Micromax Canvas A1 [ Android One ] Review:

Android One..

Huge buzz, huge response, great price, looks impressive....
But can it take on the competition ?? Can it be the new Budget King ??  The 1st Tier Market in India is getting tougher and tougher... Is this the device you are looking for ? Let's find out in my review below:

The Search: 

I was looking for the perfect Android One device, had 3 options to choose from. So I took a look at all of them:
1) Spice Android One Dream UNO,  (Rs 6299)

2) Micromax Canvas A1  (Rs 6499)

3) Karbonn Android One Sparkle V.  (Rs 5999)

As all of these devices have the same specs so my decision was based on the looks and I selected the Micromax Canvas A1 (+ I feel Micromax is better than the other 2 brands)..  So I ordered the device from Amazon.

The Wait: 

It took Amazon 2 days to deliver me the product. I couldn't wait, was excited and was impressed with the packaging. Great work Amazon..

I was impressed with the packaging of the device. Unboxed it and the device was lying in its full glory. So I took it out and time for the setup..
I finally had the device up and running and here are my impressions:

Design:

Simple, Solid and Minimalistic..
That's it i'm in love with it and it's solid and has a rubberized back cover. The build quality is great, way better than the other micromax devices out there.. I'm impressed that a device with such a small price tag offers a great build quality. The bezel around the screen is a bit on the larger side but it looks good and the earpiece is similar to the Nexus 5 (It looks classic).

The device has a 4.5 inch display and it offers great one handed usage. You can easily reach all 4 corners of the screen without much movement. It is totally possible to use the device with one hand without a lot of effort.

Overall the device looks good, the camera looks different and the build quality is great... I'm impressed.

Performance:
Specifications:
CPU: 1.3Ghz Quad Core MediaTek MT6582 chipset.
GPU: Mali 400
Ram: 1GB
Screen: 4.5'' 480x854 i.e. approximately 218ppi
OS: Android 4.4.4 KitKat (Android 5.0 Lollipop has been announced)
Camera: 5MP Rear Shooter with Flash and a 2MP front facing camera.
Storage: 4GB internal, expandable upto 32GB (microSD card)
Battery: 1700mAh

The device has pretty decent specifications for the price tag. It is not as fast as the Nexus 5, HTC One M8, LG G3 and the other flagships out there. But it is fast enough to compete with the Moto E,G, Asus Zenfone 4,5  and that's great. It provides a lag free experience and that's all possible because of the 1GB ram along with stock android. The device has 1 GB of ram which feels enough for day to day usage, it's possible to game, text and watch a video or play some music simultaneously but you can easily put the 1 GB out of breath with hardcore multitasking. But for the average user the device performs great and the 1GB ram should suffice.

Gaming ?? The device has a Mali 400 GPU which is pretty old, but is still capable enough to play games such as Real Racing 3, Asphalt 8, FIFA 15, Bombsquad etc without any lag or shutter. Though the graphically intense games do take a while to load but after the loading process the games run smooth.

So overall the device performs great and anyone can use the device for most of their day to day tasks and occasional hardcore usage. The performance level is at par with most of the budget devices out there and this has an additional advantage, the 2 year update policy which is valid on the Nexus devices apply on this too. So you can have the latest android for the next 2 years* and considering the price tag, this is a great device and is backed up by Google for the update procedure.

Battery Life:         

 

The device has a 1700 mAh battery which I though was very low but with my average usage I was able to squeeze 3.5 hours of screen on time and a standby time on 18 hours. This usage included browsing, video playback, audio play back, occasional voice calls and texting.
The battery unit is user replaceable so all the utilitarians out there can grab a few extra batteries and you can go on and on without stopping at all :)

1700mAh user replaceable battery

So in short, the battery life is decent enough to get you through a days usage with a full charge.


Display:
Here comes the one drawback of this device. The display is a 4.5" IPS LCD panel with a screen resolution of 480x854 pixels i.e approximately 218 ppi which is pretty low. You can easily detect the pixels on the screen. I am not saying that the display is a disaster, considering the price it is great it's bright and offers good outdoor visibility, a decent media consumption experience and come on what do you expect for such a low price.
So considering the price, the display is decent and offers great outdoor visibility.

Camera:
What can you possibly expect from a device that offers great specs and a 2 years update policy at such a small price tag ? The device has a 5MP rear shooter with LED flash capable of recording videos upto 720p. The image quality is average and that's what I expected since almost everyone was cribbing about the camera performance of the Nexus 5 so I never expected this camera unit to pull off something great and I was right, the camera is average, the day light shots are decent but low light photography is a disaster.

2MP front camera

5MP rear camera with flash

It is great that this device has a front facing camera, I never expected it to have one because the Moto E which has a similar price tag doesn't have one. The 2MP front facing camera is good enough for video calls and random selifes.

