Chinese Android Phones

MidlandsM

accap1f8 wrote: »

The elephone p8 looks great alright. Would the battery of 2800mah be good enough for moderate use?
I was waiting for to buy the thl 5000 but the battery seems to be the only big difference.

if you like me and nearly everyone else is charging their phone every night, I don't think the big battery in the thl is worth the extra outlay...the elephone p8 battery would be fine I reckon. I'm very close to getting my wallet out on it, I'm just wondering that is it just too big??

Discodog

MidlandsM wrote: »

if you like me and nearly everyone else is charging their phone every night, I don't think the big battery in the thl is worth the extra outlay...the elephone p8 battery would be fine I reckon. I'm very close to getting my wallet out on it, I'm just wondering that is it just too jbig??

Cut a piece of card to it's dimensions. It's easier than trying to visualise it. The only criticism appears to be the lack of 5.7 inch screen protectors.

Sam Mac

AlanS181824 wrote: »

Not sure if it's been mentioned here but the new XiaoMi Note was announced today.

Here are the specs copied from their post on Google+.

Meet the New Redmi Note 4G/LTE with Qualcomm Snapdragon 400, Quad-Core 1.6 GHz, 2GB RAM Available on Aug 12 in China:
- 10g lighter, better experience
- Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 MSM8928 Quad-Core 1.6 GHz
- 2GB RAM + 8GB flash memory + Extensive to 64GB
- MIUI based on Android 4.4 KitKat; Can be connected to Mi Band
- 5.5 inches IPS display
- 13MP Camera
- 3100 mAh battery
- Single-SIM
- 999 RMB (~160 USD)
- TD-LTE version will be on sale from Aug 12, 2014 (next Tue); FDD-LTE version will be available from Aug 26, 2014

Those specs look the same as the Redmi note bar the 4g, but will the 4g even work over here?

Also, is the display still 720 or did they go the full 1080p?

Mezcita

Mezcita wrote: »

Just pulled the trigger on the THL 5000. I'll report back with a review once it turns up.

Right so got it today. Purchased via Gerbest from here:

http://www.gearbest.com/cell-phones/pp_68240.html

Came to about €200. Unfortunately got nabbed by customs which meant that the final price came in at about €250. Took about nine days to get here from order date to delivery via DHL. Actually only left China on Saturday so it was Gearbest who seemed to be dragging their heels about getting the order out.

So basically I'm moving over from a Nexus 4 to this. I went for it primarily because of the battery since the Nexus always died on me at around 1am. It doesn't have 4G but that's not a major issue for me as I'm with 48 since I'm between 18 and 22 in age. Honestly.

Right so first off I'm impressed with the build quality of the phone. It's got a nice feel to it and despite the fact that it's plastic on the back the silver trim around the outside does actually look good. In terms of size it's a little bit wider than the Nexus 4 but is a good centimetre taller. It's not huge though and is still easy enough to use with one hand.

It's got 4.4.2 installed as standard. There were a few bits of bloatware installed on it but most of them can be removed. It's noticeably faster than the Nexus 4 and certainly everything seems just that bit snappier than what I'm used to. Display is nice and bright. Sound via the external speakers is decent. Not amazing but certainly does the job.

The phone is dual sim but takes the old skool larger sized sim cards. Call quality is good and reception when connected to the wireless at home is also very good. No problems at all using maps to get precise location which I believe was a problem with earlier thl phones. Sorted itself in a few seconds.

Onto the battery. As I've only had it for a day I can't really comment on how long it can last for. What I have noticed is that it barely dropped after a bunch of calls and general messing about on the web. I'll come back with more info on that after a while.

Finally regarding the previous comments about the whole Lithium battery thing. Gearbest had included a load of battery related paperwork in the package which mean that DHL marked the outside of the box to indicate that it had a battery inside. Certainly didn't seem to affect the delivery time.

Overall, I'm very pleased so far. €200 for this would have been great but €250 is not the end of the world. Thanks to everyone for the advice on here. Certainly helped sway my decision. If anyone is still on the fence feel free to send on any questions.

