Yu – Tech Raman

Yu Yunique 2 FAQ : Everything You Need To Know about this budget Smartphone

Lakshmi Rajan — Wed, 02 Aug 2017 16:57:33 +0000

Question: What are the different colors Yu Yunique 2 is available? Answer: It is available only in two colours: Champagne and Coal Black.

Question: What is the display size and resolution?

Answer: Yunique 2 has a 5-inch IPS LCD display offering a 1280 x 720 pixels pixels HD resolution with a 294 pixels per inch (PPI)

Question : What is the weight and thickness of Yunique 2?

Answer: Yunique 2 weighs 159grams and measures 9.2mm in thickness.

Question: What display settings available?

Answer: The display setting has MiraVision which allows to customize the display contrast, temperature, saturation etc. There is a adaptive brightness toggle and also the navigation button position layout of back and recent button can be changed from here.

Question: Does Yunique 2 has Blue filter ?

Answer: No. there is no blue filter in the display settings.

Question: What is the price of Yunique 2? Where can I buy?

Answer: Yunique 2 is available in India at Rs 5,999 . It is available at Flipkart.com.

Question: What size sim cards Yunique 2 accepts? Can I add a microSD card?

Answer: It supports hybrid dual-microSIM. So you can use either two SIM’s or can use one SIM and the second SIM slot can be used to house a microSD card up to 64GB.

Question: Does it have Corning Gorilla Glass protection?

Answer: Yes, it has Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection.

Question: What is the processor used in this smartphone?

Answer: Yunique 2 is powered by Mediatek MT6737 chipset withQuad-core 1.3 GHz CPU, Mali-T720 GPU, 2GB of RAM.

Question: What is the internal storage of Yunique 2?

Answer: 16GB and is expandable upto 64GB via microSD card.

Question: Does Yunique 2 has Gyroscope sensor?

Answer: No, there is no Gyroscope sensor.

Question: Does it support VR?

Answer: Since it does not support Gyroscope sensor, it is not suitable for VR.

Question: Is the buttons back lit?

Answer: No, its not backlit but there is a marking in silver color around the buttons.

Question: What USB type does it use?

Answer: It uses microUSB port.

Question: Does it have notification light?

Answer: Yes, it has notification light.

Question: What are the camera specifications of Yunique 2 ?

Answer: Yunique 2 has a 13 MP rear camera with F/2.0 , LED flash. We can take fullHD video. For selfies, there is a 5-megapixel front camera.

Question: Does the camera has OIS?

Answer: No.

Question: Can we take 4K videos in Yunique ?

Answer: No, only fullHD videos.

Question: What are the connectivity options? Does it support VoLTE?

Answer: Yes, Yunique 2 supports VoLTE. Other options include Bluetooth, A-GPS, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n/

Question: Does Yunique 2 has FM app?

Answer: Yes

Question: How to take screnshots in Yunique 2?

Answer: Press and hold the power and volume button together to take a screenshot.

Question: Does it support USB OTG?

Answer: Yes, it supports OTG and you can connect the USB drive to it.

Question: What is the battery capacity of Yunique 2?

Answer: Yunique 2 has a 2500mAh battery.

Question: Does it support fast charging?

Answer: No, it does not support fast charging.

Question: Does it have power saver modes?

Answer: No there is no power saver mode.

Question: Does it have IR blaster?

Answer: No there is no IR blaster in Yunique 2

Question: How is the call quality?

Answer: Call quality of Yunique 2 is good.

Question: Does it support one hand UI?

Answer: No and is not required either since it is a compact phone

Question: Does Yunique 2 has fingerprint scanner?

Answer: No, it does not have a fingerprint sensor.

Question: Does Yunique 2 support App lock?

Answer: No, it does not support.

Question: What OS does it run?

Answer: Yunique 2 runs on Android 7.0 Marshmallow.

Question: Does it support two Whatsapp in the same phone?

Answer: No, it does not.

Question: Does Yunique 2 support call recording?

Answer: No it does not support call recording Question: Does Yunique 2 support NFC? Answer: No, NFC is not supported.

Question: Does Yunique 2 has split screen feature?

Answer: No it does not support.]]>

Yu Yureka Black FAQ : Everything You Need To Know

Lakshmi Rajan — Tue, 01 Aug 2017 18:35:58 +0000

Question: What are the different colors Yu Yureka Black is available? Answer: As the name suggests, it is available only in one color – glossy black.

Question: What is the display size and resolution?

Answer: Yu Yureka Black has a 5-inch IPS LCD display offering a 1920 x 1080 pixels pixels FullHD resolution with a 414 pixels per inch (PPI)

Question: What display settings available?

Answer: The display settings has view mode with small, medium and large settings to control the size of interface elements such as images and characters. Elements will be bigger in large mode while more content will be displayed in small mode. The other settings here includes brightness, color temperature, font size, text style and eye comfort mode which is another name for blue filter.