Updates:
Being backed up by Google for the update process means one thins that this will be one of the first few devices to get the next Android. The devices in the Android One program will be updated for 2 years just as any Nexus device is done. Luckily Android Lollipop was announced and the Android One devices will be one of the 1st few handsets to receive the update.
Android Lollipop has a lot to offer, so if you are someone who desires the latest android then this device is a great option.

Verdict:
The device is a bang for the bucks. Performs great, has a great build quality, will get updated for the next 2 years directly from Google (Super Fast updates), great developer support (if you plan on flashing Custom Roms). What else does someone need from a device with such a small price tag?
I'm pretty much satisfied with the device and I'd easily recommend this to anyone who needs a device that isn't crappy and has a super small price tag.

Rating:  7.5/10


Please feel free to like, share my review if you liked it and follow me on Google+ for all the latest updates and teasers.
Enjoy !! 

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Posted in Android One, KitKat, Review

REDMI 1S REVIEW:

The Redmi 1S, I guess most of you might have heard about this device. You would be thinking why the hell am I posting about the Redmi 1S so late. The reason is pretty simple, it went on sale on 2nd September 2014 in India via Flipkart. The stock had only 40,000 pieces and almost 2,00,000 people registered for the Flash Sale. It went out of stock within 4.2s and one needs superhuman reflexes to buy it. { I am lucky, I have superhuman reflexes} :)

So I ordered it and the phone didn't ship. One week passed and finally the phone shipped and took 3 days to reach my place. So here's a spec rundown:
Screen: 4.7inches with a 720p resolution
Processor: 1.6Ghz quad-core Snapdragon 400
Graphics: Adreno 305
RAM: 1GB
Storage: 8GB Internal and supports microSD upto 64GB.
Camera: 8MP Rear Camera and  a 1.6MP Front Camera.
Battery: 2050 mAh

So is the device worth the trouble and wait ??? Lets find out.

Build: The one thing that came into my mind after holding the device for the 1st time was that "It's heavy and weighs almost equal to the One M8", well that's a good thing and the device feels solid.
The 2nd thing that caught my attention were the RED navigation buttons. I just love the black and red combination and anything that has a black n red combination wins my heart..
The device feel pretty strong and is well build all around. The ports, buttons all feel sturdy and the Metal Gray color adds a premium feel to the device. Considering the price i.e. Rs5999 (Approx $98) {Less than half the price of the Moto G 2nd Gen} the build quality is wonderful and hats off to Xiaomi they nailed it.

The Metal Gray shade with the classy MI logo

The buttons feel great and offer great feedback. Impressed !

The front with the lovely RED navigation buttons

Performace: The Snapdragon 400 clocked at 1.6ghz performs very well and is capable enough to handle almost any task we throw at it easily. But the bottleneck is created because of the 1GB Ram and one may face a little lag or slowdown and sometimes a 3-4s delay in opening up of an app in the Play Store. This maybe because of the device running Android 4.3 with the MIUI skin on top of it.
The device is cable enough to play most of the recent games easily and performs great. Maybe a software update would fix the few issues that I encountered but these issues do not affect the overall usability of the device. In short it performs great or should I say way better than the other budget competition out there..

Battery Life: The 2050mAh battery is very capable. It performs great and gets the phone though a day of moderate use easily. It gives around 4-4.5h of screen-on time with moderate usage. So the battery life of the phone is great and yeah another plus point the battery is removable, so you can carry an additional battery on road trips etc and stay connected for even longer.

Storage: The phone has 8GB of internal storage and the user gets around 6GB of storage but the device supports microSD card upto 64GB and it even supports OTG. So storage is no big issue at all.

Usability: The MIUI rom is very famous for its customization capabilities and ease of use and as the device runs the MIUI rom {Android 4.3 right now, will be updated soon}it's ease of use is nothing to talk about. However there are a few apps that come preinstalled and are in Chinese so I was unable to understand them and sometimes they would send some notifications in Chinese but the plus point here is that the user can uninstall them if he/she wants. The experience is really charming and if you want to try the ROM out, well there are a lot of tutorials out there on how to flash different custom roms.  So you can give it a try if you want but the risk is all yours.

Here are a few screens of the UI:

                         
                         

Running Android 4.3

The general settings

The quick settings.

Camera: The 8MP primary camera performs great, way better than most budget devices out there and a lot better than the 5MP disaster on the 1st Gen Moto G. Considering the price point i.e Rs 5,999 or $98 which is almost half of the Moto G and a little cheaper than the Moto E I'd say Motorola needs to learn. Who the hell says you cant get a front camera on such a low priced device because it didn't fit the budget {Pointing towards the MOTO E}. Xiaomi managed to get a 8MP rear facing camera with LED Flash and a 1.6MP front camera, Motorola should learn. Well sorry I went a little off topic... Now back to the camera performance, the front facing camera is good enough for selfies and video calls. The camera performance is great GOOD WORK Xiaomi !!

