<div>Something about the Lenovo K3 Note seems to have caught the fancy of smartphone consumers in India. The little price tag of Rs 9,999 may have something to do with it. Lenovo claims they have 2 million registrations for their online “open” sale on Flipkart on Monday and Tuesday and that they’ve sold 200,000 units since they launched a few weeks ago.</div><div> </div><div>Budget phones are where the action is today. Increasingly, they seem to be offering what was standard fare on devices that cost upward of Rs 30,000. The K3 Note is 5.5-inch slab – hence the “Note” reminiscent of the large form factor started by Samsung many years ago. It’s slim and all straight lines except for the slightly rounded corners. The back, which mercifully can be removed, is a pearlescent plastic, not cheap and not premium, and you get it in white, black and a limited edition look-at-me yellow. On the back is a big Lenovo logo. Other than that it’s… well, a slab.</div><div> </div><div>The soft buttons with their nice tactile feedback switch the smartphone on to reveal a nice looking IPS display. It’s got to be because it’s a Full HD 1080x1920 with 401 ppi density. And yes it looks it – fine and crisp with rich colour and decent viewing angles, though it is a bit reflective. This is not Gorilla Glass and nor is there any special coating to repel fingerprints. It’s also not especially sunlight friendly. Those are all extras that you pay a</div><div>premium for. Not long ago, one wouldn’t have imagined a screen with this resolution selling for a fraction of the cost the flagships that initially featured such screen cost.</div><div> </div><div>Swipe the home screen and you’ll find all your apps are lined up there, not in a separate app drawer. This is a favourite style of Chinese players who perhaps think it’s very Apple-like. You’ll also find that there are just too many apps preloaded. With 16GB of internal storage available, one would think you’d like to choose what you want o that phone, but some decisions have been taken for you to begin with and you’ll need to go through a few of the apps to see what you don’t want to keep and if it’ll uninstall.</div><div> </div><div>Other than that the Lenovo interface, called Vibe, is fine and has its customisation options including setting gestures such as a double-tap to wake, changing colour balance, changing themses, managing screens etc. It’s running on Android 5.0 Lollipop. The K3 Note connects to 4G on one of its two SIMs and has a slot for a memory card of expansion of 32GB. It also supports on-the-go connectivity.</div><div> </div><div>The K3 is not short on power with its 64-bit 1.5GHz MediaTek MT6572 CPU and 2GB RAM. The device does very well on benchmark scores and performs well. The 3,000mAh battery is perhaps just about enough, but this is a big screen and heavy use will definitely make short work of the battery. But well, big crisp screens are there to be enjoyed, so users should just keep potable chargers ready and use the device in peace.</div><div> </div><div>The cameras on the K3 are optimised for low-light, but that often means softened images. But the 13MP and 5MP shooters are great for online sharing of pictures and Instagramming.</div><div> </div><div>The Lenovo K3 Note isn’t the only value-for-money device to have just launched. There’s the Moto G 3rd gen, the Yu Yureka Plus and a whole host of offerings from Asus in their Zenfone 2 range. The customer is nice and spoiled for choice.</div>
BW Reporters
Mala Bhargava has been writing on technology well before the advent of internet in Indians and before CDs made their way into computers. Mala writes on technology, social media, startups and fitness. A trained psychologist, she claims that her understanding of psychology helps her understand the human side of technology.