Question: Does Yureka Black has Blue filter ?

Answer: No. there is no blue filter in the display settings.

Question: What is the price of Yu Yureka Black? Where can I buy?

Answer: Yu Yureka Black is available in India at Rs 8,999 ($140). It is available at Flipkart.com.

Question: What size sim cards Yu Yureka Black accepts? Can I add a microSD card?

Answer: It supports hybrid dual-microSIM. So you can use either two SIM’s or can use one SIM and the second SIM slot can be used to house a microSD card up to 64GB.

Question: Does it have Corning Gorilla Glass protection?

Answer: Yes, it has Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection.

Question: What is the processor used in this smartphone?

Answer: Yu Yureka Black is powered by Snapdragon 430 chipset with a Octa-core 1.4 GHz CPU, Adreno 505 GPU, 4GB of RAM.

Question: Does Yureka Black has Gyroscope sensor?

Answer: No, there is no Gyroscope sensor.

Question: Does it support VR?

Answer: Since it does not support Gyroscope sensor, it is not suitable for VR.

Question: Is the buttons back lit?

Answer: No, its not backlit but there is a marking in silver color around the buttons.

Question: What USB type does it use?

Answer: It uses microUSB port.

Question: Does it have notification light?

Answer: Yes, it has notification light.

Question: What are the camera specifications of Yu Yureka Black?

Answer: Yu Yureka Black has a 13 MP rear camera with phase detection autofocus, dual-LED flash with 1/3″ sensor. We can take fullHD video. For selfies, there is a 8-megapixel front camera.

Question: Does the camera has OIS?

Answer: No.

Question: Can we take 4K videos in Yu Yureka Black?

Answer: No, only fullHD videos.

Question: What are the connectivity options? Does it support VoLTE?

Answer: Yes, Yu Yureka Black supports VoLTE. Other options include Bluetooth, A-GPS, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n/

Question: Does Yu Yureka Black has FM app?

Answer: Yes

Question: How to take screnshots in Yu Yureka Black?

Answer: Press and hold the power and volume button together to take a screenshot.

Question: Does it support USB OTG?

Answer: Yes, it supports OTG and you can connect the USB drive to it.

Question: What is the battery capacity of Yu Yureka Black?

Answer: Yureka Black has a 3000mAh battery.

Question: Does it support fast charging?

Answer: No, it does not support fast charging.

Question: Does it have power saver modes?

Answer: No there is no power saver mode.

Question: Does it have IR blaster?

Answer: No there is no IR blaster in Yureka Black

Question: How is the call quality?

Answer: Call quality of Yureka Black is very good.

Question: Does it support one hand UI?

Answer: Yes there is one hand mode toggle in display settings.

Question: Does Yureka black has fingerprint scanner?

Answer: Yes, it does not have a fingerprint sensor.

Question: Does Yureka Black support App lock?

Answer: No, it does not support.

Question: What OS does it run?

Answer: Yureka Black runs on Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow.

Question: Does it support two whatsapp in the same phone?

Answer: No, it does not.

Question: Does Yureka Black support call recording?

Answer: Yes, it supports auto call record. Question: Does Yureka Black support NFC? Answer: No, NFC is not supported.

Question: Does Yureka Black has split screen feature?

Answer: No it does not support.]]>

Yu Yunicorn Review

Lakshmi Rajan — Wed, 15 Jun 2016 22:35:47 +0000

It was an eureka moment, when Yu Televentures, the subsidiary of Micromax India announced the Yurerka back in 2015. They wooed Cyanogen into an exclusive partnership in India, gathered serious interests amongst the tech communities as well as general interest for the device. It was also a clever strategy by Micromax to gain respect as a technology company and shed the image of just being a price-driven budget device maker. Of course, the initial Yu devices were still affordable and offered more value for money. The momentum soon shifted course, the marriage with Cyanogen got into rough weather, they started offering stock Android and then they launched Yutopia which was far from being utopia. Lessons learned and after lying low, Yunicorn is here. The company says they are ‘redefining flagship’ devices with this one but does it? I am finding it out in this Yu Yunicorn review. https://youtu.be/hst4tWHKsOo

Design and Build

Metal unibody
Aluminum, Magnesium & Manganese materials
Brushed finish
8.15mm thickness
172 grams
hybrid dual-nano SIM

