UK operator O2 has lowered the price of the Huawei Ascend W1 on PAYG to £99.99, making it the cheapest Windows Phone 8 device available in the UK. The handset, which is avalable in blue and pink, was previsouly priced at £129.99, and is also available for free on a £14 per month (50 minutes talk, unlimited texts, 100MB data), two year contract.

The Ascend W1 has a dual-core Qualcomm 1.2GHz processor, accompanied by 512MB RAM, marking out it as a lower specification Windows Phone 8 device (like the Nokia Lumia 520, 620, 720 and HTC 8S). Other hardware features of note includes a 4 inch 480x800 IPS screen,  a 5 megapixel camera, and a 2,000 mAh battery. However, the most important hardware specification to note is the presence of just 4GB of storage. Although a microSD card slot offers extra memory possibilities for media files, it is hard to avoid the conclusion, even allowing for the handset budget status, that the small amount of internal memory is a weak point, as it doesn't leave a lot of room for apps and games.