IconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD: tablet review: talent with GLONASS and two SIM cards
Not always the market for mobile devices is expanding due to significant innovations. Often, the next trend is the result of combinations of current developments in the industry. Approximately this situation has developed with dual 7-inch tablets with GPS support. Yes, an important point is precisely the budget models, which in aggregate look like a tempting option both as a “first tablet” and as an “omnivorous” device for a home-work-home-route (travel, vacation, etc.). IconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD is from such a breed. This model seemed interesting to me for two reasons. First, it is based on the “non-pop” 4-core Broadcom BCM23550, and second, it contains a hybrid GLONASS / GPS receiver.
I still have the category of tablets with a spoken speaker on the front side “a la smartphone” that cause some confusion. Although not so long ago in Moscow, I still managed for the first time in my life to see a person who spoke on the tablet. Actually, the social adaptation to the new role of tablets is in full swing, misunderstanding is replaced by a neutral attitude. I remember well how at the dawn of the emergence of ZTE V9 and Huawei S7 in the CIS, these tablets "blew up" the broad masses of consumers with the possibility of making calls in a bundle "tablet plus headset". In the light of the fact that the latest flagship smartphones do not shun 5.5-inch diagonals, iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD devices do not seem to be a wonder.
')
The box is framed in exactly the same way as 100% of the previous smartphones and tablets of the brand, which I had on testing. Only a small icon attracts attention and indicates that there will be no problems with the search and stability of satellite holding at iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD. What is already encouraging, because every new MediaTek device reminds me of a roulette: will there be problems with navigation or not? In the characteristics we see that the brand was not ashamed to indicate the specific model of the chipset and even the GPU. It always makes me smile when Russian brands are bashfully limited to information about the architecture and processor frequency.
You probably and without me perfectly imagine what can be in the box with similar tablets. And surely you will not guess the full set - there is no cheap headset here. And in this case, I rather support the nod in the direction of the sales assistants, who will certainly offer the consumer to get a decent headset. Because I don’t remember in any tablet or smartphone cheaper than 10,000 rubles ($ 285) of intelligible “ears”. The rest - warranty card, manual, cable and network charging unit. For the last I put a "plus", the body is completely matte and does not get dirty.
Looking ahead, I will say that the set was not limited to this - under the transport film there was found the same, but protective. I was going to fully appreciate the OGS-display, so I got rid of it.
It's hard to come up with something really new in the form factor of 7-inch tablets. Here and iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD to experiments does not, it is a typical representative of its diagonal. The model looks "all the money", that is, it is not misleading - the usual inexpensive "pill". Yet for a premium appearance, I would recommend to apply to a completely different price category. However, plus, I note that the model does not have cheap-looking glossy surfaces.
The body ergonomics are not bad, sharp corners or joints at 90 degrees are missing a little more than completely. Instead of them - completely round, which I especially like, and in the transition between the ends and the back cover. The thickness of 10 mm is an indicator far from the record one, but for me personally, both in tablets and smartphones, the thin profile is not always purely pure in terms of grip convenience.
Build quality - on the four on a five-point system. In the area of ​​the back cover, micro-crunching is heard without much difficulty. But nothing really critical, such as a noticeable backlash, serious deflections, etc.
Perhaps praise for the practicality of the election of the material of the case. More precisely, for the relief grid of the back side - it really fights well with fingerprints and other undesirable bloom. No, not absolutely, but in one move any uninvited “cover” is completely erased.
On the front side is the earpiece, to the right of it is the front camera. Event indicators, lighting and proximity sensors are not about iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD, you have to be content with little. There is also no touch panel, but this is absolutely normal for a 7-inch tablet.
All buttons are located exclusively on the right side, on top - the volume rocker, just below - the on / off key, the hole “cuts” immediately lurked. I do not particularly welcome attempts to invent a bicycle in an effort to find an even better combination of positions. Fortunately, in most cases, both giants and local brands are limited to thinking about which of the two buttons to put above.
And here I disagree with the collective conspiracy of the Nexus 7 and Samsung, Huawei and others like them. I like to use the sound rocker while reading in CoolReader. However, if the key is under the power button - you have to have a palm lower relative to the body. So, depending on the grip, the weight of the tablet is worse distributed or it is not too “firmly” held in the hand.