Most popular phones in this category have strong resemblance to each other, I don’t blame them though. I began my career as a fashion designer and I understand invariably there is a fad and any particular season, there will be a common trait. While there would be semblance, a detailed look offers how they vary from each other. With Yunicorn what is immediately noticeable when you take the phone in hand is its build quality assurance. It gives a feeling of strong body and it is reassuring. Though it is slightly on a heavier side compared to some of its peer at 172 grams. At 8.15mm, it’s not svelte either but not very bulky too. The front design doesn’t excite, especially the white face around the display. A golden shade would have complimented well with the rear. The bezels are a bit prominent too. There is a home button at the bottom chin which combines as the finger print sensor. Then there is the set of on-screen buttons too. The top has the unsuspecting earpiece flanked by sensors and selfie camera. The back sports a different personality and is charming. The brushed finish wins the attention, so does the overall looks. There are radio cutouts on the top and bottom and the 13-megapixel camera is positioned at the top center with the dual LED flash below it. Yu branding is straight below. Yu says the choice of alloy that has gone into making the chassis gets better unlike some other metal devices that are prone to scratches. Well, I been using the device for couple of weeks now and the body shows no abrasions so far. Yunicorn uses a hybrid dual-SIM, so one of the SIM can be replaced by a microSD card. The bottom houses the microUSB port (it’s not type-C type) and speaker grille. The right has the volume and power button at the right reach and offering good tactile feedback. The top houses the audio jack and a microphone. [gallery link="file" columns="4" ids="11256,11255,11254,11249"]

Display

5.5-inch IPS LCD display
1920 x 1080 resolution
401 ppi
2.5D glass
1000:1 contrast ratio

Yunicorn faithfully sticks to fullHD and not get adventurous overstepping it in the name of redefining flagship and it’s a wise decision. The display has nothing to complaint about, it’s pretty good. It also helps a bit to the device’s remarkable battery life which we shall discuss in a while. Viewing angles an day light legibility are acceptable. Swiping up from the bottom throws open a settings shade. It gives quick access to music controls, wallpapers, widgets and a monochrome setting. Tapping the monochrome setting, strips off the colors. The black and white grew up on me quickly. The display settings has the miravision engine for color tuning. Though, the blue filter toggle now we find in most phones is missing. There is no auto-brightness slider but dig into the display settings, you will find an adaptive display toggle. While it works well, it takes few seconds to adapt to the new environment.

Software

Android Lollipop 5.1.1
AoS (Android on Steroids)
Around Yu services

Lollipop in 2016 is definitely not a redefining implementation. Then, Yu Televentures have their challenges post Cyanogen breakup, while interacting with Rahul Sharma, founder of Yu, he mentioned they are working on a bloatware-free, smooth Android experience better than the stock Android, they call it Android on Steroids. Well, going by my time spend with Yunicorn, the intend is there and they are working towards that but as of now, the software needs more attention in many areas. The UI has patches of areas that needs to be in tune with latest Android experience. Having said that, the AoS is bloatware free and nimble. https://youtu.be/cHJVow77G0M Micromax has been investing in many startups in last year or two and they have a game plan in mind. The company wants to push itself away from the specs war, which invariably everyone are catching up with and concentrate on their service platform to be the differentiator of their devices. Around Yu is where they bet their future and they are integrating it not only in their Yu devices but also across Micromax phones. Who knows, if the plan goes well, they might be making money out of their services and can be more competitive with their products. They invested in Gaana music app and made sure it is the default music player in the Yunicorn (also in other Yu devices), also it comes with a six month premium subscription for free when you activate the device. Another notable integration is Lybrate, a healthcare startup that Micormax invested last year. The app is a one stop for personal health care and offers consultation, appointment with doctors, book lab tests and free diet plans. Service focused approach is future forward and good to see Yu taking that course and if they get proactive with their software updates, we can expect a clean, lean yet purposeful UI from Yu.

Internals

MediaTek Helio P10
MTK MT6755
1.8 Ghz Octa Core
Mali-T860
4GB RAM
32 GB ROM + MicroSD upto 128 GB
4000mAh Li-Polymer

Internals are not going to win any spec war if pitted against the competing models but Yu clearly does not want to be part of it with Yunicorn. When they mean ‘redefining flagship’ , I assume they want to break-free from the spec mindset. The idea is to offer the chipset that works well and delivers for this particular device and they have placed the bet on Helio P10 and mashed it up with a 4GB of RAM for the extra push. How does it transform into day to day performance? Unless you have this set mind for the ultimate spec for the price you spend, an average consumer would not be disappointed. Yunicorn performs well in many counts. To start with, it handles well the everyday tasks most of us will put it through. It does not hang, it’s agile. There are slight frame drops if you play resource demanding games like NOVA 3 but still they are playable. https://youtu.be/jW77gOCYfc4 What is positive though is it does not heat up much. Also, the battery holds up well. In fact the single most bright spot of the Yunicorn is its battery life, having a large 4000mAh battery helps and it delivers amazing backup. On a normal mixed use, it can easily sail through two days, and offers close to 8-9 hours of screen on time (SOT). What is a bit of shame though is it does not offer any sort of quick charging and takes close to 4 hours for full re-charge cycle. Call quality is good and the speaker is acceptable too. The finger print scanner works most time and is on par if not better than the competition. The physical home button works as the finger print sensor and there is also a on-screen navigation buttons. Long pressing the home button when the screen is on also opens up the recent apps tray. For Google Now, you need to press the on-screen home button. I feel if a manufacturer opts for a physical home button for finger print sensor, the other navigation button also should be on the chin flanking it.

