The Asus Zenfone hasn’t been known by the market to make big waves in the smartphone arena, with its Zenfone 4 and 5 being forgettable, at best. But their most recent addition to the Zenfone series, the Zenfone 6, is showing the smartphone world that the underdog is ready to bare its teeth. With a huge display, a more familiar Android-leaning interface, and better battery capacity, for the affordable price, you get a taste of how Asus may move to make itself a standout smartphone competitor in the future.
One of the smartphone’s more remarkable features is its hinged camera. Users of the Zenfone 6 may notice its lack of front-facing camera. That’s because its rear-facing camera flips up and can actually rotate 180°. The camera can also lock onto an object and move with that object and perform hands-free panorama images (just make sure there aren’t any moving objects in the frame). The hinge mechanism can set into place fairly quickly, and the mechanics are generally stable and reliable.
But with greater mechanics means greater problems. With expectations raised with the Zenfone 6, so are our performance expectations. That means when something goes wrong, it’s even more frustrating than if you had purchased a device you knew was supposed to be a bit of a lemon to begin with.
If you are experiencing problems with the Zenfone 6 180° camera feature, try out some of these troubleshooting tips before calling up customer support.
Camera Not Working
Let’s start with the most basic problem: your camera software isn’t opening or working as it should. Many users have experienced “camera will not flip” error messages that cannot be resolved, even with a factory reset. However, it is still worth trying to troubleshoot.
Clear Cache & Data
Always restart your phone before anything. Your smartphone could just be glitching out and need a good reset to get it working again. If resetting the phone didn’t work, you may need to clear your cache or update your phone.
- Navigate to Settings > Apps & Notifications.
- From there, tap Apps Info.
- Find the Camera app and select it.
- Tap Storage & Memory and clear both data and cache.
This should unload any files “clogging” the software.
Perform Updates
Check if you need any updates to your Camera app. Oftentimes, applications and other smartphone features will stop working if the software is out-of-date. Go to GooglePlay and download the latest version of the Camera app to your smartphone.
Once you have updated the app, you may want to check for OS updates.
- Go to Settings > System.
- Find System Updates and tap Check Now.
- If updates are available, proceed with them.
In fact, Zenfone released an update to the camera that fixes other minor issues users were having with the phone. Running this update will:
- Create a smoother camera rotation
- Complete the 180° rotation
- Improve Super Night Mode
- Optimizes electronic image stabilization for videos
- Improved call quality
- Reduced battery usage
- General stability improvements
Factory Reset
Factory Reset is a last-ditch effort before you can be sure that the problem cannot be solved by yourself.
- Step one, two, and three should just say, “back up all of your data.” A factory reset erases all personal information, apps, etc.
- Go to Settings > System.
- Did you back up all of your data first? If you did, tap Reset > Factory Reset.
- The system will guide you through confirmation steps to finalize the process.
Gosh, I hope you backed-up all of your data.
The Camera is Too Loud
This issue is a matter of personal preference. Many users have commented that the flip camera practically sounds like an earthquake when the Zenfone is on vibrate. They also do not like the motor sounds when the camera rotates.
The easy solution is to turn off or lower the intensity of the Zenfone’s vibration. Or, you can wait until the Zenfone 7 is released, and updates to the camera’s mechanics have been made.
Final Verdict
Asus is an underdog smartphone company but has made huge strides with the Zenfone 6 smartphone. Its new camera seems to be its best and worst feature, but with patch updates resolving some more of the minor issues, all that’s left to complain about is the mechanical components of the camera. Of course, if you are still experiencing software issues, contact customer service.
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