Elephone P6000 Review: Entry-level has never looked so good

Elephone has been making (or at least showing off) phones at the speed of light in recent times. The young company started off with entry-level and mid-range p not too long ago, and has gradually managed to build itself an audience with some more powerful offerings in the recent past. The Elephone P5000, P6000 and the upcoming P7000 happen to be some phones from this category, all of which not only look good but also have some serious specifications backing their arguments. The P6000 comes with the all new MT6732 chip, which has more than just impressed, as you shall know through the course of this review.

We spent a good couple of weeks with the Elephone P6000 to be able to test out every aspect of the phone, and here’s what we feel about this new Elephone smartphone.

Elephone P6000 Review: Unboxing

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PIjM8Me7g0&w=560&h=315]

Elephone P6000 Review: Design and Build

Right off the bat, the Elephone P6000 doesn’t look, and certainly doesn’t feel, like a generic rebranded phone. The phone has a heft to it, the sort of heft that leaves you confident about the device’s build quality. It’s made out of plastic, but a reinforced metal lip goes right around the screen for some added protection. The weight of the device also seems to suggest that the internal frame is metal rather than plastic.

If there is something that Chinese OEMs have, without doubt, gotten better about, it is build. Not just ‘original’ phones like the P6000, but we’ve seen even clone makers like No.1 give phones like the No.1 Note 4 and the No.1 Mi4 some real good material for the build on them. This comes at a price though; the P6000 is certainly not one of the thinnest phones around, but rather a phone which you would gladly keep in your pocket and be confident about it not bending while its inside.

To speak of the P6000’s design, the rear looks a lot like one of the new Meizus or even the JiaYu S3 (which we recently reviewed), the only difference being the LED flash (dual LED flash vs. single on the P6000). Many Chinese and international companies have started being very ‘minimalistic’ about branding on the phone, but Elephone certainly aren’t shy of showing off their logo on the back which stands right in the center, in chrome. It might take some a while to get used to it, but we didn’t really mind it.

What’s peculiar about the design though is that the rear casing of the phone has a larger footprint than the rest of the phone. This will certainly take some getting used to. It’s exaggerated on the chin of the phone where the rear case protrudes the most; it might sound like a massive design fail but it really doesn’t look as bad. Also, the rear is made up of some high quality toughened plastic unlike other phones which come with flexible rear covers, which is definitely a good thing. There’s no real creaking/squeaking except for a the left edge of the phone – exactly opposite to the volume and power buttons. Ours was a pre-production sample, but it doesn’t look like a design error but more a manufacturing defect… which is more worrisome.

Taking off the rear is no child’s play, especially if you like to keep your nails short. It will first take you some searching to find the notch to push your nail into (pro tip: it’s on the top edge of the phone), and then some to pry out the case inch by inch. Once done, you’re greeted by what looks like a real 2700mAh thick battery, and above that, two SIM slots (both micro SIM) and a microSD slot. Below the battery slot sits the mono speaker, some 3D printed antennae and a vibration motor (which is a little on the stronger side) exposed on one side.

Something that certainly deserves a mention is the glowing halo which also doubles up as the home button on the P6000. Many might remember something like this from the Meizu MX series of phones also. On the P6000, the glowing halo is accompanied by two capacitive buttons on either side, which don’t light up with the halo in the center. Which is not much of a problem, in fact, it also gives the glowing halo an exaggerated look since there’s no light shining anywhere around it. It lights up during charging and when there’s an unattended notification.

We’re pretty happy with the build quality on the P6000 in general, and hope that the slightly squeaky back is a one-off thing. Design wise the phone isn’t a miracle (doesn’t have the thinnest bezels also), but somehow it still manages to impress.

Elephone P6000 Review: Components and Performance

Since the P6000 is one of the first few phones to come with the MT6732, there’s naturally a buzz about how its going to perform and hold up to day-to-day situations. Up until 2014, many believed (and rightly so) that most MediaTek phones can only be entry-level troopers. However, MediaTek wants to set the record straight with their new 64-bit line up, and how well it shows.

In other words, if the MT6732 chip is going to be powering entry-level phones, entry-level is in good hands. My daily driver, for a long time, has been the Xiaomi Mi 4 now. Being a GizChina guy requires me to test phones, and more often than not the phones that I’m testing aren’t up to Mi 4 levels of performance, battery, etc. But the P6000 is an exception. The phone actually trumps the Mi 4 in a couple of departments as you shall read further, but first, lets get the specifications out of the way.

There’s nothing too fancy on the P6000. It starts with an austere 1280 x 720p display which is the first thing you notice about the phone (alongside the cool blue ‘breathing’ halo). Not the highest pixel density screen, but install an AOSP-style launcher such as Nova and the screen suddenly looks a lot better (Elephone NEED to get rid of the ugly icons!). There’s literally no backlight bleeding on the display (we’re saying this a lot more frequently about Chinese phones, shows that things are improving), and in all it looks like a very decent, more than just a display that does the job.