Camera

13-megapixel rear camera
OmniVision OV5693 sensor
EIS (Electronic Image Stabilization)
5P lens, F2.2
Wide angle 79.5 degree
True Tone Dual LED Flash
5-megapixel front camera
4P lens, f/2.2 aperture

The specs are listed above but how does it clicks in real terms? When I started using the camera, there was a slight 2 seconds lag in the processing which was bit annoying but Yu rolled out an update which sorted it out. Coming to the camera performance, let me walk through some of the samples, pictures speaks 1000 words, right? As expected, the rear camera performed decently well on well lit areas, especially outdoors. Though it lacked a bit of depth and overall vibrancy. [gallery link="file" columns="5" ids="11301,11302,11298,11292,11299"] Things gets bit noisier when at indoors and especially if the lights goes on a low ebb. On a positive note, the Yunicorn’s sensors manages to reproduce the color to a certain extend even at a moderately low artificial light, though there are quiet a noise level when you strain your eyes at the pictures. [gallery link="file" columns="5" ids="11300,11293,11295,11296,11297"] The HDR was kind of nice, though not exceptionally well. The front camera is OK.

Battery performance

When you have a 4000mAh battery, you does expect a above average battery life and Yunicorn does not disappoint and does extremely well. A screen on time (SoT) averaging between 8.5 hours to 9.15 hours is seriously fab but it is a shame though that there is no quick charging feature. It takes frustratingly close to four hours for a full recharge. Once charged though, you will be happy with the battery life.

Final words

I would not say Yunicorn is redefining flagships it’s not. But what it does indicate is Yu televenutres as a company is redefining itself and is reflected in this device. The idea is to shift the focus from hardware to better user experience and services to access from the phone itself bypassing the need to install multitudes of apps. Around Yu is shaping into a neat platform and the various startups Micromax invested in are increasingly getting accommodated into their ecosystem. It’s a healthy sign. As far as Yunicorn is concern, it’s a decent, solid device with many good traits and few let downs, many of the negatives can be sorted out with software updates and Yu seems to be aware of it and is pushing it in that makes Yunicorn a decent buy, if not a great pick. ]]>

Yu teases a new Smartphone with claims of 'Redefining Flagships'

Lakshmi Rajan — Wed, 04 May 2016 11:38:44 +0000

Just when we thought Yu is playing low, here is a new teaser from Rahul Sharma promising a new flagship to be launched this month. In a short 18-second clip posted on YU’s forum , Rahul is seen smashing a phone placed on a beautiful ship model. The teaser also mentions this month hinting at the launch. https://youtu.be/AJSM9GvSTOE Along with the video clip, Rahul also wrote “Excited to tell you all that our next device is round the corner and its nothing short of Incredible. It’s insanely beautiful and it will break some hearts. It will break records, it will break the conventional, it will break the rules…WAIT, it will break the flagships” Few weeks back Yu silently started selling Yu Note featuring 6-inch display and large 4,000 mAh battery and priced at Rs 13,499 in the retail stores. The company’s last flagship Smartphone was Yutopia which was launched back in December. It would be interesting to see what device Yu will launch. Their budget devices below Rs 10,000 have performed exceedingly well, so will Yu bring a similar mass product or try their hands yet again on another Flagship device has to be seen. Recent leaks have spotted two devices YU5530 and YU5200. While the former comes with MediaTek’s Helio X10 octa-core processor along with 4GB of RAM. The later is powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 615 octa-core SoC, 3GB of RAM and 16GB onboard storage and a 5.2-inch fullHD display. While these are leaks, we will keep you informed as we get more credible information. ]]>

