The first attempt to make such a phone was the release of the Highscreen Boost 2 smartphone, which left users with mixed feelings. As if equipped with a powerful 6000 mAh battery, however, the Qualcomm 8225Q processor - in terms of energy consumption - is far from the best. But the manufacturers did a good job of their mistakes and gave out “Highscreen Boost 2 SE”, the case and batteries of which remained the same, but the filling was almost completely changed.
Major changes to the new gadget model
The most noticeable change is the installation of Qualcomm Snapdragon 400, the modification processor MSM8228. Still, MediaTek is not quite what we need for our case. And given 2 GB of RAM, it turns out quite a decent company. In the previous model there was only a GPS-receiver, but now it was replaced by a hybrid GPS / GLONASS, the camera with a resolution of 8 megapixels was changed to 13 megapixels.
The internal memory doubled from 4 GB to 8 GB, Android 4.3 installed the operating system version, the matrix was changed to Sharp. If you take a closer look, it becomes noticeable that the Highscreen Booster 2 SE is already an interesting device for attention. True, its cost has slightly increased.
Smartphone Options
Those who saw in which cardboard boxes the devices of this brand are sold were always surprised at this minimalism and appearance. Over time, nothing has changed. But there is an opinion that eco-friendly cardboard is better than pasting the packaging of most modern gadgets. The issue is debatable, we will not delve into it, especially since we are not buying packaging, but what is inside. By the way, together with the device, the buyer receives 64 GB in the 4Sync “cloud”. And it's free, but for 100 GB you already need to pay a hundred US dollars.
What is inside a cardboard box? There are: instructions,
warranty card, of course, the charging unit from the network, microUSB cable and a headset. If you read “Highscreen Boost 2 SE” reviews, then you’ll understand that it’s better to immediately replace the headphones with something more decent, unless you are a lover of low frequencies. Since there are two batteries, there are also two covers. By the way, both models of smartphones and the cover, and the battery is completely interchangeable. There will be no problems.
Smartphone Appearance
As noted, the phone case remains the same. Literally a couple of nuances were added - the panel under the display and on the cover became gray, an inscription appeared in the back, in which the installed processor was indicated. With such an insert, the device is noticeably more interesting than the all-black predecessor. Unless you need to handle “Highscreen Boost 2 SE" carefully to reduce the erasure of the edges. And the panel, by the way, is made of metal. The dimensions of the device have not changed at all and are: when installing a 3000 mAh battery - 151 grams of weight and 68.6 x 140 x 9, 8 mm, with a 6000 mAh battery - 203 grams and 68.6 x 140 x 14.8 mm, to be honest, the ergonomics of the model are quite normal and you will probably like it.
Visually, when connecting a smaller battery, the Highscreen smartphone seems even thin, and it turns out to be of quite normal weight, not heavy. The height of the body is moderate, a zone less than 15% remains inaccessible to the finger. Thanks to the rounded bottom and top, the gray insert and the shape of the speech speaker, the appearance of the gadget turned out to be a little more interesting than similar second-tier smartphones. A year earlier, they all looked like terrifying “bricks”. After installing the battery at 6000 mAh, the device becomes ugly, backlash and scripts appear in it.
Device controls
On the front side of the phone are proximity and light sensors , a speech speaker and a camera. There are no changes here, everything is standard. Under the screen is a touchpad, deprived, as before, of boring Android icons. Instead, there are glowing dots on the sides, and in the center there is a circle that replaces the standard event indicator: when a new letter or SMS message starts flashing. In addition, it does it unobtrusively and does not annoy you, even if it lies on a table in front of your eyes. Nevertheless, it performs its function without distracting.
On the left side of the case, in the center, is a multi-function button that dilutes the set of power and volume keys. Where they should be, at the top, there is an audio output and a microUSB connector. There are two slots under the device’s cover: the first is for microSIM, the second is for microSD-card. As you can see, the Highscreen Boost 2 SE controls are still quite convenient.
