【【【Foreword: We are doing the test of the old model again, this time there are 6 units in one breath】】】
Some time ago, we tested the Redmi Note 8 Pro and vivo Xshot two old models, and compared them with the new products. From them, on the one hand, we have seen a significant improvement in the technology and performance of smartphones in recent years, and on the other hand, we are very pleased with the fact that these ancient models can still be used normally today.
But as we all know, the competition in the smartphone market has become more and more fierce in recent years, and the reason why old models like Redmi and Vivo can still be used normally is largely related to the strength of the brand itself, the workmanship of the product, the continuous system and software update services. So what if "unfortunately" an old mobile phone is turned over, and it happens to be a brand that has long faded out of the market?
In order to clarify this problem, we Sanyi Life also found 6 old mobile phones in one go, ready to conduct an unprecedented "old model horizontal review".
【【【Reference mobile phone debut: regardless of high-end and low-end, all small memory】】
First of all, let's ask for the lineup of the old models tested this time.
The first was the HTC One E9+, which was released in February 2015 as a "sub-top large-screen model" at the time. As a derivative of the HTC One M9, the E9+ used a plastic rather than a metal body, but still retained the front-facing stereo speakers and 2K screen that were rare at the time.
In the performance section, the E9+ is equipped with mediatek Helio X10 master control, with an eight-core 2GHz A53 core, while providing a 3GB+32GB storage combination, and this was also a sub-flagship configuration at the time.
The second is the flagship version of 360 Qiku, which was released in August 2015 and was a representative work of 360's official entry into the mobile phone industry at that time. It had a very rare 6-inch large-screen and rear dual-camera design, and was one of the first models with built-in heat pipes.
In the performance part, the 360 Qiku flagship version uses the Qualcomm Snapdragon 808, but it is only equipped with a 3GB +16GB storage combination by default, which is one of the smallest storage combinations in the old mobile phone we tested this time. So does 16GB of storage capacity cause some problems? This part will be revealed later in this section.
The third model is the nut mobile phone released by Hammer Technology in August 2015. Note that it is not the same thing as the familiar "nut phone", but an entry-level standalone product launched by Hammer in the early days to explore the entry-level market.
Because of this, the nut mobile phone uses plastic materials, and the main control scheme is the Snapdragon 615, which was already very low-end at the time, with 2GB+16GB storage. Overall, whether it is computing power, memory or storage, it is the most beginner in this batch of old mobile phones - will it be particularly stuck when it is taken out and used now?
The fourth is the IUNI N1, which many friends may not know much about. In fact, IUNI is an Internet brand launched earlier by Gionee, when the main focus was a completely ad-free system experience, while also a good body design and workmanship.
The N1 was released in September 2015 as an entry-level model of the IUNI brand. It is equipped with MediaTek MT6753 master control, as well as 2GB +16GB memory. This is also a very introductory configuration, you may wish to expect that between it and the nut mobile phone, who will perform better.
The fifth model is LeTV's Le 1S. As a mainstream model that was once extremely popular, the Le 1S released in October 2015 undoubtedly represents the era when Boss Jia was full of spirit. Its "ID bezel-less" design and metal body are actually very distinctive so far.
In terms of hardware configuration, Le 1S uses MediaTek Helio X10 overclocking master control, with a 2.2GHz octa-core A53 CPU, and a 3GB+16/32GB storage configuration. We're testing the 32GB version, which seems to be relatively reassuring.
The sixth mobile phone, we chose the Coolpad Fengshang MAX. The model is famous for its "touching" Apple's iPhone 6 and Huawei Mate7 in the publicity, and it does have an integrated metal body that looks good, as well as a 2.5D glass front panel.
However, as a model positioned as a "high-end business", the hardware configuration of Coolpad Fengshang MAX released in November 2015 is really not high. Snapdragon 615 plus 3GB + 32GB of storage combination, the appeal at that time is actually not very strong.
It is not difficult to see that the storage combination of all these old models we tested this time is very small, the largest is only 3GB +32GB, the smallest is even only 2+16GB, but their master control performance includes a variety of solutions from entry to high-end at that time.
