Wickedleak Wammy Note Review & Hands-On
Our cool friends at WickedLeak sent us the Wammy Note and the device finally landed on our review desk after spending some quality time with the courier people. We were curious to get our hands on this device and see what this gadget offers. Being the long time users of the Galaxy Note, we couldn't help comparing the two phones. Did the Wammy Note impress us? Does the phone justify the Rs. 11,000 (excluding taxes) price tag? Should you really put your hard-earned money in this phone? We'll give you all the answers in this review. Grab a cup of Mocha and get ready to explore the 5", Android Powered, Dual-Sim Wammy Note!
Unboxing & First Impression
The box that was shipped to us is the retail package that encloses the the Note along with two 3.7 V, 2500 mAh Li-Ion batteries, a USB travel adapter along with USB cable, a standard 3.5mm headphone and a back-cover along with Android User Manual. The phone was in perfect condition. The front side of the phone gives you the impression that you're looking at a smaller version of Samsung Galaxy Note.
#-Link-Snipped-#
#-Link-Snipped-#
The back side of the phone, however disappointed us a bit. The WickedLeak logo looks totally Wicked, and it could have been very well displayed at the bottom of the back-lid. The material of the removable back-lid is of the same quality that you'd find on the Galaxy Note. It's easy to remove and flexible, making it easier to handle. Being a 5" model, the phone is easier to hold and the keys on the side are easily approachable. There's a standard on/off key on the top, volume up/down keys on the right, a dedicated key for camera on the left, the power port at the bottom and to the left of it are the ports for 3.5 mm headphone jack and microphone. On the bottom - right of the phone, you'll see a telescopic antenna which takes the place of the stylus. There's no stylus with the Wammy Note, but we didn't miss it while using the phone.
#-Link-Snipped-#
#-Link-Snipped-#
The Wammy Note offers Dual SIM slots along with a slot for the MicroSD card (up to 16 Gb). You can spot the 8MP camera with LED flash while the front camera for video calls is 0.3 MP. The model shipped to us had a screen-guard which is a nice thing to have. Holding the phone in call-position makes you more feel more comfortable than other bigger sized devices. We are quite happy with the size of the phone. If you care about the dimensions, the phone measures 144 x 89 x 12 mm. We turned on the phone after inserting one of the two batteries.
Using The Wammy Note
Turning on the phone was a usual business and the phone showed up the lock-screen in 9 seconds. The initial setup of the phone was a cakewalk. Tapping on the lock gives you two options, one to unlock the phone and second to directly go to the camera. Unlocking the phone presents you with the standard Android UI. Another thing that really caught our attention was the extra brightness of the touch-buttons on either side of the home buttons. The 'back' button on our model wasn't very responsive to our taps. The menu button and home button worked absolutely fine.
#-Link-Snipped-#
The Screen:
The Wammy Note features a Capacitive Super HD touch screen operating at 480 x 800 resolution. Having laid our eyes on the SAMOLED and Retina displays, we were not very impressed by the display. The display performed just fine in the moderate sunlight, making the icons visible and usable. The screen is multi-touch and was responsive. We didn't notice any considerable lag while browsing through various apps and screens. Composing message was also easy and we've nothing to complain in that department as well.
![[IMG]](proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.crazyengineers.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2012%2F09%2Fimage_9.jpeg&hash=b28093d94e967ef75692311c80f77bdb)
Making A Call (Call Quality):
We used our standard IDEA cellular SIM card to test the call quality. The speakerphone is satisfying but not impressive. We encountered no problems during our 10 call test from different locations. We however felt that a louder speaker would have made it more convenient to listen in noisy surroundings.
The Antenna & TV App:
The telescopic antenna at the bottom makes the phone look like a short-range desktop chord-less phone. We tried to tune channels but the phone wasn't ready to pick up the signal. We could tune in to Doordarshan after several attempts, but the audio wasn't very good. For the other channels, the phone would show ghost images; but didn't serve the purpose. We aren't sure whether this phone will realise your dream of watching a live cricket match in your office, when the boss's not watching.
The Camera:
When it comes to cameras, the more megapixels don't really mean a better picture quality. Megapixels is only a representation of how big can your photo be enlarged without losing the quality. Well, we tested this phone from a regular user's point of view; but were disappointed by the performance of the camera in the default settings. Check out this sample photo we clicked using default settings.
![[IMG]](proxy.php?image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.crazyengineers.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2012%2F09%2Fwammy-note-photo-test.jpg&hash=bd6ef306587de4de488067a70c5ed3af)
We captured photos and videos but found them to be surprisingly below the quality we'd expect from any camera in a smartphone. The front camera too, doesn't do justice. So if you're looking to capture pretty photos; this phone is certainly not for you.
Battery Life:
The first thing that immediately impressed us was the spare battery that shipped with this phone. We used the phone for 4 days as our 'primary phone', making calls, browsing the Internet, listening to music and capturing a few snapshots on the go and we got a approximately 1.2 - 1.5 days of battery life before the phone called it quits. For a heavy user, the Wammy Note will definitely deliver a day of performance on every charging cycle.
Our Opinion & Verdict:
The Wammy Note 5 sells for Rs. 11,000 + taxes in the market. Unboxing the phone gave us few 'aha' moments, but a deeper look at some of the features disappointed us. We liked the overall built of the phone, screen size, a responsive screen and battery life. On the other hand, we didn't like the quality of the screen, camera performance and the disappointing TV functionality. Do these features matter to you? If yes, we'd recommend you to spend your money somewhere else. However, for the price this phone is a nice device with a big screen, good battery backup, Android ICS etc. The phone offers a 1GHz processor which makes this phone faster to use; but you will always have the impression of a 'budget phone'.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here's some good news - Wickedleak is offering a discount voucher to the CrazyEngineers VoiCE Readers who are looking forward to buy the Wammy Note online via the company site - Wickedleak.org.
