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liam_on_linuxSo... when the lack of apps for my beloved Blackberry Passport, and the issues with running sideloaded Android apps, became problematic, I decided to check out a cheap Chinese Android Phablet.
(P.S. The Passport is for sale! Let me know if you're interested.)
The Passport superseded a Samsung Galaxy Note 2, which subsequently got stolen, unfortunately. It was decent, occasionally sluggish, ran an elderly version of Android with no updates in ages, and had a totally useless stylus I never used. It replaced an iPhone 4 which replaced an HTC Desire HD, which replaced a Nokia Communicator E90 -- the best form-factor for a smartphone I've ever had, but nothing like it exists any more.
I wanted a dual-core or quad-core phablet, bigger than 5.5", with dual SIM and a memory card. That was my starting point. I don't have or use a tablet and never have -- I'm a keyboard junkie. I spend a lot of time surfing the web, on social networks, reading books and things on my phone. I wanted one as big as I could get, but still pocketable. My nicked Samsing was 5.5" and I wanted a little larger. I tried a 6" phablet in a shop and wanted still bigger if possible. I also tried a 6.8" Lenovo Phab Pro in a shop and that was a bit too big (but I might be persuaded -- with a tiny bezel, such a device might be usable).
I looked at several sites -- the main 2 are:
* Coolicool -- http://coolicool.com/
* GearBest -- http://www.gearbest.com/
I've also been told DX.com is good ( http://www.dx.com/ ) but not tried it myself.
... and Googled in general. I found tons of them. I even started to built a spreadsheet to compare them, there were so many.
So I started looking for things to eliminate certain offerings.
Old models are easy to eliminate. 512MB RAM or something? Too little, strike that line out. I wanted at least 2GB. Tiny amount of Flash? 2, 4, 8GB Flash -- strike that line out.
Then it got a bit harder and needed to pay closer attention to the specs.
So then I started looking at Android versions.
Android 4.2 was the oldest I'd consider. It's the last version to play Flash, which is handy, but it's really old now. That had mostly already gone with the models with very low memory or storage.
Android 4.4 is OK, but still old.
So I looked for devices with Android 5.1 (as 5.0 and 5.0.x were buggy and leaked memory).
Bing, everything went away. The iRulu Victory v3 was the only one left, so I bought one.
Basically, now, there are 3 layers in the market.
There's high-end, low-end, and a poorly-defined layer in between.
There are premium big-name devices: Samsung, LG, Sony, HTC, Google Nexus. These are typically poor at what I consider useful extras like dual-SIM, memory card slots, removable batteries. But on the other hand, they abound in very hi-res screens (even with pointless gimmickry like curved screens or bevelled edges), extras like fingerprint readers and NFC and so on that I don't want. Even external expansion connectors like headphone sockets are now disappearing. They are 3x -- 4x the price of low-end devices.
There's the low-end: mostly Chinese, you've never heard of them. Basic but workable. Beware of ancient versions of Android, tiny amounts of memory and Flash, very slow processors or very low-res screens. As of last year, if it's less than £100, it's junk.
But they extend upwards slightly into decent, usable, cheap phones (and tablets, I guess -- I've not looked.)
The high end of the Chinese no-brand generics blurs into the mid-range of smaller brands.
Lenovo sits here, perhaps unexpectedly. Internationally it's a PC company but in its home market it makes hundreds of phones and tablets that non-Chinese markets rarely see. On international sale are about 1% of its models. It has some tempting devices and next time I might go for one, but as ever, they're always compromised -- the memory card is in SIM slot 2, the batteries aren't removable, etc.
Some of the semi-premium brands sit here too -- Huawei, Asus, Xiaomi.
A bit more expensive, but better build quality and support. Software-wise, you might get updates, which is good, but then again, you'll get some horrible customised skin on Android, and preloaded crapware, which is bad.
There are also smaller European companies, making deals with unheard-of Chinese vendors, rebranding them and offering European-customised Android and a bit of after-sales support. If you want to buy in the UK and are scared of dealing directly with China or whatever, this is a good choice.
Main examples:
* WileyFox -- https://www.wileyfox.com/
* OnePlus -- https://oneplus.net/uk/
So, the iRulu Victory v3 I'm currently using...
https://www.irulu.com/phone/p-irulu-victory-v3-smartphone-6.5-inch-4g-lte-unlock-cell-phone-android-5.1-gsm-wcdma-ips-touch-screen-qualcomm-quad-core-gms-certified_1123492.html
I bought it off eBay, new, from Singapore.
