keep the screen clean and avoids finger print marks – however that film is not scratch resistant.
The 7 inch tab look great, it is sleek, got curved edges and with a black and white colour combination. The rear side has got a white glossy look and a part of it is with embossed design for a better grip. The power button and all the ports are placed on the right side and there are no extra buttons anywhere else.
There are no physical buttons even on front side. Well the ICS OS does allocate a dedicated space for navigational buttons placed at the bottom and hence physical buttons are not required.
Performance
The screen of size 7 inches with capacitive touch is smooth and responsive, the ICS works pretty smoothly. The Fronix Star tab comes with a lot of pre-loaded apps. There are the latest games and latest Bollywood music video clips. Apart from that there are some APK files (games) which you can installed as needed.
Useful apps like Adobe reader, Dolphin browser, flash player, Akdiko e-reader, Office Documents, yourtube and other Google services are also included.
The RAM is 512MB and internal storage is 8GB of which around 1GB is allocated for apps storage and about 5GB as an internal SD storage. You can also use the micro SD slot to add card up to 32GB capacity.
I played some of the pre-installed HD games which were smooth – all credits to the Mali 400 GPU. There should not be a problem playing ShadowGun, ASPHalt and some other games which have performed well on the Mali 400 GPU.
You can use Skype for video chat using the front camera. Though the quality of the camera is not so great.
Benchmark
The quadrant benchmark score = 2250.
AnTuTu Benchmark score = 2703.
Battery performance
I charged the battery at full 100% and ran few video clips (1080p as well as 720p) in loop. Here are the results. (Videos in loop with 15% brightness / Wi-Fi Off).
| Time | Battery Level (%) |
| 6:46 – Video test started | 100 |
| 8:05 | 77 |
| 10:10 | 45 |
| 11:27 | 26 |
| 11:49 Video test Ended | 20 |
The battery life seems pretty good with usage time of about 4 to 5 hours.
Fronix Star key features and specifications
- Allwinner A13 (1.2GHz) with Mali 400 GPU.
- ICS Android 4.0 with Jelly Bean upgrade (Android 4.1).
- 512MB DDR3 RAM, 8GB internal storage and Micro SD card up to 32GB supported.
- Wi-Fi, 3G (External dongle (WCDMA / EVDO / TD-SCDMA), G-Sensor, 3.5mm jack, 1080p playback, flash 10.3 and front 0.3MP camera.
- 7 inch capacitive touchscreen with 5 touch points (resolution 800×480 pixels).
- Lithium Po battery of 4000 mAh with usage time of more than 4 hours.
Fronix Star Review
The tab looks good and does a very good job. For connectivity there is Wi-Fi, you can also connect a compatible 3G dongle via the micro USB port using the OTG cable. This is similar to the other Allwinner A13 tablets but what I liked was the host of pre-loaded apps / games but most of all – it is Jelly Bean upgradable. The JB upgrade is mentioned on the box pack and probably within few months the update will be available. Tab price Rs. 5,400.
Picture Gallery
Watch the Fronix Star review and unboxing video