Elephone G6 Review MT6592 5.0″ 720p

We have a couple of Elephone reviews to be written. Coming next week will be the Elephone P3000, but first up is the Elephone G6.

Elephone G6 review style and build

The Elephone G6 is perhaps one of the slickest feeling and looking phones I’ve had a chance to review. It is very similarly shaped to the iOcean X7 and recently reviewed MPIE G7, with their slightly curved top and bottom, but there are a couple of subtle differences with the G6 that really add class to the phone.

The backpiece, which may be plain plastic, comes across as looking a bit like magnesium alloy. The sides and border of the phone, which seem to be colored deep teal and have to be inspected closely to determine they’re not aluminum, add to the style of the phone.

I’ve found Coolicool to be one of the top shops in the business. Check out the Elephone G6 and the rest of the store at www.coolicool.com

The top and bottom are textured, the back tapers, and the evenly lit capacitive buttons, which are slits instead of standard menu and back button icons.

There is a mirrored sliver of glass laying between the bottom of the display and the border plastic of the phone.

Taken together, the phone looks slick and modern, and feels great in the hand.

Normally I don’t go into this, but the boot image, animation, and sound from Elephone are all classy. I’ve been using that word a lot, but this is the sense I get from the small touches Elephone has put on the G6.

This is a step up from THL’s “Technology. Happy. Life.”

The one negative aspect of the external appearance of the phone is the phrase at the bottom of the phone which states “Keep expecting and be surprised”. This is a step up from THL’s “Technology. Happy. Life.”, but still something that needs to be left off the phone. Regardless, this is a minor gripe in the face of all that’s right about the look and feel of the G6.

Elephone G6 review OS and system stability

The OS on the Elephone G6 is KitKat 4.4.2. It runs as smoothly as Android comes. I’ve tested the standard array of apps which I use to gauge OS stability. YouTube, Chrome, Facebook, Line app, Skype, Gmail and Maps all run perfectly on the phone with no force closes. Fast touch typing is as quick as it comes and there were no ghost touches, double taps needed or doubling up of letters while typing.

Play Store is already installed and I signed on, updated and installed apps with no problems. The OS is free of all junkware. There are no strange China shops or apps preinstalled on my copy of the phone.

My copy of the Elephone G6 also came prerooted with SuperSU. The root is a true root and I updated to the latest binary from within Android without issue.

In the last two phones I’ve reviewed from Elephone, the firmware on the phone when it arrived and the downloaded update ROMs have come rooted. They use SuperSU as opposed to KingUser which is very nice.

Elephone G6 review ROM storage

The Elephone G6 came stock with just over 1GB for internal storage. I modified the EBRs and will hand them over to CPA admins to post on the forum.

Though this is a relatively simple process for the user to change the EBR to give more internal storage, China brands really need to have all of their phones coming out of the factory with at least 3GB relegated to internal.

The average user should be okay with 2GB, but I’ve found 3GB about optimal for my usage. 1GB simply isn’t enough unless putting minimal apps.

Note: There’s an updated stock ROM available from Elephone that should address this EBR issue.

Elephone G6 review frequency support

Under the battery on the copy of the G6 I received is printed 850/2100, but according to Elephone’s site, Coolicool and engineering mode, the G6 supports 850/1900/2100.

I have been in contact with Elephone and confirmed the phone is indeed support 850/1900/2100 and that the 850/2100 printed on the phone is a mistake from the factory.

Interesting this is the exact opposite of what happened with iNew V3 Plus, where the sticker said 850/1900/2100 but confirmed to be only 850/2100.

these kinds of seemingly small mistakes are actually a big deal, and often set very successful brands apart from the ones that just remain mediocre.

I am inclined to give Elephone the benefit of the doubt here, but these kinds of seemingly small mistakes are actually a big deal, and often set very successful brands apart from the ones that just remain mediocre.

Elephone G6 review camera

The camera on the Elephone G6 look quite good. Dynamic range is weak and there is evidence of extreme sharpening even viewing at 800×600, but this is better than the very soft images that come out of some $140 phones.

if you compare the G6 images to other phones in this price range, it holds it’s own.

See the images here in the gallery. The 100% crops are from 8mp shots. Keep in mind these shots are straight out of the Elephone G6 with no edits other than resizing/cropping.

[flickr_set id=”72157649249493617″ lightbox=”colorbox” randomize=”false”]

This needs to be taken into perspective relative to the price. This is a $140 phone, and if you compare the G6 images to other phones in this price range, it holds it’s own. They were a step up from the MPIE G7, but not as good as what came from the iNew V3 Plus.

Though this is not a camera you would want to rely on for very important moments, the images from the Elephone G6 easily hold up for social sharing and look better than much of what I see posted on the web these days.

Elephone G6 review display

The display on the Elephone is IPS 720p which is a ppi of 293 and easily enough for a 5.0″ display. From all angles color and contrast remained true.

I’ve found Coolicool to be one of the top shops in the business. Check out the Elephone G6 and the rest of the store at www.coolicool.com

There was some slight light bleed from the bottom right area of the display, but this was not overly distracting and can be fairly common with LCDs.

Elephone G6 review external speaker / mic / earpiece

I normally test mic and earpiece by standing near a busy road and making a short phone call to see if both parties can be heard. In terms of hearing and being heard, the G6 passed my phone call test with no problems. (EDIT: See page 2 for an update on mic)

The external speaker on the G6 is beyond adequate for hearing movies / YouTube and for video calls.