ZTE Axon 7 mini Unlocked 4G Smartphone, 5.2″ Android 6.0 Mobile Phone with Snapdragon Octa Core, 3GB RAM 32GB ROM, Dual Sim(Dual Standby), Dual Camera(16.0M/8.0M), GPS, Quick Charge SIM-Free Phablet (Grey)
- Android 6.0 with Qualcomm Snapdragon MSM8952, Octa-Core processor, and 3GB RAM+32 GB ROM: Operate web browsing, apps and video in faster way, enjoy a better viewing experience. Provide enough space for store your movies, music, and pictures.
- 4G LTE Unlocked Dual SIM Smartphone: ZTE Axon 7 mini allows you to have Two Nano SIM Cards or One Nano SIM Card and One TF Card on one device, whether it is a personal and a business number or a personal number and an international SIM.
- 5.2 inch FHD AMOLED Screen with 1080x 1920 pixels resolution: Big enough to be a comfort to your eyes, display of every detail in scenery, clearer and more vivid.
- Double camera: 16MP Back Camera with auto focus and flashlight, supports PDAF, imaging compensation enable you to take beautiful pictures no matter when you are moving. 8.0MP High Resolution front camera , make your selfies more distinctive.
- Guarantee: All ZTE Axon 7 mini are original one with CE and ROHS certification. All handsets are environmental-friendly. And we offer 12 months warranty with 24 hours perfect customer service.
Product Parameter
Model Name: ZTE AXON 7 mini
Shell Material:Metal
OS:Android 6.0
CPU:Snapdragon Octa Core(MSM8952) 4x15GHz + 4×1.2GHz
GPU: Adreno 405
Storage: ROM: 32GB RAM:3GB
Main Display Size: 5.2 inch
Screen Type: SUPER AMOLED Capacitive Screen, 2.5D Arc Glass
Resolution: 1080*1920 FHD
Camera: Back Camera 16.0MP; front camera 8.0MP
Sim Card: Dual SIM Cards
Service Provide: Unlocked
Compatible Band:
2G: GSM B2/3/5/8 (850 /900/1800/19
List Price: £389.99
Price: [wpramaprice asin=”B01M0HCXO5″]
[wpramareviews asin=”B01M0HCXO5″]
A great phone with a major problem.,
Note before main review: A MAJOR PROBLEM at this moment and one that makes it impossible for me to recommend this phone is that the audio when watching video is ahead of what is on the screen. This makes for an extremely jarring experience and I’m sure you can imagine just how infuriating it is to hear someone say something a long time after the mouth moves. I’d estimate the delay is in the realm of 200-250ms (1/4 of a second) which is incredibly annoying. A factory reset was performed and didn’t rectify the problem. It also persisted when moving recorded videos to a computer to view in a different player. When Dolby Atmos is turned on with headphones in, the volume of the music is reduced by about a half so you can’t reach a comfortable level even at max volume (WARNING: Don’t turn Dolby Atmos off when the volume is still at max as this will return the audio to the previous level which is VERY LOUD!!!). The neutral EQ sounds great anyway. I will update this if it gets fixed soon, I’ve contacted ZTE.
Main review:
The screen:
Vivid, bright, nicely saturated and very detailed. This screen is one of the best I’ve seen on any smartphone and is protected with Corning Gorilla glass 4 which is smooth to the touch, avoiding any horrible drag on the fingertips. Still, if you drop your phone on the screen….it’ll still break (Surprise!).
There are 3 colour grading options to choose from which either make the screen warmer or darker i.e more saturated or less. Watching a variety of content is a pleasure, especially 1080p and 1440p videos (2k resolution) which have a small but perceptible increase in quality that does make a difference and narrowly justifies the higher resolution! As far as screen impact on battery life is concerned – rest easy as it lasts a very long time.
Sound & speakers:
The in-built speakers are of very good quality and when the Dolby Atmos is enabled the stereo field really pops out. As you can expect there is very little deep bass in there but the lower mids up to the treble are very well represented for a smartphone. As previously mentioned, the soundstage is conveyed realistically and a few times I was watching video content I was surprised at how good they were at conveying depth (bird song fluttered to the far left and seemed behind my ear when in fact the speakers were facing me.)