So this begs the question, for older models, is high performance more important, or is large memory more important?
【【【System inspection: all need to be tossed manually, but the difficulty varies greatly】】
After introducing the lineup participating in the review, let's officially enter the process of "tossing" and examining them. As you can see, we have selected all the models released in 2015, and since they have been lying in the warehouse of our Sanyi Life Evaluation Room for several years, the first test is that these old models can still charge and boot normally?
Happily, all 6 models tested passed the first round of testing. None of them has problems such as battery bulges and broken screen touches because they are placed for too long. In fact, this is not a blind worry, because in the past experience, some updated mobile phones may suddenly become unusable after being stored for a period of time. In contrast, these six-year-old mobile phones perform better in terms of basic quality.
After charging and verifying that everything can be booted on normally, it is the second link of the test. For these 6 years old phones, is there any way to upgrade them to the latest system version in their respective lifecycles?
I have to say that this is a very challenging, but also very meaningful test project. As we said earlier, the brands corresponding to these 6 models have basically bid farewell to the mobile phone market, or at least have interrupted this business.
This means that the network system update function that comes with the 6 participating models this time can no longer be used normally. We need a variety of manual ways to install a new version of the system for it. And in the process, interesting differences arise.
First of all, the best performing model in this link is the 360 Qiku flagship version. The reason is simple, because its official forum is still working today, and many of the links to the system upgrade package provided in the forum are still valid. Therefore, you only need to simply download the upgrade package and manually upgrade it on the machine in order of version.
Of course, we also found some problems in the process. For example, the 360 Qiku flagship version had a serious stuttering phenomenon after the system upgrade, so we had to reset it again to alleviate this problem. In addition, it originally had an official line brush upgrade tool that was theoretically more convenient, but this tool is currently unusable.
Secondly, INUI N1 and LeEco 1S ranked second together in this link. Their official forums are now inaccessible, but it may be because of the large number of purchasers in the past, coupled with the relatively open attitude of the two models themselves to brushing machines, so that they have relatively complete private resources. From the Tieba of these two models, we can easily find the new version of the official upgrade package and complete the system update.
In contrast, the "luck" component of the brushing process of the nut mobile phone is higher. Its official forum is currently inaccessible, and it also lacks private resources such as Tieba and user groups. In the end, we searched for the server direct download address of the official update package in the network, fortunately, this address has not expired, and the card swipe system update was completed through the original Recovery built into the mobile phone.
Judging from the in-flight version number, BANK OFC's HTC One E9+ may never update the system
Finally, the most disappointing performance in this link is the Cool Front Max and HTC One E9+. I don't know if the official does not pay attention to it, or the sales of these two old mobile phones that year are not good, we either can't search for the available system update packages, or we can download the update packages, but found that the official line brush software can not be used normally. In the end, neither phone was able to complete the system update, and it was still stuck on the software version we put it into storage 6 years ago.
Software testing: Most of the app stores are invalid, and some models have poor compatibility
Why should we update these older models to the latest version as much as possible? In addition to examining the after-sales service of related brands for old products, there are many problems because for too old models, the compatibility of the old system and the availability of its built-in components will often be problematic.
Take the 6 models tested this time, among which HTC, Coolpad, iuni, as well as Applications such as LeTV's built-in app store and built-in video client, have become unusable because the official server has been shut down.
In contrast, the 360 Qiku flagship version and the nut mobile phone are the only two surprises. As two models that went public in 2015 and whose respective parent brands have withdrawn from the mobile phone market, their built-in app stores are still fully functional today, and there are no problems downloading and updating apps.
Of course, it's not hard to solve the problem that the app store is not available, just install a third-party app store. But the problem is that for these old mobile phones in 2015, their system versions are generally still stuck in Android 5.0 ~ Android 6.0, which has led to some new problems.
For example, the HTC One E9+ is the oldest system version of the older model we tested this time. Due to the lack of updates, its system version is still stuck on Android 5.0. This makes it unable to be compatible with some of the latest versions of commonly used apps, or even unable to run, but even installed.
