This is the OPPO Neo 5, a budget friendly 4G Android smartphone. It’s a smallish smartphone, which is a welcome relief for those who are finding other smartphones too large for their comfort. The hardware specifications are mid-range, but it should be quite sufficient for people who just need basic functions on their smartphones.
OPPO is reputed for building pretty good quality phones, and the Neo 5 won’t disappoint in this department. The phone feels very sturdy, and given its lightweight and compact size, is very easy to handle in one-hand.
The Neo 5 runs Color OS, OPPO’s take on Android, and it’s based on Android 4.3 Jelly Bean. Color OS is pretty light and pleasant to use. The phone packs a 4.5″ IPS multitouch display with a resolution of 480 x 854. The display is bright, although the 218ppi pixel density isn’t that great given the low resolution. I did find a problem with the screen being a little too reflective.
Under the hood, the Neo 5 is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 quad-core processor clocked at 1.2GHz. There’s a 5MP main camera with LED flash, and 2MP front-facing camera.
The Neo 5’s connectivity options are good. Apart from the 4G I already mentioned, there’s Bluetooth 4.0 with A2DP, USB OTG, and dual band 802.11 a/b/g/nWi-Fi, Wi-Fi Direct and DLNA. There’s no NFC.
OPPO announced the Neo 5 in January 2014, and it just launched in Singapore August. Off contract, the Neo 5 costs only S$219. With any of SingTel’s new Combo contracts, this smartphone is free. If you’re looking to get a budget Android smartphone with basic functions, the Neo 5 should be something worth your consideration.
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