As smartphones get re-engineered to enhance their aesthetics with features such as slim bezels, thin frame, glass/ceramic body and others, they become more fragile. But there are persons who desire their phones to be rugged while still having all the functions of a smartphone. Blackview satisfies the need of that segment with the BV series. The rugged phone maker sent in a unit of the Blackview BV9000 for review a couple of months back. Here you have it.

BlackviewBV9000 isn’t a relatively new model as it was launched a long time ago alongside the BV9000 Pro. The models are separated by just a few hardware features. I’ve had this phone for more than 4 months and it is always with me whenever I have to hit the road to a remote region or rough terrain or while it rains. So my take on the BV9000 won’t be based on assumptions but on practical results.

DESIGN

You won’t have to take a second look at the device to conclude that the device is a rugged phone as a result of its mammoth size and weight.

The rugged phone comes with a cool rubberised body with some metal plates to add some aesthetics. The metal band and rubberized backplate held up pretty well over time. I’ve noticed that if you scratch the rubberized surface, you can polish minor scratches away with a cleaning cloth, which is pretty cool. However, any scratch to the metal backplate remains there permanently but it won’t scratch easily except on hard surface like the floor. The backplate tends to provide protection to the rear cameras and fingerprint sensor which it wraps around.

The BV9000 comes with an IP-68 rating meaning that it is water and dust resistant. The device has the SIM tray slot at the top edge while the charging port is at the bottom. Both are covered with a rubber seal designed in such a way as not to allow water in. The port also has rubber seals around it as well as the SIM slot holds tightly when it is slotted in. Also, the rugged body assures that the phone will survive a few accidental drops. The phone did drop accidentally on a few occasions, sometimes from the hands of my kids. The rubberised body gives that feel of cushion effect to any damage that may occur. I also did put the phone under running water and even inside a bucket of water and it still worked fine. Even under the rain, the phone works fine, including the display but as usual, the fingerprint sensor won’t respond well.

I found the display to be very good overall. While the sunlight legibility is not the best, it’s pretty good. I also love the loudspeaker that can get really loud and the sound quality is pretty good for a budget device. Other features include the LED notification light and a hybrid dual sim card slot. I found the fingerprint scanner to be quite accurate even though the display could light up a bit faster. The device has its volume rockers, power button and a shortcut button at the right side of the display. The shortcut button can be set to take the user directly to launch a particular app with one, two and three presses.So,you can add three different commands.

Finally, the phone lacks headset jack, which means that you always need to bring a USB-C to 3.5mm adapter with you but the phone ships with an adapter in the retail box. You also get an earphone, USB-C cable, OTG cable, a screen protector and a fast charge charging adapter.

HARDWARE and PERFORMANCE

When it comes to hardware, the Blackview BV9000 Pro is one of the most powerful budget rugged phones out there.

The gaming performance is just great. All the 3D games work without any issues even if you play them on the very highest graphics settings, which is very impressive for a budget phone.

SPECIFICATIONS

The BV9000 packs a 5.7-inch display with FHD+ resolution and 18:9 aspect ratio. It offers a triple camera setup featuring a 13MP+5MP camera combination at the back and an 8MP front shooter for selfies. The device is a MediaTek MTK6757CD Octa Core 2.6GHz processor (Helio P25), under the hood. The chipset is paired with 4GB of RAM while there are 64GB and 128GB storage options. In addition, the phone runs Android 8.0 Oreo, has dual-SIM support and crams a non-removable 4180mAh battery under the hood.

USER INTERFACE

The gadget has been very quick consistently despite the fact that I’m not a gigantic aficionado of redesigned icons in the UI. I wish Blackview stayed with stock Android yet that is effectively fixable utilizing a third-party launcher.

IMAGE QUALITY

I also like that the Blackview BV9000 is one of those rare budget phones from China that can take decent daylight pictures even on the cloudy days. The portrait shots are also surprisingly good in comparison to most of the budget Chinese phones I’ve recently tested. Selfies look pretty good but the video quality using both main and front cameras does not impress, even after receiving a few software updates. Check out some of the camera samples.

TEST NOTES

I didn’t have any connectivity issues with this phone and battery life has been consistently good. I was usually able to get about 7 hours of screen-on time which is a good result.

CONCLUSIONS

In conclusion, I strongly hold that the Blackview BV9000 is a solid rugged phone on a budget. The phone has performed very well over time with awesome user experience.  The design is great, it attracts a lot of attention wherever I go and the battery can take you several places without fear of running out of battery power. Even the camera output is pretty decent for such a model. However, the lack of a headphone jack is quite frustrating, making it impossible to listen to music and charge the phone.

