THE TECNO W4 REVIEW
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POWERING ON THE DEVICE
Powering on the device takes about 35 seconds
Booting off time is about 5 seconds.
On the chart, the Tecno W4 is higher than the Hot 3 when it comes to the boot time, which isn’t bad
…But I am sure some of you are like.
UI.
If you aren’t one to be bothered by a Phone’s boot time, you might be
interested to know that the W4 doesn’t come with the stock Android 6.0
UI, instead you have Tecno’s UI, the HiOS, but unlike what you have in
the Boom J8, the W4 has left out one HiOS feature – the Hi Manager from
the app list (Although if you go to settings and storage you can click
on the cleaner to enact the Hi Manager feature).
See more UI screenshots.
When
it comes to bloatware and preinstalled apps, you have the regular apps
like Twitter, BBM, Palm play and others which can be uninstalled.
ALL ABOUT THE MARSHMALLOW
Okay, we know that Tecno launched the W4 with the hope that the
Marshmallow feature might sweep you off your feet, but will it? What
differentiates the W4 from the Boom J8 and other Lollipop devices when
it comes to OS experience? At first glance, nothing much! But if you are
an explorer, you will notice small features like the much talked about
Google Now on tap which will give you useful information about anything
highlighted with just a tap of the home button.
You also have the opportunity to limit an app’s impact on battery
life when not being actively used in order to save battery life and not
forgetting the advanced permission settings for your apps.
Google lives in the Settings Menu – what this means is that you can
check/alter your account information for the many heads of the Google
hydra from one section in the Settings menu. There is the do not disturb
mode, that will ensure your apps or calls do no disturb you when you
are busy.
Smartlock will allow you to store your app passwords in the cloud
which you can access whenever you move to a new device. Another
marshmallow feature is the ability to add a line of text to your lock
screen.
Finally, you have your Flex Storage that makes using SD cards or
external storage devices as encrypted expanded storage for your apps and
games on Android Marshmallow a whole lot easier.
Yeah, that is what marshmallow feature has to offer on the W4, worth it?
WHAT IS THE DISPLAY LIKE?
With the 720 by 1280 pixels and a 320dpi on the W4, you get an
average phone display. I compared it with the Hot 3 in both indoor and
outdoor situations and with the brightness to the maximum.
I noticed that the W4 did quite better than the Hot 3, Remember I
said in my earlier review that the colors on the Hot 3 look a little bit
saturated.
Of course, I am not saying that the W4 has the best display as the
test I carried out revealed some dead pixels, but when compared to
another entry level device like the Hot 3, I’d pick the W4.
MAJOR BUMMER ALERT – THE 1GB RAM!
Just like the Hot 3, the Tecno W4 comes with the dreaded 1GB RAM, but
remember that unlike the Hot 3, the W4 comes with the Android
Marshmallow which ensures that apps are well optimized, so will this
make it perform way better?
My answer:
I tried playing 4 HEAVY games, individually, they played nicely,
there were frame drops, but no significant lag, however, when I tried to
multitask, yeah you guessed right!
THE CAMERA?
2MP front-facing the camera and an 8MP back-facing camera won’t earn
an accolade in anyone’s books. Also, with the W4, you only get 4 modes.
See the various tests below:
IN COMES THE 2500mAh battery
Remember when I talked about Marshmallow doze and battery
optimization for apps earlier? Well, they sure did a number on the W4.
You get a slightly above average performance when it comes to the
battery.
Also, the doze comes into play when your device turns off. Don’t
forget that you have the ultra power saving mode to quickly fix you up
when you have little battery juice.
HOW FAST DOES IT CHARGE?
I ran a test, started charging the battery by 8:14am and by 9:55am
(P.s.: Took the screenshot late, hence the 10:08 discrepancy) It had
charged to 59%
I guess it had to follow the footsteps of the Tecno Boom J8 when it
comes to charging, but I’d still score it a little bit higher than the
J8.
AUDIO PERFORMANCE
Given that the speaker is placed at the back, you might have some
restrictions when you place your device on the table. Overall, the
quality isn’t so great, but for a N23,000 device, It is manageable.
OTA UPDATES
I received a firmware update that was about 252MB in size to enhance machine stability and patch bugs.
However, I am not sure if the W4 will receive the Android N update (That would be asking for too much, wouldn’t it?).
DOES THE W4 HEATS UP
Not at all! Following from the RAM test, I tested out the temperature
after playing the games for about 30 minutes with the flashlight
switched on during this process, see the results below: (P.S: The range
before playing the game was between 30 and 31)
GIMMICKS
You have the basic magic gesture, which includes tap to wake (This will turn off the screen when you double click)
Your Gesture control
Musical Gestures will control your music with your fingers.
Finally, you have your flip and wave to answer
HOW MANY SENSORS DOES THE W4 HAVE?
Just 3, the accelerometer, Proximity, and light sensors.
FLAWS
Thank God there were no grammatical blunders or Chinese words this
time, but asides the shortcomings mentioned, I noticed that the W4 comes
with 10GB of ROM, despite it having 16GB on paper
Not really a flaw, but the Tecno W4 doesn’t support USB OTG
BENCHMARKS
Surprisingly, it performed better than the Hot 3 in the Antutu
benchmark, but the Hot 3 slightly had an edge in other benchmarks.
MY GIF CONCLUSION
How much of a side chick is this device
Does the Marshmallow OS bring in anything significant to the table?
OVERALL
I can sense a “the battle of the side chicks” post coming soon
because I feel the W4 is another device that can pass off as a side chic
material if you have enough to get a second device or the main chick
for those who don’t. Of course, it comes with a lot of shortcomings and
the Marshmallow OS isn’t enough to make us overlook these shortcomings,
but overall, I think the OS made it have a slight edge over its direct
competiton.
Source: Misstechy.com