Only two connectors, 3.5 mm audio output and microUSB.
Upstairs, on the back side, remove the panel and see the memory card slot, just to the right - two SIM card slots. For the first time, I’m always afraid to install a sim card - a phobia after a pair of tablets that miraculously “swallowed” my cards. In iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD they didn’t think a bit about that, the cards are simply thrust about 60%, and therefore there are no difficulties with removing them.
Directly behind the mentioned relief cover is, and the peephole of the camera with speaker slots. I honestly made an attempt to remove the cover, but all the slots are very tight, and it was not in my plans to redeem the deformed model. I had to leave the "surgical" plans for a more pliable model.
A 7-inch TFT-TN screen with a resolution of 1024 x 600 pixels is a classic of the genre. If it were not for one “but” - production using OGS technology, which theoretically can give such “buns” as improvement of viewing angles, increase in brightness and “more live” picture. In general, the quality of the display is not beyond expectations, given the price of the model. The brightness margin is quite good, although in the sun the parameter has to be twisted to maximum without options, plus at a certain angle the picture completely “disappears” from the display. In the room I was more than enough 50% brightness. Coverage for sRGB is slightly incomplete, but there is no overt distortion of color rendition.
The display's cover is glass, the surface reacts very quickly to touches, I didn't have to do double presses. As I said, the protective film was removed by me, the test was carried out on the "bare" glass. Marcos are predictably present, but do not attract much attention. That is, I met tablets in which after a couple of minutes of web surfing I wanted to run for a napkin. In iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD everything is more than tolerable, there are no “fat prints”. Viewing angles are not particularly prominent, on the right side there is an inversion, on the rest the brightness begins to fall.
Supports up to five simultaneous touches.
In general, the display left a rather positive impression on me, from frank minuses - only viewing angles. Well, a small grain is still present, which is characteristic of absolutely any tablet with such a diagonal and resolution.
A bunch of 0.3 megapixels and two megapixels automatically set me up on the fact that nothing special should be expected, especially from the main camera. It's nice that I made a mistake, the back module turned out to be a very “wow” for its megapixels. The iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD camera will give odds to many 5 megapixels “eyes” without autofocus in budget smartphones. There is no faded picture typical for cheap cameras, the palette is quite rich - of course, depending on the lighting, but still. Clarity can be assessed on the test picture - the letters are read already at a height of 3 mm, only the smaller font on the right side blurs ... But as soon as I used the zoom, as it was, everything became “readable”. In other words, despite the meager megapixels, any student will be well-suited for iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD for photographing abstracts.
Original
The shooting application is standard for Android, for more impressive "custom" appeal to tablets with MediaTek. My main complaint about the “stock” interface is the complete absence of the quick access panel to any options, even to change the camera, you have to call the context menu. However, this negative point is relevant only for smartphones with more serious modules, in iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD, I somehow did not have a special need to wander around the settings. Therefore, this minus in practice is not particularly made itself felt.
The hardware model is based on a 4-core Broadcom BCM23550 with an ARM Cortex-A7 and a frequency of 1.2 GHz. This chipset was introduced exactly a year ago as a solution for budget dual-card smartphones. Yandex.Market does not know about this chipset at all, either from smartphones or tablets, and Google was not a particularly effective assistant. In the characteristics on the tablet page on the site iconBIT, a certain “VC425” is indicated as a graphics accelerator, AntTuTu specified: VideoCore IV. If you believe this rating , this “graphics” is more powerful than the Adreno 220 and Mali-400 MP2, but inferior to the Mali-400 MP4. Completes the picture 512 MB of RAM and 4 GB of ROM (real - 0.98 GB + 1.68 GB).
RAM, let's face it, a bit. Perhaps, I will immediately share the impression of how this entire hardware bundle showed itself in deeds. I prepared in advance for the obvious slowdowns and lags of the interface, but ... Nothing like that. The system works surprisingly well, unless you forget to clean the RAM. In a “calm” state, only 180 MB of RAM is free — a miser by today's standards. But even so, I felt comfortable while surfing the web with watching videos, switching between tasks, etc. Yes, it is clear that the tablet doesn’t react to commands at all instantly, but these are not blatant lags that would indicate poor optimization of hardware and software.
In AnTuTu Benchmark, the tablet scored almost 14,000 points, not bad.