For example, while we just praised the system update and built-in app store of the 360 Qiku ultimate edition, it actually has compatibility issues with its Android 6.0 system. When we tried to update the app store (360 mobile assistant) that came with us, it failed to install several times, and finally inexplicably succeeded.
Fortunately, in addition to these two models, the other four (Nuts, IUNI N1, LeTV Le 1S and Cool Fengshang MAX) did not have any troublesome problems in the installation and update test of our commonly used software (including QQ, Weibo, WeChat, Tencent Video, iQiyi, Bilibili, Alipay, Taobao, JD.com, Douyin, and AutoNavi Map). In the end, the latest version of these applications in March 2022 was successfully installed, and it was able to open and use normally.
Final experience and summary: In the face of years, optimization is more meaningful than configuration
Finally, let's briefly talk about the use of these 6 old mobile phones after tossing the system and installing the latest common software, as well as some of our feelings.
First of all, although the 360 Qiku flagship version is the one that looks the most powerful and theoretically has the strongest computing power among the 6 mobile phones. But in fact, when we installed a series of common software for 2022, it was the worst experience and did not have one. The obvious stuttering and heating brought a very bad experience, making this old model almost useless.
There are many "black technologies", and the use experience is very stuck
Why is that? We suspect that an overly cumbersome system and too small storage space may be the two biggest factors. On the one hand, the 360 system comes with too many functional components, plus a variety of "security functions" and "cleanup functions" often run automatically in the background, so the system resources are occupied a lot. On the other hand, the redundant system makes the 16GB storage space of the flagship version of Qiku not much left at all, almost slightly installing a few commonly used software, there will be a storage capacity alarm.
In contrast, IUNI N1, Hammer Nut, and CoolPad Max, although the hardware computing power and storage space are also quite strong, their systems are much more concise, so that although they are relatively low in configuration, they are much better in terms of fluency and the space left after installing commonly used applications. Among them, the use experience of IUNI N1 and nut mobile phones is particularly outstanding, and it has to be lamented that their disappearance may indeed be a loss for consumers.
Released in 2015, the system update continued until 2017, which is still very rare
Finally, the HTC One E9+ and LeTV 1S are similar in configuration, and both are high-end products in these 6 old mobile phones. But in practice, the Le 1S, whether it is in the fluency of the system interface, or in the speed of opening various video software and loading the video playback interface, has overwhelmed the E9+ that should have been positioned higher. From this point, it is not difficult to see how much good system optimization and relatively more diligent system updates have for mobile phones.
To be honest, today's "review" is not very formal, because for these old models from 6 years ago, competing for batteries, running scores, games and other projects is actually completely meaningless. The reason why we will come to do this test and write this article is more out of a curiosity, inquiry psychology, want to try these brands that have almost no sense of existence at present, and how much "residual heat" their old models still have.
But in such a test, driven by curiosity and tossing psychology, we came to some conclusions that are not possible in regular reviews and are very interesting.
For old mobile phones, "hardware performance" is no longer the most important determinant of the experience
First of all, because the technology development of the mobile phone industry is very rapid, for the old models that have been a certain age, "card" and "no card" may not necessarily be linked to the performance level of the master. After all, even if it was once a top SoC, after five or six years, it will definitely not be able to beat the lowest-end entry products. In contrast, whether the system is concise enough and whether the underlying Android version of the system is as new as possible may have a greater impact.
Secondly, what kind of old models can have more waste heat? The conclusion we have drawn from this test is that "the models that used to sell better are more worth tossing." After all, selling better means that more people play the machine, which means that even after many years, it is possible to find resources such as systems and software. In contrast, the more unpopular the brand or model, the less residual value it tends to have.
Finally, if you also want to turn over the old mobile phone at home to pick up and pick up, reuse it as an alarm clock, video player or something, then our advice to everyone is to pay attention to safety first. After all, as long as it is an electronic product with a battery, it may produce a risk of battery damage after a long time. The reason why we were able to do such a phase of the evaluation is largely because we know how much the battery loss of these old models is. But if you don't know how hard the old equipment you accidentally turned over has been "built", we still don't recommend tossing it, because fun is small and safety is big.