A 1.5GHz quad-core MT6732 CPU rocks the boat for the Elephone P6000 as mentioned before. You might be wondering why MediaTek chose to go the quad-core route after making the octa-core (which might seem like a step back) MT6592. Turns out, MediaTek have a winner on their hands. The MT6732 holds up extremely well; through the couple of weeks of usage, the CPU hasn’t disappointed once. Now, for a brand new chipset with an all-new architecture, that is some feat.

AnTuTu benchmark and other things apart, the CPU makes the device feel like something powered by a slightly more powerful Snapdragon 600… besides the added advantages of a newer and more power-efficient architecture. Now that’s nothing to write home about, if you don’t consider the pricing. The phone goes for only around the US$150 mark, which is honestly a good price to pay for what you get.

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Elephone P6000 Benchmark scores:

AnTuTu: 31,007
AnTuTu X: 30,140
GFXBench Manhattan: 505.8
GFXBench Manhattan Offscreen: 252.3
GFXBench T-Rex: 1,032
GFXBench T-Rex Offscreen: 626.1
Geekbench single-core Score: 736
Geekbench multi-core Score: 2,173

In fact, a direct competitor from the Snapdragon series happens to be the Snapdragon 615, that features on phones such as the Yu Yureka (similar pricing, but no international availability). General usage is very much on par, but we’d still give it to the MT6732 for better power optimization. It really doesn’t feel like one from the breed we’ve come to know as Chinese phones.

Power to the internals is supplied by a 2700mAh cell, which for a change looks true to its claimed capacity. The beefy cell is more than good enough for one day’s usage, pretty much regardless of how you use the phone (unless you’re just looking for a portable gaming rig — in case of which there are better alternatives). This is partly the result of a good quality cell (we can only tell from how well it works), and partly the outcome of good power optimization on MediaTek’s part.

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A typical smartphone day for me consists of a lot of browsing on WiFi, WhatsApp, 20-odd photos, and other applications like feedly, etc. with around 3-4 hours of screen on time. The P6000 more often than not had enough juice left to take me through half of the next day (the WiFi half).

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On a busy day, the phone managed more than 5 hours of screen on time as well, which is very acceptable. The phone is supposed to get an update to Android 5.0 Lollipop in the coming few days, so battery life is something you can expect will be improved.

Elephone P6000 Review: Camera

We’ve tested a lot of entry-level and mid-range MediaTek powered phones through the whole of 2014, but unfortunately not many have managed to impress us with their camera performance. The Elephone P6000 comes with a 13 mega-pixel rear camera and a 2 mega-pixel front, and considering how much the rest of the phone impressed us, we expected to be pleasantly surprised on the camera department as well… which wasn’t to be, unfortunately.

Having said that, let us also tell you that the P6000 camera is in no way substandard. It just doesn’t impress (rather, doesn’t surprise – in a good way) as much as the phone around it. Dynamic range suffers to a certain extent, but the shutter, and the camera app itself are decently fast. There’s also a general lack in sharpness which we have noticed in a lot of phones that cost about as much as the Elephone P6000.

Photos come out decent in sufficient light, but then again only if there isn’t one single bright source/area. Selecting the HDR mode helps up to an extent, but there’s still something that leaves you wanting. Pictures can also often look pixelized, the reason behind which can only be an extrapolated camera. And that is something which can be checked only by doing a teardown of the phone…

One area where the P6000 camera impresses, though, is low-light performance. In general, we found the phone to be better at low-light photos (when no flash was used ) than the Xiaomi Mi 4, if that’s any standard. It is, however, a completely different story when flash is used.

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First, there’s only a single LED flash on the P6000 which simply doesn’t cut it on a 2015 phone; second, the light from the flash disturbs the overall composition of the picture, giving it an artificial look. If you have to use the P6000 in low-light situations, and if it isn’t pitch dark, you’re recommended taking photos with the flash off!

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Elephone P6000 Review: ROM, and Other Issues to take Note of

The Elephone P6000 comes with a near-stock version of Android, running v4.4 KitKat. There’s hardly a departure from vanilla Android besides a few added features such as the customary scheduled power on/off, etc. However, one interesting addition (which according to us is software-only, so there’s a possibility of it showing on other phones) is MiraVision (more info on MediaTek website) settings.

The suite basically lets you tweak the picture to your heart’s content. Editable settings include a choice of picture mode (between Standard, Vivid and Custom). If you do select Custom, you are now given the access to color tuning (contrast, brightness, saturation) and other advanced settings such as sharpness, color temperature, etc. Other than that, it’s quite a stock ROM.

A few things that are worth mentioning about the P6000: the phone comes pre-rooted, which is certainly helpful if you plan to tweak your phone. GravityBox on the Xposed Framework is a great place to start. Also, there is a weird sort of a touch bug on the P6000, something that has to do with the wrong touch resolution. In other words, instead of registering a clean swipe, the P6000 will register your gesture say after your finger travels 5 pixels. Think continuous vs. discrete.

Elephone P6000 Review: Conclusion

It really doesn’t feel like one from the breed we’ve come to know as Chinese phones.