The listening experience through headphones is the best I’ve experienced on any mobile device. Crisp highs, faithful, un-hyped bass and refreshingly transparent mids really drove the experience home. The stereo image that was relayed through the speakers was accurately represented through headphones (sennheiser HD 25-ii) and really did impress me as well as how clear individual parts were. It handled content ranging from Burial’s Untrue to Radiohead’s A Moon Shaped Pool (24bit lossless) gracefully, even compressed audio such as Audioslave’s debut album purchased from Google Music (256kbps) sounded great, so the audio claims are definitely deserved. You don’t need expensive headphones to hear the difference either as the included ones demonstrated the same fundamental quality.
Camera Quality:
A solid camera with less-than-desirable low-light performance. Video quality is good although it does take a while to focus sometimes. Basically the camera is on the good side of OK but don’t expect anything impressive, unlike the sound capabilities. A variety of options are available when taking a picture which will satisfy more seasoned snappers.
Performance:
Very fast and snappy, moves from app-to-app quickly and painlessly. A joy to use.
Battery life:
Moderate usage – probably 2 days. Heavy usage – a day with 20-30% to spare at the end. Drains at night by about 1-2% when doing nothing connected to wifi and mobile. Overall solid and on the impressive side of smartphone batteries.
Overall a solid phone that has impressed me, hopefully the issues described in the opening paragraph will be addressed by ZTE at some point as otherwise it’s pretty useless!
I hope this was helpful and well done for making it to the end!
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|So much for so little cost.,
The phone build is a masterclass in quality. Good solid metal unibody but, be warned, it is very slippy. To combat this, ZTE ship a very thin, clear case which has more grip. I don’t know any phone manufacturer that does this. Nice little case too.
Using the phone is pretty much standard android with no bloatware (take note Sony, LG and Samsung!). It’s snappy and has a really responsive touchscreen. Battery life is very good. Went on beano to Blackpool and at the end of a great day out, taking photos and all the usual stuff, there was still 33% life left. Very impressed.
The screen is ok. There’s nothing wrong with it and it goes so bright I’ve put it on 50% and it’s still clear, it’s just I’ve come from a QHD screen from LG and I can see the difference.I’m just being picky about it.
All the normal apps work as they should, BBC iPlayer, All4, My5, ITV Hub, Amazon Video, UKTV play etc are all functioning. I don’t use Now Tv or Sky Go but they are available to install so obviously supported.
The camera is decent enough too. Loads of different modes and effects and it takes a quick pic.
Some of my widgets wouldn’t work correctly at first and after a Google search I found out it was down to the phones aggressive power management. Once I’d turned off power saving to those particular apps, everything is sorted.
I couldn’t understand why some of my images weren’t showing in galleries until, I saw the app has a strange option to turn off images lower than a certain memory size(?). I switched that option off and once again, sorted.
I don’t play many games but have a few puzzle games and they all play and look good. I installed Temple Run to see if there was any judder from the 3D rendering and it was smooth as a nut.
It easily takes a 128gb memory card and has ample at 32gb built in with 3gb RAM. The RAM is used very conservatively with 1gb pretty always spare.
The main messaging app is a bit bland so you might want something a bit more customiseable, I installed Textra and it works beautifully.
The main selling point for this phone though is the sound. Those speakers are outstanding. This is billed as the loudest phone on the planet and I can’t argue. Dolby Atmos enhances it even more. It really is amazing. Played the opening of Star Wars and it was gobsmacking. I had the phone about 10″ away from my face and I could actually hear bass. Not just that but through the 3.5mm the sound is staggering. This phone outputs 32bit audio and if you use some decent cans, preferably hi res certified, music is the best I’ve ever heard it sound. The supplied earphones are a bit pants so a good excuse to upgrade.
For this price with this build quality and with that audio performance, this phone is an absolute steal. I’m very impressed.
edit
After using this phone for a few weeks now, I’m still impressed with the build and sound BUT, if you’re not a tech head you may struggle. No matter what permissions you give apps, by default, they don’t get access to your memory card when you install them. OK, this is more to do with the new android OS but also, you have to manually turn off all power saver options on every app. By default, each app is strangled to heck so that when asleep, some don’t work at all. Messaging, alarms, widgets etc. Very silly. You’ll need to be more aware of the phone’s inner workings to get a frustration free experience. It IS worth it when you do though.
