MediaTek triggered quite a revolution with the quad-core MT6589 series of chipsets. Xiaomi’s Hongmi is perfect testimony to how the chipset (a higher clocked version of it, actually) turned tables; the Hongmi was made available at ‘just’ $130 which was quite a sensation back then. MediaTek has come out with many new chipsets since then, but is the quad-core MediaTek MT6589T still relevant? To answer that, we tested the THL W200 from last year. Retailing at a little over $100 now, the THL W200 is again another ‘budget’ phone. However, it has a few things going its way when compared to other, newer phones. A beautiful design and sturdy build are a couple of the traits that the W200 displays in general use.
Lets dig that, and a lot more in the THL W200 review!
TL;DR
THL W200 Review: Specifications
[table id=175 /]THL W200 Review: In the box
The THL W200 ships in a plain white box, something similar to what iNew ship their phones in. Here’s what you get in it:
- screen protector
- user’s manual
- earphones
- USB to micro USB cable
- charger
- THL W200 smartphone
THL W200 Review: Design, build
Most phones in or around the $100 range are either blatant clones, or generic, rounded rectanlges. However, the W200 is scores much, much higher on design terms than these other devices. Partly, the reason behind that is the fact that we’re looking at a phone that’s more than a year old, which means it has suffered numerous price cuts, which bring it to the $100 range.
The device feels extremely good in the hand. This is because of its slightly curved back, and the fact that it has reasonably slim bezels. Specifications state that the body of the phone is 8mm thick, and although I didn’t have a Vernier Caliper handy, it did feel like 8-8.5mm more or less. There’s a lot of quality in the phone, at least on the exterior. It certainly doesn’t feel like a $110 phone! The yellow colour also gave the phone an eccentric appeal. I’ve never used any phone which wasn’t black or white, and I never thought I would too. However, the THL W200’s yellow did manage to catch my fancy, but I’m just not sure how long it would be like that.
For build, I’d rate the phone 10/10, considering the price. No squeaky back, no tacky frame… like I mentioned before, it just doesn’t feel like a $110 phone (and to be honest, it isn’t). Take a look at some pictures below.
THL W200 Review: Display
The phone has a 5-inch 720p panel which is pretty beautiful to look at. It is a bit towards the saturated side, akin to AMOLED displays. However, it does have an extremely good picture quality, which reflects the overall hardware quality that THL has fused to make the W200. The screen is fairly bright as well, so readability in direct sunlight isn’t much of a problem either. The 720p resolution does suffice, unless you’re a sucker for not being able to discern between pixels with a microscope in hand.
Besides the sturdy build build and lovely design, the very attractive looking display is the phone’s best feature. In a nutshell, it has great viewing angles, high brightness and a lovely picture quality, almost everything and then more you can expect from a $110 phone.
THL W200 Review: Performance
The general performance of the W200 is up to the standards set by the MediaTek MT6582. General in the sense, transitions between various UI elements, etc. However, once you start firing up apps, it’s a completely different story. There’s a lot of difference between how this phone handles general UI and apps, which is a bit of a shame. When I first took it out of the box, I almost couldn’t fathom why MediaTek chose to make the MT6582. However, I realized once apps on the phone ran pretty slow. It certainly does feel like a 2013 phone and not one from this year.
If you use plan to use your phone for anything more than WhatsApp and WeChat, I’d strongly recommend getting the budget Cubot S168, which actually sells for lesser. The only downside would be the low-ish display resolution.
1GB of RAM is a bit of a bottleneck. 1GB RAM phones run quite a bit better on the MediaTek MT6582 as opposed to the MT6589 or even the MT6589T, as in this case. We’re not sure why that is, but the W200 isn’t the best performing $110 phone out there. Switching from app to app is pretty slow, and that doesn’t add to the multitasking abilities of the phone. If you have more than two tabs open on Chrome, it’s highly likely that the ones in the background get cached. This is just one example of an otherwise poor multitasking system.
THL W200 Review: Camera
The THL W200 packs a decent 8 mega-pixel camera. While many budget phones now have 13 mega-pixel shooters, the W200 is pretty much on par in terms of picture quality. Focus is decently fast as well, which is always a desirable trait. You probably won’t feel the need for a camera with a greater number of pixels if you don’t often put your photos on your computer/TV for viewing.
The app can sometimes be slow, which is sporadic. However, I noticed a trend of sorts here; the camera is usually slow-ish when you move from dark to bright surroundings, or vice versa. The sensor itself it a very able one in bright areas, and doesn’t do too bad in low light conditions as well. HDR is something you could make use of on the phone to get better results.