Despite the minor few glitches the P6000 has, the device is still a very, very strong contender in the list of budget phones. For just around US$150, you get a phone that’s way more powerful than what the money would otherwise buy you, complete with 2GB of RAM for the power user. Perhaps for the first time, battery life on a phone like this isn’t disappointing; so OEMs are slowly, but certainly getting there. If there was one thing I would’ve liked on the P6000, it most certainly would be a better camera. I’m more than happy with the 720p screen and other no-nonsense hardware that’s supplied on the phone, otherwise.

We’d like to thank CooliCool for supplying us the review unit. The phone can be had off their web-store for US$159.99 with free shipping. GizChina readers can enjoy an additional US$5 discount by using the following coupon at checkout: CICP6000

Disclaimer: We may be compensated by some of the companies whose products we talk about, but our articles and reviews are always our honest opinions. For more details, you can check out our editorial guidelines and learn about how we use affiliate links.

About the author
Yash Garg
Yash is a blogger by profession, builder of things by passion and foodie by birth. You'll usually find him talking about technology, music, travel and the game of cricket on the streets of Pune when not busy writing or speeding his way through the country! Read more on retro handheld gaming on RETRO91

You can learn more about Yash, add him to your Google+ circles or follow him on Twitter to stay connected!

billybloggs
February 15, 2015
Looks like a good bet fore a second phone or for someone who isn’t after the bleeding edge and wants a good basic phone.
- Riccardo Benzoni
  February 15, 2015
  it’s capable of more than basic things… multitasking, gaming and hd streams go without problems, only the camera isn’t that good, but it’s just enough for typical smartphones’ shoots. Performances will also increase with Lollipop (64bit system)

Venci
February 15, 2015
- realjjj
  February 15, 2015
  The Meizu m1 with 2GB RAM would be at similar prices and there are significant differences, The P6000 is dual SIM the m1 is not, the bands supported are different too , the P6000 has slightly bigger and removable battery., the m1 has higher res front cam (5MP vs 2MP). How they compare in screen quality and back cam quality no idea really. The design and the UI are a subjective matter.
  What i see as the real competition for such a phone is 1080p screens. The price difference between 720p and 1080p is small now, the phone makers would pay 7-8$ more for 1080p than for 720p and the retail pricing would be maybe 20$ more.
  - Venci
    February 16, 2015
    yeah, there are some differences, but whrn you take in account so many people having problems with elephone phones. The meizu is going to be the better buy in my opinion.
    About the 1080p / 720p displays, the cost difference maybe small, but the processor should support it. I think 6732 is only 720p capable, not quite shure about that, though.

realjjj
February 15, 2015
Didn’t knew about Miravision, any chance you can list all options in the setting, tried to find that info but nobody seems to have covered Miravision at all really (you could even make an article out of it since screen calibration on mobile devices is not as easy as it could be). Would be nice if the software would work with some popular colorimeters so anyone that cares to actually be able to get the best out of his screen.
Also wonder if other recent Mediatek phones include the software or not, would be nice if everybody had it.

billybloggs
February 15, 2015
Looks like a good bet fore a second phone or for someone who isn’t after the bleeding edge and wants a good basic phone.
- Riccardo Benzoni
  February 16, 2015
  it’s capable of more than basic things… multitasking, gaming and hd streams go without problems, only the camera isn’t that good, but it’s just enough for typical smartphones’ shoots. Performances will also increase with Lollipop (64bit system)
Venci
February 15, 2015
- realjjj
  February 15, 2015
  The Meizu m1 with 2GB RAM would be at similar prices and there are significant differences, The P6000 is dual SIM the m1 is not, the bands supported are different too , the P6000 has slightly bigger and removable battery., the m1 has higher res front cam (5MP vs 2MP). How they compare in screen quality and back cam quality no idea really. The design and the UI are a subjective matter.
  What i see as the real competition for such a phone is 1080p screens. The price difference between 720p and 1080p is small now, the phone makers would pay 7-8$ more for 1080p than for 720p and the retail pricing would be maybe 20$ more.
- Venci
  February 16, 2015
  yeah, there are some differences, but whrn you take in account so many people having problems with elephone phones. The meizu is going to be the better buy in my opinion.
  About the 1080p / 720p displays, the cost difference maybe small, but the processor should support it. I think 6732 is only 720p capable, not quite shure about that, though.

Riccardo Benzoni
February 15, 2015
i wouldn’t rate mt6732 entry level, not yet at least… more a mid-range level to me, old mt6582 is now the entry-level standard in china, with 70-100 usd pricetag
Brown Alma
February 15, 2015
wow, this phone is so cool ,and i want to buy one from coolicool.

realjjj
February 15, 2015
Didn’t knew about Miravision, any chance you can list all options in the setting, tried to find that info but nobody seems to have covered Miravision at all really (you could even make an article out of it since screen calibration on mobile devices is not as easy as it could be). Would be nice if the software would work with some popular colorimeters so anyone that cares to actually be able to get the best out of his screen.
Also wonder if other recent Mediatek phones include the software or not, would be nice if everybody had it.

