A low budget phone

The latest offering of Chinese smartphone maker Coolpad's Mega 3 has many features, which will attract buyers in this price range. But low resolution can let this phone down, writes Rakesh Kumar

In November Chinese smartphone maker Coolpad came up with its new phone Mega 3. Like its predecessor, Mega 3 is also a low budget phone at just Rs 6,999. What is good about the phone is its triple sim and good design. But the phone’s resolution is very low, lacking the punch one requires to watch high definition movies or games. Another drawback of the phone could be its speed, especially when multiple browser, apps or games are opened. Switching between apps could be a little stressful.

Design and storage

The Coolpad Mega 3 is built well and looks good. The phone weighs 170g and is 8.3mm thick. The exterior of the phone is covered with plastic, which is removable and doesn't feel delicate. The good thing about the phone is its coarse finish at the back, which gives a good grip unlike glass. The volume keys are on the left side while the power button is on the right. The purpose behind separating the power buttons and volume buttons is to give people a better idea of where each of them is exactly placed. The other good thing about the phone is that it can support three SIM cards, all of them 4G-ready, at a time.

 The internal storage of the phone is 16GB and one could enhance the storage to another 32GB through a micro-SD card. The battery of the phone has 3,050 mAh, which can run well for a full day with modest usage.

 Unlike other budget phones, the camera of the phone, which is 8-megapixel both in front and back, is not very appealing.  Shots taken in daylight looked decent, with reasonable colour accuracy but a lack of detail.

Software and display

The Mega 3 runs on Android 6.0 Marshmallow with the company's CoolUI skin. There is no app drawer, which means all the apps will be shown on Home screen. But the advantage is one can change the look and feel by applying new themes and wallpapers. The phone has a MediaTek 1.2GHz MT6737 quad-core processor with 2GB RAM. It gives smooth performance, until multiple tabs are opened. In terms of resolution, the 5.5 inch smartphone has a resolution of 1,280x720p, which handles colour well. Visibility from odd angles is good.

All in all, given the specifications, features and price, the phone is impressive in this price range.