Alcatel – TWFLD

Alcatel OneTouch Alpha Reviewed

Papi Mabele — Mon, 28 Jul 2014 11:24:53 +0000

Alcatel OneTouch has turned a new leaf in 2014. In the past, the TCL-affiliated manufacturer has been known to crank out a dozen or more cheap smartphones at European trade shows with no apparent focus on quality, but after a recent adjustment in brand strategy, we’re looking at the company in a completely new light. The frequency of new phones hasn’t changed much, but Alcatel is working hard to change its reputation by adding a few high-end devices to its portfolio, such as the Idol Alpha which was launched locally a few weeks ago at a glamour event in Sandton. Taking the lead as the flagship of the company’s premiere Android lineup, the Alpha is a 5-inch beaut that appears to live up to its name, complete with aluminum build (that the local GM couldn’t stop raving about) and a new type of transparent material on the top and bottom. It’s a phone that took us a bit off-guard, so join us after the break (and the gallery in-between) to read more of my review.

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The Alpha is the most premium Alcatel OneTouch phone I’ve ever played with, both in terms of look and feel. Simply put, it’s stunning, sleek and stylish. It features a 3D aluminum frame, which company reps tell us is “achieved with three dimensional forming with 3D diamond cut on the chamfer.” They claim that this approach — instead of going for the standard boxy style — is the first of its kind, and whether that’s true or not, it’s still done quite well. To add to the phone’s overall durability, the Alpha has a metallic back and the front is covered with an oleophobic coating (for enhanced protection against scratches, smudges and other superficial damage to the screen) and a slab of Dragontrail Glass, a lesser-known Corning competitor that aims to protect smartphones with the same kind of scratch resistance and toughness.

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Another element of the Alpha’s design that truly shines is the translucent edges on top and bottom. We’re told that it’s made of a special transparent material that isn’t plastic or glass, though reps wouldn’t get more specific. It’s not just there for its looks, though we must admit it adds a splash of elegance to the device; rather, the bottom edge doubles as a notification bar, lit up by three LEDs that sit on the end of the physical chassis. It’s designed in such a way that the phone glows underneath to give the appearance that it’s floating; after all, who doesn’t want a special glowing phone that floats in mid-air?

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The specs aren’t top-of-the-line, unfortunately, but we have a feeling that most people won’t mind — as long as price isn’t a negative factor, which Alcatel confirmed at a firm R5999 (R5499 at CelluCity). The Alpha runs Android 4.2.2 with a special UI designed by Alcatel and features a 4.7-inch 720p IPS display, a 1.2GHz quad-core SoC, 1GB RAM, 16GB internal storage with no microSD support and a 2,000mAh battery. It has DC-HSPA+ 42Mbps connectivity, but no LTE. The Alpha started to roll on 7 July in Mzansi and will expand to countries in Africa. For all that style, class and friendly usage, we’d highly recommend you stopping by your local retail stores for a visit. For the Idol Alpha, of course.

All images by Papi Mabele

Samsung Ch@t 333 and Alcatel OneTouch Tribe 3000 Review

Papi Mabele — Mon, 14 Jul 2014 18:04:30 +0000

Global smartphones sales may have eclipsed feature phone sales, but that means billions of people are still using feature phones. And let’s face it, feature phone design hasn’t changed all that much over the last ten years. Compared to sleek new smartphones like the Apple iPhone 5 and 5s or the Samsung Galaxy S5, feature phones can look, well, drab. Luckily, Samsung and Alcatel are taking center stage to making absolutely gorgeous new feature phones with a high-quality display attention to design and friendly to the pocket. It’s what all feature phones should aspire to. I, for one, looked forward to putting the Samsung chat 333 and Alcatel OneTouch 3000 to the test.

[title type=”h2″ class=””]Samsung Chat 333[/title]

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First Looks

On unpacking, the tale of our white Samsung Chat 333’s design and usability can be told in two parts: the surprisingly good and the surprisingly bad.

The good is that the Chat is one of the best-looking phones at this price. It looks stylish and elegant with a brushed-metal look on the keyboard and the front buttons complemented by a metallic rim. The Chat is light but feels solid in the hand (thanks to the metallic trimming) and is quite slim too. The presence of the optical track-pad is also nice since when done well, the optical trackpad definitely works better here. Also, the Chat’s user interface (UI) is easy on the eye and has a simple design with a couple of customisation options.

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The bad begins with the keyboard – which is very disappointing to use in spite of it looking good. The keys are too soft and aren’t sufficiently raised making it difficult to type on. Reminds me of the Blackberry 8520 (for more on how much I hate it, check-out my bio below). Also, on pressing a key almost every other key around it wobbles, which takes away from the usability. The optical trackpad is also a little too sensitive and not very accurate. Even after I had set the trackpad’s sensitivity to its lowest, the Samsung Chat 333 was just too darn difficult to control. The screen on the 333 is average but at least the interface looks good on it. However, it handles terribly under sunlight and videos, even indoors, doesn’t look great on it.

