ASUS ZenFone 2 Unlocked Cellphone, 64GB, Red (U.S. Warranty)

My Nexus 5 phone was stolen from my car which was broken into. I did not plan to buy a new phone. While the Nexus 5 was getting old in the tooth, its performance was quite satisfactory for me. My goal was not to buy the latest flagship but to find a phone that would be a good replacement for the Nexus 5. The Nexus five had the following issues, poor battery life, out-of-date camera and not enough storage. I went to T-Mobile. The only replacements they had would cost me from $525.00 to $800.00. The first phone that I considered was the Blue Studio LTE 6 Edge. For many, this would be a great phone at only $206.00. However, I was concerned about only having 8GB storage even if it did work with a Micro SD. Several reviews mentioned that the performance was not outstanding. For less than $100.00, the Asus Zenfone 2 is so much more of a phone. Some of the concerns I had were: Would my software work? How bright was the screen? What was the build quality of the phone? Would I like the Zen UI? I have lots of software that I use on the phone. One package didn't work. This was the Verizon Mobile application. Everything else works. * Note: I downloaded the latest OS update and the Verizon Mobile software now works. I can watch FOISE TV programs on my phone. The screen was a pleasant surprise for me. I would say it is at least as good as the Nexus 5. The resolution is the same The bigger screen is welcomed. I have no issue with the brightness. The build quality of the phone was quite good. I had the Nexus 4 before the Nexus 5. The Nexus 4 was a very pretty phone that was built to very high standards. The Nexus 5 and the Asus ZenFone 2 have very similar built quality. The Zenfone 2 is a pretty phone. The user interface is very intuitive. The standard virtual keyboard didn't have a swipe function that I could find so I replaced it with the Google keyboard which acts just the same as the Nexus 5 phone did. The ZenFone 2 is faster than the Nexus phone. The performance is very good. I don't play games but I run lots of applications at once. I often found myself restarting my Nexus 5 because I had too many applications running and it was the best way to get everything running again. I don't think there is a better phone on the market for the price. The ZenFone 2 does everything well. I didn't test out the camera for photography. I have film and digital cameras I use and rarely take a snapshot with my phone. The camera is certainly good enough for scanning documents, using for bar codes taking quick shots to send photos to customers. From what I can tell, the camera is an upgrade from what I had but perhaps not as good as is available on more expensive phones. However, it makes no sense to me to pay $200 or $300 more when I already have a great camera (the Sony a6000). Here are some sample photos take with the ZenFone 2: https://www.flickr.com/photos/85738626@N00/sets/72157653795083371 Another great feature that I welcome is the fast charger that comes standard with the phone. It really does work. So far, the battery life seems to be about 15% better than what I had on the Nexus 5 (I had just replaced the battery). It actually could be better as I have been working the phone harder than normal downloading software and setting it up. The Bluetooth work just fine. I had no problem syncing to my devices. One thing I wish the phone had is wireless charging. I bought some wireless chargers for the Nexus phone. My wife's Samsung Galaxy 5 doesn't have this feature either. If you have a phone that is one or two years old and you need to replace it, the ZenFone 2 will provide you with everything you need for the best price. I felt smart having bought the Nexus 3, 4 and 5. These phones were great for the money. Google no longer offers a value phone. Asus is filling that role very well and I am very happy that I got such a nice phone for $300.00.

