We have reached eight months of Year 2015 and we know how the smartphone trend is going on and the silicon technology gets more advanced efficient. One of the more popular smartphone System-on-Chip (SoC) in the market, is none other than Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 615 64-bit Octa-Core processor, and we have seen this chip being featured on too many smartphones. There’s actually a lot to love about this particular Qualcomm SoC, its power efficiency, decent smartphone performance and finally, it doesn’t heat up terribly even on super thin smartphones, so if you don’t need to have a powerful Exynos 7 or Snapdragon 800 series processor on your phone, here is our verdict on these Snapdragon 615 powered smartphones.
Oppo R7 and R7 Plus (RM1599-RM1799)
Oppo has been an active user of the MSM8939 chipset, the company’s latest R7 and R7 Plus smartphones continue to use Qualcomm’s trusty chip which was once used on the super slim 4.85mm Oppo R5 and our recently reviewed R1x smartphone. In particular, the Oppo R7 Plus is the highest specced Snapdragon 615 smartphone that we have ever seen as it comes with 3GB of RAM and 32GB of built-in flash storage while supporting Micro SD expansion, the phone has a great 13-megapixel f/2.0 Sonymanufactured main camera and a 8-megapixel front camera, the best part of this device is its huge 4100mAh battery that could probably last you up to two days if you aren’t the heavy type of user. The Oppo R7 and R7 Plus comes preloaded with ColorOS 2.1.1 based on Android 5.1.1 Lollipop out of the box.
Our take: The Oppo R7 and R7 Plus may be a costly phone to afford, but you can’t deny this is a really beautiful smartphone that comes with a killer smartphone camera and something that power users are quenching for – battery life and storage.
Xiaomi Mi 4i (RM749)
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The Mi 4i is the most affordable Snapdragon 615 device in this list, retailing at a mere RM749, this phone has a lot of perks when compared to its competition, which includes a beautiful 5-inch Full HD display with Sunlight Display technology that produces great visibility under sunlight, dual SIM 4G standby, a 13-megapixel f/2.0 camera and 5-megapixel f/1.8 front camera, and a 3000mAh battery under the hood. Moreover, the Mi 4i comes with an exclusively made second generation Snapdragon 615 processor, both its big.LITTLE cores are using high performance Cortex-A53 cores albeit clocked at 1.7GHz and 1.0GHz respectively.
Our take: The Mi 4i has the perfect form factor and build quality that most smartphone users will be looking forward to, however Xiaomi’s MIUI software reliability remains questionable and its mere 16GB storage may not be able to fulfill the storage demanding users.
Samsung Galaxy A7 (RM1499-RM1599)
Samsung has been rather silent with the A7 in its local launch, while the phone was still being shown on the ground, it is also one of the most earliest Snapdragon 615 powered smartphones this year and drew a lot of attention then. Based on our last impressions, the Galaxy A7 maintains the very same old beautiful metal design language found on the Galaxy Note 4, its 5.5-inch Super AMOLED Full HD display is simply top notch with an extremely slim bezel, making it one hand usability really comfortable despite not being able to reach most parts of the screen estate, if you love Samsung’s camera software features you may want to take note that it comes with a 13-megapixel main and 5-megapixel front wide angle cameras, the phone comes with a rather reasonable 2600mAh battery that should last for one full working day.
Our take: Samsung’s Galaxy A7 is a beautiful and fully featured smartphone, however its current asking price tag at RM1499 makes the phone really expensive while its features have pretty much been shadowed by competition as the months passed, but still, Samsung is a manufacturer that has been really consistent on software updates so you might want to consider them as well.
HTC Desire 826 (RM1100-RM1200)
The Desire 826 is a mid-range device worth mentioning as one of our favorite Snapdragon 615 device. First, the phone has a pretty unique design language which was first featured on the Desire EYE, users are encouraged to check out the phone’s camera software which offers the EYE experience, in which you are able to do some great customizations and gimmicks to your pictures. The phone comes with a 13-megapixel main camera and Ultrapixel front camera that takes brilliant selfies under low light, this is also the only Snapdragon 615 powered device in this list to offer front facing BoomSound stereo speakers, which is perfect for music lovers.
Our take: HTC’s Desire 826 is one of the well balanced smartphones of all its competition, its price tag of RM1200 isn’t too much to ask for given the phone’s reliable HTC Sense software experience and great camera features, however its plasticky build quality might set you thinking on whether it is worth paying for that price tag.
vivo x5max (RM1699-RM1799)
vivo smartphones have always been under rated as a Chinese smartphone, the x5Max that we have reviewed back then was a pretty decent device, we don’t like its iOS rip off software experience, however we never had any reliability issues with the phone, its 13-megapixel f/2.0 main camera is a solid performer in low light and its Hi-Fi sound chip is what makes the phone really stands out in the competition, and before we forget to mention, the phone is also very slim at 5.5mm yet it still features dual SIM 4G standby and Micro SD storage expansion on top of its 16GB built-in storage.
Our take: The x5max is a generous slim smartphone that is almost flawless in terms of hardware offering, however its software experience can get really annoying in the long term if you are looking to have a pure Android phone experience. In addition, its RM1799 price tag isn’t what we love.
