Asus Zenfone 2

Hootanany

I cant install whatsapp:eek:

Euphoriasean

Hootanany wrote: »

I cant install whatsapp:eek:

Didn't have an issue with this,did it not reinstall after logging into your Google a/c?

Euphoriasean

Tragedy wrote: »

The phone is full of useless Asus bloat, the zenui even with nova launcher is obtuse and ugly

Fair enough there is a lot of bloat but I havn't heard many people call the Zen UI ugly,if fact most people including me think it is one of the positives. This is objective though so I'm not knocking you for this.

Not having the issues will calls as you are. The battery yeah it's not great at the moment but I knew that before I got it. Asus have made big improvement already with there OTA updates,hopefully they will continue to do so.

You don't seem happy so your right to look elsewhere.

Tragedy

Euphoriasean wrote: »

Fair enough there is a lot of bloat but I havn't heard many people call the Zen UI ugly,if fact most people including me think it is one of the positives. This is objective though so I'm not knocking you for this.

Not having the issues will calls as you are. The battery yeah it's not great at the moment but I knew that before I got it. Asus have made big improvement already with there OTA updates,hopefully they will continue to do so.

You don't seem happy so your right to look elsewhere.

The quick settings panel has huge icons, and requires a minimum of 4 tools and 8 items. It looks like ass and is far too large. Icons are far too large in general and the UI reminds me of LG's mixed with an older version of Sense. I'm not sure 'most people' have an opinion on zenui or that if they did, you would know it - but I accept that beyond lag/performance UIs are thoroughly subjective.

Two examples of unnecessary annoyances: the taskbar loses transparency settings in some apps so that if the app has a white or grey background, the taskbar is all but invisible. The keyboard is so clunky and strangely shaped that it's an exercise in frustration to type on despite the area being so large.

SubatomicKiwi

Overall I'm very happy with the device, there's a fair bit of bloat but most of it can be uninstalled. I actually like ZenUI, this is the first time I've stuck with the default Launcher/Keyboard/Messaging app and I think I may stay with them for some time.


The vibrate motor did seem to stop/start working a lot yesterday, haven't noticed it happening this morning. The uppermost section of the screen became unresponsive earlier, a restart fixed it. Both seem to be software issues.

The camera isn't the best but that was already known. Battery is better than expected:

2+ hours SOT (Reddit,boards,chrome,games), 1 hour Bluetooth audio, 2 hours internal audio and Wi-Fi/4G on all night: 56% remaining.

If you use the included adapter it seems to fast charge all the way to 100, it's meant to stop at 60%. While this is fast it can get hot (40 at worst) so I can't imagine this is good in the long term.

Screen is very nice, haven't noticed any lag, 4G speeds are at least double what I was getting on the M7 (had to manually add the APN). Double tap to wake is a really nice feature and speaker is decent.

So only worries so far: Vibrate motor, Charing temperature

Hootanany

Mine charges really slowly

SubatomicKiwi

Hootanany wrote: »

Mine charges really slowly

hmm thats strange. I just charged mine up there and it went from 53% to 100% in about 80 minutes, and actually changed to 'Charging' at some point (Not fast charging). Max temp it reached this time was 34, which seems just about right for fast charging.

80 mins is nothing too fantastic for fast charging, especially when I went from 15-100 in a similar amount of time yesterday so I'm assuming the fast charging did stop at 60% this time, although the peak temp was at around 80%.

Doesn't seem to be anything to worry about anyway, vibrate is gone again and I can't decide if I should get a replacement or not.

Crimsonforce

Tragedy wrote: »

Got mine today. Intensely disappointing would be my two word review.


Red 32gb from Amazon Italy.

Battery lasts about 5hour screen on time, android kernel is using a huge amount of juice. Camera is desperately bad in any sort of low light situation, awfully noisy with a distinct moire effect. Also doesn't handle contrasting light well (e.g. daylight coming through window). It either has inside at the right light level with the window being far too bright, or has the window at the right level and inside far too dark.

The phone is full of useless Asus bloat, the zenui even with nova launcher is obtuse and ugly.

