When the time comes to upgrade your phone, you will realize that you may not be able to afford the top of the range phone. I have had the chance to test out some really amazing phones but not all of us have the cash to spare or are willing to justify their high price tag.
Gearbest is an online store that sells loads of different products. They asked me to choose a phone from their store and review it. Dual rear cameras are still pretty new, well to me at least, so when I saw the MEIIGOO M1 with a dual rear camera, I knew I had to see if it is any good.
Picking up the MEIIGOO M1 you realize that MEIIGOO have put a lot of effort into insuring that the device is made to last. The body is made of metal and feels really sturdy. The body and display combine seamlessly to provide a premium look and feel. At 9mm, the M1 is not the thinnest device I have seen but it certainly is easy to hold. Comparing it’s weight to a phone of similar size such as the Galaxy S8 ,which weighs 155 grams, the M1, which weighs 188 grams, is a bit on the heavy side for its size.
At the front of the device you get a 5.5 inch 1920 x 1090 FHD display with 443 pixels. The display is pleasant to look at. Colours show really nicely and videos look good. MEIIGOO have done a good job with the bezels. The bezels at the side are hardly noticeable while the top and bottom bezels are thicker as they house important components such as a front facing camera, flash, speaker, notification LED and a fingerprint sensor. On the back of the device you get a dual camera and a flash. At the top you get an earphone jack and at the bottom a USB Type -C port and speakers. On the sides you get a sim and memory card slot as well as a power button and volume rocker. The buttons are well placed for easy access. The fingerprint sensor is part of a capacitive Home button and works really well and quickly.
The MEIIGOO M1 is powered by a 2.3Ghz Octa Core processor and 6GB of RAM. Performance is decent but sometimes there is a slight delay when opening apps. I am noticing it as I have used some flagship deices but if you are new to smart phones you won’t even notice it. With 6GB of RAM you are able to do multitasking with many apps running at the same time.
As said, the rear camera has two lenses: a 13MP(Sony IMX214) and a 8MP. The front camera is an 8MP lens. Dual lenses are still very new but they have two benefits. Firstly you can take photos with the subject in focus and the background with the bokeh effect. Secondly, you can have two photos of the same subject. One normal image and one wide angle image. Selfie lovers will be able to take lit photos as there is not only a flash at the rear but a flash for the front facing camera as well. Video can be recorded in 1080P.
The Zoom is surprisingly good:
There are a couple of modes such as Facebeauty, which is meant to beatify you, Panoramic mode, Mono mode which takes a black and white image and Pro Photo which is the manual mode where you can edit Saturation, brightness, Contrast, Exposure, ISO and White Balance.
Photos and videos aren’t the best I have seen but they are usable for social media, what most of us do with our phone photos anyways. Here are some photos that I took out and about in Cape Town.
The M1 runs Android 7.0 (Nougat) but I haven’t heard if it will be getting Android 8. The UI is quick and responsive and looks very stock Android to me. Swiping left or right on the home screen opens the app drawer. Swiping down opens the notification panel and Android’s Quick Settings. Overall the experience is actually really good.
The speakers produce crips, clear and loud music. You will find that sometimes your hand may get in the way of the speakers but luckily it doesn’t block the sound.
One of the coolest functions of the M1 is that you can turn it into a power bank. 99% of the time you are going to want to use a power bank to charge your phone but if you want to help a friend out in an emergency situation, you can charge their device.
You have 64GB of storage with support of a Micro SD card up to 128GB. So storage on the device is very good.
The battery is pretty large with 4000mAh and non removable. I was very happy with the battery life of the phone. I was able to get a full day of normal usage. With taking photos and videos you will notice a faster battery drop but this is normal. You have the choice of sports and normal mode to save battery power.
The MEIIGOO M1 sells for $229.87 (Around R2682,03) on Gearbest. You can either go with free shipping and wait a long time for it to arrive (I think it took like 2 months) or you can pay about R100 for shipping which will take around 18 days. Note the phone will land up at customs and they will slow it down as well. I only had to pay R25 which is the new standard handling fee of the post office and no customs but be prepared to pay a bit of customs.
So to answer the question of “Can a cheap phone replace an expensive phone?”, the answer is yes. Not everyone needs the best of the best. Not everyone can afford the top of the range device. If you are looking for a device with a nice large display, good build quality, decent performance all for a good price, then the MEIIGOO M1 may be the phone for you.
You can purchase the MEIIGOO M1 by click here!