Overall, the Blackview BV9000 is still one of the best options in this price range and I recommend you check it out if you’re shopping for a rugged phone on a budget.

Buy Blackview BV9000 on Amazon

Buy Blackview BV9000 on AliExpress

Buy other Blackview Products on AliExpress

The post Blackview BV9000 Review – A Rugged phone that doesn’t compromise on beauty appeared first on Gizmochina.

The Blackview BV9000 Pro was released a long time ago and I’ve had this phone for more than 3 months. I took it with me when I wanted to have a rugged device that also has great specs and a huge battery. Let’s see how the Blackview BV9000 Pro looks like after 3 months. 

VIDEO

DESIGN

Once you pick the Blackview BV9000 Pro up, you will immediately notice this is a rugged phone because of its sheer size and weight.

The metal band and rubberized backplate held up pretty well over the time. I’ve noticed that if you scratch that the rubberized surface, you can polish minor scratches away with a cleaning cloth, which is pretty cool.

The phone has the IP-68 rating meaning that it is water and dust resistant. Also, the rugged body assures that the phone will survive a few accidental drops. I didn’t drop the phone on purpose but I used it in the rain or underwater a lot and the device still works fine.

I found the display to be very good overall. While the sunlight legibility is not the best, it’s pretty good. I also love the loudspeaker that can get really loud and the sound quality is pretty good for a budget device. Other features include the LED notification light and a hybrid dual sim card slot. I found the fingerprint scanner to be quite accurate even though the display could light up a bit faster.

Finally, the phone lacks headset jack, which means that you always need to bring an adapter with you, which is supplied in the retail packaging.

HARDWARE and PERFORMANCE

When it comes to hardware, the Blackview BV9000 Pro is one of the most powerful budget rugged phones out there.

The gaming performance is just great. All the 3D games work without any issues even if you play them on the very highest graphics settings, which is very impressive for a budget phone.

USER INTERFACE

The device has been quite fast on the daily basis even though I’m not a huge fan of redesigned icons in the user interface. I wish Blackview stuck with stock Android but that’s easily fixable using a third party launcher.

IMAGE QUALITY

I also like that the Blackview BV9000 is one of those rare budget phones from China that can take decent daylight pictures even on the cloudy days. The portrait shots are also surprisingly good in comparison to most of the budget Chinese phones I’ve recently tested.  Selfies look pretty good but the video quality using both main and front cameras does not impress, even after receiving a few software updates.

TEST NOTES

I didn’t have any connectivity issues with this phone and battery life has been consistently good. I was usually able to get about 7 hours of screen-on time which is a good result.

CONCLUSIONS

In conclusion, I think the Blackview BV9000 Pro is a solid budget rugged phone that held up pretty well over the time. I like it for its design, good overall performance, battery life and even decent cameras. However, I’m frustrated with the video and sound recording quality, and there is no headset jack.

At the end of the day, the Blackview BV9000 Pro is still one of the best options in this price range and I can recommend you check it out, despite the fact that there are a few minor flaws.

The post Blackview BV9000 Pro Review After 3 months – A Solid Budget Rugged Phone! appeared first on Gizmochina.

The company Blackview is known for producing all sorts of budget phones but their rugged devices series is one of the most popular on the market. The reason for that is the company manages to find a good balance between design, rugged properties, great specifications and of course, the price. Learn more in the Blackview BV9000 Pro review.

VIDEO REVIEW

UNBOXING

The phone ships with all the usual items and some extras include a screen protector, a pair of earphones, USB OTG cable, 3.5mm to USB C adapter, and micro USB to USB c adapter.

DESIGN and DISPLAY

It is obvious that the BV9000 Pro is a rugged phone since it is thick and heavy but I have to say this is one of the best-designed and well-built rugged smartphones, just like my previously reviewed Blackview rugged phones. The build quality is excellent as the phone uses mostly metal and rubber in its construction. I love some extra features like a highly customizable smart key.

We now have 18:9 aspect ratio display that I found to be pretty sharp and vibrant both indoors and outdoors. The phone has the IP-68 rating meaning that it is water and dust resistant. Also, the rugged body assures that the phone will survive a few accidental drops. Unlike the BV8000 Pro, there are flaps that cover the ports to avoid water damage.

Just above the display, we have an 8MP shooter for selfies. It is great that we have a multicolor and customizable LED notification light. Gone are the capacitive keys, which are now implemented on the screen.