Screen of our device
The main parameters of the predecessor are saved: resolution 1280x720 with a five-inch screen, which means 294 PPI. Up to Full HD screens, of course, far, but there is no noticeable graininess, as with qHD. The result was the so-called “golden mean”. For better quality, you need to install more expensive displays, which, accordingly, will raise the price of the device. Therefore, the best option is chosen. As an example, take “Highscreen Booster 2 SE": its price has increased from 10,990 rubles to 12,490 rubles compared to the previous model.
But there is nothing to complain about. The current screen is manufactured by Sharp, which is equipped with quite relevant Full Lamination and OGS technologies. Although the novelty in terms of maximum brightness loses to
Highscreen Boost 2. But here in terms of color accuracy and detail, it is much ahead. She has black color - deeper, and with white there are problems in both cases. One has an orange tint, the other has a blue tint. But the last model, unlike its predecessor, has the ability to adjust the color rendering of the screen: for manual - four parameters and presets - “bright” and “standard”. Both models have approximately the same viewing angles.
Performance Highscreen Boost 2 SE
Our smartphone features, as already noted, the quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor. At the time of its release, it was the only gadget with the QS 400 MSM8228. It has four ARM Cortex A7 cores, clocked at 1.4 GHz. Adreno 305 is a very good graphics chip that supports FlexRender, Renderscript Compute, OpenCL, DirectX and OpenGL ES 3.0. Completes the picture is a good RAM - 2GB. It turned out a device with good performance, ahead of the competition on MediaTek MT6589. In the AnTuTu Benchmark program, the phone scored about 2000 points, which is very decent.
Graphics tests also stand up pretty well. The video reproduces well, without any problems, films up to Full HD 60 fps were launched. Launch 4k did not work, but this is already too much. Resource-intensive games are handled conscientiously. Neither Real Racing 3 nor Iron Man 3 slowed down even at maximum settings. There are no microlags at those moments when the effects of dust, smoke, explosions, etc. are observed in the frame. The device immediately loads new scenario elements, without falling into thoughtfulness.
Camera
The front camera of the device we are considering is, say, so-so, two-megapixel, but fulfills its main purpose - for video communications. The rear is more impressive, 13 megapixels, which already allows you to take pictures with a good resolution of 4128 x 3096 pixels. Although, if you read the user reviews again on the Highscreen Boost 2 SE smartphone, it becomes clear that again such numbers, as often happens, are present only for beauty. The quality of photos at best corresponds to 8 megapixel models.
The reason is the banal cheap optics, although the result is still better than the previous version. But the camera copes well with some types of shooting, for example, close-ups, well capturing insects and flowers in an open field. Therefore, it cannot be said that this is a completely useless thing. Detailing at long and medium distances is not enough, saturation also has to be manually added, the speed is normal, without complaints.
Smartphone system
Having examined some characteristics of the device, we will briefly dwell on the operating system. Briefly - because no special add-ons "Highscreen" -phone did not receive. The Android version is 4.3, which is not the newest, but not bad, and besides, at that time on devices with MediaTek processors it was not installed yet. Compared to version 4.2, there are no significant advantages and innovations, only the information curtain has become a little more convenient. A few words about the multifunction button.
Now it has become truly, as planned, versatile. Previously, with her help, only four tasks could be assigned. Now, you can select any of all installed programs in the system. But note: to enable this functionality, the boxed version of the software needs to be updated.
Device autonomy
In conclusion, we will talk a little about such a characteristic of the device as the operating time. Thanks to the 28 nm process technology, our Highscreen Booster 2 SE phone has fully unleashed the potential of a 6000 mAh battery. In CoolReader, for example, at full brightness, it works for 20 hours, plays HD-video at medium volume and maximum brightness - 9 hours 10 minutes, Epic Citadel - 6 hours 50 minutes.
In order to further save energy, there is Qualcomm BatteryGury - a pre-installed utility. It automatically monitors your activity for several days, and then automatically optimizes the battery charge / consumption mode. In general, we can conclude: last year, our smartphone was one of the best new products in its class.