Considering my bad luck with smartphone devices, I've decided to start a topic about reviewing some of these devices. Particularly devices that are often on the entry-level / mid-level range.
I'll start with this one:
QILIVE Q4 5.5" V1.2
Considering that I've enjoyed several of their products (from tablets to smartphones), this particular entry is baffling in more ways than one. Let me start off with the good: it has a decent quad-core processor, it has 1GB of RAM and has 16 GB of Internal Storage. Good for games, maybe not intensive ones, but the mid-range stuff should work fine. 16GB Internal Storage should be more than enough for media consumption. Battery life is also exceptionally good at 2500 mAh, a full charge should get you through most of the day without much of a hassle.
Now the bad, the camera... is absolute crap. Not even the below entry-level chinese OEM devs could produce a camera this bad. It's bad on 2 levels, the autofocus function is poorly conceived, takes way too long and shots often look blurry. And I'm talking about broad daylight shots. The second one is the actual interface that combines icons with long menus. Want to change the camera setting from auto-flash to flash? Try to guess the correct icon, then scroll the menu to find the flash settings and then change it. You have to take three steps to change something that in other basic camera phone UIs requires just one tap.
The camera performance like I said, is bad, it takes too long to focus, though if you take the time to learn the ropes you can pull off a decent photo here and there, it's not something that a casual social network user will have any fun with. Like I said before, even in broad daylight, the quality of the shots is variable. At night, the camera, even with flash on, is almost useless. The front camera does a little better performance if you want average selfie photos. The rear camera only seems to do OK with near static objects and close up shots when the focus is just right.
Video recording at 720p on the other hand is good, not mindblowing but at least makes for the dissapointing camera.
Also dissapointing is the Android 4.4.4 which, while it's robust and well rounded, it's strange to see a device in the market with such an outdated device.
The final big screw-up from Qilive (which is most likely why they released a newer version of this model, the Q4 V2) is that it either fails to detect microsd cards or simply corrupts them. For some odd reason, it could only detect an old 8GB Samsung microSD card that I had for years. Other cards with good quality build, the device seems to detect them at first but after a while I'm prompted with a notificiation saying that the card is either empty or has an invalid file system. I insert that same card on other devices and surprise... surprise... no problem whatsoever, it finds all my media.
The Good: Battery Life, Hardware
The Bad: Camera, Android Kit Kat and Micro SD Card issues
Finally got this off my chest.
