The market is flooded with budget-range devices, every brand provides has covered this segment. The budget segment has been the most focused category as the price point is the right for the average Nepalese customers. And with more and more Chinese manufacturers are entering the market, even the quality of those ranged devices has been better given the competition. Today, we are talking about one of those budget range Chinese manufactured device, OTTO Mark II. After using for a month or so, I am here sharing my experience and at the end, I will provide our final verdict and let you decide yourself. Here’s the full OTTO Mark II Review.
OTTO Mark II overview
- Screen Size: 6 inch 2.5D Curved HD IPS Display
- Memory: 3GB RAM
- Internal Storage: 32GB ROM(expandable up to 128GB)
- Rear Camera: 13MP Autofocus, Dual tone LED flash, Geo-tagging, Touch focus, Panorama, HDR, Face Recognition Mode
- Front Camera: 5MP Wide Aperture Mode, Beauty Mode, Face Recognition Mode
- Battery: Non-Removable 3845mAh, Fast Charging 5V 2Amp
- Chipset: MediaTek MT6735, 64 bit quad-core CPU
- Operating System: Android™ Marshmallow 6.0
- Sensor: Gyroscope Sensor, G-sensor, Light sensor, Proximity Sensor, Light Indicator Sensor, Fingerprint Sensor
- Special Features: 4G LTE, OTG Support, Custom Android UI, Direct Video Calling, Controlled Networking: Data Saving Mode, Fast Charging, Built-in Gyro-Sensor
- Design: Metal unibody with Aluminum Alloy
- Fingerprint: 0.3 seconds 360-degree fast fingerprint recognition, Fingerprint menu swipe, Fingerprint tap to capture
- Dimension (mm): 160.2 x 82.4 x 8.6mm,8.6 mm thickness
- Weight: 114g
- Connectivity: 4G: FDD-LTE B1/B3/B7/B20., 3G WCDMA: 900/2100Mhz, GSM: 850/900/1800/1900
- SIM Card: Dual SIM, Dual Standby
- Color: Platinum Grey, Champagne Gold
Build and Design:
The OTTO Mark 2 is built with metal unibody with aluminum alloy. The material company opted to use for this budget-minded device makes it feel premium on the hands and looks. Furthermore, at first sight, you won’t be able to differentiate it from any other premium end phone.
Talking about the design, it’s pretty straightforward, front camera, speaker and sensors above the screen, Power ON/OF/sleep/wake button and SIM & microSD card slot, on the left of the phone, however, the SIM & microSD tray looked pretty delicate and hard to insert & eject, and volume rocker on the right. And at the rear, a camera, a LED flash in between the camera and fingerprint sensor. At the top, you will see the 3.5mm audio jack. The microphone & speaker, along with micro USB port in the middle, at the bottom of the phone.
And also, the massive 6-inch display used on the device makes it difficult for one-handed use. Most of the time you will be keeping both your hands busy while using the phone.
Display:
The OTTO Mark II has a massive 6″ IPS LCD display with the resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels. The display is not sharper and crispier as the higher end devices but is enough to watch or play games and also its bright and colors are decent with good enough viewing angle. However, the display is a bit reflective which can be an issue on the direct sunlight.
If are enjoy to consume a lot of multimedia, the screen size is right for you. The bigger screen makes the contain bigger. And also, the company also is promoting it as a multimedia device.
Performance:
Like most of the budget range Chinese manufacturer, OTTO has opted for Quad-core MediaTek MT6735 SoC with a clock speed of 988MHz which is based on 28nm technology. The SoC is paired with Mali-T720 GPU which is not as snappy as high-end but is enough for play games like Asphalt 8 and Dead Zombies. Still, we tried some game, which was not a good experience. That means, no heavy gaming at all.
For smooth performance, the device has 3GB of RAM which is smoother most of the time but we observed some occasional lags but overall it works pretty well, no complains.
- Software:
The downside of the software is the device is stilling running a couple of years old Android 6.0 Marshmallow. And there is no news regarding future update from the company. And the like most of the Chinese manufacturer, the company has used custom skin on the top of Android 6.0.
The UI of the custom skin is not visibly pleasing, the bigger icon on the big screen makes it somewhat unusual. Well, there is a way, you can download the third-party launcher from the Play store. But there were some issues while using some launcher, maybe because of the older version of the Android. But, there are some useful features like gesture control to run allocated apps and double tap to wake up the screen to check the notification without unlocking the device.
Hardware
On the front of the display, the 6-inch screen is covered with 2.5D curved glass. There is no physical button on the screen, instead, the company has used the on-screen button, sometimes is caused irritation only. On the top, there is 5MP camera alongside LED notification and proximity sensor. The hardware supported the performance pretty well, there was no sign of overheating or whats so ever.
The headphone jack yes the headphone jack is on the top. Hybrid SIM slot is on the right along with power button and volume rockers on the left. There are the speaker and micro USB slot for charging and data transfer on the bottom. And at the back, you get a 13MP rear camera, dual-tone flash, and a fingerprint sensor. I must say, the fingerprint sensor worked pretty well and in some cases was quicker than other same range smartphones.
Camera:
The downside of the device is its camera, which is not to the par as the company claimed. Though the device has a 13MP camera, which is same as used by some of the high-end devices but this proves that megapixel is not everything. The photos are somewhat dull, there is HDR feature but that doesn’t improve the photos. And, the low light photos are too noisy, could be because of lack of OIS and aperture of the camera.
The 5MP camera used takes decent photos but are not sharp. There are modes like beauty mode and face recognition mode, which really didn’t work as expected. Furthermore, the low light photos are noisy.
Connectivity:
The OTTO Mark II comes with a Dual Hybrid SIM tray. It supports 4G along with other connectivity options like Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and USB OTG. Sensor wise, it has compass, light, accelerometer, magnetometer, and gyroscope. All work pretty fine, no issues at all.
Battery:
The OTTO Mark II is powered by a huge 3850 mAh battery, which is a plus point for the device. The 720p screen used is better for battery life but the SoC which is based on 28nm is not energy efficient. There is also some feature to optimize the battery for longer use.
The battery gave around 5 hours of the screen On-time for the heavy usage. The heavy usage included a full movie, some light/heavy gaming, lots of social media, youtube, etc. Well, for moderate use the battery can last for some 1 and half days. And with the battery saving mode, the battery can last some more hours in case of power outage or when you are out of charging zone. The company claims to have fast-charging, but it took around 2 and half hours for the battery to charge fully from zero.
Verdict:
At the given price range of Rs. 15,900, it is one of the best smartphones on that price range category. The battery, display, performance and the specification are decent for the price. Though, keep in mind that the phone is a multimedia-focused phone, I do not recommend it for heavy gaming at all. Because of the bigger screen, watching a movie or any video is fun, and in terms of sound quality, it’s decent and loud enough.
The major issue with the device will the software, Android 6.0 used on the device makes it stay behind most of its competitors and software optimization makes it laggy sometimes.
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