Yu Yutopia launched with blazing specs; Price and Features

Lakshmi Rajan — Thu, 17 Dec 2015 09:52:32 +0000

Yu Yunique Review – A unique proposition

Lakshmi Rajan — Mon, 05 Oct 2015 11:04:00 +0000

It’s amazing how the last 18 months have seen terrific paradigm shift in the mobile industry, truly democratizing the digital population and making devices affordable to wider sections of the society. Slowly, the Smartphones breached the feature phone price segment and is a good sign. The bigger news is that unlike earlier, there is really a good Smartphone with decent specs and performance in various price points. While till now the fight was for the Rs. 10,000 price segment, it is shifting to the Rs 5,000 segment now. The segment hitherto dominated by the likes of Intex, Celkon and Karbonn. First it was Lenovo with its A2010 but Yu . the sub-brand of Micromax, dropped the bomb with Yu Yunique that would drastically change the future lineup in this segment. For starters, Yunique comes with a tag as the most affordable 4G Smartphone with HD resolution and is priced at Rs 4,999. Yunique looks like a younger brother of Yu Yuphria complete with the big camera module on the rear. There is no metal banding around the sides though, and Yunique has a polycarbonate body. Measuring 8.3mm and 128 grams, Yunique gets the weight and thickness right. For those who find the 5-inch and more displays too big to handle, the 4.7-inch screen, compact body should come as a relief. The bezels are less making the phone good to snuggle on palms. Yunique does in the sub-5K segment what Yureka did for the sub-10K price segment. Yureka was the first Smartphone to bring fullHD (1080p) affordable under Rs. 10,000 and now Yunique brings HD (720p) resolution affordable at the sub-5K price band. Not just that, the display also gets Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection, which is very rare find at this price level. Talking about the display quality, the 1280x720pixels packs a 312ppi but if you are someone who love a brighter display, you might be disappointed a tad bit. But, the screen is sharper and crisp. The big camera dial is a design trait spilled over from Yuphoria. The rear wraps around the front and the rounded corners scores high on ergonomics. The pin-holed rows of the speaker grille looks neat. Apart from the big large eye on the rear, the design is plain jane but pleasant. The soft matte finish of the thin back panel feels really nice but also gathers smudges. The power button is sandwiched between the volume rockers. A gleam of metal breaks the monotony of the black shade. The 3.5mm audio jack is on top and the microUSB port rests on the bottom. A notification LED is embedded in the earpiece grille on the front and the front camera is a bit off to one side of the phone. There are no capacitive buttons and Yunique uses on-screen Android navigation buttons. [gallery link="file" columns="5" ids="9778,9777,9776,9775,9774"] The back panel is removable but not the 2000mAh battery. There is a dual-SIM slot with the first slot supporting LTE (4G) and the second a 2G. There is also a microSD card slot to expand up to 32GB. The Yu devices runs on Cyanogen OS and that proved to be the key selling point, it also led to the bitter legal tussle with OnePlus, and so it came as a surprise that Yunique comes with almost a clean Android Lollipop baked. Actually, it is good as the phone was lot snappier. Yu says the option to run it on Cyanogen OS 12.1 in case you want to. The stock Android is indeed a unique part of this device. On the downside, if you were fan of all those cool, customization options that CM offered, you will find the plain vanilla Android boring. The shift to stock Android also solved some of the headaches the previous Yu devices faced – the bugs. Yunique should not be facing such issues with stock Android around, though I still faced few instances when some Chinese screen came up while booting. While the soul remains the stock, there are visual tinkering superficially. Yu also has opted for its browser, Yuniverse which is basically a custom-build Opera browser. The phone is lag-free and responsive except some times when you are playing some heavy games and try to quit, it slows down or momentarily freezes, with a budget offering it is pardonable and not a major issue. The audio quality again is pretty good both while calls or media playback. The Snapdragon 410 chipset and a quad-core processor clocked at 1.2GHz, 1GB of RAM, Adreno 306 GPU and a near stock android works wonderfully on this compact device. Be it gaming, browsing or watching videos and every day task, I never felt any issues and the phone was a good all rounder for the price. Gaming is one area that surprised me. The hardware except for the 1 gigs is similar to the one in Yuphoria, ZenFone 2 Laser and here the 1GB RAM was not underwhelming when it comes to gaming. It handled most of the game with ease including Asphalt 8 even when the graphics was turned on high. For most gaming needs, this phone can muster it with heating levels that again is within acceptable levels. Do check our gaming performance video where we show couple of games been played on this device. https://youtu.be/2jlrddRXf0Q While a 2000mAh battery might look smaller but for a compact device with a 410 chipset, it works well. It will easily last you more than a day. Yunique is armed with a 8-megapixel rear camera with autofocus with a f/2.0 aperture. It can also record videos at 1080p resolution. The front hosts a 2MP shooter. Before we get into the picture quality, let’s make it realistic. This is a budget phone and we have to keep our expectation toned down. Sounds like a forewarning? No, some people tend to get too carried away when it comes to the imaging capabilities of the mobile camera. Yunique definitely can store your memories in a decent way but if you are looking at too much detailing, it might disappoint that explains the warning bells. It does its job as much a sub-5K phone can do. Like most phones, the day light pics came out decently well though we had few focus issues on some frames. A minute eye can detect noise and the low light pictures are just about OK. I would just say, the Yunique is a average camera to deal with. [gallery link="file" columns="5" ids="9801,9802,9803,9804,9805,9806,9807,9808,9809,9810"] So is the Yunique the right phone for you? Absolutely yes! If you are on a tight budget and looking for a device strictly below Rs 5,000, I can’t suggest a better phone than Yunique currently. If you stretch your budget a little bit, then there is Redmi 2 Prime but in the sub-5K, Yunique is in a unique comfort zone and you will never regret the money spend on it. It is a very good all-rounder and a phone you can live with. https://youtu.be/UFCbX5zLsx4]]>

