After reviewing quite a few Leagoo phones, I have an opinion that the company usually makes decent phones for a bargain price. The Leagoo S8 aims to continue that tradition by offering premium full-screen design and a lot more for just about $130. Learn more in our full Leagoo S8 review.

UNBOXING

The phone ships with all the usual stuff and some extras include a pair of earphones and a soft TPU case.

DESIGN and DISPLAY

The Leagoo S8 is yet another budget phone that has a full-screen design but I have to tell you that this is one of my favorites since the device just feels nice in the hand. That brilliant 5.7” HD+ display with 18:9 aspect ratio and tiny side bezels make the phone narrow and comfortable to hold even though the device is taller than phones with 16:9 aspect ratio displays. The panel itself is great but I wish it was a little bit brighter.

The build quality is solid and the phone looks premium thanks to the metal frame with nice buttons and glass backplate.

The Leagoo S8 is one of those rare budget phones that has a dual camera setup both on the back and on the front.

Now a few features as quickly as possible: the fingerprint scanner is accurate but the display could light up faster, there is a front-facing LED flash for selfies and another LED for notifications.

Finally, the loudspeaker quality does not really impress like on most of the budget phones.

HARDWARE and PERFORMANCE

As most of these budget phones, the Leagoo S8 ships with good specs for the price.

I like that gaming performance is pretty good even in the highest graphics settings, which is always impressive on any budget phone. However, the Leagoo S8 gets hot on the upper portion of the phone very quickly.

BENCHMARKS

USER INTERFACE

When it comes to the user interface, the phone runs Android 7 with the Leagoo’s skin on top of it. I don’t like the fact that they took away the app launcher and for some reason, Leagoo added their own Play Store that I didn’t really use. As for added features, there aren’t too many to talk about. You can customize the navigation bar, switch on/off LED notification light and that’s about it. You can also choose from quite a few different themes, wallpapers or change the transition effects. As for the day to day performance, the Leagoo S8 is a fast phone as I’m yet to see it lag or stutter.

IMAGE QUALITY

The overall image quality is pretty good given the fact that I could only test the camera on a dark and cloudy day, meaning that the lighting was poor. The dual-camera setup may be fun to play with for some time but the camera’s software simply draws a circle around the center of the image, meaning this is not the best-looking bokeh effect.

Selfies look pretty good in daylight and the front facing LED flash is pretty powerful in lower lit environment.

The 1080p video quality is just mediocre. What is a bit frustrating is that the audio is being recorded to the right channel only.

Selfie camera is able to shoot videos only in 480p, meaning that the quality of the footage is kind of poor.

CONNECTIVITY

In terms of connectivity, I can’t really complain. I found the call quality and signal reception to be quite good and other connectivity options work fine.

The phone ships with 12 sensors including the gyroscope, so you are all set if you want to use the device with VR headsets.

BATTERY LIFE

A 2900mAh power bank assures a pretty much standard battery life. I could get over 5.5h of screen-on time but this measurement is always subjective, so your results may vary.

It takes about 1.5h to fully charge the phone with the supplied fast charger, which is a great result for a budget phone. However, the phone still uses the micro USB port, not the USB type C.

CONCLUSIONS

Overall, the Leagoo S8 shapes up to be one of the better all-around budget full-screen phones out there. Sure, it has a few minor caveats to consider like poor audio in video recording mode, micro USB port instead of the USB Type C but in general, this is a solid and nice-looking phone that is not going to break your bank.

The post Leagoo S8 Review – One of the Better Budget All-Screen Phones! appeared first on Gizmochina.

Gigaset is not the first manufacturer name that comes to your mind when you think of buying a new  smartphone but I came across a beautiful and powerful Gigaset ME device. It was designed in Germany, it’s an official partner Munchen Bayern football club and the phone costs just $140. In fact, the Gigaset ME used to cost over $500 when it was just released, which was simply too much. Learn more in the full review.

Gigaset Me Review: VIDEO REVIEW

[embedyt] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1a4f3ie9s90[/embedyt]

Gigaset Me Review: UNBOXING

The phone comes in a premium packaging and inside of it, you can find the all the usual stuff. Some extras include a pair of earphones that actually sound pretty good.

Gigaset Me Review: DESIGN and DISPLAY

Honestly, the Gigaset Me looks and feels like a much more expensive phone. It uses a high-quality stainless steel chassis, tactile metal buttons and a sheet of Gorilla Glass 3 on the front and rear.