As for optics, we now have a dual camera setup that I will cover a bit later in the review.

You can access two SIM card slots and the microSD card slot easier, you don’t need to remove the backplate like on a previous generation model.

I found the fingerprint scanner to be quite accurate even though the display could light up a bit faster.

Unfortunately, there is no headset jack but the sound quality via the supplied adapter is pretty good. Finally, the loudspeaker is one of the loudest I’ve ever heard and the quality is quite good but the sound could be more balanced.

HARDWARE and PERFORMANCE

When it comes to hardware, the Blackview BV9000 Pro is one of the most powerful budget rugged phones out there.

The phone ships with an octa-core MTK6757CD chip (2.6GHz), 6GB of RAM and 128GB of expandable storage.

The gaming performance is just great. All the 3D games work without any issues even if you play them on the very highest graphics settings, which is very impressive for a budget phone. Finally, I didn’t notice any overheating issues.

USER INTERFACE

As far as user interface goes, we are looking at a heavily customized Blackview’s skin that is built on top of Android 7.1.

I’m glad that this time around they kept the app tray and there are customization options and extra features. You can customize the navigation bar, LED notification light, use some gesture controls that work fine or choose from quite a few fingerprint gestures if you wish so. Overall, it would have been nice to have Android 8 out of the box but I’m happy with the day to day performance as the phone is really fast and smooth even after installing plenty of apps.

BENCHMARKS

IMAGE QUALITY

The overall image quality is pretty good even if you take pictures on a cloudy day like I did. Sure, some of the shots could be more detailed but I at the end of the day, this is still a budget phone and I’m happy with the results.

The portrait shots are also surprisingly good in comparison to most of the budget Chinese phones I’ve recently tested.

The night image quality, however, does not impress.

On a positive note, selfies taken with the 8MP camera look pretty good.

The phone can shoot videos in 4k and 1080p. The 4k video quality does not really impress as it could be much more detailed. There are also quite a few video artifacts going on and there is no continuous auto-focus.

720p selfie video quality could be better and the sound recording quality is just awful.

Download full resolution camera samples

CONNECTIVITY

I didn’t have any connectivity issues with this device as the call quality and signal reception are pretty good, and even the GPS lock speeds and accuracy were okay. The phone has quite a few sensors including a gyroscope, so you will be able to use the device with VR headsets.

BATTERY LIFE

The Blackview BV9000 Pro ships with a built-in 4180mAh battery that performs just great. I could constantly get over 7 or 8 hours of screen-on time but your mileage may vary, depending on the usage.

Finally, the phone ships with the fast charger that can fully charge the battery in about 1.5 hours.

CONCLUSIONS

Blackview BV9000 Pro is a great-looking and well-crafted device that was built with the power users in mind who usually work in harsh weather or environmental conditions.

The phone is very fast on the daily basis, it can handle most of the 3D games, daylight image quality is pretty good and the battery life is great. However, the phone lacks the headset jack and video and sound recording quality could be better.

I still believe that Blackview BV9000 Pro is one of the most powerful and one of the best budget rugged phones out there, despite a few shortcomings.

The post Blackview BV9000 Pro Review – The New Best Budget IP68 Rugged Phone? appeared first on Gizmochina.

Blackview announced the BV9000 Pro a few weeks back with top-notch specs and premium design. The rugged smartphone maker is now set to unleash another model BV9000 into the market.

Talking about the specifications, the BV9000 features a 13MP dual Sony sensor at the rear. The rugged smartphone also comes equipped with the MT6757CD octa-core processor clocked at 2.6GHz with 4GB of RAM and there is 64GB of internal memory. The BV9000 still retains the 5.7-inch display size seen on the BV9000 Pro and it comes with a 4180mAH battery. The only difference between both models is the memory: 6GB RAM+ 128GB ROM on BV9000 Pro.

Both the Blackview BV9000 and BV9000 Pro are basically Blackview’s final rugged phone in 2017. They come with new accessories and a brand new design. The entire package comes encased in a premium upgraded solid wood packaging box and is not the same as the paper box packaging used on previous Blackview models. This no doubt keeps your phone safer and more upscale. Blackview BV9000 & BV9000 Pro also packs an earphone as well as a USB Type-C cable for data syncing and charging, and a charger inside their boxes.

The entire package of BV9000Pro is available at a starting price of just $299.99. If you are looking for an unusual and premium Christmas gift for yourself or relatives, it looks like a totally good pick.

The post Blackview BV9000 & BV9000 Pro 2017 : Which One Do You Choose? appeared first on Gizmochina.