AlexanderEliasson
February 16, 2015
Of Elephone P6000 and Kingzone N3 Plus, which would you choose? Kingzone retails for about 10+$
- February 18, 2015
  Have a feeling the P6000 is going to be a popular phone, so the community aspect could be crucial. Anyway, we have an N3 Plus on the way to us so we’ll be in a better position to answer that once the review is out.
Riccardo Benzoni
February 16, 2015
i wouldn’t rate mt6732 entry level, not yet at least… more a mid-range level to me, old mt6582 is now the entry-level standard in china, with 70-100 usd pricetag

Brown Alma
February 16, 2015
wow, this phone is so cool ,and i want to buy one from coolicool.
Guest
February 16, 2015
This comment was deleted.
- Yash Garg
  February 18, 2015
  Have a feeling the P6000 is going to be a popular phone, so the community aspect could be crucial. Anyway, we have an N3 Plus on the way to us so we’ll be in a better position to answer that once the review is out.

Lazar Prodanovic
February 16, 2015
Well Yash, as after close examining the comparable in dept review of new Exynos SoS’s in Note 4 compared with one in Alpha I come to a conclusion that the MT6732 is by far best balanced entry lv soc on market at this time. It’s has a balanced power consumption will good performance. The quad A53’s clocked at 1.5GHz on high optimized mobile 28nm TSCM lithography will consume up to 2.5 less power than MT6753 true octa core & up to 50% less than S615, S615 on paper have potential to deliver some lover saving & be up to 60% better than MT6732 if it uses only lo powered CPU cluster but as scheduler logic is far from perfect this won’t happen hardly ever.
Compared to older A7 MTK SoC variants clocked at 1.3GHz it will consume around 2x more power & again even that good thanks to more advanced manufacturing process. CPU performance of MT6732 in real usage scenarios should be on pair with S615 & not far behind the MT6752 as nothing really uses all 8 CPU cores wile compared to A7 siblings it should be up around 43% (MTK @ 1.3 or 33% against hi clocked S400 1.6GHz). The real reason why you actually need new ARM V8 cores is Lollipop as it comes with encryption & only new cores have built in coprocessors to do it proper. When we come to MT6732 GPU you are quite wrong about how it is not a good combo in this variant for gaming. To start with the cut down frequency of T760 MP2 (500MHz) at this manufacturing process is ideal balanced between power consumption & performance. Compared with A305 & A306 it will give you around 66% performance gain in EGLS 2.0 & up to 4x in EGLS 3.0. Compared to A405 & higher clocked T760 MP2 (@700MHz) it will be around 30-35% slower in EGLS 3.0 it will even catch up to A405. However there are evidences of uncomfortable heating devices with A405 & T760 (700MHz) & really bad battery consumption. The T760 on MT6732 is good for 720p displays & it should last long as good it that category. Any of mentioned GPU’s is to week for 1080p displays. Consider & that all Adrenos have huge problems with any kind of surface texture transforms.
Before I start about P6000 let’s just inform you how Yu Yureka is actually a rebranded COOLPAD F2 & F2 is available. It’s all in all much worse phone then P6000 in every aspect & it costs around 30 US$ more. If you read review of it you will see all I mentioned about poor in game battery life & heat problems.
Now P6000
It’s Sony’s 13 MP camera and it’s a little inconsistent quality vise but still better then Samsungs same sized one in most occasions. Front one is 1.9MP pretty small one but very vide & more then good for
720p videos. The battery, SoC, 5″ OGS 720p IPS rate is currently the best one on the market performance vs battery life & hand/pocket friendly = user experience. Used component’s are quality ones. Even Elephone got 4 quality certificates (others usually stop at one or two) there are still some quality concerns as in different reviews people noticed different problems from; hedaphone jack, some sensors to in your case cracking left mid back cover, only consistent one is touch one related.
The design is nothing special all do its not bad news this one is actually fat ass but I like it that way. I hate when Chinese manufacturers try to spare 3$ cutting small things in this case notification led, lit back light & only blue one & ear pieces. It’s just plane stupid!
The things you forgot to mention & are pluses: unified data & app partition, pre rooted, no light bleeding at ages of screen at all, OTG work’s but only with external power source & LTE bands support are mostly used ones across the Europe. With price off 150$ P6000 represents absolutely best buy at this moment & I intend to bay one.
At the end one question. Is the blue light steamed glass included on/in phone? I did read & looked many reviews but no one actually answered this adequate. I know it’s pricy so I don’t know is it only an optional pay for add on?
Didn’t intend to wrote this much. 🙂
- February 16, 2015
  The Yureka is a rebrand indeed, but it doesn’t matter as much as it would if we were talking high-end. It’s a solid phone in its own right (review will be out in a few days). About the P6000’s blue light, yep, it’s a standard feature. 🙂
  - Lazar Prodanovic
    February 16, 2015
    Well that actually adds even more to the P6000 value as blue light tempted glass is almost as sapphire when it comes to hardness & it’s even more usable than sapphire as it partially refracts blue light & it totally refracts UV light. So this will be a little more rugged and healthy phone with exelent viewing on direct sunlight. Interesting enough it costs almost 10% of the phones price. I am now even ready to forgive them no ear pieces. 😀
    - February 16, 2015
      Hey, I think there’s a little comfusion here; we’re not sure what type of glass it is (will check with the company on that; listings mention ‘impregnable glass’). I assumed you were asking about the blue light on the home button.
      - Lazar Prodanovic
        February 16, 2015
        Thank you very much about that!
        I exaggerated a little with pricing blue glass is around 9$ for P6000 still that’s quite much for device costing just 150$.