The phone is compact due to it’s 5” 1080p display, which is sharp and vibrant. Just above the display we have an 8MP camera and a notification LED light.

I don’t like the fact that there are only the on-screen navigation keys but at least you can change the position of the buttons.

The back looks really nice but obviously, it is a huge fingerprint magnet as most of the glass surfaces, and the phone is quite slippery.

Besides the beefy 16MP camera, dual tone dual-LED flash, you can find some other sensors since the phone has quite a few fitness-oriented features.

You can track your heart rate, check the UV level using a dedicated sensor if you need to, track your steps with the built-in pedometer and once you finish your workout, control devices like TVs with the help of the IR blaster.

The fingerprint scanner is very accurate and it unlocks the phone straight from the standby mode. However, sometimes the display lights up slower than expected.

The phone is being advertised for the good sound but I would rate the loudspeaker quality as above average. Also, you will usually end up covering it up if you hold the phone in the landscape mode. The sound via the headset jack is great and I have no complaints here.

Gigaset Me Review: HARDWARE and PERFORMANCE

Since the Gigaset ME was released quite while ago, it sports a little outdated but still pretty good specs that include an octa-core Snapdragon 810 chip, 3GB of RAM and 32GB of expandable storage.

The Snapdragon 810 chip was used in the last year’s flagships for a reason. The phone can handle anything you throw at it without any issues. There is no stutter or skipped frames once you play the most demanding 3D games. Finally, the phone gets quite warm when gaming but it does not overheat.

Gigaset Me Review: BENCHMARKS

Gigaset Me Review: USER INTERFACE

The phone runs on the outdated Android 5.1 with the Gigaset’s skin on top it.

There are not too many features to talk about except for the fact that there are some redesigned icons and the app tray has been removed for some reason.

Most importantly, the UI runs fast and I didn’t have any stutter even after installing quite a few apps.

Gigaset Me Review: IMAGE QUALITY

IT IS HIGHLY-RECOMMENDED TO DOWNLOAD FULL RESOLUTION CAMERA SAMPLES TO SEE THE ACTUAL IMAGE QUALITY. THE PICTURES UPLOADED ON THE WEBSITE ARE 50% SMALLER IN RESOLUTION.

When it comes to the image quality, the Gigaset Me is definitely one of the best $150 camera phones you can buy. The images come out sharp, detailed and the color reproduction is accurate even though I took all the daylight pictures during the cloudy and foggy day.

The night photos don’t look that great but you will still be to take some usable images. Obviously, the pictures looks quite grainy buy my biggest complaint is a visible purple tint in most of the shots.

The selfies look kind of mediocre. All the images I took have quite a soft focus.

The phone can shoot videos at the resolution of 2k or 1080p. Either way, the quality of footage is just mediocre. My biggest complaint is a very poor sound recording quality.

Download full resolution camera samples

Gigaset Me Review: CONNECTIVITY

The phone ships with the hybrid SIM card tray where you can either put 2 nano SIM cards or a combo of 1 SIM and the microSD card.

I didn’t have any connectivity issues with this phone except for the fact that the sound quality from the earpiece is kind of mediocre.

Gigaset Me Review: BATTERY LIFE

The 3000mAh battery performs great. It will easily get you through the day and that translates to about 5 hours of screen-on time on a mixed use.

Also, the phone supports the Quick Charge 2.0 and you can fully charge the phone in about 1h 30 mins.

Gigaset Me Review: CONCLUSIONS

So, there you have it, the Gigaset ME, the phone you’ve probably never considered buying.

Obviously, it was simply too expensive at the time of the release but for the current price of just $150, I think that it is a pretty good deal.

The phone looks and feels expensive, the display is pretty sharp and vibrant and the Gigaset Me has the specs that can still handle even the most demanding tasks like 3D games.

The camera can take some really nice and sharp pictures in daylight but it struggles in lower-lit situations. Also, the sound quality in the video recording mode is just horrible.

If you decide to buy this phone, you will probably be stuck with the Android 5.1. On the other hand, the day-to-day performance of the UI is good.

Still, the Gigaset ME is definitely worth $140 as it is a solid and nice-looking phone if you don’t mind the previously mentioned shortcomings and the fact that it will attract all the fingerprints and smudges once you use it.

The post Gigaset Me Review – Designed in Germany and Premium for $140! appeared first on Gizmochina.