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| Kata V5 Review; Good for Basic Usage and Beyond |
INTRODUCTION:
Kata Philippines recently launches the Kata V5, an entry-level smartphone, which said to be the successor of last year’s Kata V4. With a bigger number value on its name, and a higher asking price, we couldn’t help but expect new things from this device.
So, we decided to take it for a spin to see what this handset has to offer. Come, join us, as we dig deeper into Kata's latest budget-offering, the V5.
PHYSICAL:
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| Back |
Just like its predecessor, the Kata V5 has metal framing, which makes it a pretty solid to touch. The back cover, although made of plastic offers nice aesthetics, and complements its whole appearance. Overall, it looks good, especially when you consider its asking price.
Kata V5 Unboxing and Hands-on
It measures 135mm x 67.5mm x 8.9mm, making it compact enough to carry and use even with just one hand. It only weighs 149 grams, so solid grip is guaranteed, too. By the way, its physical dimensions are identical to that of the Kata V4.
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| Top |
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| Right Side |
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| Left Side |
The 3.5mm headphone jack and the micro USB port are located on the top, the volume rockers are placed on the left side, while the power button is positioned on the right.
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| Rear Camera and Special Circular Button |
The back of the phone accommodates a special circular button, which is situated below the main camera. The button can power on the device from standby, launch the camera, and doubles as a shutter button when taking selfies. Sadly, it is not user-programmable, which means you are stuck with its configuration.
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| Kata V5's Display |
The front is dominated by its 4.5-inch IPS display that has FWVGA resolution, which translates to about 218 pixels per inch. The brightness is not the best we have seen from phones with similar price tags, but still manageable. However, using it under direct sunlight is a different story, and sometimes could be a little frustrating. Nonetheless, it is still OK for watching videos or playing games, as long as you use it indoors.
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| Kata V5 Display Supports 5-Point Touch |
One thing that the Kata V5 is better than the V4 is the number of simultaneous touches it can recognize, the latter only supports up to two fingers, while the former can accommodate up to five at the same time.
See Also: Kata Philippines Announces Kata T Mini 4
SOFTWARE:
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| Kata UI without App Drawer |
Those looking for a newer Android OS need to look elsewhere, as the Kata V5 still runs on Android 5.1 Lollipop, and based on Kata's track record, most probably, it will never experience even a Marshmallow update.
Moving on, the interface is almost stock Android, except for some pre-installed software like the KataCloud. It has no app drawer, and to clean it up, users must organize it by creating folders.
PERFORMANCE:
The Kata V5 is still powered by the same MediaTek MT6580 chipset, that has quad core Cortex-A7 CPU cores clocked at 1.3GHz each paired with ARM Mali 400 graphics. The RAM is still at 1GB, which is pretty common for its price bracket, while the native is storage is set at 8GB with an option to expand it using a micro SD card.
To give us a preview of its raw processing power, below are the scores it got on our favorite benchmark apps.
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| Benchmark Scores |
As expected, the benchmark results are similar to that of the Kata V4, which simply means it will perform almost the same. That said, the Kata V5 still offers a decent performance, as long as you know its capabilities. It isn’t fast, but it could smoothly run applications when they’re opened one at a time. It is better that way, as opening multiple applications at once will most likely leave you hanging.
It is capable of playing videos, but it’s a different story when the video has heavy graphics. The same holds true when playing games, less resources-hungry titles run smoothly, but those that require more, usually experience stutters every now and then. Moreover, it tends to get a little hot under heavy usage.
Nevertheless, we have nothing bad to say when we just used it as our basic phone, as it was able to meet our primary smartphone needs.
CAMERA:
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| Camera Interface |
The Kata V5 is equipped with an 8-megapixel auto focus rear shooter that has an f-stop of f/2.4, and accompanied by an LED flash. On the other side, a 5-megapixel fixed-focus snapper is mounted in the front. The interface is the old Android UI, which most people can operate with ease.
Sample photos:
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| Pedestrian |
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| Buildings |
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| Flower |
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| Chandelier |
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| Trees |
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| Dessert |
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| Makati City Hall? |
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| Selfie |
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| Low Light Selfie |
Both the front and rear cameras could produce fine (sort of) photos under good lighting conditions, but under low light scenes, images turned grainy. Also, blurred photos were produced when the subject was a little far from us (even if we’re not zooming in the camera). Meanwhile, photos taken in bright environments usually tend to be overexposed. In other words, the Kata V5 cameras are either a hit or a miss, so, better take multiple shots and save the best ones.
Also Read: Kata M4s Unveiled, Octa Core with 4,350mAh Battery
CONNECTIVITY:
The Kata V5 is a dual-SIM device that supports 3G connectivity that allows users to surf the web or be online while on the go. If you have no data plan, or just saving up those precious mobile data, WiFi connection is the way to go. Other things include Bluetooth 4.0, GPS with A-GPS, all worked well during our tests. Moreover, we never had a problem in receiving texts and calls.
BATTERY:
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| Battery |
The Kata V5 is equipped with 1,800mAh removable battery, which based on our continuous mix usages that includes checking emails, SMS, calls, and casual social media browsing, can last for about four to six hours. Meanwhile, we also did a traditional video loop test (with the highest volume, Wi-Fi connection, and maximum level of brightness), the device almost lasted for four hours.
CONCLUSION:
The Kata V5 is a nice looking device with good build quality that comfortably sits on your hand. It might not be the perfect phone on its range, but it delivers, and can be considered as a capable entry-level Android smartphone.
However, after close inspection, it is an almost identical handset with the last year's Kata V4, except that it improves in the multiple touch department. And, if you want to save 300 pesos of your hard-earned money, you better pick the V4 (Php2,699) over the V5 (Php2,999).
KATA V5 Specs:
- GSM: 850/900/1800/1900MHz
- 3G: 850/1900/2100MHz
- Dual SIM, dual standby
- 4.5-inch FWVGA (480 x 854) touchscreen display, 5-point touch
- Dimensions: 135mm x 67.5mm x 8.9mm
- Android 5.1 Lollipop
- 1.3GHz quad core Cortex-A7 CPU, Mali-400MP GPU, MediaTek MT6580 chipset
- 1GB of RAM
- 8GB of ROM, expandable up to 32GB via micro SD card
- 8MP f/2.4 auto focus primary camera with LED flash, dedicated shutter button
- 5MP fixed-focus secondary camera
- Multimedia player
- FM Radio
- 3.5mm audio jack
- GPS with A-GPS
- WiFi 802.11 b/g/n
- Bluetooth v4.0
- Sensors: light, proximity, accelerometer
- Battery: 1,800mAh, removable
- Price: Php2,999
