iPHONE 5C REVIEW: APPLE'S IDEA OF A BUDGET PHONE

I would really like to apologize for our absence in the past month but we are back to doing what we do best in this part of sub-saharan africa, which is bringing you reviews and news updates about gadgets and what nots. 

Without any more further ado, we would be doing a review about apple's first attempt at a budget phone, Yes you read that right, A BUDGET PHONE. As you already know we at Technerd Nigeria are huge fans of budget phones because we believe smartphones shouldn't be limited to the rich and mighty alone, everybody deserves to get a piece of the pie. So you can imagine the excitement with which we accepted the idea of a budget iPhone, the phone comes with an assorted array of features such as the preinstalled iOS 7 which apple launched a while ago and some more, BUT the price point is no where near budget, well lets just say we were left with a taste of rotten apples. 

OVERVIEW 

We were not totally caught with our pants down on this one, as its the usual trend there are always tonnes of leaks prior to the release of any smartphone this days and apple has also been a victim of this. We first heard about the iphone 5C a few months back and at the time we had little information about it. The most striking thing was that it would come in an assorted array of colours (....yup we see you apple, taking cues out of Nokia's playbook are we?....) beyond that little was known about the phone. we have had an opportunity to spend time with the phone courtsey of our friends at www.smartshopng.com  and this is what we found.

HARDWARE AND SPECS

Its an absolute surprise to see Apple using polycarbonate plastic to build a phone, a material which they have repeatedly bashed other OEM's for using because it was perceived cheap unlike the aluminium and glass finish which we are used to seeing on Apple's devices. The plastic in it self isn't a bad idea, it feels like most other plastic phones out there, from the first glance, I can see that Apple is having some sort of
 "Manufacturers innovation block" because there's nothing new about this phone besides the new i0S 7, the plastic casing and the custom paint job, its almost as if someone dropped a iphone 5 in a kindergarten class and let the kids have a go at it with their poster color.  In terms of its internal specs, nothing has changed, besides the high capacity 64 GB option that was available on last years iPhone 5, The iPhone 5c packs the same A6 system-on-a-chip as the iPhone 5, backed up by the same 1GB of RAM and nearly the same storage options( only the 16 and 32GB storage capacities are available). The 4-inch, 1136×640 IPS display is the same as last year’s as well, and the 8MP camera around back is also identical. If you probably take out the casing and have a look at the internals, you might a few changes such as types of screws and adhesives but besides that there have been no changes. The only notable improvements on the spec sheet  is thath the iphone 5C now sports a bigger battery than its predecessor has the  iPhone 5′s 1440mAh (5.35Wh) pack has been swapped for a 1507mAh (5.74Wh) battery for the 5C, the  1.2 MP front facing camera has also received a minor spec bump in the size of its sensor,  from a 1.75µm  sensor on the iPhone 5 to a 1.9µm unit on the 5C.

SOFTWARE AND CAMERA

The Software is one of the few cool points this phone has, iOS 7 is one of the biggest innovations apple has had since the original iOS and the first generation iPhone was released a few years ago.If you haven't had a feel of the new operating system "you don carry last oh", the OS tackles all what i have considered mundane and boring with the old iOS platform, The new OS is Apples take on a flatter UI experience, the notification centre  has recieved a total overhaul and a ton of other feature which we have already done a review for on here while the OS was in beta. Other new feature of this OS is the availability of the iWork Suite of Apps which Apple has made available without out no extra charge, this used to piss me off as i usually had to pay for every word processing app on iOS in the past,  now you can edit documents such as spreadsheets, word documents, pictures and videos using these suite of apps at no extra cost whatsoever. I tried to find a pet- peeve with this new OS on several occasions but i came up with nothing, it has smooth and fast as usual, its only when compared with Android OS that you might begin to notice some discrepancies such as Apples long standing issues with Sharing, you still cant share files  seamlessly from one app to the other as can be found on Android or from one device to the other as well, the bluetooth system still wont play nicely with other non-iOS devices as well. 

The iPhone 5C has the same camera as the previous iPhone 5, its the same 8.0MP camera with a minor bump in the size of its sensor, last year the iPhone 5 was at the pinnacle of smartphone photography, it was so big that it gathered a cult following, a niche was carved for photographers who took pictures basically with only iPhones, a thriving industry was created called iPhoneography which is the art of shooting and editing pictures with just iOS devices and they held the world at awe, but that was the story before, many OEM's have upped the ante with devices sporting high end cameras with not only better Mega-pixels such as Nokia's 41MP Lumia 1020 or Ultra-pixels in the case of HTC ONE but with better features such as Back Side Illumination, OIS, etc. This camera brings nothing new to the table in terms of innovation, its just a basic 8MP shooter that can get you through your day,  The Image quality isn't better than it was on the iPhone 5, it delivers great pictures in considerable lighting conditions but pictures still appear to be grimey and noisy when the lights go out.

PERFORMANCE

iOS devices have been known to offer one of the smoothest experiences when it comes to the operating system performance and this device doesn't disappoint me in this regard. The device has been fun to use and it was really becoming hard to let go of my review unit, the iphone 5C never lagged for even a millionth of a second, its one of the most responsive modern UI I have experienced in a while, I can see the reason why apple has so many fanboys  customers. Applications launched and closed smoothly, call quality was impressive, we were able to contact loved ones and friends clearly. The iPhone 5C is not all work and no play, gaming applications such as temple Run, Dead Trigger II, Asphalt 8 are all available in the app store and we were able to play them on the device with no hassles. The only concerns with this phone in terms of performance is the unexpandable storage capacity, we are stuck with either the 16GB or the 32GB variety there's no microSD slot and it also has a  non removable 1507mAh battery, we were barely able to last 8 hours on a full charge, this could be pretty impressive by some people's standard but if you are a power user, you might need to get an extra power pack to augment the mediocre battery life.

PRICING AND AVAILABILITY

I believe this is the segment of the review most people has been waiting for,

• 16GB #99,500
• 32GB #125,000 

 this is what breaks my heart most about this phone, the prices are no where near budget at all.....kudos to Apple, i believe this is because our Network Providers do not subsidise this phones like its done in America and the UK. but even at this price point its still cheaper than the iPhone 5S so its still a budget phone in that regard.

PROS 

• refreshed UI and Operating System
• responsive and smooth performance
• solid build quality
• very impressive screen Resolution
• Good Camera

CONS

• non expandable storage
• non removable battery
• average battery life
• poly carbonate plastic casing
• lack of innovation in terms of hardware specs
• small screen size

CONCLUSION/ VERDICT 6.6

The iPhone 5C isn't a groundbreaking innovation in any sense, its safe to say that in Apple's haste to make an "affordable phone" for every one, they exhibited a total lack of innovation which is uncommon with Apple devices, like I said earlier its like someone dropped the iphone 5 into a bucket of paint. Although it still has that Apple effect, even though its a disguised iphone 5, the iPhone 5C has been able to give a nice user experience which apple has been known for. I enjoyed the user interface and the revamped iOS features but the phone itself lacks the justification for being called a "Budget phone". its like every other iOS device, A fashion statement at its best the colour variations would even give you options to combine them with your clothing if you are into that sort of thing. however for this review we would rate this phone 6.6  buying this device would be more of a  statement of class/social status thing......simply put its for the big boys!!

Picture Credit: Pocketnow.com

P.S: if you are interested in purchasing  this device or any of other gadget and devices, you can visit our retail website www.smartshopng.com to view all the prices, send us an email technerdng@gmail.com or call us on 08074795983. if this review has been helpful please remember to subscribe to this blog and share this information with your friends. thank you.

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