Yu Yunique – Top 7 Features and Reasons to Buy this budget Smartphone

Lakshmi Rajan — Fri, 02 Oct 2015 17:21:15 +0000

Priced at Rs 4,999, the Yu Yunique from Yu Televentures, an offshoot of Micromax is a compact Smartphone that offers more than one reason to take a look at it. Here we list the top features of the phone that makes it a compelling buy at its price segment. https://youtu.be/UFCbX5zLsx4

Display

If you have think almost all the much talked about phones are too big for your palm, the 4.7-inch display of Yunique might be right fit for you. And you get a 1280 x 720 pixel resolution, packing a 312 pixels per inch. It also boasts of Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection. The display is pretty good for this segment.

Design

Yunique looks like a smaller version of Yu Yuphoria but lacks the metal frame on the edges. The big round camera module is the highlight of the design. Yunique measures 8.3mm and weighs 128 grams, it is both light weight and fairly thin and snuggles nicely on the palm. Design wise, it is all-pleasing and good looking.

4G

With a 720p resolution, the Yunique is the most affordable 4G Smartphone with HD resolution. It supports dual-SIM.

Gaming

Powering the Yunique is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 410 chipset, a quad-core processor clocked at 1.3GHz, 1GB of RAM and Adreno 306 GPU. What surprised me was the ease of gaming. Yunique handled most of the games fairly well including Ashaphalt 8 decently. If you are looking for a decent gaming Smartphone and have a tight budget, this phone makes sense.

Notification light

Not many phones at the sub-5K comes with notification light and Yunique gets it. So if you have any missed calls, messages or notifications, the faint blink shall remind you and you don’t have to unlock the phone every now and then to see if you missed out anything.

USB OTG

Yes, it supports USB OTG and so if you have files in your microUSB pen drive, you can directly access it.

Pricing

Finally, this phone offers bang on value for the bucks spend. For Rs 4,999 it offers a good performance and with the features listed above, it is worth the money spend. ]]>

Yu counters Lenovo K3 Note with 5.5-inch Yureka Plus priced at Rs 9,999

Lakshmi Rajan — Mon, 20 Jul 2015 07:57:10 +0000

With Lenovo K3 Note gaining all eyeballs and selling like hot cakes, its time the competition steps in to check it. Yu has stepped up the pedal and today announced Yureka Plus at similar price point of K3 Note. Having sold over half a million Yureka, the company today announced a bigger sibling, the Yureka Plus featuring a 5.5-inch, 1080p IPS display. Powered by an octa-core Snapdragon 615 processor with 64-bit architecture, the Yureka Plus also gets a 2GB RAM, Adreno 405 GPU and 16GB of internal storage. Out of the box, it runs on Cyanogen 12 based on Android Lollipop. The dual-SIM, 4G LTE Smartphone features a 13-megapixel rear camera and a 5-megapixel front camera and fits a 2,500mAh battery. Rahul Sharma, Founder Yu, states “We have been overwhelmed with the enthusiasm and cheer we received for the Zeus of phones, Yureka. Grateful for the encouragement and support we are returning the love by breaking our very own unprecedented benchmark with Yureka Plus. ” Yureka Plus will be Amazon exclusive and the first flash sale is locked at Friday 24, 2015, 12 noon. The registration for the flash sale begins today, 12PM onwards.

Yureka Plus Specifications

5.5 inch IPS display
1080 x 1920 resolution
Snapdragon 615 octa-core processor
2GB RAM
Adreno 405 GPU
16GB internal storage
Cyanogen 12
2,500mAh battery
13-MP rear / 5MP front camera
dual-SIM, LTE

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The metal-clad Yu Yuphoria Launched; Priced at Rs 6,999 and takes on Redmi 2 & A6000