Voucher Code : CrazyEng200Off (The offer is valid for the first 200 users only.)
Unboxing & First Impression
The box that was shipped to us is the retail package that encloses the the Note along with two 3.7 V, 2500 mAh Li-Ion batteries, a USB travel adapter along with USB cable, a standard 3.5mm headphone and a back-cover along with Android User Manual. The phone was in perfect condition. The front side of the phone gives you the impression that you're looking at a smaller version of Samsung Galaxy Note.
#-Link-Snipped-#
#-Link-Snipped-#
The back side of the phone, however disappointed us a bit. The WickedLeak logo looks totally Wicked, and it could have been very well displayed at the bottom of the back-lid. The material of the removable back-lid is of the same quality that you'd find on the Galaxy Note. It's easy to remove and flexible, making it easier to handle. Being a 5" model, the phone is easier to hold and the keys on the side are easily approachable. There's a standard on/off key on the top, volume up/down keys on the right, a dedicated key for camera on the left, the power port at the bottom and to the left of it are the ports for 3.5 mm headphone jack and microphone. On the bottom - right of the phone, you'll see a telescopic antenna which takes the place of the stylus. There's no stylus with the Wammy Note, but we didn't miss it while using the phone.
#-Link-Snipped-#
#-Link-Snipped-#
The Wammy Note offers Dual SIM slots along with a slot for the MicroSD card (up to 16 Gb). You can spot the 8MP camera with LED flash while the front camera for video calls is 0.3 MP. The model shipped to us had a screen-guard which is a nice thing to have. Holding the phone in call-position makes you more feel more comfortable than other bigger sized devices. We are quite happy with the size of the phone. If you care about the dimensions, the phone measures 144 x 89 x 12 mm. We turned on the phone after inserting one of the two batteries.
Using The Wammy Note
Turning on the phone was a usual business and the phone showed up the lock-screen in 9 seconds. The initial setup of the phone was a cakewalk. Tapping on the lock gives you two options, one to unlock the phone and second to directly go to the camera. Unlocking the phone presents you with the standard Android UI. Another thing that really caught our attention was the extra brightness of the touch-buttons on either side of the home buttons. The 'back' button on our model wasn't very responsive to our taps. The menu button and home button worked absolutely fine.
#-Link-Snipped-#
The Screen:
The Wammy Note features a Capacitive Super HD touch screen operating at 480 x 800 resolution. Having laid our eyes on the SAMOLED and Retina displays, we were not very impressed by the display. The display performed just fine in the moderate sunlight, making the icons visible and usable. The screen is multi-touch and was responsive. We didn't notice any considerable lag while browsing through various apps and screens. Composing message was also easy and we've nothing to complain in that department as well.
Making A Call (Call Quality):
We used our standard IDEA cellular SIM card to test the call quality. The speakerphone is satisfying but not impressive. We encountered no problems during our 10 call test from different locations. We however felt that a louder speaker would have made it more convenient to listen in noisy surroundings.
The Antenna & TV App:
The telescopic antenna at the bottom makes the phone look like a short-range desktop chord-less phone. We tried to tune channels but the phone wasn't ready to pick up the signal. We could tune in to Doordarshan after several attempts, but the audio wasn't very good. For the other channels, the phone would show ghost images; but didn't serve the purpose. We aren't sure whether this phone will realise your dream of watching a live cricket match in your office, when the boss's not watching.
The Camera:
When it comes to cameras, the more megapixels don't really mean a better picture quality. Megapixels is only a representation of how big can your photo be enlarged without losing the quality. Well, we tested this phone from a regular user's point of view; but were disappointed by the performance of the camera in the default settings. Check out this sample photo we clicked using default settings.
We captured photos and videos but found them to be surprisingly below the quality we'd expect from any camera in a smartphone. The front camera too, doesn't do justice. So if you're looking to capture pretty photos; this phone is certainly not for you.
Battery Life:
The first thing that immediately impressed us was the spare battery that shipped with this phone. We used the phone for 4 days as our 'primary phone', making calls, browsing the Internet, listening to music and capturing a few snapshots on the go and we got a approximately 1.2 - 1.5 days of battery life before the phone called it quits. For a heavy user, the Wammy Note will definitely deliver a day of performance on every charging cycle.
Our Opinion & Verdict:
The Wammy Note 5 sells for Rs. 11,000 + taxes in the market. Unboxing the phone gave us few 'aha' moments, but a deeper look at some of the features disappointed us. We liked the overall built of the phone, screen size, a responsive screen and battery life. On the other hand, we didn't like the quality of the screen, camera performance and the disappointing TV functionality. Do these features matter to you? If yes, we'd recommend you to spend your money somewhere else. However, for the price this phone is a nice device with a big screen, good battery backup, Android ICS etc. The phone offers a 1GHz processor which makes this phone faster to use; but you will always have the impression of a 'budget phone'.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here's some good news - Wickedleak is offering a discount voucher to the CrazyEngineers VoiCE Readers who are looking forward to buy the Wammy Note online via the company site - Wickedleak.org.
Voucher Code : CrazyEng200Off (The offer is valid for the first 200 users only.)
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