I found the best site for checking specs is GSMArena but there are others, e.g.
http://www.devicespecifications.com/en/model/502a3723
It's cheap and plasticky, but it works and it cost £125 new. I spent an extra fiver on a flip case, from a different vendor on eBay. It's one of those where you replace the back cover and the case attaches to that. Another fiver bought a pack of screen protectors. I'll only ever need one, but it was cheaper to buy 5 than 3. I made a balls up of fitting the first one, so I got a shop to do the next, and they did a lovely job.
It's a huge, fairly high-spec phablet for the money -- 2GB RAM, 16GB Flash, both Dual SIM and a µSD slot. (Often makers/vendors claim this but a memory card goes in the 2nd socket. I needed dual SIM plus a memory card.)
The only downside is that there's no compass. Not no compass app -- that's trivial -- no compass chip. Makes navigation on foot trickier. Not a problem in a car but I very rarely need that .
It's huge but it's light as the case and frame aren't metal. As it's not Gorilla Glass or other super-tough screen covering, I regard a screen protector and a hard case as essential. I've dropped it once or twice and it's not cracked or anything yet.
It fits in most trouser pockets fine, even jeans, and it's a talking point and conversation starter because it's so big. But then I have huge hands and can just, barely, use this one-handed.
The battery life is poor, despite an alleged 3000 mAh battery. I carry a power bank. I need to reboot daily, and carefully move all apps that can be moved from internal storage to my memory card.
The iRulu isn't lasting well. I have occasionally errors with the SIM not registering, the backlight sometimes flickers, and the volume-down key no longer works. I have to press volume up and then use a fingertip to move the onscreen slider. However, it remains usable. If it lasts a year, I'll be happy. If it only lasts 9 months, for the money, I won't be gutted. In my experience, premium-brand Android phones are on their last legs after 2 years. If my ChiPhone lasts half as long but costs a quarter of the money, I'm quids in. If it lasts a third as long and costs a quarter, I'm still good. If it lasts a third and costs a third, it's still not bad -- I'm better off if it gets lost or stolen.
A tip of the hat to my mate Louis Dobson ( http://thegentlemansnapper.blogspot.cz/ ) who told me that this was an option right after I bought my Samsung Galaxy Note 2, about 3 years ago. Go adopt one of his dogs.
(P.S. The Passport is for sale! Let me know if you're interested.)
The Passport superseded a Samsung Galaxy Note 2, which subsequently got stolen, unfortunately. It was decent, occasionally sluggish, ran an elderly version of Android with no updates in ages, and had a totally useless stylus I never used. It replaced an iPhone 4 which replaced an HTC Desire HD, which replaced a Nokia Communicator E90 -- the best form-factor for a smartphone I've ever had, but nothing like it exists any more.
I wanted a dual-core or quad-core phablet, bigger than 5.5", with dual SIM and a memory card. That was my starting point. I don't have or use a tablet and never have -- I'm a keyboard junkie. I spend a lot of time surfing the web, on social networks, reading books and things on my phone. I wanted one as big as I could get, but still pocketable. My nicked Samsing was 5.5" and I wanted a little larger. I tried a 6" phablet in a shop and wanted still bigger if possible. I also tried a 6.8" Lenovo Phab Pro in a shop and that was a bit too big (but I might be persuaded -- with a tiny bezel, such a device might be usable).
I looked at several sites -- the main 2 are:
* Coolicool -- http://coolicool.com/
* GearBest -- http://www.gearbest.com/
I've also been told DX.com is good ( http://www.dx.com/ ) but not tried it myself.
... and Googled in general. I found tons of them. I even started to built a spreadsheet to compare them, there were so many.
So I started looking for things to eliminate certain offerings.
Old models are easy to eliminate. 512MB RAM or something? Too little, strike that line out. I wanted at least 2GB. Tiny amount of Flash? 2, 4, 8GB Flash -- strike that line out.
Then it got a bit harder and needed to pay closer attention to the specs.
- Dual SIM but one of them is the card slot -- strike that line out.
- Not an ARM chip (e.g. Intel) -- strike that line out.
- No removable battery -- strike that line out. (I didn't think to check that spares are available for mine. They aren't. :-( )
- Low-res screen. At least 720P is normal now. 1280*600 is grainy and low-res these days. Anything less than 720P across (i.e. the narrow axis) got struck out.
So then I started looking at Android versions.
Android 4.2 was the oldest I'd consider. It's the last version to play Flash, which is handy, but it's really old now. That had mostly already gone with the models with very low memory or storage.
Android 4.4 is OK, but still old.
So I looked for devices with Android 5.1 (as 5.0 and 5.0.x were buggy and leaked memory).