THL W200 Review: UI
Again, largely unchanged from stock like a lot of other Chinese phones. What’s good about the W200 is that even the icons aren’t force rounded, like say how they are on the Ecoo Focus. This, in my opinion, looks much better than force rounded icons which can sometimes be a mess.
If you’re into customizations and the likes, you’re probably out of luck with 3rd party ROMs built from scratch. However, rooting the phone is extremely simple, and you can make use of one of the best Xposed modules out there after that — GravityBox — to give your phone a whole new look and feel.
Rooting the W200: To root the device, simply download and install Framaroot, and select ‘install SuperSU’ and bam. To install Xposed modules, you first need to install the Xposed modules framework, which you can easily find with a Google search.
THL W200 Review: Battery life
The W200 doesn’t do very well with regards to battery. The MT6589 was MediaTek’s first ever quad-core chip, and the lack of refinement shows. The device doesn’t do more than 3:30-3:50min screen on time, which is a bit of a shame. Most other quad-core MT6582 phones get close to 5 hours of screen on, which is a lot more acceptable. Depending on your style of usage, the W200 may or may not last a day.
THL W200 Review: Other points to note
Again, there’s a notification LED on the phone which seems to work only when it indicates that the phone is being charged. We’ve encountered this on a lot of Chinese phones this year, and we can’t really fathom why the company would want to have it that way. Also, the device runs Android v4.2 Jelly Bean out of the box, which if not ancient, is certainly old enough now.
THL W200 Review: Verdict
Pros
- Superb build
- Price
- Camera
- Display
Cons
- Battery life
- Poor multitasking
- Defunct notification LED
- Android Jelly Bean
The THL W200 is an extremely well constructed phone on the outside. It comes with a quad-core processor, the older MediaTek MT6589T and 1GB of RAM to make for an entry-level smartphone in this day and age. While the device is sufficiently fast and snappy while you’re playing with its general UI, things start to get messy as more 3rd party apps start showing up. The camera is pretty usable (which goes to show that camera tech hasn’t changed all that much in the last year or so), especially with its decently powerful HDR feature. However, the phone suffers from rather poor multitasking thanks to the ageing processor. While the hardware, on the exterior, is top notch considering the $110 price, you’d probably be better off getting a phone running on the newer MT6582 chip, perhaps something like a Cubot S168.
The phone can be bought from popular e-store, Chinavasion.com who are currently offering the THL W200 for $109.99!
Still on Android Jelly Bean, what a waste. That is why most MediaTek and Chinese phones are not worth buying even at low cost. They will never be updated. When will they ever learn.
I think there is still a market for such phones for people who dont really care about getting the latest update. Not me am a greedy bastard just like almost young people nowadays i want the LATEST AND THE GREATEST!! e.g. i got 3 smartphones already OPPO F7a, Xiaomi MI4 and Huawei Honor 6 then recently i got an invite for OneplusOne and i bought it even tho i dont need it! Now i got 4 phones and no one is even texting me!
you are pathetic. loser.
Blame THL not MediaTek.
THL should be blame… Never buy from them anymore
THL makes very good phones they just don’t provide updates regularly but that’s not to say the phones aren’t good. For the hardware they use their phones run fine on 4.2 and 4.3. There isn’t that much of an improvement with Kit Kat over Jelly Bean. And there are plenty of ROM’s based off Kit Kat available for most THL phones if you really must have it.
Has ZERO to do with Mediatek. There are still hundreds of Qualcomm phones that haven’t been updated to Kit Kat yet. Mediatek has no control over what THL or any other company does. It’s like blaming Intel because HP uses Windows 7 over 8.
I thought it was because Mediatek never released the Kitkat code for the MTK6589 series..? (And in THL’s case, they’d be the last ones to provide a solid update even if they could anyway, but I’m pretty sure that not one MTK6589 series phone out there has Kitkat..?
Mediatek released it back in March but very few manufacturers did anything with it seeing as that is an archaic chip set in the world of smartphones.
A MTK-based phone with a suspicious lack of GPS mentioned in the review. I wonder why?
Don’t blame MediaTek, Lenovo S920 (MT6589) and Honor 3X (MT6592) have GPSes that work fine (not as good as GPS+Glonass but that should be obvious).
The problem is crappy manufacturers that doesn’t put the right antennas, not the MediaTek chipsets. Actually the Chinese phone with the worst ever GPS that I tried had a Qualcomm Snapdragon 200…
It’s a known problem with MTK chipsets, hence there being so many apps to fix it and guides around the net. I’ve no doubt manufacturers contribute, but to say MTK deserve no blame is a joke.
