Design and Performance
Apart from the weight, the device is well designed, fits comfortably into the hand and is pleasing to look at with its slim 8mm thick design and “luxurious gold” finish on the polycarbonate back panel.
The front of the device is dominated by the gargantuan 5.5 inch HD Display with a resolution of 1280 x 720p and 320 dpi, giving the device enough capability to be a powerhouse when it comes to display quality, viewing angles, gaming and multimedia playback. The display also performs well under bright sunlight.
Pros
• Low price— below Rs10k
• Useful built-in apps and tools
• 5.5 inch HD display
• Decent low-light camera
• Excellent battery life
Under the hood, the Infinix HOT 3 is equipped with a 1.3 GHz Quad-Core MediaTek MT6580 processor coupled with 16GB internal storage and 1GB RAM. Storage can be expanded using the MicroSD card slot up to 32GB.
During my week with the device I found the RAM to be its biggest shortcoming. In my opinion, 16GB internal storage and 1GB RAM is not enough when coupled with a 5.5 inch display.
The front of the device also features a 2MP camera, a light and proximity sensor, and a front facing soft flash to improve your experience while snapping a ‘selfie’. While the front facing flash sounded like a good idea, testing it out under low-light conditions did not deliver favourable results.
Cons
• Low RAM for 5.5" device
• OS/XUI takes up half of RAM
• Multiple apps slow down device
• Phone too light for its size
Just below the display, we see the familiar navigation buttons associated with Android devices. These buttons are not backlit, which can get frustrating while operating the device in darkness.
The bottom of the device only features the main microphone. There is an additional microphone opening at the back of the device in order to reduce noise while capturing audio.
The back of the device features the speaker grill, a design element I am not a fan of. If the device is placed on a flat surface, the resulting audio becomes muffled and one must place the device upside down to make full use of the speaker.
The back also houses the primary 8MP HDR camera with face detection, autofocus, geo tagging and a powerful LED flash.
In natural light, the camera performance was as expected from a low priced device, however, in low light conditions the camera exceeded my expectations.