90sBla

Khannie wrote: »

What are people's thoughts on the ZTE Nubia Z5S Mini (versus, for example the Jiayu G4S)?

edit: Bah....2000mah battery is a deal breaker.

I have a nubia z5s mini and can tell you it's a brilliant the phone. The camera on it is just amazing.
I can get a full days use out of it from 8am when I use wifi but when using data all day it's gone by about 7pm that eve.

Cracked the screen on it. Waiting on replacement part in post.

Barr

Mezcita wrote: »

Right so got it today. Purchased via Gerbest from here:

http://www.gearbest.com/cell-phones/pp_68240.html

Great review Mezcita , what about the camera - have you had a go on it yet ?

connollys

Great Review Mezcita, looks like I just bought from the wrong place

mistress_gi

For those with issues with the gps you can try this:
http://chinesetech.net/2013/10/16/mtk-phone-gps-software-fix/
works a treat on the hongmi

irishproduce

Ok, revised review of Elephone P6S from BangGood.com. I posted this elswhere on another forum recently and felt I should post here too.

So, been using the Elephone P6s from banggood.com for three months.
On opening the box, it was well wrapped, like any samsung device I suppose, it comes with a little booklet on android, not sure if it is specific to this version of android as I haven’t read it. Earphones, screen cover (although it already has a perfectly placed screen cover on it also) and a charger with an UK three pin adaptor. Google play straight out of the box too with no crapware.

Phone is solid, sturdy and robust. Nothing on it feels cheap, maybe just the little home button feels a little clickier than a samsung home button but its not a major issue. Rocker and power button are solid and feel robust. The phone is heavy, I will say that, and a little fat. I like that though, it feels better in the hand.

The audio speaker in the earpiece is not as loud as any other phone I have used but I have since discovered these can be altered with some tweaking using MTK engineer kit from playstore. It is important that one changes the volume settings using the engineer kit because for a about a month, I didn’t know of that app and so was quite frustrated as it was really hard to have a conversation anywhere with the remotest of background noise.

Bluetooth is ok, I paired with Parrot Mki9200 in the car and it works fine, nothing different than my samsung s3. One thing I noticed though, previously when getting into the car and starting it up, samsung s3 connected almost immediately whereas this elephone takes a bit longer to pair – sometimes it doesn't pair at all and I have to turn bluetooth on/ off to get it to do it. Again, not a big thing but would be better if it was as fast as s3.

Spent about 2 hours straight browsing on the phone shortly after getting it and noticed the back of it became hot. The s3 would do this too but I thought the elephone was a little hotter.

It says that it is USB OTG but it isn’t. At least when I plug in the usb stick nothing happens and when I installed OTG checker it said phone isn’t OTG either so that is a pain. I thought it was! This is a big disappointment because that is a feature I use quite a lot with the old s3, so be warned, the p6s is not USB OTG.

Wi-fi is really good. At the back of the house, where s3 couldn’t retain wifi connection, the elephone has two bars so that is impressive.
The onboard speaker isn’t very loud either but it is fine. It is a little less than the s3 and it is noticeable alright. You can alter this though with that engineering tool I mentioned earlier.

GPS is solid, picked up 9 satellites when I ran the satellite app. This is instant, no delay, it locked on to me really quickly and followed me out around the street. Used it extensively across Europe over a course of a few weeks too and again, no issues, exact same as S3. I know some have reservations about GPS on these chip sets, well this phone is not affected. GPS is great.

The hd quality is very impressive when looking at a video, the camera also is very good. Can’t really see any difference from my s3 there. Showed some people at work and they were very impressed with screen quality. The touch is bang on too, nothing to report there, exactly the same as s3, very smooth. One thing though, when I slide down fast on a webpage on my s3, it flings through a whole page and you can fly through a long page in seconds watching the page fly by. Not on this though, fast swiping doesn’t do anything so you have to keep putting your finger back on and sliding down/ upagain. Not a big thing though but would be better without that missing option.

