You may have heard of Umi – a small Chinese manufacturer that has not been in the industry for years but it has been known for good understanding of how to design the phones. Firstly, the company attracted a lot of attention with its Zero model, which spotted some premium materials and decent specs at affordable price. Since that it has become clear that Umi will try to stay in the competition with a nicely designed handsets and thus lure some consumers. Their newest model Iron is no exception. Let's take a look what we've got.
We wanted to say thanks to Pandawill.com for sending Umi Iron for a review !
Umi Iron Review: SPECS
| Display | 5.5″ 1080p |
| Processor | MediaTek MT6753, 1.3GHz, octa-core, 64-bit |
| RAM | 3GB |
| Camera | 8MP Front/13MP Back |
| Connectivity | Bluetooth, 3G, 4G, GPS, WIFI, GSM,EDGE, GPRS, UMTS, HSPA, HSPA+ |
| Battery | 3.350 mAh (non-removable) |
| Dimensions | 152.3 x 76.5 x 7.9mm/ 148g |
| OS | Android 5.1 |
| Storage | 16GB (expandable via microSD card slot up to 64GB) |
Umi Iron Review: UNBOXING
The packaging is a bit different than the majority of boxes as you have to pull one side to open it up. Then you will see all the items packed neatly.
The accessories that are in the box include the instruction manuals, USB plug along with the USB cable . Last but not least the company added USB OTG cable . Well, any extra accessory is a great thing.
Overall, the contents look to be of good quality (but not the best).
Not sure if it is included in every package but I have also received a decent quality leather flip cover case. Not sure if it is a real leather but it definitely feels like.
Last but not least I received a tempered glass screen protector. I will inform you if each smartphone comes with a free extra leather flip cover case and this glass protector or it was just me.
Umi Iron: DESIGN and DISPLAY
The device comes with a 5.5″ display , which is very bright, sharp and vivid. Also, it has great viewing angles and natural looking colours. Overall, it is a superb panel for a budget device and you will notice it immediately once you turn on the device.
On the top side there is a proximity sensor, 8MP camera sensor, earpiece and front firing LED flash for night selfies.
On the bottom side there is really nice looking notification LED light , which has a great looking pulsing effect . It flashes green for notifications and red for charging/low battery as default but it can be changed!
The LED has plenty of customisation options , which is a really neat feature if you want to assign the colours you want for particular things. Also, you have a lot of colours to choose from. I have to tell that it really makes the device stand out as the the LED is bright and looks great with a pulsing effect.
Here is why we call this model Iron as the back plate is made out of metal . It definitely feels like a high quality material and adds a bit of a premium look and feel. Also, it is feels great in the hand (I may be subjective as I just love metal phones).
However, the top and bottom parts are made out of plastic as this is the solution Umi chose to implement to get a normal antenna reception.
On the top side there is a 13MP Sony IMX214 shooter along with dual tone dual LED flash and a noise cancelling mic . It is worth mentioning that the camera lens are surrounded by a quality stainless steel ring.
On the bottom side there is an UMI logo along with the loudspeaker .
The metal shell continues to the sides of the device and it is tightened up with screws, which also provide a nice looking industrial design.
In addition, you can find a nano SIM card/microSD card (up to 64GB) slot , which you have to open up with a pin.
On the left side you can find a metal made power on/off switch along with a volume rocker .
On the top side there is just a headset jack .
Finally, on the bottom you can find a micro USB charging port along with the main microphone .
Umi Iron Review: UI
Umi Iron runs Android 5.1 with a light Umi skin on top of it out of the box. The experience of using this device for a few weeks has been good so far. I didn't have any lags or hiccups if I was doing non-demanding stuff, e.g. browsing the web, Facebook, Youtube etc.
In addition, all the apps are opening up and closing fast, transitions are smooth and I have no major complaints.
Umi marketed this model "as the world's first" to have Iris scanner. Well, at least on a budget device. However, I could not test it as it simply does not work. It may be due to non-final software (the device is not on sale yet). Hopefully, it was not just a gimmick and it will work with a future software update, which I actually received one already.
It may sound funny but there is a software bug in the software update department. I could not download an update without inserting a microSD card. That is really strange. On the other hand, after inserting the microSD card, the update was successful.
Overall, I am pretty happy with the overall UI performance as it is working fast and snappy almost all the time.
Umi Iron Review: BENCHMARKS
Umi Iron Review: PERFORMANCE
The most graphically tasks like gaming could be better. The graphics look quite good but there is occasional lag and stutter during gaming sessions. You can still enjoy gaming but for more serious gamers out there, it may be annoying at some times.
On the other hand, the device gets warm as usual but not hot at all even after 30 mins of gaming, which is quite an impressive achievement in terms of thermal management considering the fact that the device has a metal back plate.
Umi Iron Review: MULTIMEDIA
You can enjoy multimedia like 1080p video, Internet browsing, scrolling through gallery and even listening to FM radio (a feature that slowly disappears in today's device) on this device without any issues.
The music playback is kind of the star of the show on Umi Iron. The company is really proud to implement a DIRECTPATH HiFi Audio chip on a budget device. Well, it indeed sound awesome. But what about the sound quality via earphones?
