O+ EVO 4G Review, Speed At Your Fingertips

O+ EVO 4G Review, Speed At Your Fingertips

INTRODUCTION:

The O+ EVO 4G is the pilot device from Oplus USA to feature two things that do not exist with their portfolio before, being powered by a 64-bit quad core processor and having an LTE connectivity.

CPU-Z

On top of having these two features, it also has pretty impressive overall specifications, to name a few it has 5-inch IPS HD display with scratch-resistant glass, 1GB of RAM, 8GB ROM, 8MP camera and OTG support.


UNBOXING:

Unboxing Video

Retail Package

The retail package consists of the unit, charger, USB cable, headset, warranty card and user manual. It also comes with two freebies, namely a screen protector and 4GB micro SD card.


HARDWARE:

Front

The secondary camera can be found above the display on the left side of the earpiece grill while the notification light together with the sensors are on the right side. Meanwhile, the back-lighted capacitive keys are places directly below the screen.

Back

The back is slightly curved towards the edges, which makes it comfortable to hold. It has a very fine glaze finish that is only noticeable during close inspection. Here, you can find the main camera and the LED flash at the upper left most corner while the loudspeaker grill is on the lower left.

Back without cover

The back cover is removable, however, the battery is not, there is no means to access it without tampering the screws plus the terminals are linked by a ribbon cable. On the other note, the two micro SIM slots and the micro SD slot are all hot-swappable.

Left

Right

The left side was kept bare while the right side holds both the volume rocker and the power button.

Top

Bottom

The top has both the micro USB port and 3.5mm audio jack while the bottom has nothing on it.

Although the O+ EVO 4G is made of mostly plastic, it does not look and feel cheap, in fact, it is one of the best looking phones from Oplus. The build quality is also robust, buttons are tactile and the back cover fits well in place.


DISPLAY:

Display

It has a 5-inch display with HD resolution and IPS technology for better viewing plus a layer of scratch-resistant glass is placed on top. It can also support up to 5-point touch and the brightness can be adjusted manually or automatically with the help of the light sensor.


SENSORS:

Sensors

The sensors of the phone include accelerometer, proximity, light, orientation and magnetometer, all of which are functioning properly according to their purpose.


BENCHMARKS:

Antutu

Quadrant

Vellamo

NenaMark2

In terms of benchmark results, it ate the O+ 8.17 (hexa-core device) alive, except for the NenaMark2 wherein their scores are similar. When compared to an MT6592 octa core device like the O+ Air, it still managed to surpass the Antutu (30K+ vs 26K+) and match the Vellamo scores, but fell short on Quadrant and NenaMark2, 9K+ vs 17K+ and 53+fps vs 68+fps respectively.

If our impression will be based on the benchmark scores, we can safely say that it is way better than those devices powered by MediaTek chipset with 6 CPU cores. 


INTERFACE:

About Phone

Start-up

Interface

One Hand and Air Shuffle

It runs on slightly newer Android 4.4.4 KitKat, the interface is still almost stock Android with the usual O+ icons and some third-party pre-installed apps. It also comes with O+ Air Shuffle feature plus the newest One Hand accessibility that always float no matter what you are doing on the screen.


BASIC FUNCTIONS:

Basic Functions

The messaging, telephony, call history, phonebook, messaging and email are all working properly and served their purposes well, no issue or problem encountered during the review period.


MULTIMEDIA:

Gallery:

Gallery

The gallery holds all the photos and videos on your phone and can be filtered by albums, locations or times. It also has a built-in photo editor app and video trimming tool.

Video Player, Music Player and FM Radio:

Video Player, Music Player and FM Radio

The video player supports multiple file types up to 1080p resolution, .avi, .3gp, .mp4, .flv and .mkv are all confirmed working. Watching on its 5-inch HD display is enjoyable, especially when both the ClearMotion and MiraVision technologies are enabled. Meanwhile, the FM radio and the music player have the same old looks found on almost every Android KitKat device of Oplus.

Camera and Video:

Camera and Video

The camera and video still share the same interface, but this time it offers more features. One of which is the inclusion of filters that you can use to add effects on your photos and videos. In terms of shooting modes, it has lots of them, namely normal, live photo, motion track, panorama, multi-angle, QR code scanner, picture-in-picture (PIP) and selfie fix mode.

The PIP utilizes both the main and secondary camera in order the capture the group or scenery (rear) together with the person (front) that taking the photo. On the other hand, the Selfie Fix allows you to adjust three factors, namely wrinkle removal, whiten and shape. Meanwhile, capturing photos/videos can be done in several ways, you can use the on-screen shutter keys, self-timer, by smiling and using the peace sign.

Sample Photos:

Day

100% Crop

With Filter

With Filter

The main camera can take photos up to 8 megapixel resolution. When there is good lighting condition, the images produced are relatively good with the right amount of brightness, color and details. Speaking of details, it can capture even those small particulars. If you take a look on the sample photo, the address below the glass can still be clearly read.


Sample Video:

Sample Video - 1080p

 Sample Video - 720p

Sample Video - 720p with filter

The O+ EVO 4G can record videos up to 1080p at 30fps, the output is also good with a more natural look and almost no dropped frames.