Most importantly, it hates my sim card that's working fine in my US Moto G and UK LG G2.

It didn't read the APN, wouldn't come off LTE when receiving a call/text until I enabled data roaming, and even on H it still sends calls straight to voicemail occasionally. Had a similar issue with the Nexus 5 when it originally launched, is a software issue where the phone is meant to hand off LTE so it can accept a call.

Already submitted a return too amazon and will be sending it back for oh so many reasons. Shame that.

well thats a disappointment. I receive mine tomorrow and will check out your issues on another phone..

Hootanany

SubatomicKiwi wrote: »

hmm thats strange. I just charged mine up there and it went from 53% to 100% in about 80 minutes, and actually changed to 'Charging' at some point (Not fast charging). Max temp it reached this time was 34, which seems just about right for fast charging.

80 mins is nothing too fantastic for fast charging, especially when I went from 15-100 in a similar amount of time yesterday so I'm assuming the fast charging did stop at 60% this time, although the peak temp was at around 80%.

Doesn't seem to be anything to worry about anyway, vibrate is gone again and I can't decide if I should get a replacement or not.

Only got whatsapp now dont know why and battery stuck at 83 percent for last half hour should i be worried?

SubatomicKiwi

Alright, want some opinions on this if possible.

Vibrate has been coming and going since I got it. Right now it's gone and this is the longest it's been gone for so far. At one point yesterday I reset it and vibrate still did not work yet it came back about a half hour later. Return/Replace? Assume its software?

There’s one post on the ZenTalk forum however the guy there seems to say his is gone completely and an OTA upgrade triggered it. Mine definitely worked for a few mins after the OTA.

Kinda stumped on this, still really happy with the phone but the fact that it's having an intermittent issue out of the box makes me tempted to get a replacement.

SubatomicKiwi

Hootanany wrote: »

Only got whatsapp now dont know why and battery stuck at 83 percent for last half hour should i be worried?

WhatsApp/Viber refuesed to send the verification sms to me, had to use the call. Wonder if it's something to do with the phone or just sim/network issues.

The battery charging does seem to slow a lot once it hits about 80%.....In saying that the longest the log shows mine as 'stuck' for is 4 minutes. Are you using the charger/cable that came with it? I did notice my standard chargers take longer.

daytob

SubatomicKiwi wrote: »

Alright, want some opinions on this if possible.

Vibrate has been coming and going since I got it. Right now it's gone and this is the longest it's been gone for so far. At one point yesterday I reset it and vibrate still did not work yet it came back about a half hour later. Return/Replace? Assume its software?

There’s one post on the ZenTalk forum however the guy there seems to say his is gone completely and an OTA upgrade triggered it. Mine definitely worked for a few mins after the OTA.

Kinda stumped on this, still really happy with the phone but the fact that it's having an intermittent issue out of the box makes me tempted to get a replacement.

There is a widget app you can get, its called volume control +
its quite good, it has brightness, vibrate, silent, media volume and alarm volume. its not a perfect fix but I hope it might help

SubatomicKiwi

daytob wrote: »

There is a widget app you can get, its called volume control +
its quite good, it has brightness, vibrate, silent, media volume and alarm volume. its not a perfect fix but I hope it might help

That doesn't fix it It's like the motor just disconnects, it even fails the Asus diagnostic test. Then it randomly comes back (or at least it usually does, it still hasn't) and all is fine.

Tragedy

SubatomicKiwi wrote: »

WhatsApp/Viber refuesed to send the verification sms to me, had to use the call. Wonder if it's something to do with the phone or just sim/network issues.

The battery charging does seem to slow a lot once it hits about 80%.....In saying that the longest the log shows mine as 'stuck' for is 4 minutes. Are you using the charger/cable that came with it? I did notice my standard chargers take longer.

I suspect it's a phone issue reading our sims fwiw.

Crimsonforce

Tragedy wrote: »

I suspect it's a phone issue reading our sims fwiw.

Your boards name says it all about the phone.

droidman123

Is it really that bad?

