A phone with a lot of metal and glass, even more cameras, with a great price.

Introductory

In the telecom, we are once again presented as a young company, produced by ELEPHONE. China, and of course, established in Shenzhen, has been manufacturing smartphones, wearable smart devices (watches and activity meters) and action cameras since 2006. Its main product line, however, is mobile manufacturing, and it is a prime example that the company is committed to research, development and production of high-end smartphones, and is offering them at affordable prices. 
The manufacturer focuses primarily on the production of innovative and user-friendly smartphones with elegant design, premium quality and superior performance. They are gaining popularity worldwide, so the company considered it important to establish service centers outside Russia, Spain, the United Kingdom and Germany to help fix any errors quickly. The number of these centers is steadily increasing, as the brand cuts out a slice of the market.

But let's talk about the main character mentioned in the title, ELEPHONE A5, a mid-range phone that stands out from the sea of ​​mobile phones because of several interesting features. I am thinking not only of the good value / value ratio of Chinese manufacturers, but also of the premium materials used, but also that there are two versions of ELEPHONE A5. When shopping for it, it is very worth paying attention, because one of the versions is 1. is specifically designed for the Member States of the European Union, while 2. for non-EU countries. I have never heard of such a regional division, but only of Chinese / global versions, but this can create a new category, and it is also a sign of how seriously they are buying the 28 member country and paying more attention to this area.

Exterior

The size of the phone in the phablet category is similar to the average, its physical parameters are 155 x 75,5 x 8,1 mm, and it is associated with around 200 grams. Its color runs under the name "Twillight" (the same thing was given by UMiDIGI One Max), it seems the manufacturers liked this fantasy name, although here the colors got the blue-black-purple color that alternates vertically on the back. The front and back of the A5 are also protected by an extremely massive glass panel, and its side is surrounded by a stainless steel frame. With this use of materials, designers have been able to get the premium feeling that we've only got in the top category for the price of this price.

The front panel is occupied by the 6,18 2246 x 1080 pixel resolution with the “naturally” notchhal 82,7 pixel resolution. With these ratios, the 20% became the front / display ratio, which is not bad, and the phone can be handled without problems without accidentally pressing the display. The proximity sensor, the light sensor, the speaker, and the two front cameras are located on the sensor island. Their resolution is 5 and 128 megapixels, the main camera is responsible for taking the picture, while the secondary camera helps in depth-depth detection. We can record video here in HD resolution, which is enough for video calling. The front panel sensors allow the face-to-face resolution of the device, examining the 0,2 feature of the face in just XNUMX seconds.

The backsheet is protected by the glass mentioned above, with the THREE image capture unit positioned here. Their resolution has become 12 + 5 + 0,3 megapixels, so as with the front panel, you can still adjust the depth of focus and the quality of night-time images is also greatly improved. We can produce video in maximum FHD quality. The LED flashes under the triple camera system, there's nothing else on the clean back cover. On the left, as you get used to the SIM tray, where you can place your 2 SIM card, or a SIM and a microSD card. On the right side, the volume control buttons are placed underneath the circular power button, and finally the fingerprint reader can be tapped into a small recess. This sensor also functions as a quick touch, which, in case of double-touch detection, triggers the preset application.

At the bottom of the phone is the USB-C connector, and two sides are just behind the cutouts of the speaker. In sound, NXP Smart PA helps ELEPHONE A5, which delivers high-quality sound effects. The 3,5 mm jack connects the phone to the latest trends, the older standard headphones can be operated with the USB-C - jack converter (big red dot!) Packed next to the device. Alternatively, you might want to use a USB-to-C tab or a wireless Bluetooth headset.

intrinsic value

The phone is powered by the MediaTek P60 (MT6771) tile, which is extremely modern and fast. Introduced in spring this year, the 12 nanometer bandwidth unit focuses on the upper third of the mid-range, exceeding Helio P70 at speeds of up to 30, and consuming less than P23 in the lower end of the board. Qualcomm's Snapdragon 630 and 636 inserts are designed to be rivals.

There are eight cores in the processor, two clusters, one for low power consumption and one for high performance. It is interesting that, unlike usual, each of the seeds can scale up to 2 GHz depending on performance. However, these seeds are not the same, the lower, energy-saving part is Cortex-A53, while the upper, power-tuned part is Cortex-A73. The graphical touching role of the processor is provided by Mali-G72 MP3, unfortunately, it is only 850 MHz instead of the factory 800 MHz clock.

The reason why MediaTek Helio P60 is interesting is the presence of a neural accelerator - though it would be a pity to conceal that its performance is not as close to the accelerator used in Huawei's Kirin 970. However, there is a better solution than using a CPU or GPU for this task. MediaTek was also clear of performance, so NeuroPilot technology was implemented, which can distribute some of the computational tasks between the neural accelerator, GPU and CPU if needed.

4 GB or 6 GB LPDDR4X is available from memory, plus 64 GB or 128 GB internal storage depending on the installation, which can be extended with a maximum of 512 GB memory card. An 4000 mAh capacity battery provides power supply, which fortunately supports the quick charge function (9V / 1,8A or 5V / 2A). Standard sensors are available, the WIFI module supports the a / b / g / n / ac standard, is capable of 2,4 GHz and 5 GHz, we get the 4.2 version from Bluetooth, we have GPS, proximity sensor, G-sensor, and light sensor. No need to worry about anyone because of the 4G, we get the B20 800 MHz LTE frequency again, as this is an important aspect of the European Union.

From a software point of view, the manufacturer, following the trend that has become more and more popular recently, is giving the phone a factory-made Android with the 8.1 version in its internal storage. This will be updated later on FOTA (Firmware Over-the-Air) for the 9 Pie system. The stock operating system is being used by more and more manufacturers, which can have more positive effects. One is that the phone can receive updates sooner because it doesn't have to be optimized for UI, just for the hardware of the phone, the CPU-GPU-RAM has more free resources without the unique launcher, and the development costs of the end user. price is also cheaper. And last but not least, we can customize the graphic interface of the phone with a unique interface if Google's desing does not suit us.

Final and price

All in all, we get a phone with the correct hardware for our money, and we can't complain about it. The package also comes with a few extra accessories that would be suitable for other manufacturers, but it doesn't. With a standard phone charger / charger / data cable, you get a USB Type-C-3,5 (jack) headphone converter and a screen protector. We are not talking about a big sum, if we take it separately, but it is a nice and practical gesture that we do not have to spend money on them or find them, especially if the jack is no longer in the phone.

We have already mentioned above that the price of the Elephone mobile phone is very affordable. The fact is that currently the larger version with 6 GB of memory and 128 GB of storage can be added to the basket for under $ 200, according to the current exchange rate it means 56 forints. I think this device can be a really good buy!

Here you can buy it: Elephone A5 - 6 GB / 128 GB

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