UMi Hammer Smash Test – How Tough is the Hammer?


umi hammer smash test

With all the benchmarks and photos out of the way for the upcoming UMi Hammer review, it was time to have a little fun and see just how tough the Hammer really is. Find out in our smash video.

In our first hands on and impressions of the UMi Hammer I took a sturdy metal spanner to the screen to see if it would break. It didn’t, and from that moment on I decided to make it my duty to see how much punishment the UMi Hammer can actually take.

For this video I decided to drop the phone from various heights to see what kind of protection the tough alloy chassis provides the Hammer. First up was a couple of waist height drops (at the start of the video) which I redid as you couldn’t actually see the phone hitting the concrete floor. After 4 waist drops I moved on to a wall drop, drops above my head and finally throwing the UMi Hammer at a wall. See the results in the following video.

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UMi Hammer Smash Test Video

The drop from the wall which caught the corner of the screen was unfortunate for the Hammer. If it hadn’t been for that early break then I have every confidence that the screen would have stayed in one piece for longer.

I’ve been fortunate enough with my time with phones to only have broken one and that was a Meizu MX3 from waist height. The screen shattered and the digitizer died, it was an expensive repair. The UMi Hammer wend through way more abuse and even with a smashed screen the phone remains functional.

UMi went out to make a phone that could take knocks and drops and I feel that they have done a solid job for the money. Of course the phone will break if you torture it enough, but it will just take larger and more frequent drops to do so.

The UMi Hammer will be officially released for sale on the 20th April. The phone features a 5-inch 720p display, 2GB RAM and 64bit Mediatek MT6732 processor with LTE. Our full review will be up next week.

[ UMi ]
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35 Comments

  1. Atomicrus
    April 17, 2015

    Nice test. Mine Oneplus One hold just one throw inna wall and touch died)

  2. Chris
    April 17, 2015

    Quite impressive for such a good looking phone. I’ve dropped my galaxy s3 from waist height onto a laminated wood floor pretty often (probably higher, it slides out of my shirt pocket when I bent over) and so far it has survived without a scratch. Wouldn’t want to try dropping it from 2 meters though.

    • manniefred86
      April 17, 2015

      Seems like a good feature on a phone, my nexus 5 screen broke because of a drop of 30 cm. Any idea what the pricing is gonna be?

      • April 17, 2015

        About $160 I think

        • Riccardo Benzoni
          April 17, 2015

          even lower, it’s around 130-140$

  3. geronimonster
    April 17, 2015

    Nice test. But how does it fare a real-world nut cracking scenario? 😛

    • April 17, 2015

      haha, I can still try it but it might be unfair as it is all smashed up now. I’m going to have to get some more ‘tough’ phones it really is fun throwing them around 😀

      • geronimonster
        April 17, 2015

        Lol sounds good

      • fido futte
        April 17, 2015

        Andy – is it also water-proff or only water -resistance ?

      • geronimonster
        April 17, 2015

        Just an idea mate… saw you enjoying those high drops, why not get your hands on one of them drone jobbies and take it to the next level 😀

        • April 17, 2015

          I had a drone sent for review. I crashed it and it set on fire …… 🙁

          • geronimonster
            April 17, 2015

            Lol the crash and burn test 😀

  4. Chico Migraña
    April 17, 2015

    is there any chance to unlock 3g bands on MTK phones? all these new phones doesn’t have 850 MHz band and I need this one in Chile u_u

    • Owsley_66
      April 17, 2015

      Try this link to look for specs on phones. Actually quite a few support 3G 850.
      http://www.devicespecifications.com/en
      Not always 100% accurate but I don’t know of a better and more reliable site for checking specs.

    • balcobomber25
      April 18, 2015

      3G bands are tied to the modem(radio) that the phone uses. If your phone is tied to specific carrier (ATT in the US for example) it may have all the bands but lock the ones they don’t use. In that case you just need to get it unlocked to use the rest of the bands.

      But if your phone only has the 900/2100 bands there is nothing you can do to get the 850 short of dismantling the phone and installing the correct modem/antennae.

      • Chico Migraña
        April 19, 2015

        damn, all the latest smartphones only have 900/2100 u_u

        • balcobomber25
          April 19, 2015

          2100 is near universal in Asia, 900 is used several larger countries like Indonesia and Malaysia. That is why those are the bands you must likely are to see. But there are several phones which do have 850, it is becoming a lot easier to find phones with 850 than it was a few years ago. Even better more and more phones are starting to utilize quad band modems that support all the major bands.

  5. danielexd1
    April 17, 2015

    it would have been more fun to launch the phone saying bad words! 😀

    • April 17, 2015
      • balcobomber25
        April 18, 2015

        That Doogee really ticked you off….

        Just breath Andi, it’s the weekend have a drink and relax. We all remember that one phone which really left us breathless and not in a good way.

        • April 18, 2015

          It’s just that company (doogee) . They have the means to make decent phones at a good price and offer customer support and updates, but they choose not to….

          • balcobomber25
            April 18, 2015

            Trust me I am well aware. I bought a Doogee DG 2014. A phone that looked great and was miserable in just about every aspect except build quality.

  6. Airyl
    April 17, 2015

    Looks pretty fun.

  7. nick
    April 17, 2015

    nice test, hope the general review was ready 😀

  8. Marco Lancaster
    April 17, 2015

    Really impressive. For a phone on that price range, which we can consider really cheap for the overall package, and for a rugged phone, Hammer doesn’t is bulky or ugly it has a really good design and classy finish, due the metal frame. I’m really impressed Umi has made a really good phone, without overprice it. This show their are learning with some mistakes, for example Zero was overpriced on the start, would be nice if some Chinese OEM’s also learn that. (That was for you $opo)

    For addition, The Umi Hammer should act good on connections too, I’ve saw the device surpassing Jiayu S3 and even Mi4 in Wi-fi Speed.

  9. Riccardo Benzoni
    April 17, 2015

    Quite impressive. this brings the “rugged” thing into a whole new world… You ain’t be fat, ugly and slow to be resistent! 😀

  10. iKosh
    April 17, 2015

    Giveaway please. It would be funny to win a smashed phone.

  11. bhendrajana
    April 17, 2015

    I get the point… please stop smashing phones… please…

  12. balcobomber25
    April 18, 2015

    One of the most durable phones I ever owned was a Blu Life Play (Gionee E3). I hate using covers and cases with my phones and the back of that phone is very slippery which would cause me to drop it a lot. That phone survived hundreds of drops from my pockets/hands over a year period. I thought I lost it when I dropped it from a motorbike which resulted in another motorbike running it over. There was some scuffs and scrapes and the power/volume buttons broke off but the phone kept ticking. It finally died after falling from my pocket when getting out of my dad’s jeep, it smashed onto the concrete.

  13. junior_poa
    April 18, 2015

    4:41 LOL

  14. Stelios Alexandrou
    April 18, 2015

    I don’t know how good is the phone but I hate the fact that they copied the design of my beloved Vivo Xshot! 🙂

  15. Ada
    April 20, 2015

    see it on 1949deal with 129usd !

  16. Ada
    April 20, 2015

    see it on 1949deal with 129usd !