Browser:

Browser

The only browser install is the stock Android app, it is generally good for everyday surfing, it is fast and loads web pages quickly. It offers multiple tabs, sites can be saved to bookmarks or for offline reading and you can request desktop version too.

Gaming:

Despicable Me

Asphalt 7

Dead Trigger 2

Storage and Install Location

This is the first time we reviewed a 64-bit device and in terms of gaming performance its muscles are proven to drive games, even those high definition ones smoothly. It has 8GB of storage, but only 5.74GB is accessible to the user, which is shared between internal storage (1.94GB) and phone storage (3.8GB). If you are going to use an SD card, you can select it as your default storage and transfer apps in it. However, only the data files are movable to SD card and the "app files" remain on the internal storage.


CONNECTIVITY:

Connectivity

As the name implies, it has 4G or commonly known as LTE and this capability is applicable on both SIM slots, which in turn you can share via tethering or hotspot. If you do not have a data plan, you can always count on its reliable WiFi connection. Other connectivity features include Bluetooth, 3.5mm CTIA compliant audio jack, micro USB port with OTG support, wireless printing and wireless display.

Wireless Display

I will expand the last one a little bit, on older MediaTek devices, you can only use the Wireless Display function to project the phone's screen to a bigger display such HDTV. But on the O+ EVO 4G, you can also do the opposite, another device can connect with it and use its display to mirror the contents of the connected device. In the photo above, I used the O+ Air to connect with it. As you can see, I am playing Chess Genius using the O+ Air and it is being displayed at the same time in the EVO 4G.


PRODUCTIVITY:

Productivity

The productivity applications are the Calculator, Calendar, Clock, My Notes, Sound Recorder, File Manager and To Do. There is no document viewer or editor, but you can download one easily for free in the Play Store.


GPS:

GPS

When the location mode is set to high accuracy, the O+ EVO 4G managed to get a satellite lock in less than 10 seconds with an accuracy of about 9 feet.


BATTERY STATS:

Battery Stats

During our video loop test, it managed to last an impressive 7+ hours, which as far as I can recall is the longest among other smartphones we reviewed (first screenshot). On the other hand, playing video continuously lasted for more than 3 hours before the battery warning came up (second screenshot). After that, I left the phone in standby mode and surprisingly, it only consumed 1%  for more than 8 hours (third screenshot).


OTHERS:

O+ Hub and O+ Share

The O+ Hub is a the place where you can access/learn everything about O+ USA while the O+ Share is the company's own cloud storage solution.

ClearMotion

MiraVision

The ClearMotion and MiraVision are two technologies that developed by MediaTek. The former allows a smoother video transitions, something like a 30fps clip would be played at 60fps while the latter provides the best possible display quality, something like up-scaling 720p to 1080p.

Bluetooth Notice

The Bluetooth Notice is installed by default, it is an app that allows to push notification to a remote device. This is an you can use when you have an O+ Time or O+ Tag.

Google Apps

As an Android device, there are lots of Google apps pre-installed and there is no means to uninstall them without the root access.

Other Apps

Other apps installed are SIM Toolkit, Search, News & Weather, Torch, Downloads and Facebook.

Anti-Theft, Visitor Mode, Lossless Bluetooth Mode

Other interesting things you can find under the system settings are the Anti-Theft feature that allows you to send notification, lock and wipe out information on your phone when it get lost or stolen. Meanwhile, the Visitor Mode hides personal information such as contacts, call history and messages, which is useful when lend your phone to someone, but you do not want him/her to access those things. Lastly, the Lossless Bluetooth Mode enables high quality audio on your BT headphone or speaker.



CONCLUSION:

Oplus USA able to hit two birds in one stone with the O+ EVO 4G, it is their first device to have LTE and also their first smartphone to have 64-bit quad core chipset. Apart from these two highlights, it also offers pretty decent overall specs at a very competitive pricing. Performance wise, the interface navigation is smooth, has a satisfactory camera output, fluid gaming and above average battery life.


PROS:

LTE connectivity
64-bit quad core processor
5-inch scratch-resistant HD display
Decent camera performance
Decent battery life

CONS:

Non-removable battery
Internal storage is not unified


Specifications:

• GSM 850/900/1800/1900
• WCDMA 850/2100
• LTE 850/1800/2100
• Dual micro SIM, dual standby
• 5-inch IPS capacitive HD touchscreen display, 5-point touch, scratch resistant glass
• Dimensions: 145.8mm x 72.2mm x 9.3mm
• Weight: 140 grams
• Android 4.4.4 KitKat
• 1.5GHz 64-bit quad core Cortex-A53 CPU, Mali-T760 GPU, MediaTek MT6732 chipset
• 1GB of RAM
• 8GB internal storage, expandable up to 32GB via micro SD, 15GB FREE O+ Air Share
• 8MP auto focus main camera with LED flash
• 2MP f/2.0 secondary camera
• Multimedia player
• FM Radio
• 3.5 audio jack
• GPS with A-GPS
• WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, Wireless Display, WiFi Hotspot
• Micro USB 2.0 with OTG support
• Bluetooth v4.0
• Sensor: accelerometer, light, proximity, orientation, magnetic
• 2500mAh Li-Ion non-removable battery
• Price: Php7,995
• Freebies: 4GB micro SD card and screen protector