Cherry Mobile Flare S4 Plus Review

Display and Multimedia

You might be fooled by the huge black part on the front as the device’s whole display, but the Flare S4 Plus only utilizes a percentage of it, giving the device small but noticeable bezels on the sides when used. The Full HD display is great, as the screen gives off crisp images and vivid colors on any angle the phone is viewed. It’s an advantage that the device is also a bit brighter, as it helps improve legibility outdoors.

Remember when we said earlier that this phone has two speaker grills on the bottom? Fact Check: Much like most of the devices that implement this setup, the holes only account for symmetry and better aesthetics. Only the right speaker works, and the sound it produces is pretty much on the average side. If you’re very keen with what you’re hearing, you’ll notice a bit of difference when it comes to the lows as they tend to be dull, and the volume isn’t loud enough to be used outdoors.

Camera

The camera software is as stock as you can get with other locally-branded smartphones. Nonetheless, capturing photos are swift and do not take a lot of lag. Most images produced great saturation and sharpness, except for those that emit mostly blue hue. The rear flash compensates well in capturing photos in low light, and indoor photography is good as long as there is a good amount of ambient light. Here are sample shots taken with the Flare S4 Plus:

Taking videos on the other hand is a no-brainer as well. By default, it is set to 720p resolution, which you can further expand to Full HD by toggling the settings. The colors on the video are just right, and there’s an anti-shake function present as well, though it doesn’t help as much when taking clips on motion, and/or if you have shaky hands. Here’s a sample clip:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?edit=vd&v=elNaw5ZZKg0

OS, UI, and Apps

Like most of Cherry Mobile’s offerings, the Flare S4 Plus is packed with an almost-stock version of Android’s Lollipop operating system, so you won’t have to worry about navigating inside the phone. Pre-bundled apps such as Opera Mini, Facebook, Kakaotalk, TouchPal X (the phone’s default keyboard) and a slew of the local brand’s own apps are present when you open the device on first run. 11.6GB of the 16GB internal storage is available for your favorite apps and files, and can further be expanded with the use of a microSD card (which in this case could take away your second SIM slot).

Cherry Mobile also added some nifty features, including a smart wake phone function which unlocks or activates specific applications by drawing letters when the phone is locked. There’s also a gesture-sensing function, which controls specific functions by waving your hand over the phone akin to O+ USA’s Air Shuffle feature. Wireless updates are present, as we have received a few over-the-air updates from the first time we booted the device. We would’ve wanted to see a better message icon though, since that one looks like something we’ve seen from the Gingerbread era.

Next Page: Performance and Benchmarks, Connectivity and Battery Life, and Conclusion