During an age of stylish smartphones, tidy tablets, and luxurious laptops, we’re spoilt for innovative, handheld, mobile treats. However, as great as the selection is, these devices come at a cost. The lower end of the market, let’s be frank, has always lacked the spark that the higher end products promise to deliver. So, you can imagine the Eureka moment Huawei must have had when it completed the Ascend G300, a low end, affordable smartphone that actually warrants its place beside the iPhone, Galaxy and BlackBerry.
In response to the next generation consumers, the Ascend G300 is a brilliant device from the outside in. It’s stylish, light (140g), and solid. The solidity is something worth mentioning because it is a cheaper option of smartphone, and these devices can often feel that way. However, Huawei have bridged a significant gap with this model, it feels complete in your hand. Ok, it’s a little rough and ready, the finish doesn’t ooze quality, but that’s not the point. The Ascend isn’t trying to distract you from the fact that it’s a cheaper smartphone option (asides the metallic disguising plastic cover I suppose); it plays to its strengths.
The boring details; it runs on the Android OS, Gingerbread v2.3, 5mp camera, 4 GB of memory, full touch screen, and 480×800 pixel resolution. Not too bad so far, considering its price.
The screen isn’t nearly as crisp as the more expensive models, fine face on, but slightly off axis you’ll easily recognise the difference. However, it’s packed full of decent features which are highly enjoyable regardless. Simple things like live wallpapers, similar to the Galaxy, swipe panel options for the home screen and an extremely fast start-up time, all add neat touches.
I recorded around about four and a half hours of battery life when Wi-Fi browsing, that’s more than I could get from some recent high end market releases – that’s impressive. The company claims that the talk time is over five hours, but I don’t have that many friends, so I can’t confirm this.
The Qualcomm Snapdragon processor (1GHz) on board the G300 is a very good runner. It’s fast enough, plays high quality, 3D games, and makes light work of the swipe browsing, which makes the phone very user friendly. Too often have I thrown a device (literally) because of slow reaction speeds. Rest assured, your family, friends and colleagues are safe in your presence when you’re holding the G300.
I’m a snappy happy chap, and I had a lovely surprise when I tucked into the camera. In good light, and in focus, the Ascend takes fine photo. There are a few good camera options/settings and I had a good couple of hours enjoying them. It isn’t a fantastic piece of work but it’s adequate considering the asking price. The shutter speed is pretty fast, as is the auto-focus, so I wasn’t complaining.
It’s a pretty good social phone, you won’t be lagging behind your pals too much if they have the more expensive models. However, it doesn’t have a camera built into the front of the device, so you will get left out of the video calls.
Final verdict?
I have awarded the Huawei Ascend G300 two thumbs up, more if I had them. It has a great battery life, and is stylish and sturdy with a good list of features. The pitfalls of most cheap smartphones seemed to have been addressed and answered to a fairly decent standard in the G300. The winning element of this phone though, is of course the price – a criminal AED 799.
This review was done by Joe Lipscombe, Sub-Editor of CPI Technology
