For those of you wanting a smaller, 64bit MT6752 phone there is currently only one choice and that’s the THL 2015. We’ve been lucky enough to get an early review unit and here is our first hands on and impressions of the octacore phone.
Over the past few weeks we have seen plenty of 5.5-inch phones sporting the latest octacore MT6752 processor such as the JiaYu S3, Meizu m1 note and most recently the iOcean MT6752 Rock smartphone.
5.5-inch might be the standard that most smartphone companies consider to be the norm for flagship phones, but not every customer wants such a large device, and a smaller phone is preferable. At 5-inch the THL 2015 is currently the smallest Chinese phone on the market with an MT6752 chipset, LTE and 2GB RAM, so how does it feel?
Video: THL 2015 Hands on and First Impressions
THL 2015 First impressions
When I took the THL 2015 from it’s packaging I was quite surprised by the feel of the phone. The chassis looks and feels similar to the alloy frame of the Vivo Xshot, while the plastic rear cover has a coating that feels similar to metal and cold to the touch.
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Compared to the first renders we saw of the 2015, the actual phone looks better in the flesh, but that’s relative. It was ugly in the renders and it isn’t the best looking phone when in your hand (but nowhere near has bad as I expected).
Although the device does have only a 5-inch display, the borders are quite thick so we’re not getting the full benefit of the smaller display in terms of width, but the overall length is much shorter than 5.5-inch phones of a similar specification. The shorter length means that you can enjoy one-handed operation with a little more confidence.
Hardware includes the above mentioned screen, processor, 2GB RAM, LTE, 8 mega-pixel front camera, 13 mega-pixel rear, dual SIM, micro SD and 2700mAh battery. The 7.5mm thickness probably prevented a larger battery, and I’m not all that worried about the battery size as the screen is smaller.
What I do find odd is the pricing of the THL 2015. While the JiaYu S3 with similar specs and 5.5-inch display can be easily bought for $190, the smaller 2015 costs as much as $220. That’s not a whole lot of money for a flagship Android phone these days, but considering the competition I think THL are charging way to much.
A full THL 2015 review plus comparisons with the JiaYu S3 and iOcean Rock are planned. Keep posted.
I’m with you, their software support is a joke and they are most likely to ignore a ground breaking bug than to acknowledge it and try fix it.
Similar story with Zopo these days too… My partners zp999 gets OTA’s quite often, but they never seem to actually change anything… Strange really, I can’t ever find a solid changelog either and she’s constantly reporting how crap the battery is on it…
She had a THL W100 before and I don’t think she ever got one OTA on that in the 18 months that she had it!
From experience I can say Xiaomi does, there were constant new features given to MIUI but recently not so much, mainly bug fixes.
There was a time that a major bug came up, with headphones plugged in swiping down to view the notifications would disables the touch-screen and then shut off the phone after a minute. Within a few days the bug was fixed.
II have owned two THL’s and both were very good devices in terms of support and build quality. The original Monkey King is still one of my favorite phones ever made.
Personal phone is Mi4, which I love. Work phone is Doogee DG_2014 but looking at iOcean x8 as replacement.
Considering the last THL Phone I had was in 2013, no they didn’t get Lollipop. But they were upgraded to the latest version of Android that was available at the time.
I owned two THL phones ( W100 and 4000) and i am very satisfied with their performance….