A 4inch screen phone may seem small today it certainly did to me as I put my own phone away for the duration of this test but as I got used to it I found it did everything I needed so this is not only about the phone but also the service.
Buy Now...
click image to enlarge
To test the service I deliberately went to several places that I know are ‘dead spots’ where my own phone struggles, one such place gave a good service, another that is notorious dead spot on the line from Waterloo to Wimbledon where you so frequently here peoples conversations come to stop with ‘Hello, Hello’ again still in service.
It is 12x6.5x1cm and weights 111grams.
The right side has on/off button and below this the volume rocker. The centre of the base has micro USB input for charging and the centre of the top 3.5mm socket for headphones. On the back 2.5cm down from the top centrally positioned is the camera. Beside this is one speaker and the other is on the face above the screen.
The viewable screen is 8.6x5.3cm which gives the notional diagonal imperial measurement of 4inches.
For the first couple of days of use this seemed small but after that as it did all I needed it seemed less important, probably only web browsing where you see less of the web page did I really notice it. I downloaded the Apps I regularly use the most important to me is Bus Countdown in day to day travel around town.
From empty when switch off a full charge took 200minutes.
A full 8½ hours of use streaming to Bluetooth emptied the battery. In my normal day to day use a full battery lasted close to three days.
There is a notch bottom right just behind the screen that allows you with care to keep your fingernail when you remove the back, this gives access to the battery, the full size SIM and any micro SD card you insert.
So a few facts about the phone it runs Android Kitkat 4.4 (the previous to current main release). It supports Bluetooth 4 and it works which not all Android 4.4 devices do. It has 4GB ROM and 512 MB RAM. The screen is 480x800. The camera is 2MP. The phones processor is a 1GHz dual core offering. The battery is 1400mAh.
The specifications in the above paragraph are not the greatest you may notice a little drag with the 1GHz processor when used on Wi-Fi but it gets there. While there are larger and higher resolution screens this was quite readable.
Also in the box are a set of earbuds, Quick Start Guide, micro USB to USB cable and charger plug.
The one thing I missed was the ability to insert an OTG (On The Go) device which I normally transfer a range of files to test on phones, yes it was easy enough to use my PC to transfer these to a Micro SD Card and do it that way but most recent phones normally seem to support OTG these days.
I was happy with the service offered by Vodafone, the handset while compact lacked some oomph and OTG.
If you are happy with this 3G phone it can be purchased from Vodafone for £40 on PAYG in either black or white.
http://shop.vodafone.co.uk/shop/pay-as-you-go/vodafone-smart-first-6-payg/sku86188-black
!!
Comment by paul_smart, 26 June 2015 12:18