As competition between smartphone manufacturers dramatically increased, ZTE wants to claim a larger share of American market share by offering a new device with some of the most sought after characteristics: large display, huge battery, low price.
The ZTE ZMAX smartphone provides those characteristics by offering a mid-tier performance. Nevertheless, as hardware improved dramatically over the years, even with mid-tier hardware, the latest Android version, KitKat, will run smoothly, as well as most common apps.
ZTE ZMAX is a 5.7 inches display smartphone, placing it in the phablet category. The latest flagship smartphones have displays of 5.2-5.7 inches, so the average display dimension grew radically in the last year. Well, not everyone is content with it, as they have to cope with larger devices if they want increased performance. Nevertheless, there are some mini flagship versions, although only the Z3 compact seems to provide top-notch performance with a 4.6 inches display, along with the 4.7 inches Samsung Galaxy Alpha and Iphone 6.
Getting back to ZMAX, the handset is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 SoC, that is a 1.2 Ghz quad core processor and 2 GB of RAM. The RAM size will definitely help the new smartphone provide a smooth experience. Users will have the possibility to expand the 16 GB internal storage through the helpful MicroSD slot.
The display of this large smartphone offers only HD resolution (1280 X 720 pixels). That may not be satisfactory for the tech enthusiasts used to the latest qHD resolutions, but in daily usage, the PPI offered by ZMAX should suffice.
The resolution is strategically chosen to offer lower power consumption. The device comes with an impressive 3.400mAh battery. A Full HD or qHD display would probably last through one full day with this battery, but an HD resolution may offer two full days of usage without searching plugging the device. Two days is almost a holy grail for most smartphone users. The latest Xperia Z3, as well as its compact version, promise similar performance, but we need to test the devices to confirm Sony’s bold claims.
ZTE chose to only lightly alter the Android 4.4.2 booted by the ZMAX. The smartphone is equipped with dual microphone noise cancelling technology, as well as Dolby DM3 audio.
So what is the price of this promising device? Without a contract, it will be sold for $252, and with a T-Mobile 24 months contract, only $10.5.