[Aliexpress] Umidigi A5 Pro smartphone ~$120

2parks wrote: ↑

Jul 8th, 2019 6:47 pm

Nah bro, you can find it for 400 if you look hard enough. Phone was for my kid but I'll just give her my mi a2 lite and get the 9t for myself. Would of stuck with the A5 if the seller got back to me.

$400 vs $130?

Got mine in today but I ended up buying a new phone since the wait was too long. Brand new in box, pm if you want to purchase ( located in greater Vancouver area).

death_hawk wrote: ↑

Jul 8th, 2019 7:53 pm

$400 vs $130?

Yeah Xiaomi support and quality vs umidigi, well worth it. As I mentioned already I would of stuck with the A5 pro if the seller cared enough to get back to me.

lorenzo1000 wrote: ↑

Jul 7th, 2019 10:27 pm

So has anyone here on Red Flag who ordered it actually received this phone yet? Umidigi A5 Pro I mean.

I got it today. Just finished installing an OTA update. It is a bit laggy but apart from that it's totally worth the price. To minimize the lag, don't use the stock launcher. I find the stock launcher laggy. Use either Nova launcher or Action launcher. I use Action Launcher.
For this price, this kind of performance was expected. But I only got this phone for backup purposes and for travel since it has global LTE bands.

Mine arrived today as well (also in Vancouver area) and paid customs $23.58. My phone won't boot up. It initially behaved like a normal android setup, connecting to my other device. But it's now been looping through the connection with wifi or data, and moving to 'checking for updates'. 4 hours in and I'm finally looking into support. But it looks like it's impossible to open a support ticket.

I absolutely love my Umidigi One - and assumed the A5 would be better (I bought it for the larger screen size) but I'm feeling a bit deflated tonight.

I was also on the circus ride pre-delivery (completely ignored, and then a message that seemed completely out of context). They seem to be very overwhelmed - it sounded like they have quite a small team & didn't realize how many orders they would get with this new release.

The last message I received from them was that they needed to receive more inventory before they could ship to me, but in fact, my order had been shipped already (2 days early). I'm mildly intrigued by the possibility they might ship out a 2nd phone.

BeanGirl2 wrote: ↑

Jul 8th, 2019 9:12 pm

Mine arrived today as well (also in Vancouver area) and paid customs $23.58. My phone won't boot up. It initially behaved like a normal android setup, connecting to my other device. But it's now been looping through the connection with wifi or data, and moving to 'checking for updates'. 4 hours in and I'm finally looking into support. But it looks like it's impossible to open a support ticket.

I absolutely love my Umidigi One - and assumed the A5 would be better (I bought it for the larger screen size) but I'm feeling a bit deflated tonight.

I was also on the circus ride pre-delivery (completely ignored, and then a message that seemed completely out of context). They seem to be very overwhelmed - it sounded like they have quite a small team & didn't realize how many orders they would get with this new release.

The last message I received from them was that they needed to receive more inventory before they could ship to me, but in fact, my order had been shipped already (2 days early). I'm mildly intrigued by the possibility they might ship out a 2nd phone.

Well that's not good

BeanGirl2 wrote: ↑

Jul 8th, 2019 9:12 pm

Mine arrived today as well (also in Vancouver area) and paid customs $23.58. My phone won't boot up. It initially behaved like a normal android setup, connecting to my other device. But it's now been looping through the connection with wifi or data, and moving to 'checking for updates'. 4 hours in and I'm finally looking into support. But it looks like it's impossible to open a support ticket.

I absolutely love my Umidigi One - and assumed the A5 would be better (I bought it for the larger screen size) but I'm feeling a bit deflated tonight.

I was also on the circus ride pre-delivery (completely ignored, and then a message that seemed completely out of context). They seem to be very overwhelmed - it sounded like they have quite a small team & didn't realize how many orders they would get with this new release.

The last message I received from them was that they needed to receive more inventory before they could ship to me, but in fact, my order had been shipped already (2 days early). I'm mildly intrigued by the possibility they might ship out a 2nd phone.

Sorry to hear that. I'm glad I cancelled my order today.

Received via DHL after paying $25.xx ($16.00 was DHL's fees, rest was HST). Here's my quick impressions (I'm not a phone reviewer or anything, just a phone user, so I'm not getting into PPI or benchmark scores or anything).

Overall, appears to be an excellent value at that $100 USD price point and if you can overlook below average photos and videos.

