Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsGood Phone, So Close to being Great!
Reviewed in the United States on November 18, 2015
Overall this is a very solid phone and a great value for the money. My main driver for buying this was the dual SIM capability, I normally carry two phones, one for work and my personal phone. My work and personal phones were an LG G4 and Galaxy Note Edge, so I am coming from the perspective of a high-end phone user. Let me start by saying that the dual SIM capability is great, having access to both phone numbers as well as both data plans on a single device is a game changer.
However, there are a few small features that Asus could have included with minimal effect on price. This review will focus on those "missing" features as well as the phones strong points.
After 48 hours of heavy use, the following features are the ones I miss the most from my two previous phones.
- NFC, so I can use Android Pay again! This a major feature in my opinion and almost a deal breaker.
- Lighted capacitive buttons, this is very annoying.
- Rapid charging, not a must have because the battery life is good...but it would be nice
- IR blaster, again, not a must have, but a nice and inexpensive feature to add.
- Ships with android 5.0, lollipop. Phone this new should ship with marshmallow.
I understand that this is a "budget" phone, but I would gladly pay an additional $25-$50 for the above features to be included. Having said that let's look at the phones strong points:
- Dual SIM, I don't know why none of the major manufacturers do this
- Great value and performance for the money.
- Good build quality, it feels very solid in the hand. I know it's all plastic, but it doesn't feel that way.
- Nice screen
- Great camera, fast autofocus.(not as good as the LG G4 camera...but few are)
My hope is that Asus will continue to mature the Zenfone line and perhaps introduce an upgraded version of the laser with some or all of the features mentioned above. For me, the dual SIM capability is enough to make it a keeper...for now.
UPDATE:
After I updated the IMEI numbers with AT&T the phone would no longer detect the 4G network. After two phone calls with AT&T support and one phone call with Asus support, I discovered that Data plans are based on the phones IMEI number and according to AT&T the IMEI numbers for this phone only support 3G. I understand that the phone technically supports 4G, but AT&T will not support non-AT&T devices on their 4G LTE network.
Based on that information I decided to return the phone and go back to carrying two phones. Hopefully, AT&T and Asus support will work together to resolve this issue but until then dual SIM card support is not worth sacrificing 4G speeds. Yes, I could have left the old IMEI numbers in the system at AT&T, but then I could never sell the other two phones. Not worth it.
