ZTE V987 - 4-core smartphone with an excellent screen

So the new stage of development of Chinese smartphones on the new Mediatek MT6589 platform has begun. The parade was opened by brands focused on the domestic market (THL, Zopo, UMI), but over time, models from more famous manufacturers began to appear. In this review, we will consider one of the new products from the company ZTE - smartphone ZTE V987. The main feature of which is the use of high-quality 5-inch OGS screen with a resolution of 1280 × 720 pixels.

► Specifications

Screen: 5 ", OGS, 1280x720 IPS
Processor: Mediatek MT6589 (Cortex-A7 1.2GHz, 4 cores) + GPU: PowerVR SGX544
RAM: 1GB
User memory: 4GB + MicroSD slot with support for cards up to 64 GB
Camera: front 1MP, back - 8MP
Communication: 2 SIM cards (GSM + WCDMA), GPS, Bluetooth, Wifi (802.11 b / g / n)
Battery: 2500mAh
Dimensions: 141 x 70 x 9.2 mm

► Appearance and equipment

The box in which the smartphone is delivered is very tiny. This greatly saves space in the package.


No familiar 2 levels for the phone and accessory. Everything is packed in the form of a “sandwich”. The smartphone itself is stored in a double bag of bubble wrap:


A set of accessories: a charger with an adapter, headphones, a USB cable. Nothing extra. But I would like to have a proprietary protective film in the kit, as in ThL phones.


And yes, this is another device with which we are offered to play the game "guess the full characteristics yourself." There is only a brief description on the box:

• 5-inch OGS HD screen
• Quad-core processor with a frequency of 1.2 GHz
• 8MP rear camera with autofocus
• 2 SIM cards for use in GSM + WCDMA networks
• 2500mAh battery

The instructions only tell you how to insert a SIM card and make calls.
Where are even the basic characteristics in the form of the name of the chip, the amount of RAM and permanent memory?
Personally, I don’t understand what the meaning of this approach is. After all, not every buyer knows the exact characteristics of all models when he goes to the store to choose his phone.
But back to the study of appearance.

The front case looks good. Deep black color, strict design - all this allows the smartphone to look solid.


Below are 3 touch buttons:


The case design itself is taken from the older model ZTE Grand S. Only the thickness has changed (up).
At the back - white matte plastic with a black insert near the camera:


8MP rear camera with flash:


The volume control rocker is on the left: There


is a 3.5mm headphone input and a power button on top:


But the microUSB port is in a slightly unusual place - on the side:


The back panel is thin, the latches are very tight. At the first opening, it seems that it can be broken.




Under the rear panel are 2 SIM card slots that work in standby mode (when talking on one card, you cannot receive calls to the second, but in standby mode 2 cards are active). The first slot is for work in GSM and WCDMA networks, the second is only for GSM.


In the engineering menu, which can be called with the command * # * # 3646633 # * # *, we see the supported networks:


The first item corresponds to the support of work in WCDMA-2100 networks (for Ukraine it is the operator Ukrtelecom (aka Trimob)), the second - WCDMA-900. Unfortunately I can’t check the WCDMA-900, but this item is active in the engineering menu.

Slot for microSD-cards, with which you can expand the internal memory:


Battery with a capacity of 2500mAh:

► Screen

And here a surprise awaited me ... Big and beautiful, 5 inches in size. This is the best screen I have ever seen in smartphones made in China. Neither Jiayu nor ThL even stood next to the screen that is installed in the ZTE V987.
I don’t know, maybe the whole trick is that the screen is made using the OGS (One Glass Solution) technology, when the touchscreen and the protective glass are one piece. The very high value of maximum brightness and image clarity allows you to comfortably use the screen in sunny weather. Of course, when exposed to direct sunlight, even OGS does not save from the mirror effect, but in comparison with other screens, an advantage is clearly visible.
The resolution of the IPS screen is 1280x720 pixels.
Color rendering is excellent:


Colors are bright, juicy:


Good viewing angles:



In a THL W8 review from my colleague, a discussion developed about how convenient it is to use a 5-inch phone. At first, it also seemed to me that 5 inches is a lot. But picking up the ZTE V987, I realized that this is just a great size for the phone. Perhaps the matter is in the design, because of the narrow frame around the screen the phone does not seem wide (width is 70mm).
Compared to the 4.5-inch AMOI N828, the 5-inch ZTE is only slightly wider. But longer.


The effective area of ​​the 5-inch screen seems much larger than the 4.5-inch:


Indeed, the design of the ZTE turned out to be practical.
Holding the phone in one hand, I can reach 75% of the screen size in height:


Since the main functions (calls, SMS, keyboard) are at the bottom of the screen - the control is very convenient.
While holding the phone with one hand it’s difficult to reach the quick control panel, you have to help yourself with the second hand.

► Performance

The ZTE V987 has a 4-core Mediatek MT6589 chip, which is based on a Cortex-A7 processor with a frequency of up to 1.2 GHz and a PowerVR SGX544MP graphics accelerator. The amount of RAM is 1 GB, the constant is 4 GB.
Let's look at the results of synthetic tests:
Antutu 3.2.2:

12443 points - this is a good result for the new platform. This is less than the devices with Samsung Exynos are gaining, but obvious progress is visible compared to the previous generation - the dual-core Mediatek MT6577 chip.

Quadrant:


Linpack and Vellamo


MT6589 show good results in the Linpack test. The high value of the HTML 5 test result in Vellamo indicates a good speed of processing web pages.

Nenamark2:

► Games

The modern MT6589 platform copes well with 3D games. For example, with Dead Space:

But due to optimization problems, there are games in which there is a drop in fps. One of these games is Real Racing 3.