Lakshmi Rajan — Tue, 12 May 2015 11:52:35 +0000

The cat is out and after many teasers Micromax’s subsidiary Yu unveiled its second device, the Yu Yuphoria at an launch event at Delhi. Strictly by the look and pricing of the device, there is more reason for its immediate rivals Xiaomi and Lenovo who have the Redmi 2 and A6000 in the price segment to worry in spite of the flash sales party keeping the brands happy for now. As expected, the new Smartphone is priced very attractively at Rs 6,999 and will be exclusively available on Amazon India. The registration for the first flash sale that will be on May 28 begins today at 5PM. The metal body gives the device a premium look and an identity to mark it different from its competitors in this segment who are dressed in polycarbonates. On the specs count, the dual-SIM Yu Yuphoria with LTE support flaunts a 5-inch TFT IPS display producing a 720 pixel resolution. The display gets a Corning Gorilla Glass 3 care. Under the hood is a Snapdragon 410 chipset with a 64-bit architecture, a quad-core processor clocked at 1.2GHz and paired with 2GB of RAM and Adreno 306 GPU. A 16GB of ROM finds place but you get no external memory slot. Baked out-of-the-box and running the device is Cyanogen OS 12 based on Android Lollipop. A 2,230mAh battery is packed in and Yu says it comes with a quick charging technology that can hit 64 percent in just 45 minutes. The camera on the rear is positioned in the middle with a huge ring around it which reminds of the Lumia 830. The rear camera has 8-megapixel with f/2.2 aperture, LED flash and a fullHD video recording. On the front, there is a 5-megapixel snapper with a 86 degree wide angle lens to fit more. Yu Yuphoria comes in two color variants, a buffed steel and champagne gold. Going strictly by the price and specs, Yu can be euphoric about its product, agree?]]>

Yu Yureka Review – Yu can dream it, Yu can do it

Lakshmi Rajan — Thu, 22 Jan 2015 14:41:17 +0000

Who would have thought that you can sell bucket loads of Smartphones exclusively on e-commerce portal even if the brand is new or unknown to the market? Well, Xiaomi did that successfully and now everyone wants to suit. Micromax inspite of being the second biggest Smartphone vendor in India does have an image deficiency and lacks acceptance at certain segments. To tackle it, the company has carved a new brand sans any mention or influence of Micromax and Yu is born. The master move of course is to tie up with Cyanogen (forget the ugly legal tangle with OnePlus in India) to be the only official Indian OEM to support out-of-the-box Cyanogen OS which is quiet popular amongst the developer community and geeks. It completes the halo on the new brand, giving it enough talking bytes in social media. Then, the new company screamed ‘Yureka’ and the irresistible pricing of Rs 8,999 made sure Yu Yureka had more than 3 lakhs registrations on Amazon for the first flash sale. The Yureka comes sleekly packaged in recycled paper box reminding of the Xiaomi boxes which again reminded me of the Samsung’s boxes. The box contents is pretty basic stuffs on expected lines – the device, battery, power adapter, USB data cable, earphones and set of documents which are user manual and warranty card. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P20TQg6S7N8

D&B – The Design and Build quality

When you first hold the Yureka, it is a pleasant feeling. I was using the Redmi Note 4G and when Yureka came, it was a drastic difference on hand, suddenly the 44 grams difference between the Note and Yureka looked more prominent. For a 5.5-inch device at this category, Yureka at 155 gram and 8.8mm thickness is a light weight banter. I am not biased against made-in-plastic bodies if they don’t look cheapo, Yureka with its matte moon dust grey back panel with nice non-glossy texture got the looks for the money one puts into this device and more importantly it also soaks well on the palms. Yu wants to match the OnePlus sandstone back cover, though it does not match the finesse of the OnePlus, hey Yureka is selling at less than half the price of the OnePlus so why compare?!. The build quality is decent enough to put it mildly. If you are a sucker for fine finish, you will also notice that the removable cover tend to protrude along all the sides, if you are used to phones that merge smoothly. Talking of the buttons and ports, the power button is on the right and the volume rocker occupies the left side. In case, you get a flip case for this phone, accessing the volume rocker will be clumsy affair. The audio jack is positioned on top right and the microUSB port fits into the bottom with a microphone giving it a company. There is also another mic on the rear adjacent to the 13-megapixel camera which also has a LED flash a little below it. A speaker grille adorns the rear bottom and cool blue Yu logo completes the back picture. On the front, you have the 5-megapixel front camera, LED notifications, sensors and a grille. [gallery link="file" columns="6" ids="8410,8411,8412,8413,8414,8415"] Yu Yureka sports 5.5-inch HD (720x1280p) IPS display with 80-degree viewing angle. The display also gets Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection to ensure it being scratch-resistant. The display quality is pretty good for a phone in this price range. In spite of packing low pixel density, the display is sharp enough, the colors are vibrant and the screen offers good viewing angles and outdoor visibility.

The Internals – Yu tell me what Yu got within

This is here Yureka really shines. It packs internal stuffs, you don’t normally find in a phone at this price range. First on the boasting list is the the 64-bit Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 SoC. Then you have Qualcomm’s 8-core processor, with eight Cortex-A54 cores with four clocked at 1.7Ghz and the other set of four clocked at 1GHz. The GPU is Adreno 405 and you also get 2GB of DDR3 RAM, 16GB of internal storage of which 12.8GB is user available. If that is not enough, you also get microSD card expansion. The tech specs is a dream buy for phones in its price range and something that instantly makes Yureka irresistible. Yureka is a dual SIM phone and it supports Cat4 4G LTE with TDD 2300MHz and FDD 1800MHz bands supported for India. Pop out the rear panel you find a 2500mAh battery, dual micro-SIM slots one that supports 4G LTE and also microSD slot to hike up the storage.