Go to the games. In Asphalt 8, the default settings were given by iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD with difficulty, sagging below 20 FPS was regular. But it was worth putting “low”, as the gameplay “normalized”, without losing much in the effects: smoke, shiny metal, sparks remained in place.
Shadowgun: DeadZone by default set “LOW”, giving out under 30 FPS. However, I did not agree and chose "MEDIUM". The frequency of frames dropped by 5-8, but the picture still remained smooth, and the visual component improved noticeably.
In Riptide GP2, I immediately set the maximum, although in reality a number of settings were limited to the game itself. The failure of frames was noticeable in some places, although in general it was possible to play. But I would still recommend lowering some settings.
Moving on to the video, as usual I turn to the IXBT methodology.
I could not make up a single opinion about the ability to play HD video, but the tablet played all files without exception, and this happens very rarely. A selection of HD and Full HD clips came to the rescue, which allowed us to state unequivocally: iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD normally loses 720p (up to 3 Mbps) in hardware mode, and it copes well with 1080p (up to 5.3 Mbps). Thus, the "video" will remain satisfied.
Battery capacity iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD - 2 800 mAh, not much even by the standards of modern smartphones. This is enough for about 4.5 hours of video playback (HD - up to 4 hours), about 2.5 hours of 3G Internet and up to 4.5 hours of Wi-Fi. All operations were performed at maximum brightness, video - with 100% sound. The results are not particularly outstanding, "middling" as it is. If you go hiking or a long journey, it is better to grab an external battery with you.
The tablet supports Bluetooth 4.0, Wi-Fi 802.11 b / g / n and 3G / HSPA / HSPA +. I note that in budget tablets support for HSPA + was added recently. Responsible for the navigation module hybrid GLONASS / GPS, with him and start. The “cold” start is excellent, right after switching on (literally - in 2-3 seconds), the tablet found 6 satellites and immediately put them all into operation. In navigation programs, location has never exceeded more than one minute. What especially pleased me was that iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD had almost no misunderstandings with 2GIS. For example, I visited Moscow on the May holidays and used a GLONASS / GPS smartphone based on Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 as a navigator. Sometimes he behaved very capriciously, forcing him to spend time trying to “motivate” the navigation. With iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD everything went smoothly, the tablet had no problems with switching the module on / off as it interacted with the program.
Voice calls are answered by GSM: 850/900/1800/1900 MHz. 3G - 900/2100 MHz. In budget tablets with 3G, the support of 900 MHz is often saved; as a result, the towers of operators are overloaded in the range of 2 100 MHz. The result is worse reception quality, and here iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD has an opportunity to save the situation with switching to 900 MHz. Plus, if my memory serves me, in Russia 2,100 MHz like to use the military and simply “jam” these frequencies for civilian use.
The program interface of calls and SMS has not undergone fundamental processing, some standard icons have been changed. If localization touched all menu items - it would be quite good.
Managing SIM-cards is the same as in any Android-smartphone without branded launchers. With the only difference that in the absence of inserted SIMs in the settings list, the item “Manage your SIM card” will never appear. By default, voice calls, SMS, etc. can be assigned to the card. I checked the communication on the SIM-cards of two operators, the stability of signal reception was good. As for voice calls, the speech of the interlocutor is legible, the volume margin is enough for a conversation on the street. The voice is a bit "flat", in quality - at the level of "dialers" for $ 40-60. The second microphone for noise reduction would not hurt, in case of strong wind, the audibility of the iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD owner's speech is reduced - “interference”.
Android 4.2.2 is installed in the tablet, I can’t highlight anything special about the software, except the file and radio manager with a non-standard theme. Yes, more - wallpaper, as many as 29 pieces. Practically everything is not “stock”, but really aesthetically pleasing pictures.
I do not like to review budget tablets - I constantly have to tune in to the awareness of compromises and their cheating on the price of the device. With iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD, it was different, for about two weeks I was too lazy to charge my 10-inch tablet, and the 7-inch tablet replaced it with success. I spend almost two hours on a tablet for about two hours in games, videos, and web surfing, and with iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD, I didn’t have much discomfort, except for the subjective preferences of the diagonal. Not very high priority for me, but the model also performed with dignity important for someone the functions of the phone and GPS-navigator. Games, videos - also without complaints, albeit with reservations on 3D titles. Even the camera I can not write to the cons.