I have used about a dozen Mtek phones, none of them had problems with GPS in the US or Thailand.
Same here, it’s strange, I had a Zopo ZP998 for a while around mid-year and that got a gps fix pretty much instantly, no problems at all! But then you look around at what people are saying about the ZP998 and it’s ‘GPS Problems’ and it’s a strange one… Luck of the draw I think..?
Yea I have used phones from THL, TCL, Doogee, Kingzone, Xioami and Blu/Gionee all with MTK chipsets and none of them had any issues with GPS. The only phone I had with real GPS issues is my current Mi4 with a Snapdragon.
They do not. The problem is a combination of shit antenna design and AGPS not being active by default.
Perhaps you should learn a little instead of spouting verbatim some garbage you read online.
Right, the many people having problems with it are wrong and you’re right.
And the cheap phones that don’t use MTK chipsets and have good GPS coincidentally have better antannae.
Correlation does not equal causation. He explained the reason for the problems. You don’t seem to have much of an argument.
Still on Android Jelly Bean, what a waste. That is why most MediaTek and Chinese phones are not worth buying even at low cost. They will never be updated. When will they ever learn.
I think there is still a market for such phones for people who dont really care about getting the latest update. Not me am a greedy bastard just like almost young people nowadays i want the LATEST AND THE GREATEST!! e.g. i got 3 smartphones already OPPO F7a, Xiaomi MI4 and Huawei Honor 6 then recently i got an invite for OneplusOne and i bought it even tho i dont need it! Now i got 4 phones and no one is even texting me!
Blame THL not MediaTek.
you are pathetic. loser.
Has ZERO to do with Mediatek. There are still hundreds of Qualcomm phones that haven’t been updated to Kit Kat yet. Mediatek has no control over what THL or any other company does. It’s like blaming Intel because HP uses Windows 7 over 8.
I thought it was because Mediatek never released the Kitkat code for the MTK6589 series..? (And in THL’s case, they’d be the last ones to provide a solid update even if they could anyway, but I’m pretty sure that not one MTK6589 series phone out there has Kitkat..?
THL should be blame… Never buy from them anymore
Mediatek released it back in March but very few manufacturers did anything with it seeing as that is an archaic chip set in the world of smartphones.
THL makes very good phones they just don’t provide updates regularly but that’s not to say the phones aren’t good. For the hardware they use their phones run fine on 4.2 and 4.3. There isn’t that much of an improvement with Kit Kat over Jelly Bean. And there are plenty of ROM’s based off Kit Kat available for most THL phones if you really must have it.
A MTK-based phone with a suspicious lack of GPS mentioned in the review. I wonder why?
Don’t blame MediaTek, Lenovo S920 (MT6589) and Honor 3X (MT6592) have GPSes that work fine (not as good as GPS+Glonass but that should be obvious).
The problem is crappy manufacturers that doesn’t put the right antennas, not the MediaTek chipsets. Actually the Chinese phone with the worst ever GPS that I tried had a Qualcomm Snapdragon 200…
It’s a known problem with MTK chipsets, hence there being so many apps to fix it and guides around the net. I’ve no doubt manufacturers contribute, but to say MTK deserve no blame is a joke.
I have used about a dozen Mtek phones, none of them had problems with GPS in the US or Thailand.
They do not. The problem is a combination of shit antenna design and AGPS not being active by default.
Perhaps you should learn a little instead of spouting verbatim some garbage you read online.
Same here, it’s strange, I had a Zopo ZP998 for a while around mid-year and that got a gps fix pretty much instantly, no problems at all! But then you look around at what people are saying about the ZP998 and it’s ‘GPS Problems’ and it’s a strange one… Luck of the draw I think..?
Same here, it’s strange, I had a Zopo ZP998 for a while around mid-year and that got a gps fix pretty much instantly, no problems at all! But then you look around at what people are saying about the ZP998 and it’s ‘GPS Problems’ and it’s a strange one… Luck of the draw I think..?
Right, the many people having problems with it are wrong and you’re right.
And the cheap phones that don’t use MTK chipsets and have good GPS coincidentally have better antannae.
Yea I have used phones from THL, TCL, Doogee, Kingzone, Xioami and Blu/Gionee all with MTK chipsets and none of them had any issues with GPS. The only phone I had with real GPS issues is my current Mi4 with a Snapdragon.
Correlation does not equal causation. He explained the reason for the problems. You don’t seem to have much of an argument.
A THL 6 Pro ($116) with a Octa core and Kitkat or the THL 4000 ($99) although with a 6582 SOC but 4000mAh battery and Kitkat would be a far more interesting choice. Only GPS is not the strongest point on THL phones, something Xiaomi was able to manage with their Hongmi Mediatek phones.
