ZTE V970 Review (Updated 24-08-2012)

This is my review of the ZTE V970 Dual-Sim phone. I will post my impressions and experiences with the phone, including the good and bad.

I will not provide a full review of the OS - Android 4.0.4 ICS - as that is a standard system, and covered in many other review's. I will only focus on specifics for the V970.

I have had the phone from the 13. august 2012 and am starting the review early, but will update in time.

My dual-sim background

It is important for me to mention my background in the "dual-sim world". I have in the last two years owned and used HD9, Hot 958, T9199, Lenovo A60, Star x18i, ZTE U960 and Lenovo 750. I work as an consultant and dual sim is an important feature for my, to be able to separate my work and private life.

Main specs

• Android 4.0.4
• CPU: MTK MT6577 Dual-Core 1GHz
• Dual Sim Active 3G WCDMA/HDPA/HDPA+
• 1 GB RAM / 4 GB ROM
• 4,3" QHD 960 x 540 IPS-LCD Screen
• Capacitive Multi Touch Screen
• Micro SD card slot
• GPS, Bluetooth, WiFi
• 5 mega pixel camera with auto focus and LED flash
• 1600 mAh battery

  

Design and feel 

I must say, that I am very impressed with the desigt and feel of the phone. It is a really great design, looks beautiful and exclusive. Even my wife loves the design! :-)

The frame is metal, and screen glass. Has a good quality feel to it.

The back has a "anti" slip surface, and feels a little soft. I guess the material is helping making it so slim.

The phone is slim at just 9,9 mm - and it looks slim too.

There is four buttons in the buttom: Menu, Home, Back and Search. They are backlit.

Size is perfect for me. Nice big screen, but still feels light, and can easily be held in one hand.

Screen 

The screen is very good, beautiful color's and has a high resolution, so it in no way looks pixelated. The viewing angles are also quite good. There is an auto brightness setting, that seems to work well, and the screen can be used in sunlight, although that is never optimal.

Phone in sunlight.

Good colors

   

Viewing angles are good.

OS - Android 4.0.4 

As staded above, I will not be focusing on the OS, but will emphasize some features here, and specific dual sim feature in the next section.

A thing to know about Chinese phone is, that you cannot expect that there is Google Apps installed, including Google Play (Android Market). I have bought my phone from etotalk, who have installed Google Apps. Gmail, Maps and Google Play Store is working without any problems. Paid as well as free apps works, also protected apps.

Android 4.0.4 OS

Google Play Store (NB: Installed by etotalk as it is not on V970)

Works with paid, as well as free apps.

Dual Sim Features 

The dual sim intigration is 1:1 as on MT6573 and MT6575 phones.

The phone is dual sim standby, that means that both sims is online and can receive calls, but when an call is active on one sim, the other is offline. It will automatically be back online when the call ends.

When data is used, both sim's is online and can receive calls, as with MT6575.

In "Settings" -> "SIM management" you can choose if you wan't to use a specific SIM for voice call and messaging, or if you want to choose for each call/message. You can also choose a color and name for the two sim's. The color and name will show on out- and incoming calls. 

A nice feature is also, that you can choose a default sim for remote call's, e.g. in-car bluetooth as I have. This is fund under advanced Bluetooth settings.

When calling you will be able to choose sim, if you have chosen "Always ask" under settings. You can see the chosen name and color.

    

Performance

The phone performs great, and you can really feel the lift from single-core 1GHz to dual-core (comming from MT6575 and the U960's Qualcomm MSM8255) - of cause the 1 GB RAM also gives a lift. Benchmark shows the same:  On the MT6575 based Lenovo A750 I had a AnTuTu score of about 3.200, here I have a score of 5.374! 

AnTuTu benchmark. Score 5374.

AnTuTu rating chart

The phone supports 3G HSPA. In this test I have a download speed of about 3 Mbit.

   

Battery life

I use my phone quite allot, that is about 2 hours of calls, checking and sending a couple of e-mails, a little internet browsing, some messages and Bluetooth,WiFi and Data on all the time. The phone holds up fine for that.

I have not run out of power at any time, not even on the really heavy days. It should easily last a day for most, but expect to charge every night (just as with about any other Android/Windows/iPhone).

Normally I unplug it around 7 in the morning, and at around 22:00 I have 30 - 50% of juice left.  

   

Camera

The camera features touch to focus, so you can focus where you want. It has a LED flash, auto focus but no physical shutter button, and that is a shame.

Picture quality is about average. Focus seems fine, but colors is not quite as vivid as I would like them to be.

Here is some test pictures from ZTE V970 (click to enlarge):

   

GPS

The first GPS lock took about 2-3 minutes, but the following have been faster. However GPS lock sometimes does take a long time - up around 2 minutes in some cases. It might the lack of A-GPS support that is the reason for the sometime slow lock. The phone does however featurs EPO assistance, that should speed up GPS positioning.

The use when navigation works without any problems (when first GPS lock is established).
   

Other features

One other detail, is that the phone features a led light. It flashes for new messages, and lights red when charging, green when fully charged. Nice feature.

  

Problems

   

I seem to have a problem with battery percentage / charging state. It does not always update percentage left - e.g. today it has been showing 87% for 3 hours, including 30 minutes talk. That is not correct. I did wipe battery stats, and that might have done something , I have tried a reboot, leaving the battery out for 1 minute and the wiping stats again from recovery. I also have a task killer installed, that might is killing something it should not. I will update.

19-08-2012 Update: Found that other users with other phones running Android have had the same problem. So it might not be a V970 related problem. I have cleared Cache and Dalvik cache from recovery, and completely discharged and recharged the battery. It have been working fine for two days now.

24-08-2012: It happened again yesterday, that the phone stopped updating battery % left. A reboot solves the problem, but it might come back. I am considering a factory reset.

   

Conclusion

  

I will conclude a little further down the road, as this is still an early review. But so far I must say that my experience is very positive, and that this phone could be the best dual sim phone I have owned. Judging by "quality experience", and by that meant look and feel, this is in no doubt a winner among the dual-sim phones I have owned - and that i quite a few :-)

Score:
Build quality  and feel - 9/10
Screen  - 9/10
Dual Sim features 8/10
GPS 6/10
Camera 7/10
Battery 7/10



Pros:

• Build quality
• Screen
• Performance and speed
• Stability

Cons:

• No front camera