Good, clear touchscreen operation is important in arcade games. And the ZTE V987 screen copes with this task perfectly.

► Video

For the dual-core Mediatek MT6577 chip, even 720p video playback was a problem. For MT6589 and 720p and even 1080p video plays smoothly, without jerks and artifacts.

► Web browsing

Before that, I only used devices with the Android operating system, and for me, some thoughtfulness when opening pages and especially when increasing the text seemed normal. Until I saw the browser working in iOS ...
ZTE V987 surprised me - increasing the text on the page and scrolling are very fast! Of course, it probably loses in browser speed in iOS, but this is the first Android smartphone for me, which really quickly responds to actions with the page.

► Wifi

The signal level drops depending on the distance to the router, but remains stable.
Wifi reception level at a distance of 1 meter without barriers (left) and at a distance of 5 meters, 1 wall (right):

► GPS

GPS is very fast. Literally in a minute there are many satellites, the signal level is stable: a


5-inch screen is perfect for use as a car navigator.

► Sound

The earpiece and speakerphone sound good. Despite the fact that the speakerphone is very small by its custom - it makes a very loud sound and does not even wheeze. And choosing the right loud melody, you can hear a call even by putting the phone in your bag.
But if everything is fine with sound, then you cannot rely on a vibrating alert. Although it is, but the vibration is very weak.

► Software

Pre-installed Android 4.1.2 with minimal changes from ZTE.
The changes only befell the unlock screen. The phone is unlocked by a long press on the screen.


The firmware language is only English and Chinese. But soon this problem will be solved, one of the enthusiastic developers has already received his ZTE V987 and has already begun work on a multilingual firmware assembly.

Work with 2 SIM cards is very simple: when dialing a number in the status bar, you can choose a card for calls by default, or set up a mode in which each time you will be asked for a SIM card with which you want to make a call.
Full settings for the operation of SIM cards are located in the Settings-> SIM management section. You can disable one of the SIM cards in it, configure the default card for calls, sms and data transfer. Choose the behavior in roaming, and you can also “tie” the contacts to a specific SIM card.


Many Chinese programs are preinstalled in the firmware. Several types of market and search for various online stores, QQ messenger, BaiduMaps and others. Fortunately, most of these programs are uninstalled in the usual way; you don’t even need to get root access.
Several branded programs from ZTE are preinstalled:

• ZTE Apps
• ZTE Cloud
• Backup & restore
• My assistant

I am skeptical of all kinds of utilities that “optimize” performance, but after a closer examination of the program My Assistant, I realized that it can be very useful. Let's take a closer look at the possible program.

► My Assistant

A large button in the center with the name “Cleanup” performs system analysis and suggests performing actions to improve system performance: closing active applications, deleting cache files.

► Power Manager

View battery usage data, as well as estimated battery life at current charge level. I must say that forecasting is not very correct. In the “My mode” mode, the calculation is performed not according to the current situation, but according to the template, which indicates that Wifi will always be turned on. Because of this, very small battery life values ​​are obtained.
In other modes, calculations also suffer from inaccuracy.

► Data use monitor

Traffic usage statistics, setting access to applications on the Web, setting daily / monthly traffic restrictions:

► Software manager

Application management manager, backing up data, optimizing the phone by closing active applications, deleting cached files, optimizing the startup list.

► Security

Configuring the Anti-Theft system, anti-virus, setting application access to various features, setting up black lists, creating private contacts, data encryption:


The Anti-Theft system allows you to attach a “service number” to your phone, from which you can perform various actions by sending SMS:

• * zte_sd * password # - lock the phone
• * zte_xl * password # - the phone will be locked and will make a loud sound, even if the silent profile is configured
• * zte_cc * password # - the phone will delete all private data (contacts, SMS, call history, letters), and also format the memory card
• * zte_dw * password # - the phone will return to sms the coordinates of its location with a link on the map

When changing the SIM card in the phone to the “service number”, an SMS will be sent with the SIM card number that was installed.



The idea is good, but ... I could not configure the operation of this application. There may be a problem in the service number. Only the format 8 (0xx) -xxxxx was accepted, and did not want to accept the full format +38 (0xx) -xxxxx, or the abbreviated 0xx-xxxxx. In any case, SMS were delivered, but the answer did not come.

► working hours

The ZTE V987 has a 2500mAh battery. On the one hand, this is not so much, for example, the Jiayu G3 has a 2750mAh battery, and the Lenovo P770 has even more - 3500mAh.
But on the V987 side there is an advantage in the form of an energy-efficient processor architecture Cortex-A7. Let's see what results we get in Antutu Battery Tester:

First place in the ranking with 993 points! Of course, this is less than the Lenovo P770 (1257 points), but the result is really good.
With active work with the screen, the smartphone will work for 2-3 days. If you often play games, then the battery lasts for 1 day. With minimal use (a few minutes of calls per day, SMS, 10-15 minutes of Wifi, a few games), my smartphone was able to last as long as 7 days.
Self-discharge per night is 1-2%.

► Photo

The ZTE V987 has a rear 8MP BSI camera. BSI (back-illuminated sensor) is used to capture as much light as possible to improve images in low light.
In good lighting, the pictures are bright:





In poor lighting, BSI should help improve image quality, but you should not expect miracles from it.
Macro example in cloudy weather:

► Advantages and disadvantages

Screen
Good performance
Battery life
Good GPS signal reception
Only 4GB of internal memory
No compass

►Price

ZTE V987 shipping from China will cost you about $ 270.
Is it expensive?
As for a smartphone made in China - it's probably expensive. But for a phone manufactured by ZTE, such a price is justified. There are similar 5-inch solutions from other manufacturers on the same platform, but nowhere else can you find a screen of such high quality.

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