You have to install special drivers to get the PC to recognise the phone, these are searchable on line so just be careful, it won’t connect to the PC straight out of the box – windows doesn’t recognise it correctly. Fine though once you have them installed. PM me if you can't find them online, I have them on PC.

The android version is 4.3.1 kernel 3.4.39 and it is marked January 9th 2014 – 11.48 whatever that means.
I am let down by the android version compared to the s3. I am unable to change vibration intensity as there is no option.
When I receive an sms, the screen does not light up and there is no flashing from the little light at the top either. Same goes for email. I have to periodically check the phone at work whereas previously with s3, when on silent, it would flash the little bulb to tell me an sms or call or email was received.

The gesture thing works brilliant, it is really accurate but again, that is more gimmicky, not sure that it is an important feature. Sometimes when writing sms/ email etc, the phone is starting to lag and freeze a lot but patience will get you passed it.
Something really frustrating is the internal storage. I am at the stage now that installing updates on apps can’t be done because of it.
I have 32GB SD card with lots and lots of space, I even have phone storage with nearly 10GB but the “internal storage” is almost full because only 1Gb or something is allocated to that. It is a nuisance but I have it on my to do list to resolve in the future with some googling.

Finally, the car holder I bought was for Samsung model - ECS-K200BEG - and although it isn't an exact fit (The P6S is too long) it is very snug in it with no vibrating or rattling so all good there.

All in all, it is a good buy, certainly better than €600 for a galaxy mega which it is modeled on.

Thargor

Thanks for that, there will be a notifications manager app somewhere that will solve your notification LED issue...

Mezcita

Barr wrote: »

Great review Mezcita , what about the camera - have you had a go on it yet ?

Whoops! Forgot about that. Rear facing camera is good but to be honest anything would be an improvement on the camera from the Nexus 4. Link below is a sample pic. Front facing camera seems only ok in low light conditions. It does have a nice feature where it automatically takes a picture if you hold two fingers up to it. Not in a "f.uc.k you" sort of a way. More a "I can't help myself I must take another selfie and lash it on Facebook" type of thing.
Video is excellent.

Barr

Mezcita wrote: »

Whoops! Forgot about that. Rear facing camera is good but to be honest anything would be an improvement on the camera from the Nexus 4. Link below is a sample pic. Front facing camera seems only ok in low light conditions. It does have a nice feature where it automatically takes a picture if you hold two fingers up to it. Not in a "f.uc.k you" sort of a way. More a "I can't help myself I must take another selfie and lash it on Facebook" type of thing.
Video is excellent.

Did he come in the box as well

Seems to be a great all rounder so

irishproduce

Thargor wrote: »

Thanks for that, there will be a notifications manager app somewhere that will solve your notification LED issue...

Got a handy link to it?
I tried one just there off playstore but no, no change in leds after I tried to configure it

Thargor

Id need a look at the phone first. Does anything trigger the LEDs? If you havent rooted it no LED or notification manager is going to do anything for you until its rooted.

MidlandsM

http://www.etotalk.com/elephone-p8-android-44_p5400.html


Right, my mind is made up - I'm buying this today. Been longfingering it long enough, I need a new phone, my sgs3 is fecked, and I've even gone an cut out cardboard to the size of this elephone p8 to see if its not too big, but it seems ok. There is nice looking covers for it on ebay too.

so, down to ordering it, and I NEED HELP HERE please!:P ...as i want to get it right.

First off, ordering from etotalk, and I'm going to use PPal.

now, re shipping ........I'm not going to do DHL, i fear of customs interception......

so, the options are ; EMS: Normally takes 10 to 20 business days.
$ 34.00

Airmail: Normally takes 15 to 45 business days.
Sorry,no such service.

Register Airmail: Normally takes 15 to 45 business days.
$ 20.00


Whats EMS exactly? Stong change of customs with EMS is there?

or, will registered airmail be just as good?

Re; Mod Rom - do i need to get them to do this? will I ask for chinesse apps to be removed?

Do I need to ask for playstore to be added?

Will i ask for it to be sent as a gift? sub $40 value etc?

What else am I missing?