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|An excellent value mobile phone,
An excellent value mobile phone
My “ZTE Axon 7 Mini” mobile phone arrived next day thanks to Amazon Prime. I bought this as, alas, the screen on my Samsung Galaxy S6 broke and the cost of repair was, IMHO, prohibitive. As I always get sim-free mobiles (I hate being tethered to a network), I had a look around. This had some good reviews (other than some reported early software issues which have subsequently been fixed). It is also a very reasonable price for what you get. The Samsung Galaxy S7 was out of my price range and the only other real alternative was the Huawei P9 Lite. The ZTE has good reports as regards the sound quality and that proved to be the deciding factor. I chose the gold colour rather than the alternative grey.
I purchased mine from EKEYUK (fulfilled by Amazon) who, I believe, are the official importers of ZTE mobiles in the UK. I was worried that it may be a European import or a mobile that had been tied to a service provider and subsequently unlocked. No worries, this was a factory sim-free UK device and brand new. The mobile comes very attractively boxed with the usual accessories (including the correct 3-pin UK plug and a transparent gel case). Note that the device has a type-C data/charging socket rather than micro-USB. So, you may need to get some adapters and/or more type-C cables if you want any spares. I bought a type-C charging stand which it fits perfectly – even in a gel case. I also bought a tempered glass screen protector (so I have all-round protection) and a Class 10 32GB micro-SD card for data storage.
The mobile itself has a good quality feel with its metal case and speakers top and bottom. I found I liked it in the black gel case as it contrasts well (IMHO) with the gold casing of the mobile. It is nice and slim and the display is my preferred size of about 5” – big enough to be useful but no so large it’s like carrying around a dinner plate! There is a substantial user-guide (which I haven’t opened) and a 12 month warranty card for the UK. Alas, it seems you do not get the 2 year warranty offered in the USA.
The mobile takes a Nano SIM as SIM-1. The second slot can be used for either an additional SIM card or a micro-SD card (which I used). So, I charged up the mobile – which took about 20 minutes as it was already 80% charged. There is the usual android 6 set-up process which at first seemed OK until I hit a snag. The device would not connect to my BT HomeHub 5 router. It kept on reporting that it failed to get an IP address assigned to it. I then tried next door’s router and got the same message. The phone was about to get flying lessons! As a last resort I enabled WPS on the router (it’s something I normally never use) and pressed the button and did a WPS Wi-Fi set-up. It worked straightaway! From that point on I have been able to connect to any Wi-Fi with and without WPS with no issues! Strange – perhaps a quirk of the mobile’s software.
I enabled my Google Account and all my usual apps started to download. There were just a couple I had to download manually. I was pleased to note that there were no apps that failed to install. Some apps that have been tricky in the past all worked fine too – including BT-Sport, NowTV, Santander Banking, AVG Pro and various BT apps. There is also thankfully little ‘bloatware’ (take note Samsung). I did keep the WPS Office Suite as it saved installing the MS Office products and works just as well without regularly inviting me to spend £5.99pm with Microsoft!
The ZTE UI Launcher that comes with the mobile is a tad quirky but is easily changed. I opted for the ZenUI Launcher from Play Store as I already have an ASUS ZenPad tablet and this makes the look and feel of the 2 almost identical. Anyway, there are dozens of UI’s available.
I formatted the micro-SD card as external storage and will use it for music and videos. I also set up the finger print scanner which is very easy – and works very well – much better than on my Samsung. Epson Print enabler and iPrint were tested to my WF-3620 printer and all was fine. I also set up the “WD My Cloud” app so I could access our home network storage device (communal music, videos and documents) – once again, again I had no issues. I checked for software updates for the mobile but everything was up to date (ZTE B2017G V1.0.0B05). ZTE report that they will upgrade these mobiles to Android 7 sometime in 1Q17.
I was all set – play time!
I use Vodafone 4G PAYG and it all works as expected with good reception – including using data rather than Wi-Fi. Indeed, other than the initial Wi-Fi set-up problem, I have had no issues whatsoever. Using the BT Wi-Fi app, I also connected to BT hotspots without a problem.
As regards everyday use, one must remember that this mobile…
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