The Software – The Yu differentiator

The USP of the Yu Yureka is the CyanogenMod 11 ROM on the Android 4.4 platform for which it got into ugly legal spat with OnePlus. The exclusive license with Cyanogen makes it the only Smartphone vendor in India to ship CyanogenMod out of the box. Did you ask what is special about Cyanogen? The simple answer. It offers features hitherto you never experienced in stock Android, though it is forked out of the Android. The OS offers tons of customization options and if you love fiddling with your settings, you will be amazed at the bouquet of options and ease of use. Right from assigning new actions to the capacitive buttons to even housing an on-screen nav bar or tinkering with the grid layout of the homescreen, there are lots you can do. I am not going to list out everything you can do but you can watch our Yu Yureka Tips and Tricks video and you know what I mean when the software is the real deal here. http://youtu.be/_8_10MuHaq8 Yu also has thrown in few of their own stuffs like AudioFx, which lets you customise the audio output and does a good job with it, ScreenCast lets you video record your screen, a customized version of Opera browser that goes by name YUniverse. Yureka has a dedicated app called Themes, which lets you select themes based on your preferences. In stead of forcing you to stick to design aspects of one theme, you can choose design apsects of different themes like pick lockscreen look of one theme, homescreen of another and so on and custom-make your own look and feel of the phone. Yu is also working on India-specific themes and already has outed a Republic day theme. http://youtu.be/ZvpFSYoi5Es

Yu Perform?

With a mighty tech power under the hood, it is expected from Yu to deliver a good performance and it does very well. It easily outclasses its immediate competitors in its price segment notably Redmi Note and even can outwit devices that commands premium. The benchmark scores augur well too. An AnTuTu score in the range of 32K is hard to find at this segment and it is a very good indicator. All this translates positively in real life usages too. There is no lag whatsoever while using the phone and is evident when playing heavy, resource hungry games. The phone is smooth to operate. Launching apps, switching between them and scrolling performance was quite good. Call quality is just about OK. The microphone performance was poor. A friend who by now is used to dabbling with various review devices commented that call quality is a little below when I called him up. The loud speaker is another dampener. In a noisy environment, you will struggle to listen if you are playing a game outdoor, you might even miss out the ringing sound. The bundles in-ear earphones are manageable for casual music listeners. Though, I found the buds a bit clumsy when fitting into my ears. Apart from the few downsides which are not that much to complain about, Yu Yureka is a stellar performer at all fronts.

Camera – Shoot Yu

The Yureka has a 13 megapixel camera on the back and a 5 megapixel camera on the front. The camera mode is good and easy to use. On the right side is stacked vertically video, camera and panorama capture soft buttons. Placed horizontally on the bottom is toggle for front and rear camera, flash control, and controls to exposure, lighting, beauty mode, timer and geo-location and settings control. The settings give option to fiddle with camera, video and general settings which include exposure, ISO and focus modes. Video setting also has Slo-Mo at 720p and time lapse options. General settings has options to assign actions to volume, power button etc. Swiping up brings various filters as well as HDR mode. The daylight shots are good with good detailing. It’s easy to shift between various live filters which are just swipe away on the screen. HDR mode is not the strong point. It just seem to increase the saturation level. Shooting in low light is nothing much to talk about. The image lacks detail and is noisy. Yureka supports full HD video capture and the quality of the video shot is good enough. http://youtu.be/pBMa039dXrY

Battery – Yu enough?

The Yu Yureka comes with a 2500mAh battery which sounds underwhelming for a 5.5-inch display device. It does too. The phone comes with a 1A charger. Since there is no rapid charging, it takes almost 3 hours for full charge and around one hour for 30-35% charge. Yureka lasts 10-12 hours of regular use under mixed usage of calls and data consumption, though the battery level alarmingly falls when playing intensive games like Asphalt 8 for extended hours.

The final note – Is Yu for You?

An attractive price of INR 8,999 has guaranteed Yureka a flying start and also created a massive social buzz. On a tech scale, Yureka bulldozes all the rivals out there with its hardware specifications that should last for couple of years safely. Yu delivers good quality display, great overall performance, decent overall camera quality, and good battery life. Even if one has to crib about the just about OK build quality or speaker quality, Yureka smashes all questions raised for the sheer value it offers for the money spent on it. http://youtu.be/ayTWFEvEdAU To cap it, Yu has promised on-site warranty in case anything goes wrong with the phone and also regular updates from Cyanogen for the next two years. Now, the big question is how many units Yu will be able to bring in to Amazon. Unless it is able to ramp up the volumes, it will not be able to gain traction. With Redmi Note clocking around 50,000 units every week and Lenovo looking good with A6000, it all boils down to the numbers. Yu Yureka at this price level is pièce de résistance. ]]>