Overall Experience:
Simply beautiful, it's almost the perfect smartphone. It performs great, it's built beautifully, has a beautiful screen and is backed up by great developer support. There are a few shortcomings like the occasional lag etc but they do not affect the overall usability and I guess will be fixed up soon when the next update hits the device. So in my view the device is way better than the competition out there (I guess you'll understand who i'm pointing towards).

Pros:
1) Great display.
2) Performs great.
3) Nice camera.
4) Great battery life.
5) Killer pricing.

Cons:
1)After Sales / Service Center.
2) Troublesome process for purchasing the device. + Long wait.

But in the end all that I have to say is this device is the new BUDGET KING and there's no competition in it's way. Xiaomi you nailed it and anyone who's looking for a new device and has a tight budget then this is the one android phone that isn't crappy and is a total bang for the bucks.


But yeah I'm eagerly waiting for the Android One devices which are expected this October. Feel free to share this post and leave a comment in the comment section below. Enjoy :)

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Posted in Android, Redmi 1S, Review, Xiaomi

Asus Zenfone 5 Review:

Asus launched their Zenfone lineup in India last month and they offered great specs at a price lower than the competition. The Asus Zenfone lineup is Flipkart exclusive.

The lineup consists of: 

1) Asus Zenfone 4 (Rs 5999 = 98 US Dollars) {Aimed to compete with the Moto E}. 

2) Asus Zenfone 5 (Rs 9999 for 8GB & Rs 13990 for the 16GB i.e. 163 US Dollars & 228 US Dollars respectively) {Aimed to compete with the Moto E} 

3) Asus Zenfone 6 (Rs 16999 = 277 US Dollars approx) 

The device I managed to get my hands on (thanks to a friend) was the Asus Zenfone 5 8GB Model.

My initial impressions after holding the device were:

1) It's well built (Asus got it right, as always!!)

2) It's nicely designed, its easy to operate with one hand and doesn't feel uncomfortable.

3) Loved the concentric circle design on the bottom (Similar to the Zenbook series).

The specifications of the device are as follows: 

Screen- 5inch IPS Display, packing 294ppi with the Asus TruVivid Technology.

Processor - 1.6Ghz Dual Core Intel Atom Z2560 Processor with Hyper Threading.

RAM- 2GB 

GPU- PowerVR SGX 544 MP2

CAMERA - Primary = 8MP PixelMaster with auto focus, Secondary = 2MP

Storage - 8GB (Internal), expandable upto 64GB (with microSD card)

Android - 4.3 (Jelly Bean) Upgradable to 4.4 (KitKat)

The Zenfone 5 is a well built device, it feels like a premium smartphone. The device runs Android 4.3 with the Zen UI on top of it, and I didn't experience any lags at all. The 5 inch IPS display is sharp and offers great viewing angles, the display packs 294ppi which is close enough to the 300 mark and I couldn't differentiate between the pixels. It's a great display. 

The front looks fabulous!! 

 The Zen UI splashes a great number of features and it has a few pre-installed apps, which makes it easy on the resources, providing a lag free experience. The device packs 2GB of RAM, an Intel Atom 1.6Ghz Dual core CPU with hyper threading and a PowerVR GPU all the three combined allows the device to perform like a boss. It can take on any task we throw at it and it doesn't lag at all. Gaming is a charm, it played Asphalt 8 on high and Fifa without any lag or shutter. 

Coming to the battery life the device is powered by a 2110 mAh battery which is capable enough to keep the device running for about a day with moderate usage and provided a 4h 15m screen on time with heavy usage. 

The 8MP primary camera does a great job with the PixelMaster technology and the 2MP front facing camera is good enough for video calls and selfies. 

The design ? Well it would have looked like a bland phone if it didn't have the concentric circle bar at the bottom. The design is simple and the phone has a textured back which provides a better grip and the volume rockers and power key are placed at a convenient position which makes operating the Zenfone 5 with one hand an easy job.

The volume rocker and power button are sturdy.

The textured back gives a nice grip to the device but felt a little harsh.

The concentric circle bar at the bottom helps it stand out from the crowd, have a closer look at it: 

Overall, the Asus Zenfone 5 is a bang for the bucks. It performs like a beast, feels solid in the hand, has a great camera with tons of features. In my opinion the Zenfone 5 is a great option for anyone looking for an android device that performs well and is a value for money device. 

Ill be posting up a few camera samples and a video sample soon !

Feel free to share your opinions in the comment section below.  Enjoy!!

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Posted in Android, Asus, Review, Zenfone