Pros:
- Overall speed and performance is good. Loading large apps (e.g. Pokemon Go) is quick. Swiping around isn't quite "buttery-smooth" as a recent flagship, but smooth enough without noticible lags or jerkiness.
- Display is sharp and colours are good. Comes with plastic screen protector already well attached. Protector is a fingerprint magnet, unfortunately. While it's not glass, it feels as smooth as the best plastic protectors I've used.
- Speaker (only a single one at the bottom) is quite loud and clear.
- Fingerprint reader is fast, reliable and placed well at the back of the phone.
- FM radio included (have to plug in headphones to act as an antenna). This is rare nowadays.
- Clean Android. No bloatware.
- Basic black case is included. It's thin, and just barely keeps the lenses from touching your desk when laying the phone down, but it's nice that it's included.
- Build quality is great. Feels solid (albeit a bit heavy).

Cons:
- It updated to a new build (outside of the Google system update feature) when I first connected it to wifi, so I guess there is some process in the background that is contacting China? Hmmm...
- Only connects to my router's 2.4 Ghz band. When I turn wifi on the phone off, then on again, it first locks onto 5 Ghz, but then quickly changes to 2.4 and stays there. I have the same SSID for both bands and my other phones always stay on 5 GHz. As I type this, the A5Pro is at 2.4 and 65 Mbps but right beside it, I have an old Samsung S3 at 5 Ghz and 135 Mbps and a cheap Motorola E4 at 5Ghz and 150 Mbps. My Pixel 2 is at 5Ghz and 351 Mbps (but that's not a fair comparison). So something is definitely not right with the wifi radio. I'll have to investigate this more. It's still sufficient to stream 1080p videos, however.
- Included camera app is very basic: just bokeh, beauty and "Snapchat filter" modes. Can select regular or wide lens. No slo mo, panoramas, motion photos, etc.
- Camera and video quality first appears about average when taking photos in good light, but when you really zoom in, it's noticeably blurry, even compared to older phones. See the sample image I attached. This is even with the A5 Pro's "anti-shake" turned on and I took a couple of photos on "automatic" settings to get the best one. Colour balance is also a bit off. However, there's no significant shutter lag (people complained about a 1 sec+ delay on some of Umidigi's previous phones). [EDIT: Added more photos in another post: LINK]

Basically, if you (or your kid, parent, etc.) doesn't have high needs or expectations for photo/video quality, this phone is fantastic and practically disposable price-wise (no, let's not get into unfair comparisons of utilizing Koodo's policies to get cheap phones). It's probably good enough for most phone users.

I said from the very start that camera quality was going to be horrible but few people listened.

Poutinesauce wrote: ↑

Jul 9th, 2019 1:13 am

I said from the very start that camera quality was going to be horrible but few people listened.

Are you kidding me?? It's a phone for 100 USD and it packs a punch above and beyond it's price point. Where in Canada or even around world the can you find a phone with these specs, finishes AND band 13/66 support for 100 USD! Put this next to a high end phone and ask yourself if it's worth paying an extra $600 plus tax for a Samsung or Pixel etc.??

Zoughi1 wrote: ↑

Jul 9th, 2019 6:08 am

Are you kidding me?? It's a phone for 100 USD and it packs a punch above and beyond it's price point. Where in Canada or even around world the can you find a phone with these specs, finishes AND band 13/66 support for 100 USD! Put this next to a high end phone and ask yourself if it's worth paying an extra $600 plus tax for a Samsung or Pixel etc.??

Agreed. I didn't buy this 100 dollar phone to be a photographer. This is a basic phone that will serve its 100 dollar purpose to the full. Maybe even play a few games while I'm at it. Not regretting my purchase at all.

mikka2017 wrote: ↑

Jul 9th, 2019 6:17 am

are u guys using nova launcher and have the developers option:

window animation scale: off
transition animation scale: off
animator duration scale: off
this should help improve it snappiness!

hows the brightness of the screen? is it dim at half full settings, my udmigi f1 play aint that bright at half settings, even maxed out its not bright like say an iphone 8plus, i guess retina display is better then cheap chinese ips

im personally gonna setup the phone first then then give it to a senior who doesn't know much english or knows if a phone is fast or slow etc

I'm not teksavvy so I kept whatever specs that came out of the box. When using the phone last night in a dark room, I had to lower the brightness to a minimum so it doesn't hurt my eyes. Haven't been outdoors yet but certainly better than my Motorola E4.

I don't know a lot in phones, but why is the pictures taken not comparable to the one from the Oneplus 5?
The main lense is the same Sony IMX398.
Is it exclusively because of software optimisation? Do you think we could use another software with better optimisation?

Zoughi1 wrote: ↑

Jul 9th, 2019 6:08 am

Are you kidding me?? It's a phone for 100 USD and it packs a punch above and beyond it's price point. Where in Canada or even around world the can you find a phone with these specs, finishes AND band 13/66 support for 100 USD! Put this next to a high end phone and ask yourself if it's worth paying an extra $600 plus tax for a Samsung or Pixel etc.??

LG G5 and G6. FAR better pictures/video, better performance, probably a little let down on battery. Can buy a G6 on eBay right now for around $140-$160 CDN in like new condition, around $120-$130 for lightly used.