Along with the qwerty keyboard, the Chat 333 has a 2.4-in TFT screen with a resolution of 320×240 pixels and 256K colour output.
It has a 3.5mm jack for plugging in headphones and uses a microUSB port to charge and connect to the PC. It has 60MB of internal memory and supports microSD cards up to 8GB (it comes with a free 2GB microSD card). Connectivity supports Wi-Fi and Bluetooth but no 3G. The Chat also has a 2Mp fixed-focus camera with no flash that can record videos in CIF resolution (176×144). It also comes pre-installed with a couple of social networking and chat applications that include Facebook, Twitter, MSN and Yahoo.

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This is definitely not a phone you want to browse the web on, nor take pictures with. In fact, it won’t let you browse most of the internet, as it almost always runs out of memory on sites that aren’t optimised for mobile browsing. Also, the optical trackpad makes it difficult to browse on the small screen. The Chat has a surprisingly capable 2Mp camera. Although you probably shouldn’t rely on it for anything more than casual shots, it takes colourful and sharp pictures – although it does falter indoors because of the absence of auto-focus. The Chat records very ordinary videos which are only good for watching on the phone’s screen.

[title type=”h2″ class=””]Alcatel OneTouch Tribe 30.00[/title]

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First Looks

First thing first, even when you’re looking for a budget option (this baby goes for around R199 once-off depending on where you buy it) you don’t want it to look like a piece of junk. Even on the tightest of shoestring budgets, you still want something that looks socially acceptable. The Alcatel Tribe 30.00 does a half decent job. However with big budget constraints, it can’t pull out all the stylish stops. It has a very small screen which looks very dated, but the high-gloss, round-edged, compact style and QWERTY keyboard are not entirely hideous, especially for R199.

The QWERTY keyboard may have fallen a little out of favour in recent years, but it’s great for speedy texting once you get the hang of it. Meanwhile, measuring 107m x 58mm it’s small enough to seem chic so you’re not going to get laughed out of town, but perhaps don’t let any of your tech-savvy chums catch sight of the teeny tiny screen (hence I hardly took my review device anywhere)…

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This tribe can pull most of the basics off. You don’t have 3G (let alone 4G) capability, but you can text and call to your heart’s content with very respectable 2G connectivity and decent call clarity. This affordable little number also has Facebook and Twitter apps built in so you can stay social without 3G. Just don’t expect anything too snazzy. These social apps are very slow and look very dated. POP3/IMAP4 email is ready to go if you don’t mind taking your sweet time with it and Bluetooth 3.0 is also on board for your convenience.In terms of multimedia bits and pieces, you’re not going to get much for R199, but the Tribe 30.00 does generously give you a few entertainment odds and sodskis. There’s an FM radio and an inbuilt MP3 player if you’re willing to use up all your storage on your favourite track.

Using the micro SD card will bump you up to just 8GB of storage which makes this little phone a tight squeeze. Fine if you want to save a few contacts and photographs, not so good if you’d like to take your music library on the roadski. You might not have expected it, but this budget beauty does manage to cram in a little VGA camera as well! Just don’t take too many pictures or you’ll run out of storage sharpish.

In conclusion

There’s no getting away from the fact that these two are budget phones. Even its high-gloss, rounded designs ain’t fooling anybody, let’s be honest. However, for R199 and R499 once-off we can’t imagine you’ll do any better. Call quality on both these devices is good, texting is easy and, judging by user reviews, people who have invested in these little phones as a stopgap while their smartphone goes in for repairs have been pleasantly surprised by how functional and usable they are.

Introducing Alcatel’s Idol Alpha

Papi Mabele — Tue, 01 Jul 2014 17:24:34 +0000

Yep, it’s a premium smartphone alright. Alcatel OneTouch officially unveiled their Idol Alpha today at a special press event held in Sandton. Consistent with the rumors, Alcatel’s first-ever premium and “come-back” handset has a 4.7-inch display with an HD-resolution screen (720p) and 16M TFT . That makes it the same size as the Moto X, which was also supposed to be a phone for the masses. It
features an outstanding design with a sleek body outfitted with translucent strips of plastic on the top and bottom – it’s something for those who value singularity in style and at the same time don’t want to spend a fortune on a device – a quad-core 1.2GHz processor, MediaTek CPU and 1GB of RAM. As for the camera, there’s a 13-megapixel rear-facing one equipped with an f/2.0 lens and optical image stabilization and the ability to capture 1080p video. There’s also a dedicated camera key.

Other features include G sensor, Bluetooth 4.0, FM radio and WiFi channel bonding. It even supposedly has great battery life, promising nearly 360 hours of standby time, 20 hours of talk time, 24 hours of audio and 9 hours of video playback. It’ll be available exclusively from Vodacom & MTN from 7 July for you in its 16GB version. CelluCity, the authorized Vodacom reseller confirmed their contract pricing for the device at R349 per month (Smart S plan) and R5999 once-off.

