Oppo launched the Neo 5 (2015) in India at a price tag of Rs. 9,990 and it replaces the older model which also carries the name Oppo Neo 5. Recently got the review unit and after using it more than 15 days I’m sharing a detailed review of the smartphone.
Look and feel
The Oppo Neo 5 (2015) is made up of plastic but the capacitive button icons below the screen & the rings around the camera lens & flash on the rear are metallic one. It has patterned speaker grille on the lower rear and there is lot of white space above & below the screen but thin borders on the side.
The power button is placed on the left side while the volume rocker button is placed on the right side. There is a 3.5mm audio jack at the top and micro-USB port & a mic hole on the bottom. The rear panel is removable but the battery can’t be removed. There is only one micro-SIM card slot, one nano-SIM card slot & a microSD card slot.
The build quality of the phone & the accessories is pretty good. There is no problem while holding the phone into hands but the top edge felt scratchy against ears.
Specifications and Software
The Oppo Neo 5 (2015) features 4.5-inch diagonally display with a resolution of 480 x 854 pixels at 218ppi. The resolution is pretty low and disappointed when I turn the phone on. It is powered by 1.3GHz quad-core MediaTek MT6582 processor which is integrated with Mali-400MP2 graphics & 1GB of RAM. It runs on Android 4.4.2 with Color OS on top of it and it has 8GB in-built memory which can be expanded further up to 32GB by using microSD card. Thankfully, there is a USB-OTG support.
On the imaging front, it features 8-megapixel rear-camera but is limited to 720p video recording and there is 2MP front-facing camera.
It has connectivity features like Wi-Fi b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.0, FM radio and A-GPS but there is no 4G support. There are many sensors like accelerometer, compass, ambient light sensor and proximity sensor.
There is non-removable battery of 2,000mAh.
Unfortunately, the Oppo Neo 5 (2015) still runs on Android 4.4.2 KitKat with Color OS on top of it. Although, you can choose number of handful widgets which includes wallpapers, effects & themes. All these five some cosmetic control over the interface and the task switcher app is called up by long-tapping the capacitive Menu button. The Oppo Neo 5 (2015) also bundles with a Security app, there is power manager, notifications disabler, data monitor and memory cleanup tool. The Guest Mode lets you to protect contacts, photos & apps from prying eyes & permission monitor lets you see what your apps are doing behind your back. On the other hand, there are number of quick toggles in the notifications shade and the Settings app is neatly organised.
When compared the specifications of Oppo Neo 5 (2015) are outdated and thoroughly speaking, all these specifications are outmatched by competition as of now. If by going specifications, it looks like the Oppo designed the smartphone back in 2014 and decided to sell the phone in 2015.
Performance
The Oppo Neo 5 (2015) is an idle phone to do day-to-day task but struggled while playing heavy games & apps wouldn’t run. If you like multiple tasking and browsing, you might run face problems.
The Oppo Neo 5 (2015) camera is pathetic and totally disappointed with it. The images clicked on a slightly cloudy day came out overexpose & full of noise. There was no colour detailing and texture was completely lost. Things become worse when the image is viewed in a full size on laptop. To click images in dark or night you need lot of incident light as the flash works only to light the subjects up.
There were issues while playing 1080 pixels video files but 720 pixels video files played well without any lag or issue. The speaker on the back is pretty loud and the sound was clear at high volumes.
One of the biggest highlight of the smartphone is the battery, able to get respectable backup of nearly 9 hours. There is no much dip in battery level when the phone is idle and it is expected that users will get a full day usage with a single charge.
Verdict
The Oppo Neo 5 (2015) is overpriced when looking at the specifications and other things and already much better smartphone available in the market at a much lesser price. The camera & other specs are the let of this smartphone and other manufacturers those who disrupted the market have a advantage. We advise our readers before buying this smartphone, do a quick scan of the market & compare prices with specifications too.
