Alcatel One Touch reveals two low-cost smartphones destined for Bell and Virgin

Alcatel One Touch has revealed plans to bring two smartphones to Canada in the form of 5-inch Idol X and 4.3-inch Idol Mini.

While Alcatel One Touch isn’t a well-known brand in North America, the company, like Huawei and ZTE, are attempting to capture some of that high-margin user base in a market increasingly wary of high-cost devices. The Idol X sports a 5-inch 1080p IPS display, a 1.5Ghz quad-core MediaTek Cortex-A7 SoC with a PowerVR SXG544 GPU, 2GB RAM, 16GB internal storage, a 13MP rear camera, a 2000mAh battery, and Android 4.2 Jelly Bean. Unfortunately, the Idol X does not support LTE connectivity, but should run on Bell’s and Virgin’s HSPA+ network at 21Mbps.

Much like the Huawei Ascend P6, the Idol X is thin, light and attractive, but remains inexpensive due to an underpowered processor and middling battery capacity.

Also coming to Canada is the Idol Mini, a 4.3-inch Android smartphone with a measly 854×480 pixel display, a 1.3Ghz dual-core Cortex-A7 processor with a Mali-400 GPU (this is Galaxy S2-level stuff), 512MB RAM, 8GB internal storage, a 5MP rear camera, a 1700mAh battery, and Android 4.2 Jelly Bean.

Alcatel One Touch isn’t saying how much either devices will sell for, but it wouldn’t be surprising to see the Idol X sell for around $350 outright, with the Mini coming in at $100-150.

With thicknesses of 6.9mm and 7.9mm respectively, these Idols are going to be fairly light in the pocket and the wallet, but it’s hard to recommend either one based on specs alone — we’ll have to wait for review units to determine whether they’re competitive.

It’s interesting to note that Alcatel One Touch has already replaced the Idol X, which was announced almost a year ago, with the Idol X+, which sports a faster processor and metal chassis. Why Bell chose to offer the older model isn’t clear. Both devices will be available from Bell and Virgin in the coming weeks.