petarr90
February 16, 2015
About the touch problem, there is a fix, i am postin a link from xda, hope that you guys don’t mind. Just install the apk from the link, and use it to update tp drivers.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=3152512&d=1423223038|
I am satisfied with the phone, but there is also one more problem. The OTG is not working. Everything else is fine, except the camera, of course.
- Lazar Prodanovic
  February 17, 2015
  To get OTG to work you will need a cable with external power source. I hope it’s only temporarily & that USB controller actually supports power out or OTG won’t be of a much use.

Muhammad Yasir
February 16, 2015
I KNEW IT! The v.first time i saw the camera specs , i knew they were gonna suck!
Proud to see how everything else has been kept reasonably good.

Lazar Prodanovic
February 16, 2015
Well Yash, as after close examining the comparable in dept review of new Exynos SoS’s in Note 4 compared with one in Alpha I come to a conclusion that the MT6732 is by far best balanced entry lv soc on market at this time. It’s has a balanced power consumption will good performance. The quad A53’s clocked at 1.5GHz on high optimized mobile 28nm TSCM lithography will consume up to 2.5 less power than MT6753 true octa core & up to 50% less than S615, S615 on paper have potential to deliver some lover saving & be up to 60% better than MT6732 if it uses only lo powered CPU cluster but as scheduler logic is far from perfect this won’t happen hardly ever.
Compared to older A7 MTK SoC variants clocked at 1.3GHz it will consume around 2x more power & again even that good thanks to more advanced manufacturing process. CPU performance of MT6732 in real usage scenarios should be on pair with S615 & not far behind the MT6752 as nothing really uses all 8 CPU cores wile compared to A7 siblings it should be up around 43% (MTK @ 1.3 or 33% against hi clocked S400 1.6GHz). The real reason why you actually need new ARM V8 cores is Lollipop as it comes with encryption & only new cores have built in coprocessors to do it proper. When we come to MT6732 GPU you are quite wrong about how it is not a good combo in this variant for gaming. To start with the cut down frequency of T760 MP2 (500MHz) at this manufacturing process is ideal balanced between power consumption & performance. Compared with A305 & A306 it will give you around 66% performance gain in EGLS 2.0 & up to 4x in EGLS 3.0. Compared to A405 & higher clocked T760 MP2 (@700MHz) it will be around 30-35% slower in EGLS 3.0 it will even catch up to A405. However there are evidences of uncomfortable heating devices with A405 & T760 (700MHz) & really bad battery consumption. The T760 on MT6732 is good for 720p displays & it should last long as good it that category. Any of mentioned GPU’s is to week for 1080p displays. Consider & that all Adrenos have huge problems with any kind of surface texture transforms.
Before I start about P6000 let’s just inform you how Yu Yureka is actually a rebranded COOLPAD F2 & F2 is available. It’s all in all much worse phone then P6000 in every aspect & it costs around 30 US$ more. If you read review of it you will see all I mentioned about poor in game battery life & heat problems.
Now P6000
It’s Sony’s 13 MP camera and it’s a little inconsistent quality vise but still better then Samsungs same sized one in most occasions. Front one is 1.9MP pretty small one but very vide & more then good for
720p videos. The battery, SoC, 5″ OGS 720p IPS rate is currently the best one on the market performance vs battery life & hand/pocket friendly = user experience. Used component’s are quality ones. Even Elephone got 4 quality certificates (others usually stop at one or two) there are still some quality concerns as in different reviews people noticed different problems from; hedaphone jack, some sensors to in your case cracking left mid back cover, only consistent one is touch one related.
The design is nothing special all do its not bad news this one is actually fat ass but I like it that way. I hate when Chinese manufacturers try to spare 3$ cutting small things in this case notification led, lit back light & only blue one & ear pieces. It’s just plane stupid!
The things you forgot to mention & are pluses: unified data & app partition, pre rooted, no light bleeding at ages of screen at all, OTG work’s but only with external power source & LTE bands support are mostly used ones across the Europe. With price off 150$ P6000 represents absolutely best buy at this moment & I intend to bay one.
At the end one question. Is the blue light steamed glass included on/in phone? I did read & looked many reviews but no one actually answered this adequate. I know it’s pricy so I don’t know is it only an optional pay for add on?
Didn’t intend to wrote this much. 🙂
- Yash Garg
  February 16, 2015
  The Yureka is a rebrand indeed, but it doesn’t matter as much as it would if we were talking high-end. It’s a solid phone in its own right (review will be out in a few days). About the P6000’s blue light, yep, it’s a standard feature. 🙂
- Lazar Prodanovic
  February 16, 2015
  Well that actually adds even more to the P6000 value as blue light tempted glass is almost as sapphire when it comes to hardness & it’s even more usable than sapphire as it partially refracts blue light & it totally refracts UV light. So this will be a little more rugged and healthy phone with exelent viewing on direct sunlight. Interesting enough it costs almost 10% of the phones price. I am now even ready to forgive them no ear pieces. 😀
- Yash Garg
  February 16, 2015
  Hey, I think there’s a little comfusion here; we’re not sure what type of glass it is (will check with the company on that; listings mention ‘impregnable glass’). I assumed you were asking about the blue light on the home button.
- Lazar Prodanovic
  February 16, 2015
  Thank you very much about that!
  I exaggerated a little with pricing blue glass is around 9$ for P6000 still that’s quite much for device costing just 150$.

