Asus Zenfone Zoom's 3x optical zoom disappoints for shooting pics from afar

I cringe every time I watch someone pinch-to-zoom on their smartphone’s screen right before snapping a photo. The seemingly simple act of zooming in on an object, despite what the screen on the phone displays at the time, almost guarantees the end result will be a pixelated, garbled mess of a photo. All smartphones available today use this "digital zoom" technique.

But what else are we supposed to do? Lens attachments like Olloclip are expensive, and yet another thing we have to worry about carrying (or losing).

With this problem in mind, Asus developed the $399 Zenfone Zoom. According to the company, the Zoom is the first and only smartphone available equipped with optical zoom. Meaning, instead of using software to essentially crop a photo to replicate zooming in on a subject, the Zoom zooms in — just as your dad’s point and shoot does — using a series of lenses. Read more...