Without drawbacks, of course, not done. I was not particularly impressed with the screen, in fact, OGS does not particularly let me know about its presence. Ordinary design, flash appearance iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD does not work. Finally, the battery - yes, normal by the standards of 7-inch tablets. But if you recall the 3G, calls and GPS, it becomes clear that with particularly active use it is better not to be away from the outlet for more than four hours. Or, as I said, you need to fork out for an external battery. I would like to note a paradox - I was waiting for a great screen and lag due to the small amount of RAM, but everything turned out the opposite. The display is not particularly remarkable, but the actual performance of the device deserves a positive evaluation.
The price of iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD is about 4,600 rubles (~ $ 131). I will not once again list all the "buns" of the model, I can only say that it is entirely worth its money. And, what I liked most of all, in iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD there are not many moments about which you would have to speak with an eye to the price tag.
I still have the category of tablets with a spoken speaker on the front side “a la smartphone” that cause some confusion. Although not so long ago in Moscow, I still managed for the first time in my life to see a person who spoke on the tablet. Actually, the social adaptation to the new role of tablets is in full swing, misunderstanding is replaced by a neutral attitude. I remember well how at the dawn of the emergence of ZTE V9 and Huawei S7 in the CIS, these tablets "blew up" the broad masses of consumers with the possibility of making calls in a bundle "tablet plus headset". In the light of the fact that the latest flagship smartphones do not shun 5.5-inch diagonals, iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD devices do not seem to be a wonder.
')
Equipment
The box is framed in exactly the same way as 100% of the previous smartphones and tablets of the brand, which I had on testing. Only a small icon attracts attention and indicates that there will be no problems with the search and stability of satellite holding at iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD. What is already encouraging, because every new MediaTek device reminds me of a roulette: will there be problems with navigation or not? In the characteristics we see that the brand was not ashamed to indicate the specific model of the chipset and even the GPU. It always makes me smile when Russian brands are bashfully limited to information about the architecture and processor frequency.
You probably and without me perfectly imagine what can be in the box with similar tablets. And surely you will not guess the full set - there is no cheap headset here. And in this case, I rather support the nod in the direction of the sales assistants, who will certainly offer the consumer to get a decent headset. Because I don’t remember in any tablet or smartphone cheaper than 10,000 rubles ($ 285) of intelligible “ears”. The rest - warranty card, manual, cable and network charging unit. For the last I put a "plus", the body is completely matte and does not get dirty.
Looking ahead, I will say that the set was not limited to this - under the transport film there was found the same, but protective. I was going to fully appreciate the OGS-display, so I got rid of it.
Design
It's hard to come up with something really new in the form factor of 7-inch tablets. Here and iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD to experiments does not, it is a typical representative of its diagonal. The model looks "all the money", that is, it is not misleading - the usual inexpensive "pill". Yet for a premium appearance, I would recommend to apply to a completely different price category. However, plus, I note that the model does not have cheap-looking glossy surfaces.
The body ergonomics are not bad, sharp corners or joints at 90 degrees are missing a little more than completely. Instead of them - completely round, which I especially like, and in the transition between the ends and the back cover. The thickness of 10 mm is an indicator far from the record one, but for me personally, both in tablets and smartphones, the thin profile is not always purely pure in terms of grip convenience.
Build quality - on the four on a five-point system. In the area of ​​the back cover, micro-crunching is heard without much difficulty. But nothing really critical, such as a noticeable backlash, serious deflections, etc.
Perhaps praise for the practicality of the election of the material of the case. More precisely, for the relief grid of the back side - it really fights well with fingerprints and other undesirable bloom. No, not absolutely, but in one move any uninvited “cover” is completely erased.
On the front side is the earpiece, to the right of it is the front camera. Event indicators, lighting and proximity sensors are not about iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD, you have to be content with little. There is also no touch panel, but this is absolutely normal for a 7-inch tablet.
All buttons are located exclusively on the right side, on top - the volume rocker, just below - the on / off key, the hole “cuts” immediately lurked. I do not particularly welcome attempts to invent a bicycle in an effort to find an even better combination of positions. Fortunately, in most cases, both giants and local brands are limited to thinking about which of the two buttons to put above.