Hootanany

Ive no vibrate now:mad:

droidman123

I,m not saying the issues arnt there,but i find it strange that these issues havnt surfaced on the internet so far,and believe me i have researched this phone for months

SubatomicKiwi

droidman123 wrote: »

Is it really that bad?

No, not at all. It is a great device, there seem to be a few teething issues. All of which are software as far as I can tell, which hopefully means a fix will be implemented soon.

SubatomicKiwi

Hootanany wrote: »

Ive no vibrate now:mad:

You probably don't agree, but I think this is actually good thing. Further evidence it must be a software issue. Mine just came back there, after being gone since about 10.

Euphoriasean

SubatomicKiwi wrote: »

WhatsApp/Viber refuesed to send the verification sms to me, had to use the call. Wonder if it's something to do with the phone or just sim/network issues.

The battery charging does seem to slow a lot once it hits about 80%.....In saying that the longest the log shows mine as 'stuck' for is 4 minutes. Are you using the charger/cable that came with it? I did notice my standard chargers take longer.

I had no issue with Viber/WhatsApp verifying the sms. I'm with 3 btw. I used my standard charger yesterday and it took an age to charge. I'll try the asus one tonight. Battery is depleting very quick. Down 30% with 1hr SOT. Haven't done any real tweaking though.

SubatomicKiwi

Euphoriasean wrote: »

I had no issue with Viber/WhatsApp verifying the sms. I'm with 3 btw. I used my standard charger yesterday and it took an age to charge. I'll try the asus one tonight. Battery is depleting very quick. Down 30% with 1hr SOT. Haven't done any real tweaking though.

I was in the mid 80's when I hit one hour SOT. I did however have brightness very low and smart saving on.

Hootanany

Vibrate is back.
How do i drop the keyboard when im finished on my One plus there was a little arrow cant see it on this one?

Tragedy

Back button usually works!

Kernel (Android OS) is still killing my battery.

Recommend people use GSAM if they're trying to track batter usage.

SubatomicKiwi

Hootanany wrote: »

Vibrate is back.
How do i drop the keyboard when im finished on my One plus there was a little arrow cant see it on this one?

Let me know if yours follow a pattern of it taking longer to come back each time. Back button should work for that in most apps.

SubatomicKiwi

Tragedy wrote: »

Back button usually works!

Kernel (Android OS) is still killing my battery.

Recommend people use GSAM if they're trying to track batter usage.

Maybe I'm being too light on it but I'm pretty happy with the battery, easily get 4 hours SOT out of it, probably closer to 5. Thats coming from an M7 that got 2/3. I think most people would be happy with a day of usage tbh.

Tragedy

Maybe?

Maybe?



There is no maybe.

Hell, let's go back two years in battery tech/semiconductor tech:

SubatomicKiwi

Tragedy wrote: »

Maybe?

Maybe?



There is no maybe.

wow

ok thats unexpected. They have said they're working on it though. I know people with M8/iP6 and they get nowhere near those times for what its worth.

Tragedy

Benchmarks are standardised so that they can be compared across products, but not across usage types.

That said, my LG G2 did genuinely get 7-8 hours SOT without breaking a sweat, and my Note 2 similar.

The former had a 3000mah battery, the latter a 3100mah.

Since both, processor/chipset/lte have all seen huge advances in power consumption and you would expect a modern 1080p smartphone on a 22nm Intel chipset (which Intel themselves advertised as offering significantly better battery life than Snapdragon 800/805) to do better. A lot better.

SubatomicKiwi

Tragedy wrote: »

Benchmarks are standardised so that they can be compared across products, but not across usage types.

That said, my LG G2 did genuinely get 7-8 hours SOT without breaking a sweat, and my Note 2 similar.

The former had a 3000mah battery, the latter a 3100mah.

Since both, processor/chipset/lte have all seen huge advances in power consumption and you would expect a modern 1080p smartphone on a 22nm Intel chipset (which Intel themselves advertised as offering significantly better battery life than Snapdragon 800/805) to do better. A lot better.

Ah ok, that makes sense.

Well I guess that means it can only improve over time. Asus have already said they're working on it and when they launch in the US there will be even more pressure on them to allow us to unlock the bootloader so we should see more dev support soon too.