Comments Locked

30 Comments

Back to Article

  • londedoganet - Monday, February 29, 2016 - link

    No LTE Web Browsing battery test? Are the bands incompatible?
  • Brandon Chester - Monday, February 29, 2016 - link

    I was having difficulties getting sufficient reception due to the weather conditions. The phone has to be placed in a place where it's vulnerable to snow and rain. I'll try to run it at a later point if it's possible.
  • tipoo - Monday, February 29, 2016 - link

    Looks like a fair jump over the Moto G for around the same price, nice to see this space heating up. I think the midrange is honestly where the excitement is now, the high end has gotten boring.

    Though, neither this nor the G are close to taking down the Zenfone 2 for GPU performance yet in the same price category, impressively. I'm unsure if the early issues with the 2 were worked out (battery life, screen color shifting to save power), but for gaming that has both trumped. I'd like to see the Zenfone 3.
  • blanarahul - Monday, February 29, 2016 - link

    If wonder what the real life performance /power differences are between S610 and S615 considering that the extra four cores barely make any difference. Also S610 should be a little cheaper as well.
  • usama_ah - Monday, February 29, 2016 - link

    I purchased one from Amazon the day it was released for my mom. Prior to that she was using my OG Moto X on AT&T in Chicago.

    She's extremely pleased with the phone. There was a slight learning curve going from a near stock launcher to this OS but she loves the big, bright screen and the fingerprint unlock. Camera is good enough for her too. She has noticed the slight UI jankyness while moving about but that's not something she cares about. She uses WhatsApp with family and gets a LOT of pictures and videos so now she doesn't have to delete to make room because she can move them to a microSD card (I set it up to be one button transfer to microSD since WhatsApp doesn't let you default media there). She loves the battery life, and usually charges every other day. She loves the build quality and color (we got her the gold). Works well on AT&T LTE in Chicago and soon she'll be running dual SIM when she goes overseas.

    Overall I'm very happy with the purchase, and more importantly she is. It was hard for me to not get her the Moto G but I think we made the right choice, for her. If I was to recommend one to a friend I might still recommend the Moto G first because of customization and flexibility, closer to stock interface. Maybe this year's G will also have a fingerprint reader, we'll see.
  • zeeBomb - Monday, February 29, 2016 - link

    Phone doesn't surprise me due to all the phones I looked at MWC, LOL.
    Brandon, if you get the chance, review the Alcatel Idol 4!
  • fanofanand - Monday, February 29, 2016 - link

    So it barely beats year old Motorola and Asus phones that sell for the same price. We are impressed because it has a little aluminum? I'd rather a plastic phone with Marshmallow, a better LTE radio, faster ram, and more NAND. This seems like year old specs at the launch, which shouldn't impress anyone.
  • formerglory - Monday, February 29, 2016 - link

    Fun fact: the Honor 5X's screen *doesn't* have an oleophobic covering, thus the screen protector that comes with it (that has a coating). Ideally, you're not supposed to remove it, or else suffer the wrath of a constantly fingerprint-covered screen.
  • revanchrist - Monday, February 29, 2016 - link

    This is a low end phone priced at mid range price. Man, look at the Snapdragon 616, it's manufactured on 28nm LP. How old was that process already? I'll consider the 28nm HPM Snapdragon 650 and 652 and even the 14nm LPP Snapdragon 625 as mid range, but not the Snapdragon 615 and 616 thanks.
  • beginner99 - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link

    My though as well. I don't see the midrange except in price. A53's are too slow for midrange and if you really use those, take ones made on 14/16 nm and hence better battery life. The charts clearly show you are better off with a 2 year old flagship.
  • UtilityMax - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link

    Indeed. If the device is mid-range, shouldn't it be at least competitive with a three year old flagship SoC, such as the Snapdragon 800? Looking at the benchmarks, SD800 is still much faster at least in single threaded benchmarks. But the market "has spoken". We "need" 64-bit and eight cores they said..
  • LiverpoolFC5903 - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link

    I'd like to see the A53s clocked much higher (2.2-2.5 ghz) in mid range chipsets to make it competitive with previous gen Snapdragon 800 socs. SIngle threaded performance is still very critical in terms of javascript performance. A high clocked A53 based soc with dual channel RAM and a decent GPU is more than enough for most applications.
  • UtilityMax - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link