Guest
February 16, 2015
About the touch problem, there is a fix, i am postin a link from xda, hope that you guys don’t mind. Just install the apk from the link, and use it to update tp drivers.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=3152512&d=1423223038|
I am satisfied with the phone, but there is also one more problem. The OTG is not working. Everything else is fine, except the camera, of course.
- Lazar Prodanovic
  February 17, 2015
  To get OTG to work you will need a cable with external power source. I hope it’s only temporarily & that USB controller actually supports power out or OTG won’t be of a much use.

Guest
February 16, 2015
I KNEW IT! The v.first time i saw the camera specs , i knew they were gonna suck!
Proud to see how everything else has been kept reasonably good.
Ivo001
February 16, 2015
I think this will replace my iNew V3. How does it compare to a Iuni U2?
I think I might wait till the actual launch of Lollipop update, but the beta is out already.

Ivo001
February 16, 2015
I think this will replace my iNew V3. How does it compare to a Iuni U2?
I think I might wait till the actual launch of Lollipop update, but the beta is out already.
shyam
February 17, 2015
Looks like an impressive phone, how did you get it into India? I used to purchase on Ali-express but my last purchase had lots of issues in customs.
- February 18, 2015
  Yep, customs is a big issue. Try to use either FedEx, UPS or DHL (in that order).
  - shyam
    February 20, 2015

shyam
February 17, 2015
Looks like an impressive phone, how did you get it into India? I used to purchase on Ali-express but my last purchase had lots of issues in customs.
- Yash Garg
  February 18, 2015
  Yep, customs is a big issue. Try to use either FedEx, UPS or DHL (in that order).
- shyam
  February 20, 2015
  thanks for the reply. I will try fedex next time .
gman
February 17, 2015
Bought the phone from coolicool with coupon code:p6000 for 130usd. I think for that price it is a no brainer.

akacg
February 17, 2015
Well I have been waiting for this review, I ordered this phone back in January through another site still waiting for it to arrive. I am here in the US and extremely disappointed in the phone offerings we have. A phone for $250US -$400, and it does not come close to the features of many of the chinese phones. Everybody i know her is telling me I am crazy to waste $150 US on a chinese phone. I happen to trust that chinese manufacturing will only survive if it evolves properly like the Japanese did from the 70’s to the 90’s. Only china is much quicker now. If the only real drawback you find is the camera, no worries. I’m not a real selfie type person. I just hope it will be compatible with our 4G-LTE networks. You did not cover it’s network compatibility. I have read elsewhere it is 4G LTE compatible, If it doesn’t work oh well $150US is not going to break me.

Guest
February 17, 2015
Bought the phone from coolicool with coupon code:p6000 for 130usd. I think for that price it is a no brainer.
- Guest
  March 31, 2015
Guest
February 17, 2015
Well I have been waiting for this review, I ordered this phone back in January through another site still waiting for it to arrive. I am here in the US and extremely disappointed in the phone offerings we have. A phone for $250US -$400, and it does not come close to the features of many of the chinese phones. Everybody i know her is telling me I am crazy to waste $150 US on a chinese phone. I happen to trust that chinese manufacturing will only survive if it evolves properly like the Japanese did from the 70’s to the 90’s. Only china is much quicker now. If the only real drawback you find is the camera, no worries. I’m not a real selfie type person. I just hope it will be compatible with our 4G-LTE networks. You did not cover it’s network compatibility. I have read elsewhere it is 4G LTE compatible, If it doesn’t work oh well $150US is not going to break me.

ajftl250
February 18, 2015
i ordered mine today at the elephone store same price funny the tittle says android 5.0 but the phone is not running it yet? http://www.elephone.cc/elephone-p6000.html
ajftl250
February 18, 2015
i ordered mine today at the elephone store same price funny the tittle says android 5.0 but the phone is not running it yet? http://www.elephone.cc/elephone-p6000.html
bornagainpenguin
February 18, 2015
Disappointing. I like everything about this phone, except the lack of 3G4G support in the United States. 🙁

bornagainpenguin
February 19, 2015
Disappointing. I like everything about this phone, except the lack of 3G4G support in the United States. 🙁
Joe Dufresne
February 26, 2015
Is MediaTek still violating the GPL by refusing to release source code?
Joe Dufresne
February 26, 2015
Is MediaTek still violating the GPL by refusing to release source code?
John
March 31, 2015
are u satisfied with elephone? is it good or ?