Thanks

irishproduce

Thargor wrote: »

Id need a look at the phone first. Does anything trigger the LEDs? If you havent rooted it no LED or notification manager is going to do anything for you until its rooted.

That is probably the problem right there.
I am not sure this model can be (or has successfully been) rooted. I searched a few forums, I will look at it again at weekend.

Bacon and Cabbage

Can anyone here advise on the best way to put a custom ROM on a jiayu g4s? I basically just want to remove all the chinese apps and bloatware stuff

phunks

Bacon and Cabbage wrote: »

Can anyone here advise on the best way to put a custom ROM on a jiayu g4s? I basically just want to remove all the chinese apps and bloatware stuff

Download the jiayu.es app from the play store. You can do it straight from the app as well as change the recovery/boot animation etc.

I have this running at the moment and its working great. Instructions on how to install are included.

http://www.needrom.com/mobile/g4saosp-4-4-2-tf/

Bacon and Cabbage

Thanks for the reply, I have tried that exact ROM and used the jiayu app also but it always ends up saying "installation aborted" when I try to install it from the recovery screen, any ideas?

phunks

Bacon and Cabbage wrote: »

Thanks for the reply, I have tried that exact ROM and used the jiayu app also but it always ends up saying "installation aborted" when I try to install it from the recovery screen, any ideas?

Yeah the way that linked app is packaged cant be installed using the jiayu app. Sorry should maybe have been clearer about that. Ill link you to the tool you need now.

EDIT: Not sure if this is the exact tutorial I followed but it should work if you are trying to install the ROM I linked above.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1982587

Bacon and Cabbage

Lol I think you may have forgotten to include the link?

Bacon and Cabbage

I'm having some difficulty finding the MediaTek DA USB VCOM drivers, also where it says "MT6575_Android_scatter_emmc.txt or MT6577_Android_scatter_emmc.txt, depending on which phone you have", g4s is 6592 so which one would I choose?

Bacon and Cabbage

At what stage in the process do I actually select which ROM I am using? That tutorial doesn't make any mention of ROM's, highly confused here all help greatly appreciated!

Guys, im new to the whole importing thing in terms of phones but does anyone know what would be the risks of importing this phone? I realise id have to pay customs fair enough but can customs retain it on any other basis?

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Perfect-1-1-2GB-RAM-16GB-ROM-S5-i9600-Quad-core-MTK6582-Octa-core-MTK6592-Smart/1957019552.html

smileyj1987

Deleted User wrote: »

Guys, im new to the whole importing thing in terms of phones but does anyone know what would be the risks of importing this phone? I realise id have to pay customs fair enough but can customs retain it on any other basis?

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Perfect-1-1-2GB-RAM-16GB-ROM-S5-i9600-Quad-core-MTK6582-Octa-core-MTK6592-Smart/1957019552.html

You will be safe customs wise other then charges . They will not confiscate the phone unless it is a full one on one clone . The phone you have linked doesn't have any samsung badges on it which means you won't have it seized because it is not a counterfeit good .

Gotham

Sorry I didn't read through the whole thread, is there anywhere outside Dublin City Center that sells Chinese phones in a brick-and-mortar shop? Anywhere in a 20km-ish radius of Dublin would be great.

daytob

sorry just saw outside city centre. no idea ;(

connollys

Got the exact same email exactly one week later from Deal Extreme saying phone (THL 5000) was stopped at security due to the batteries. I have logged a ticket looking for a refund. I believe this to be a delaying tactic by them and they dont actually have stock of the phone. When I contacted customer service before this they just say to keep waiting. Frustrating.

mistress_gi

SO just a quick update on the newman I ordered back in may. I sent it back to pandawill for repair and I got it back today. I am well pissed off that they flashed a new software on it and it is all in chinese now. I managed to change the language by pressing settings buttons until I managed to find it and now I need to flash gapps and whatnot.
I am not very flashing oriented so if anyone could give me quick tutorial, link for this I would appreciate it.
At least I got it back and I am hopping it is all working now!

RossieMan

No feedback on that aliexpress seller, don't buy from them, might not be trustworthy. Use one with feedback.