My thl w200 is great. I play gt racing 2, vice city, san andreas, and many more 3d games pretty fine. once rooted install a cpu manager (I use no-frills) and choose either hotplug governor or performance for much smoother game play / multi-tasking. I also install greenify to take care of power intensive / memory hogging apps.
A THL 6 Pro ($116) with a Octa core and Kitkat or the THL 4000 ($99) although with a 6582 SOC but 4000mAh battery and Kitkat would be a far more interesting choice. Only GPS is not the strongest point on THL phones, something Xiaomi was able to manage with their Hongmi Mediatek phones.
My thl w200 is great. I play gt racing 2, vice city, san andreas, and many more 3d games pretty fine. once rooted install a cpu manager (I use no-frills) and choose either hotplug governor or performance for much smoother game play / multi-tasking. I also install greenify to take care of power intensive / memory hogging apps.
The W200 might have a nice screen, but it’s also one of the weakest in terms of strength. I bought two for my children and both screens cracked with only the lightest of knocks. Once cracked, the touch function is totally destroyed due to the multi layer construction.
I replaced them with the W200S which have Gorilla glass screens and an octo core processor.
Much better performance and increased battery life.
The W200 might have a nice screen, but it’s also one of the weakest in terms of strength. I bought two for my children and both screens cracked with only the lightest of knocks. Once cracked, the touch function is totally destroyed due to the multi layer construction.
I replaced them with the W200S which have Gorilla glass screens and an octo core processor.
Much better performance and increased battery life.
Mine will make year and a half and is serving me quite well so far. It has its downsides, but even so it get the job done. If you are buying low/mid range phone tho should look for MT6582 or MT6592.
Mine will make year and a half and is serving me quite well so far. It has its downsides, but even so it get the job done. If you are buying low/mid range phone tho should look for MT6582 or MT6592.
Andi you’re wrong about this phone. It can perform much better if it’s rooted. Gps on mine is great also led notification. Need kitkat, get the w200c.
Andi you’re wrong about this phone. It can perform much better if it’s rooted. Gps on mine is great also led notification. Need kitkat, get the w200c.
MediaTek has released the code for MT6589 series.
Lenovo has KitKat 4.4.2 for many MT6589 own devices, rom name is VibeUi 2.0
Returning to ThL, well like most here already noticed that ThL are a group of liars !
They just produce many, support NONE and this type of strategy will end bad for them and more bad for it’s customers.
ThL campaign over one year (1 year) is something like “coming soon, in a few time”
they don’t care for it’s customers, as many comp do the same, they just want to produce & sell high and support none whatsoever.
more badly is that they want u to buy each year a new device from them instead for them to software update.
anyway regarding of some might not agree with me, it happens that i do know ThL from over a year, i did work on ThL W100 on the most advanced rom ROFuSiON ThL W100, first ever made android jelly bean 4.2.2 for an ThL device.
And i do know tips & trick of MediaTek aarch.
also about ThL, a little warning for the owners of ThL T11,T100 as a trojan is deep inside of file “iLoongSceneEngine_BDA.apk”
virus discovered by me, and do please inform ThL, and patiently wait for an answer form them in the form of “coming soon, in a few days, and so on……)
my advice is to NEVER BUY FROM ThL !
roedi7.blogspot.ro
l
MediaTek has released the code for MT6589 series.
Lenovo has KitKat 4.4.2 for many MT6589 own devices, rom name is VibeUi 2.0
Returning to ThL, well like most here already noticed that ThL are a group of liars !
They just produce many, support NONE and this type of strategy will end bad for them and more bad for it’s customers.
ThL campaign over one year (1 year) is something like “coming soon, in a few time”
they don’t care for it’s customers, as many comp do the same, they just want to produce & sell high and support none whatsoever.
more badly is that they want u to buy each year a new device from them instead for them to software update.
anyway regarding of some might not agree with me, it happens that i do know ThL from over a year, i did work on ThL W100 on the most advanced rom ROFuSiON ThL W100, first ever made android jelly bean 4.2.2 for an ThL device.
And i do know tips & trick of MediaTek aarch.
also about ThL, a little warning for the owners of ThL T11,T100 as a trojan is deep inside of file “iLoongSceneEngine_BDA.apk”
virus discovered by me, and do please inform ThL, and patiently wait for an answer form them in the form of “coming soon, in a few days, and so on……)
my advice is to NEVER BUY FROM ThL !
roedi7.blogspot.ro
l