The sound is definitely great, you can hear some richer tones with a lot of depth, especially when you know how to play with the equaliser.
However, once you crank up the volume (the volume output is very loud)….. the device freezes and turns off after like 5 seconds. I've tested it like 5 times in a row, same result. In addition, I tried turning on/off equaliser enhancement (it is a separate app from the stock Android music player app), same result again.. It happens once you crank up the volume more than a half. A good thing is that I could barely keep the earphones in my ears as the music was so loud. On the other hand, it is a serious bug and I hope it is software related and will be fixed with a final retail unit.
The loudspeaker is located on the back side of the device. It has an average volume output as well as quality. It lacks in lows and overall depth but all in all it is far from the worst loudspeakers I've heard in this price range.
Umi Iron Review: CAMERA
Umi Iron has a stock MTK camera app that has some basic features and shooting modes and it works fine most of the times. A really odd thing is that this app shows 9.5MP as a max. resolution whereas all the testing apps as well as Google Camera app shows 13MP as declared. This is definitely a software bug as the pictures I took have 13MP.
Umi Iron Review: IMAGE QUALITY
The 13MP camera on the back is can take some good looking images outdoors. The images have a good amount of details and are quite sharp. Also, the colour reproduction is good. However, usually the corners of the images are out of focus and look a bit blurry.
The pictures taken indoors is a bit different story. The shutter speed becomes very slow and you have to have a really steady hand to avoid blurry shots. When there is less light, the colours, detail level are off and there is more noise. On the other hand, sometimes you can achieve some decent looking results.
Night shots are below average. Again, the shutter speed slows down and it is hard to focus. Also, there is a visible purple tints in some of the pictures. Finally, noise levels go up and the level of details goes down.
The dual tone dual LED flash is pretty powerful and definitely helps out. However, I found it to make night images a bit too warm for my taste (also, a colours a bit too warm than in reality).
A 5MP Selfie camera is good outdoors and decent indoors. In addition, you are getting a front facing LED flash, which is better than the one found on Ulefone Be Touch or Zeaplus M7 I've tested but much worse than the former flagship class vivo Xshot. Still, it is a pretty neat feature and it may help you taking a few selfies in a night club.
Overall, Umi Iron has an okay camera for daylight images outdoors and with a help of steady hand as well as proper lighting, you may achieve some good looking results. However, the focus may me off at the corners of the image. Finally, indoors and night images could be much better but the embedded dual tone dual LED flash comes handy in these situations.
Umi Iron Review: VIDEO QUALITY
The 1080p video quality is just mediocre as the level of details and overall sharpness are not the best. On the other hand, the colours look pretty much accurate and auto-exposure is not jumping to the extreme levels when panning or tilting the phone.
Umi Iron Review: CONNECTIVITY
The call quality is good (not on par with flagships though) and signal reception is decent. As far as Wifi, it has a good range and works without interruptions. However, the GPS lock speed is very slow. A very first cold start outdoors took like 2 minutes, which is terrible. Hopefully, this is something that Umi addresses in the future. Once you get a fix, navigation is pretty accurate though.
Umi Iron Review: BATTERY LIFE
A Geekbench 3 test score is very impressive for a budget device as Umi Iron got 6 hours 38 mins screen-on time (dim screen off, auto-brightness on, Wifi with some apps syncing on).
Real life test is not that great but still good. This diagram shows a very intensive use of the smartphone (Internet, Youtube, 3 different benchmarks, gaming, taking pictures, shooting video etc.).
Overall, the device will get you through the day even if you are a heavy user but not a die hard gamer or addicted Youtuber. If you are an average user, you may even get 2 full days of use.
Umi Iron Review: CONCLUSIONS
So here it is, Umi Iron, a metal phone for a budget. I would say that the design and build quality are one of the key aspects of this device. A metal back cover and the sides definitely add some premium look and feel and those little screws add a bit of an industrial design impression. Also, a customisable LED is a welcome feature to any device and it seems that Umi has implemented it well on this phone.
Almost stock looking Android 5.1 based UI is great and I have no major complaints doing a lot of daily tasks. However, the Iris (or Eye) scanner, which was supposed to be the highlight of this device is not working on my device due to its pre-release software, so I cannot tell my impressions on that.
In addition, the phone has an okay camera for outdoors shoots but it is far from the best either indoors or at night.
There are some issues to address like the music playback, software update issue when there is no microSD card slot and maybe it is possible to improve performance in the graphically intensive tasks department.
Finally, you are getting a good looking device, which has a great, sharp and very bright display, good battery and premium build for under $180. If Umi manages to fix some issues and make Iris scanner feature really work (although, it is a gimmick feature after all), Umi Iron can be a decent device for the price.
We wanted to say thanks to Pandawill.com for sending Umi Iron for a review!
Gizmochina readers are getting a very generous discount of $20 for Umi Iron that can be used on Pandawill.com to purchase a device. Coupon Code: PWUI and it has the expiry date of 08/02/2015 . With this coupon you can get Umi Iron for just $159.99!
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