    My thought too. Come on people. The Snapdragon 800 is three years old. Can't we have that level of performance in at least in a midrange smartphone these days? Instead, we see "midrange" devices with SoC performance that's about on the level with the original iPhone 5.
  • LiverpoolFC5903 - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link

    Last years 'mid range' Qualcomm chipsets were laughably underpowered. Hell , my 3 year old Optimus G Pro with a 1.7ghz Snapdragon 600 and Adreno 320 2nd gen GPU is STILL faster than Snapdragon 615 phones. Dual channel memory and GPU makes a LOT of difference to the overall 'feel' and usability of a smartphone. And obviously single threaded performance, which is very important in day to day user experience, needs to be at least at the Snapdragon 800/801 range in 2016.
  • zodiacfml - Sunday, March 6, 2016 - link

    Right. There are some phones still available with those chips previous the 810 for a near mid-range price.
  • mmsmsy - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link

    How about Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 with Mediatek X10 or the Pro version with Snapdragon 650? In my opinion way more important phone to review that this one.
  • LiverpoolFC5903 - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link

    I dont believe Anandtech have done a review of ANY phone with the Helio X10. Would love to see a detailed analysis of that chipset, especially compared to erstwhile flagship socs from the 800 series.
  • Badelhas - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link

    True.
    But what I really want to see is AnandTech reviewing the HTC VIVE! :)
  • Ryan Smith - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link

    It's on my list of things I want to do.=)
  • LukaP - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link

    Hell the Mi4c is only a bit more expensive than this, and offers a S808 and otherwise pretty high end specs... This is a decisively lowend device.
  • blzd - Wednesday, March 2, 2016 - link

    The key difference being you can actually buy a Honor 5x device for it's MSRP with a valid warranty. It even supports North American carriers, quite the selling feature if you ask me.

    It's easy to compare Xiaomi phones by price only and ignore all the other factors that make it a non-choice for 99% of North Americans.
  • mmsmsy - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link

    I don't know how this is a no choice for North Americans or any other? The reception is there, You can surf the web no problem. Both of my parents have Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 for a month now and they live in Chicago. I have it in England and 4G reception as well. About the warranty... I prefer to buy cheaper a better all-round phone and wait a month or two for replacement if something happens, which never happened for me. Lucky, but also my phones rarely break... never to be precise actually.
  • LukaP - Saturday, March 5, 2016 - link

    Not everyone in the world is a north american ;) Here in europe we can get xiaomi for a very decent price with warranty, and have LTE connectivity.
  • Mikuni - Tuesday, March 1, 2016 - link

    inb4 $300 in Europe.
  • TheinsanegamerN - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link

    WHO CARES if this thing has a metal back? it's going to go into a case either way. Id rather see more competent internals than a "premium" back.
  • mmsmsy - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link

    Well, I do since I would never put my phone in a case to make it a chunky brick. I see no point in damaging the feel in hand and overall ergonomics with a case, since I take good care of my devices.
  • Sunbya - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link

    Thank you! for you detail information

    Best,
    Sunbya - <a href="http://bestgng.com/">BestGnG</a>
  • ViperVisor - Saturday, March 5, 2016 - link

    Big disagreement with this...

    "Huawei also includes some features like the ability to quick launch apps when you scan a certain finger, but I think this is completely overcomplicating the entire interaction. On top of that, the scanner is quite small and the position of it makes it difficult to use with any finger other than your index finger, so I don't see that feature as being very useful."

    It's a great feature I use all the time. Picking it up and placing on the sensor my Pointer or Middle of my left hand Unlocks and pops open Pandora or Metal App. Pick up and hold the phone with my left hand and scan my right pointer finger at a right angle to the sensor *because that is how I registered the fingerprint* opens up Twitter.

    And I still got 2 more prints I need to decide on what to use for.

    Plus the back touchscreen type little features it allows. Back Button, Home Button, Shortcut menu pull-down.
  • jacksonjacksona - Thursday, March 17, 2016 - link

    welcome to
    W_W_W_._a_j_k_o_b_e_s_h_o_e_s._C_O_M

    n i k e $38
    gggggggggg
  • sany666 - Monday, March 28, 2016 - link

    How is google maps performance & gps accuracy?? as it lacks gravitation sensor and doesnt support beidou

Log in

Don't have an account? Sign up now