Still don’t forget, the unit we are having is the Lite version which lacks a rear fingerprint scanner. The device came in Sandstone Black, and when I put it on, it was having about 62% battery power. The front panel of the device is covered completely with glass, and what looks like a metal frame traveling round the edges, giving the glass extra protection and adding to it built quality.
On the glass, you’ll notice two incisions which hosts the dual front facing speakers (guys these speakers are real good, more on that). Aside the loud speaker, nothing else was found below the screen, to the top, you’ll notice the front facing 5-mega-pixel camera and an LED flash, alongside some sensors.
As for the usual Android capacitive buttons, Infinix decided to ditch that in favor of on-screen Navbars. One on hand, this development is superb because, one need not worry about using the device in the dark, knowing very well that most mid-rage devices of this price, usually have non-backlighted capacitive keys. But on the other hand, the device screen estate is reduces by some inches, because the Navbars don’t auto-hide in all apps.
With the great built quality of the front, I was impressed, only to turn to the back, and I became a bit disappointed. Why? Well, because the knowledge that the Infinix Hot 5 is all plastic became too obvious! I mean it, no one needs to tell you that. Infinix should at least made the back panel very sturdy and tight to the back of the phone, so it can even give a more premium grip, but no! In fact, in the box is this gummy ring holder and stand (very useful folks). Anytime I’m detaching it, I noticed this cracking and shackling sound, as if the back panel wants to pull along with the ring stand which was a bit disappointing to me. But then, the attractiveness of the pattern rear panel is just too good that I soon forgave Infinix, plus don’t forget, it sub $90 smartphone.
Because my unit is Sandstone Black, the Infinix brand name and HOT logo was not too visible, which I personally like, allowing all attention to the 8-megapixel rear shooter and the dual-LED flash. But when taking photos or recording a video, watch, else your finger might be blocking the camera already. Hope the next Hot series will have a better positioned camera.
The volume rockers and power button were kept at the right hand side of the smartphone. Pressing these buttons really give nice feedback, but trust me, the buttons are too popping out. Would have been nicer, if these buttons were more blended into the body of the phone, than giving such different feelings when rubbing your fingers over the edges of the device. While the left hand side of the device is bare, a 3.5 mm jack, a USB 2.0 port and a microphone shares the top and bottom of the device respectively, with each pushed to either side of the smartphone.
I pulled off the back cover, and seriously, that was when I fell in love with the Hot 5 again. The battery is covered in a rather beautiful metal panel, reassuring us again that, although we see plastic outside, but the internals are well taken care of. Unfortunately, the dual SIM slots and dedicated microSD slot was all we could see because we didn’t look further.
Storage, Processor and Display
Our unit came with 16 GB and 1 GB of RAM. But out of the 16 GB, Infinix XOS had already eaten 6+ GB leaving you with less than 10 GB. So if you watch lot of movies, you might want to consider an external SD card, which must not more than 32 GB.
Processing power comes from a Mediatek MT6580 32-bit processor built on ARM Cortex-A7, alongside Mali-400MP4. We put this processor through Antutu 6, and the result below was what we got.
(Click the bars for exact score)
[show-rjqc id=”1″]
[show-rjqc id=”2″]
Those were the only two Benchmarks we saw necessary to run. I tried Epic citadel and GeekBench, but the processor was responding too slow, so I just quited.
Infinix Hot 5 Display
As for the display, well it a 5.5-inch HD IPS display, and if you don’t expect too much, then trust me you won’t be disappointed. The display was very OK for a device of this price group. Text and icons were not popping out on the glass as on premium smartphones like the Sammy Galaxies, but there were sharp and colors were more accurate than there’re not.
Indoor usage was really good, but my pain was outdoor use. While the screen was still generally visible outdoor, don’t expect stunning view under direct sunlight, because the screen is very reflective, and the weakness of the brightness (NIT) will soon become very obvious under direct sunlight.
In all, the built quality of the Hot 5 is acceptable to me, aside the week and lofty back panel which tend to crackle sometimes.