Stefan Milosevic
April 3, 2015
Hi, whats your opinion comparing battery life on elephone p6000 and xioami mi4?
I used mi4 but broke it,so now i think about buying p6000 but i am not sure how good battery is
Stefan Milosevic
April 3, 2015
Hi, whats your opinion comparing battery life on elephone p6000 and xioami mi4?
I used mi4 but broke it,so now i think about buying p6000 but i am not sure how good battery is

Bruno
September 27, 2015
My P6000 stopped working without any reason. I’ve just connected it to the charger and it died. I do not suggest it! Also 2 Zopo ZP780 in my hands are giving serious touch screen problems. Chinese phones are very problematic!
Bruno
September 27, 2015
My P6000 stopped working without any reason. I’ve just connected it to the charger and it died. I do not suggest it! Also 2 Zopo ZP780 in my hands are giving serious touch screen problems. Chinese phones are very problematic!

Damak9
January 8, 2016
I will comment here since I believe this is one of the web stops people often come to check out the p6000 review.
I have been using the P6000 since August 2015, so about 5 months, as my daily phone. First thing you should know is that those types of Chinese phones are not backed up by a strong community and Elephone is not likely going to upgrade the OS anymore. That being said, the phone does rock Android 5.0 lollipop and it comes rooted out of the box, with absolutely no bloatware of any kind. So you do get almost stock Android, which is always good.
The software however, has a minor bug. On some phones the UI will lag when scrolling. To fix this “dial” *#*#3646633#*#* on your phone. This opens up the test menu. Flip right until you get to “Hardware Testing”, scroll down and find the AAL menu entry. Tap on it and make sure its set to “Off”. Restart and boom everything is buttery smooth from now on.
The software itself is blazing fast and very stable, although I must mention that I am not using the stock launcher, but Nova Prime instead. It never crashed on me whether I am playing some demanding 3D game, surfing the web or chatting on Viber. Everything just works.
The CPU (Mediatek MT6732) is powerful enough for everyday use and from my experience can be compared to Snapdragon 615 and in most cases its even faster. The amount of ram is adequate for this price range and will allow you to multitask couple of apps and even big games such as Modern Combat 6, without shutting them down in the background.
The general speed of the UI, application opening and installing and multitasking is comparable with many flagship devices of the past 1-2 years (Galaxy S4 I9500 for example). This is thanks to the beefy 64bit CPU under the hood, the amount of ram (2GB) and certainly the quality of the NAND used inside. Meaning, Elephone didn’t just slap in the cheapest 16 gb chip that they could find. Geekbench3 score is 725 single core and 2157 multi-core, which is not only surpassing the Galaxy S4, but coming in close to Galaxy S5 (Snapdragon 801). The Antutu sore is between 30k and 34k.
The screen quality is OK, it really is IPS panel with 720p resolution, nice colors and adequate sharpness. The brightness however is mediocre. Even on the highest setting the screen falls short when compared with other 720p phones, but not by much. The visibility inside, however, is perfectly fine. Just keep in mind that the screen itself has no anti-scratch protection (sorry, no gorilla glass here) and can be easily scratched if used without screen protector. Luckily, you do get one factory-applied outside the box, and one spare in case you decide to change it. Furthermore, there are 9H glass screen protectors available for this phone (aliexpress) for only couple of bucks.
The battery is rated 2700 mAh and depending on how you use your phone it can last anywhere between 2 days and couple of hours. From 100% to 1% I usually get around 5 to 6 hours of screen on time (SoT), on medium to high brightness. It will take you 3 full hours to recharge it from 0 to 100 and there is no fast charge available. The included travel charger is ok-ish, but I do get better results with my Xperia 1A charger (it charges the battery to full in 2 hours and 40 minutes). Some users complained that their battery percentage will jump and stay at 1% for a long time. This is something I never experienced, but if you do come across this problem, try deleting batterystats.bin (google it) when the phone is charged to 100%.
The camera is mediocre. It’s not the worst I ever seen (xperia m2), nor it’s the best. One thing is for sure, the stock camera app forces high ISO settings even in bright environments, resulting in too much noise in the final picture. You can avoid this by downloading another camera app from the play store, that allows you to set the ISO setting manually (Camera FV-5 for example). I will attach a pic taken with low ISO setting, just so you can see the quality and judge by yourself.
The speaker is also not the brightest bulb in the box. It will suffice for occasional youtube videos, but you will definitely like to use your own headphones (as the box doesn’t contain any) for movies and / or games.
The one thing that I really didn’t like about the P6000 was the squeaky battery cover that was just driving me insane. Someone over at the XDA forums advised me to order a new one online and I did. The squeaky, creaking noises are now gone.
The one downside of owning this phone is that silicon cases are generally not available anywhere. In fact, there is only one silicon case designed for Just5 Blaster2 (which btw its the same phone with different name), costs around 15$ and the quality is terrible. I just slapped on a glass screen protector and ordered universal 5″ leather pouch that works great for me.