Alcatel tease new premium smartphone

Papi Mabele — Wed, 18 Jun 2014 15:25:50 +0000

We’re not quite sure what it is yet, but Alcatel OneTouch has just invited us to save the date July 1st for a special event held in Johannesburg, in which it tells us “The beauty lies in the detail.” If this is indeed a new device, it alludes to a higher-res display, attention to design detail and greater sound; is this a likely contender to the Huawei P6 and 7? or simply in the ranks of the LG G3 and Samsung GS5? Hard to say at this point, but we’re keeping a pretty close eye out for more details. In the meantime, this is at least one more thing to look forward to in a couple weeks. Think we’re bluffing? See the invite capture above

Alcatel strikes with the 2000, exclusive to Vodacom

Papi Mabele — Thu, 20 Feb 2014 09:37:58 +0000

We’re all getting older, so let’s try to work out a great handset for those who need a little help. We speak from personal experience when we say it’s probably not going to be the Samsung Galaxy Y — trust us. It might not be the next best smartphone or spot some of the hi-tech features found in next gen smartphones but it sure does cater for the elderly. Well the Alcatel 2000 could just be it.

Sold exclusively through Vodacom at R499 The Alcatel 2000 phone designed for the elderly with large buttons and a large font screen.

Key Alcatel 2000 features

• Large 2.4” screen with BIG font

• Large keypad

• Dedicated SOS Button

• Battery life that will last up to 7 hours of talk time

· Dedicated keys for FM Radio, Lock and Torch

Alcatel One Touch Pixi & Idol S destined for SA ‘soon’

Papi Mabele — Wed, 30 Oct 2013 20:03:39 +0000

Alcatel, today 30 October, announced two new handsets destined for South Africa ‘soon’ at a launch event in Johannesburg.

Both the Idol S and OneTouch Pixi have been confirmed for South Africa with local network testing underway. The Pixi will be released just in time for Christmas at a recommended price of R699. Smaller than Idol S, the Pixi runs on Android 2.3 with a 1300mAh battery, features a 3.5″ HVGA (320×480) display, VGA camera, 1GHz processor and 256MB RAM.

The Idol S on the other hand is the larger of the two weighs 110 grams, has a 4.7-inch 1,280 x 720-pixel screen and DC-HSPA/ LTE data connectivity. It’s powered by a 1.2GHz dual-core processor, has 4GB of internal storage, 1GB of RAM and an 8-megapixel rear / 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera.

The Pixi is said to be available at PEP Cell, Ackermans and Edcon (Edgars, CNA, Jet, Legit) retailers before the end of the year. The Alcatel Idol S on the other hand is expected to reach us during Q1 of 2014 at a RRP OF R2999.

Alcatel to release One Touch Idol S, Idol Mini and Evo 8 HD tablet?

Papi Mabele — Tue, 29 Oct 2013 22:43:20 +0000

Ahead of tonight’s #OneTouchSpeak event presented by Alcatel, the three new members of Alcatel’s One Touch family have silently slipped into the company’s local website. Could they be tonight’s show stoppers? The two handsets, the Idol S and the Idol Mini have been visible on the site for more than two months now – close approximate as the local site is linked to the global site. These two follow the original trio revealed at CES this year, sharing similar elements despite the difference in size. Both run Android 4.2+ can read microSD cards up to 32GB in capacity and support quad-band GSM, as well as some UMTS (3G) bands, depending on the model as specified on the website.

Unlike the first two, the third new Alcatel device is a tablet — the 9-mm-thin One Touch Evo 8 HD with 4G LTE that’s powered by a 1.6GHz dual core ARM Cortex-A9 processor. It only has 4GB of internal storage, but it supports cards up to 64GB in capacity. Despite revealing detailed specs, the company has yet to announce the devices’ pricing and availability, hopefully this will be tonight?

Alcatel hints on more One Touch releases

Papi Mabele — Mon, 28 Oct 2013 12:14:09 +0000

We thought LG’s star-studded launch held in Jozi last week brought a closure to device announcements and launches in Mzansi, phela once Samsung hosts their annual Note launch (party) we tech-heads have nothing else rather than dry press releases and webcasts to look forward to. Not that I’m complaining, but.. yeah!

Way back in January Alcatel trotted out some new tablets set for debut in Q3, now this is all according to the guys at Engadget. But now we can confirm that some of the handsets that made a appearance earlier in August might just be on their way to our shores, erm, stores rather. The (friendly) guys at Alcatel sent out invites to their One Touch Speak event taking place this Wednesday. While our live tweet sevices have been at halt since Septmeber, we cannot guarantee live tweets to this event either. Scratch that, there will be no live tweets. But rest asssured, we will be have the updates here.

Then again, if you’re worried that you’ll be missing out on all the FOMO be sure to follow the live event hashtag, #OneTouchSpeak on twitter.