Bing, everything went away. The iRulu Victory v3 was the only one left, so I bought one.
Basically, now, there are 3 layers in the market.
There's high-end, low-end, and a poorly-defined layer in between.
There are premium big-name devices: Samsung, LG, Sony, HTC, Google Nexus. These are typically poor at what I consider useful extras like dual-SIM, memory card slots, removable batteries. But on the other hand, they abound in very hi-res screens (even with pointless gimmickry like curved screens or bevelled edges), extras like fingerprint readers and NFC and so on that I don't want. Even external expansion connectors like headphone sockets are now disappearing. They are 3x -- 4x the price of low-end devices.
There's the low-end: mostly Chinese, you've never heard of them. Basic but workable. Beware of ancient versions of Android, tiny amounts of memory and Flash, very slow processors or very low-res screens. As of last year, if it's less than £100, it's junk.
But they extend upwards slightly into decent, usable, cheap phones (and tablets, I guess -- I've not looked.)
The high end of the Chinese no-brand generics blurs into the mid-range of smaller brands.
Lenovo sits here, perhaps unexpectedly. Internationally it's a PC company but in its home market it makes hundreds of phones and tablets that non-Chinese markets rarely see. On international sale are about 1% of its models. It has some tempting devices and next time I might go for one, but as ever, they're always compromised -- the memory card is in SIM slot 2, the batteries aren't removable, etc.
Some of the semi-premium brands sit here too -- Huawei, Asus, Xiaomi.
A bit more expensive, but better build quality and support. Software-wise, you might get updates, which is good, but then again, you'll get some horrible customised skin on Android, and preloaded crapware, which is bad.
There are also smaller European companies, making deals with unheard-of Chinese vendors, rebranding them and offering European-customised Android and a bit of after-sales support. If you want to buy in the UK and are scared of dealing directly with China or whatever, this is a good choice.
Main examples:
* WileyFox -- https://www.wileyfox.com/
* OnePlus -- https://oneplus.net/uk/
So, the iRulu Victory v3 I'm currently using...
https://www.irulu.com/phone/p-irulu-victory-v3-smartphone-6.5-inch-4g-lte-unlock-cell-phone-android-5.1-gsm-wcdma-ips-touch-screen-qualcomm-quad-core-gms-certified_1123492.html
I bought it off eBay, new, from Singapore.
I found the best site for checking specs is GSMArena but there are others, e.g.
http://www.devicespecifications.com/en/model/502a3723
It's cheap and plasticky, but it works and it cost £125 new. I spent an extra fiver on a flip case, from a different vendor on eBay. It's one of those where you replace the back cover and the case attaches to that. Another fiver bought a pack of screen protectors. I'll only ever need one, but it was cheaper to buy 5 than 3. I made a balls up of fitting the first one, so I got a shop to do the next, and they did a lovely job.
It's a huge, fairly high-spec phablet for the money -- 2GB RAM, 16GB Flash, both Dual SIM and a µSD slot. (Often makers/vendors claim this but a memory card goes in the 2nd socket. I needed dual SIM plus a memory card.)
The only downside is that there's no compass. Not no compass app -- that's trivial -- no compass chip. Makes navigation on foot trickier. Not a problem in a car but I very rarely need that .
It's huge but it's light as the case and frame aren't metal. As it's not Gorilla Glass or other super-tough screen covering, I regard a screen protector and a hard case as essential. I've dropped it once or twice and it's not cracked or anything yet.
It fits in most trouser pockets fine, even jeans, and it's a talking point and conversation starter because it's so big. But then I have huge hands and can just, barely, use this one-handed.
The battery life is poor, despite an alleged 3000 mAh battery. I carry a power bank. I need to reboot daily, and carefully move all apps that can be moved from internal storage to my memory card.
The iRulu isn't lasting well. I have occasionally errors with the SIM not registering, the backlight sometimes flickers, and the volume-down key no longer works. I have to press volume up and then use a fingertip to move the onscreen slider. However, it remains usable. If it lasts a year, I'll be happy. If it only lasts 9 months, for the money, I won't be gutted. In my experience, premium-brand Android phones are on their last legs after 2 years. If my ChiPhone lasts half as long but costs a quarter of the money, I'm quids in. If it lasts a third as long and costs a quarter, I'm still good. If it lasts a third and costs a third, it's still not bad -- I'm better off if it gets lost or stolen.
A tip of the hat to my mate Louis Dobson ( http://thegentlemansnapper.blogspot.cz/ ) who told me that this was an option right after I bought my Samsung Galaxy Note 2, about 3 years ago. Go adopt one of his dogs.