Having the Zenfone 2 now for awhile now I want to share my thoughts on it. This phone would be the best bang for the buck smartphone that is out there (as of date of this review) Pros: Performance - Intel Atom Z3580 + 4GB RAM + 64GB Internal Storage Intel really never had a dominate hand in smartphones. However, ASUS and Intel as always had a close relationship and which makes me believe that's the reason ASUS decided to go with Intel's SoC chip. The graphics processor is a PowerVR G6430 which i believe is more powerful than the Adreno 330 which came in the Galaxy S5. This phone also had 4GB of ram and so far I have seen no hick-ups when changing between multiple apps. Also coming from a Galaxy S3 there was always a noticeable lag while you doing something and trying to download and install something on the Play Store. There isn't that on this phone. Now for the benchmarks: - Antutu = 48922 - Geek Bench 3 = 920 & 2942 - 3DMark ( on Ice Storm Unlimited) = 20210 Let me reminds you, benchmarks are only numbers. Real-world experience is totally a different thing. Oh another important thing is while running this phone on Antutu stability test the temperature on the CPU never got hotter than 45 degrees C. The phone only felt warm to the touch. On my S3, however, even if i was just playing games it would get hot to the touch. Reception & WiFi: My phone carrier is AT&T and considering how i live in Alaska and all, i still receive full bars everywhere i go. Now i don't have a data plan to test on my phone so i cant show you the speed for that, however, having WiFi AC is extremely fast. I get 100mbps down here and i can recieve 90 mbps down with this phone. Software: Asus has their own skin installed on here called ZenUI. Now it does still pretty close to what google calls it their materialistic design (?) ( Don't quote me on that). The upside is that its extremely customizable for a phone that isn't rooted. For example, you can change the theme of the phone and icon packs, the number of grids you want to have on you app drawer, the style of the scrolling animation, and much more. And for the complaints of the power button being on the top, ASUS makes up for that for the double-tap to wake feature that LG implemented on their phones. Now for the downsides of the software. It comes with LOTS, and i stress LOTS, of bloatware. Some of them are actually useful but most people never really need. Now you can uninstall most (if not all) the apps that ASUS did not make. If you think you can just root this phone and uninstall the system apps, DO NOT DO IT. If you do so, and you decide to update OTA you will be stuck in a boot loop.Another thing is that the system software actually eats up a lot of space. Around 10GB just for the system. Lastly, and, I'm sure ASUS did not intend for it to be like this, but when i first booted the phone up it had Talkback ON. It gave me such a headache, and this was going to be my first impression of the phone, and it just annoyed the heck out of me. I was super tempted to just return the phone, but i heard it was a good phone so i just gritted my teeth and just dealt with it. After 5 or so minutes of this nuance, i was finally able to turn Talkback off and it just became a brand new phone. I sure did love it after that. Screen: This screen is a 1080P IPS display. I still dont understand the point of having a 4K display when the screen is only 5". Sure a 4k display would make sense on a 40"+ TV, but for a phone, I rather have manufactures save their money and put better hardware/quality for the price they save on the 4k display vs 1080 one. The only downside of the screen is that its a bit too much on the bright side on the dimmest setting. Then again so was my S3. So personally, i have no complaints there. Aesthetics: Personally I think this is a really sexy phone. From the looks on the plastic back, you could never tell that it was plastic and would truly think it was a type of metal. I would of preferred it to have capasative buttons with a black-light but that's just me nitpicking. However, I am planning to get a Dbrand skin on this phone so it's only going to get better. Battery Life: The first thing when I get a new phone is I always root it and install Greenify. Also since this phone shipped (and still is) with Lolipop 5.0 the memory leak issue with it isn't fixed yet. So i also have Xposed installed and patched the ColorFade memory leak that was on 5.0. So I'm not sure how the battery life on the phone was before i did all of that, but now it just runs and runs. Since I'm out of my school schedule I can't compare back to back on how long the S3 lasted me and the Zenfone 2 last me, but from the time i go to work (8AM) and come back home (5PM) i have 50% - 70% left. Thats with listening to music most of the day, occasional texting, surfing the web, and YouTube on my break time. On a hard day where i use it all day i would get it to around 30-40% however. I would say it does last a long time. If ASUS fixed their bug on how Andriod OS eats up more battery than the screen does then this phone's battery life would last you around 2 days. Camera: I never use the camera on any phones literally. But opening the app it has plenty of features. The phone by default is set to 10MP as the aspect ratio is 16:9 and 13MP is only 4:3. For me i like my photos to be 16:9 so i left it on 10MP. The camera really is the only downfall of this phone as there is a bit of noise. But i don't use cameras too often. What would i know. Rootablity: As this phone comes with the Intel Processor there isn't really much support on it as flashing custom roms and what nots. However, it does support the essentials. Xposed with most of the modules working (of course KitKat modules not included). The only thing with installing this on the Zenfone is that you can't do it the normal way with just installing the APK and just press the install. You have to go through ADB. In fact, to get most things done, you have to do things through ADB which is way different from my S3 which had lots of support for it. The bootloader is unlockable, however, there isn't a way to relock it so if you do so your warranty is voided. Basically if you're coming with a last year's flagship phone dont expect the same support. There isn't custom ROMs as of date. Even the legendary CyogenMod isn't supported yet ( or maybe never ) on this phone. Custom Kernals are not yet available either. And rooting hoping to get rid of those pesky bloatware would bring you no where ( Oh that rhymed ) OVERALL: This is a very, very compelling phone. For the price and for the specs, its the best-bang-for-the-buck. On 3DMark, the performance on this phone already came close to the Galaxy S6 with the S6 having a score of 21186. That's a phone that is worth close to $700 (?). This phone is easily comparable to last year's flagships phone's and maybe could even beat them. If you are looking for a new phone, or just looking to be able to get Android Lollipop then this is the phone to reach for.

I like the phone a lot! it is quite good only the battery is its downside other than that all good!!

O aparelho é bom, já tinha um desse modelo que se estragou devido a uma queda e fiquei feliz em encontrar outro igual para substituí-lo depois de tanto tempo. Mas a loja o enviou sem a nota fiscal, só com uma declaração de conteúdo em branco. Foi preciso muito contato com o suporte da Amazon e vários e-mails para a loja para me enviarem a nota fiscal uma semana depois da entrega ter sido efetuada. Recomendo o produto, mas a loja precisa melhorar o atendimento. Quanto a Amazon, o suporte é de primeira.

Começando pela entrega que chegou 7 antes do prazo. A isso chamamos excelência. Quanto ao produto, atende todas as necessidades. Muito satisfeita com a compra.

great phone, got it in just 2 business days!!

A really good phone for the price however, I do suggest getting the upgraded model of this since the RAM on my current model doesn't seem to be the most helpful.