The Lenovo K5 Note Phablet
Many of the phones I review come from companies that are not very well known outside of China.
While purchasing phones from a manufacturer with no retail presence in the states can help you get a great bargain, it’s difficult to contact the company if you need any warranty or support with your device.
If you’re looking to get a great deal on a phone while dealing with a company that already does business in the states, the Lenovo K5 Note is an excellent choice. Lenovo’s line of ThinkPad notebooks is known for being incredibly reliable and durable.
let’s see if their flagship smartphone lives up to the standards they’ve set.
Lenovo K5 Design
While Lenovo’s previous phones have been fully plastic, the K5 features an aluminum back.
The gentle curves mean that the phone is very comfortable to hold in your hand while remaining durable. The only drawback to the rock-solid build is that the phone is sealed, so you won’t be able to manually replace the battery.
Fortunately, modern Li-ion batteries can last quite a long time, so you should still be able to get 3 years out of the phone.
Performance
As the way we use smartphones has changed, Lenovo has decided to take a new approach with their chipset. The MediaTek Helio P10 processor is pretty new to the market, and it certainly is a powerhouse.
The CPU has 8 cores, a full 64-bit architecture and operates at 1.8GHz.
It might seem that the 1.8ghz processor is inferior to some of the phones with 2.5GHz processors on the market, but it’s important to understand how these work so you can see the benefit of this new system.
The frequency is simply a measure of how fast calculations are performed, not how much work can be done in each calculation. Because the CPU has a huge cache and 64-bit architecture, each calculation it performs completes twice as much work as a simple 2.5ghz quad-core.
Because there are eight separate cores, you can have several apps performing tasks in the background without causing any noticeable lag.
To further improve the performance, all of the graphics calculations are offloaded to a dedicated GPU, the Mali T720. This leaves the CPU free to manage only the background calculations, keeping everything feeling snappy.
The phone has 32gb of internal storage capacity, with the ability to install an SD card up to 128gb. At the initial launch, the phone only had a disappointing 2gb of ram, but fortunately, Lenovo is now selling a new model of the K5 Note that has a proper 3gb installed.
Display
The screen doesn’t come exactly edge to edge, but the border around the screen is almost microscopic. Most of the phones that have a 5.5” screen are noticeably larger than this model.
This means that you can enjoy all of the benefits of a large display while still being able to fit the phone comfortably in your pocket.
Camera
The camera in the rear of the Lenovo K5 Note is a standard 13MP model. While pictures generally came out clear and sharp, I did occasionally have to fiddle with the exposure a little.
The front camera is surprisingly impressive, allowing for full HD video chat that worked well even in low lighting.
Software
The Lenovo K5 Note uses a completely standard version of Android 5.1. Many manufacturers like to tweak the operating system and release their own versions.
Although this can occasionally result in hardware-specific performance increases, you now need to rely on the manufacturer to continually update the software.
Since Lenovo has included the standardized release, your updates can be downloaded directly from google. This will ensure that even long after the phone has been discontinued, you will still be able to use the newest apps.
Verdict
Lenovo is a very well respected company that has a strong track record of developing products that are extremely reliable.
Although this phone is priced a little higher than some of the other imported phones, the small increase in cost should pay off long term.
Users who like to upgrade their phone every 6 months may want to look elsewhere, but if you want your phone to last several years this is one of the safest choices on the market. Get it from GearBest at a flash-sale price.
