Every ZenFone Max Pro M1 owner or prospective owner needs to read this!

May 6, 2018 Categories: Accessories, Zenfone Max, ZenFone Max M1, ZenFone Max Pro, Zenfone Max Pro M1 by 0 Comments

This is an important announcement. This is our way of drawing your attention to something that you need to be made aware of IF you’re planning to buy or have already bought the popular ZenFone Max Pro M1. This advice goes to anyone shopping for one of the budget mobile phones.

BUY A SCREEN PROTECTOR

It’s very easy these days to assume that every new smartphone comes with a scratch resistant Gorilla Glass or equivalent. With mobile phones striving to meet certain price points, sacrifices are made. In the case of the ZenFone Max Pro M1, Asus did not include that strong display protection. You MUST take matters into your own hands. Check the detailed specs and make sure multiple sites are reporting the same thing. Specs can indeed be wrong.

Take it from personal experience! I have a scratch ZenFone 4 Max and I found out the hard way that there was no Gorilla Glass protection. I incorrectly made that assumption that Gorilla Glass was a mobile phone standard. It’s not! Sorry for repeating this message but I can’t help myself.

If you put this off for next week or the week after that, be assured the display will soon feature a permanent scratch or scratches. It’s remarkable how quickly this can happen.

I put out this warning to anyone shopping for a budge mobile phone actually. Many times manufacturers are going to sacrifice a tough display glass and leave it up to you to protect it. Screen protectors are super cheap. Yes they are most certainly a hassle to put on, but this isn’t optional. It’s a must.

I urge you to have the screen protector when you first unbox your ZenFone Max Pro for the first time. You don’t want the display to start collecting dust and it certainly will almost the second you take off the plastic wrap. When you go to apply a screen protector, do it just like you would if you were a surgeon. Dust free environment, clean hands, steady hands, and a bit of patience is required. I’ve found the stiffer and thick screen protectors to be easier to manage but your mileage may vary of course.

MaxBox audio accessory – How good is it?

May 6, 2018 Categories: Accessories, MaxBox by 0 Comments

During the Asus India unveiling of the ZenFone Max Pro M1, the MaxBox accessory was mentioned. The MaxBox is a free, included in box, foldable passive audio amplifier. Essentially it’s a stand made of cardboard that doubles as a passive amplifier.

During the launch presentation, it was suggested the MaxBox will boost the audio making it “2x louder volume”.

Without having a model to test, we’ve looked at lucky individuals who have review units. From these we were able to get some information regarding the MaxBox performance. We have at least one example of volume comparison using proper equipment.

There is of course the issue of audio “quality” rather than just sheer volume. We can’t delve into the quality of the audio, such as added bass, at this time. As more reviews appear online or until we get a unit to review ourselves, we will just provide a basic overview of the MaxBox to keep your expectations realistic.

With MaxBox:

Without MaxBox:

Obviously we just grabbed screenshots but we tried to grab a shot which represents an average level. Is the volume louder using the MaxBox? Yes. Is it 2x louder? Not from what we’ve seen so far. We need to dig deeper than just looking at a few numbers on a measuring device.

A testing tool and images can only do so much. Check out this video on YouTube where music is playing on the ZenFone Max Pro and it’s quite astonishing the “before and after” audio quality when the phone is placed into the MaxBox.

Click here to hear the MaxBox before and after audio quality

Given the fact a stand is nice to have and this one is free, then we have nothing bad to say about the MaxBox. It will provide a decent bump in volume and significantly improve audio quality based on early reviews which makes it worth the effort to take out of the retail box and fold. Not a lot of heavy lifting involved folks!

Product page up, ZenFone 5Z inches closer to June release date

May 6, 2018 Categories: News, Zenfone 5, Zenfone 5z, ZS620KL by 0 Comments

Asus just put up their snazzy product page for the ZS620KL aka ZenFone 5Z. We were wondering about the “z” and whether it was actually “Z” and now we have our answer. It’s uppercase!