I won’t comment things like WiFi/3G/4G signals as the phone works just fine for me and I never had any reception problems. I use my bluetooth gamepad (iPega PG-9037) on daily basis to play emulators and never had any problems with it either.
To wrap it up, minor letdowns aside (back cover, speaker, no glass protection) I am very happy with my purchase. For 130$ I have a device that easily outperforms 300$ branded smartphones.
Finally, here is the shot I took couple of days ago. Its taken at night, with artificial fluorescent light.
Damak9
January 9, 2016
I will comment here since I believe this is one of the web stops people often come to check out the p6000 review.
I have been using the P6000 since August 2015, so about 5 months, as my daily phone. First thing you should know is that those types of Chinese phones are not backed up by a strong community and Elephone is not likely going to upgrade the OS anymore. That being said, the phone does rock Android 5.0 lollipop and it comes rooted out of the box, with absolutely no bloatware of any kind. So you do get almost stock Android, which is always good.
The software however, has a minor bug. On some phones the UI will lag when scrolling. To fix this “dial” *#*#3646633#*#* on your phone. This opens up the test menu. Flip right until you get to “Hardware Testing”, scroll down and find the AAL menu entry. Tap on it and make sure its set to “Off”. Restart and boom everything is buttery smooth from now on.
The software itself is blazing fast and very stable, although I must mention that I am not using the stock launcher, but Nova Prime instead. It never crashed on me whether I am playing some demanding 3D game, surfing the web or chatting on Viber. Everything just works.
The CPU (Mediatek MT6732) is powerful enough for everyday use and from my experience can be compared to Snapdragon 615 and in most cases its even faster. The amount of ram is adequate for this price range and will allow you to multitask couple of apps and even big games such as Modern Combat 6, without shutting them down in the background.
The general speed of the UI, application opening and installing and multitasking is comparable with many flagship devices of the past 1-2 years (Galaxy S4 I9500 for example). This is thanks to the beefy 64bit CPU under the hood, the amount of ram (2GB) and certainly the quality of the NAND used inside. Meaning, Elephone didn’t just slap in the cheapest 16 gb chip that they could find. Geekbench3 score is 725 single core and 2157 multi-core, which is not only surpassing the Galaxy S4, but coming in close to Galaxy S5 (Snapdragon 801). The Antutu sore is between 30k and 34k.
The screen quality is OK, it really is IPS panel with 720p resolution, nice colors and adequate sharpness. The brightness however is mediocre. Even on the highest setting the screen falls short when compared with other 720p phones, but not by much. The visibility inside, however, is perfectly fine. Just keep in mind that the screen itself has no anti-scratch protection (sorry, no gorilla glass here) and can be easily scratched if used without screen protector. Luckily, you do get one factory-applied outside the box, and one spare in case you decide to change it. Furthermore, there are 9H glass screen protectors available for this phone (aliexpress) for only couple of bucks.
The battery is rated 2700 mAh and depending on how you use your phone it can last anywhere between 2 days and couple of hours. From 100% to 1% I usually get around 5 to 6 hours of screen on time (SoT), on medium to high brightness. It will take you 3 full hours to recharge it from 0 to 100 and there is no fast charge available. The included travel charger is ok-ish, but I do get better results with my Xperia 1A charger (it charges the battery to full in 2 hours and 40 minutes). Some users complained that their battery percentage will jump and stay at 1% for a long time. This is something I never experienced, but if you do come across this problem, try deleting batterystats.bin (google it) when the phone is charged to 100%.
The camera is mediocre. It’s not the worst I ever seen (xperia m2), nor it’s the best. One thing is for sure, the stock camera app forces high ISO settings even in bright environments, resulting in too much noise in the final picture. You can avoid this by downloading another camera app from the play store, that allows you to set the ISO setting manually (Camera FV-5 for example). I will attach a pic taken with low ISO setting, just so you can see the quality and judge by yourself.
The speaker is also not the brightest bulb in the box. It will suffice for occasional youtube videos, but you will definitely like to use your own headphones (as the box doesn’t contain any) for movies and / or games.
The one thing that I really didn’t like about the P6000 was the squeaky battery cover that was just driving me insane. Someone over at the XDA forums advised me to order a new one online and I did. The squeaky, creaking noises are now gone.
The one downside of owning this phone is that silicon cases are generally not available anywhere. In fact, there is only one silicon case designed for Just5 Blaster2 (which btw its the same phone with different name), costs around 15$ and the quality is terrible. I just slapped on a glass screen protector and ordered universal 5″ leather pouch that works great for me.
I won’t comment things like WiFi/3G/4G signals as the phone works just fine for me and I never had any reception problems. I use my bluetooth gamepad (iPega PG-9037) on daily basis to play emulators and never had any problems with it either.
To wrap it up, minor letdowns aside (back cover, speaker, no glass protection) I am very happy with my purchase. For 130$ I have a device that easily outperforms 300$ branded smartphones.
Finally, here is the shot I took couple of days ago. Its taken at night, with artificial fluorescent light.

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