Asus so far has been precise with bringing the ZenFone 5 and ZenFone Max models to market as they promised. We are expecting the ZenFone 5Z to be available in June, starting with Taiwan and other Asian markets.

Although the design and look of the ZenFone 5 and ZenFone 5Z are identical, it’s the hardware that really puts the premium into the 5Z. If you want that cutting edge speed and performance then this is the model for you. A leaked benchmark a week ago show the ZenFone 5Z setting an all time best benchmark score in Antutu.

No specifics have been mentioned in terms of price, but everything we’ve seen so far says this will be remarkably cheap. If you were unhappy with the ZenFone 3 and ZenFone 4 pricing, we believe the ZenFone 5 pricing strategy has reverted to cheaper points. Will the price unveil be a “drop the mic” moment? We say yes.

Once that price in announced in Taiwan, we will do some number crunching and come up with a detailed and accurate pricing list for other countries. Don’t be fooled by the price comparisons that convert currency only. It’s more complicated than that!

Vodafone India and ASUS partner up and offer deals for ZenFone Max Pro M1

May 5, 2018 Categories: India, News by 0 Comments

Asus continues to make big strides in the India market. Flipkart was the first big partnership with the ZenFone Max Pro M1 and now we are seeing another announcement, this time with Vodafone.

Here are the key deals and options:

  • pre-paid customers get 120GB free additaional data at 10GB/month for a year and is available to any prepaid customer choosing a Rs. 199 plan and above
  • postpaid customers who are subscribed to RED Rs. 399 plan and above can also get 10GB per month
  • postpaid customers who are subscribed to RED are able to get free Red Shield Device Security Solution for two years
  • deals and discounts to many restaurants and cafes, e-commerce shopping offers, local travel deals, movies and more will be available via the My Vodafone App every Wednesday, Thursday and Friday

In the press release, Asus CEO Jerry Shen stated their goal of “making smartphone technology affordable and accessible to everyone in the country.” This agreement with Vodafone is a big step because it’s going to give people more data at a lower price and thus allowing people to really make use of what makes a smartphone great. Data limits can hold back the potential of a smartphone because you might not want to use certain apps or watch streaming content due to data concerns.

It’s quite clear people in India want the the ZenFone Max Pro M1 and now Asus must answer the bell and have enough units available to meet the demand and create goodwill among consumers. They really have something here and they need to capitalize on it while the going is good.

[source: Vodafone press release download PDF]

Android Go powered ZenFone Live L1 (ZA550KL) is unveiled

May 4, 2018 Categories: ZA550KL, ZenFone Live L1 by 0 Comments

There is no shortage of ZenFone news these days. No question this model came from out of nowhere and was just unveiled in Indonesia.

The ZenFone Live L1 (ZA550KL) is hoping to create some buzz because it’s featuring Google’s Android Go operating system. Technically speaking, the operating system is called Android Oreo (Go edition) and it is designed to run on less robust hardware. As you might expect, it features the typical and popular Google applications like Gmail, Google Assistant and Google Maps. The apps however are tweaked in order to become “GO” versions. These are the main selling points of Android Go according to Google:

  1. More Storage
  2. Better Performance
  3. Data Savings
  4. Secuity
  5. 50% smaller app size

So even with a cheap ZenFone Max M1 series unveiled recently, the price point of the ZenFone Live L1 will be even more affordable. Asus has not yet unveiled the price just yet. Don’t expect many markets outside of Asia to see this phone released either. Release date in Indonesia is set for May 17th.

Photo Credit: Adi Fida Rahman

Taking a look at the specs, you’re getting a Snapdragon 425 processor, 5.5-inch display, 2GB of RAM, 16GB storage, a triple-slot tray supporting 2TB microSD and two SIM cards all at the same time, 3000mAh battery, face unlock, 13MP rear camera, and 5MP front facing camera. It will comes in a variety of colors including Midnight Black and Rose Pink. We aren’t yet sure about the resolution and will update with those details once we learn of them.

Photo Credit: Adi Fida Rahman

 

Photo Credit: Adi Fida Rahman

 

Photo Credit: Adi Fida Rahman

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