And here I disagree with the collective conspiracy of the Nexus 7 and Samsung, Huawei and others like them. I like to use the sound rocker while reading in CoolReader. However, if the key is under the power button - you have to have a palm lower relative to the body. So, depending on the grip, the weight of the tablet is worse distributed or it is not too “firmly” held in the hand.
Only two connectors, 3.5 mm audio output and microUSB.
Upstairs, on the back side, remove the panel and see the memory card slot, just to the right - two SIM card slots. For the first time, I’m always afraid to install a sim card - a phobia after a pair of tablets that miraculously “swallowed” my cards. In iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD they didn’t think a bit about that, the cards are simply thrust about 60%, and therefore there are no difficulties with removing them.
Directly behind the mentioned relief cover is, and the peephole of the camera with speaker slots. I honestly made an attempt to remove the cover, but all the slots are very tight, and it was not in my plans to redeem the deformed model. I had to leave the "surgical" plans for a more pliable model.
Screen
A 7-inch TFT-TN screen with a resolution of 1024 x 600 pixels is a classic of the genre. If it were not for one “but” - production using OGS technology, which theoretically can give such “buns” as improvement of viewing angles, increase in brightness and “more live” picture. In general, the quality of the display is not beyond expectations, given the price of the model. The brightness margin is quite good, although in the sun the parameter has to be twisted to maximum without options, plus at a certain angle the picture completely “disappears” from the display. In the room I was more than enough 50% brightness. Coverage for sRGB is slightly incomplete, but there is no overt distortion of color rendition.
The display's cover is glass, the surface reacts very quickly to touches, I didn't have to do double presses. As I said, the protective film was removed by me, the test was carried out on the "bare" glass. Marcos are predictably present, but do not attract much attention. That is, I met tablets in which after a couple of minutes of web surfing I wanted to run for a napkin. In iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD everything is more than tolerable, there are no “fat prints”. Viewing angles are not particularly prominent, on the right side there is an inversion, on the rest the brightness begins to fall.
Supports up to five simultaneous touches.
In general, the display left a rather positive impression on me, from frank minuses - only viewing angles. Well, a small grain is still present, which is characteristic of absolutely any tablet with such a diagonal and resolution.
Camera
A bunch of 0.3 megapixels and two megapixels automatically set me up on the fact that nothing special should be expected, especially from the main camera. It's nice that I made a mistake, the back module turned out to be a very “wow” for its megapixels. The iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD camera will give odds to many 5 megapixels “eyes” without autofocus in budget smartphones. There is no faded picture typical for cheap cameras, the palette is quite rich - of course, depending on the lighting, but still. Clarity can be assessed on the test picture - the letters are read already at a height of 3 mm, only the smaller font on the right side blurs ... But as soon as I used the zoom, as it was, everything became “readable”. In other words, despite the meager megapixels, any student will be well-suited for iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD for photographing abstracts.
Original
The shooting application is standard for Android, for more impressive "custom" appeal to tablets with MediaTek. My main complaint about the “stock” interface is the complete absence of the quick access panel to any options, even to change the camera, you have to call the context menu. However, this negative point is relevant only for smartphones with more serious modules, in iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD, I somehow did not have a special need to wander around the settings. Therefore, this minus in practice is not particularly made itself felt.
Performance
The hardware model is based on a 4-core Broadcom BCM23550 with an ARM Cortex-A7 and a frequency of 1.2 GHz. This chipset was introduced exactly a year ago as a solution for budget dual-card smartphones. Yandex.Market does not know about this chipset at all, either from smartphones or tablets, and Google was not a particularly effective assistant. In the characteristics on the tablet page on the site iconBIT, a certain “VC425” is indicated as a graphics accelerator, AntTuTu specified: VideoCore IV. If you believe this rating , this “graphics” is more powerful than the Adreno 220 and Mali-400 MP2, but inferior to the Mali-400 MP4. Completes the picture 512 MB of RAM and 4 GB of ROM (real - 0.98 GB + 1.68 GB).
RAM, let's face it, a bit. Perhaps, I will immediately share the impression of how this entire hardware bundle showed itself in deeds. I prepared in advance for the obvious slowdowns and lags of the interface, but ... Nothing like that. The system works surprisingly well, unless you forget to clean the RAM. In a “calm” state, only 180 MB of RAM is free — a miser by today's standards. But even so, I felt comfortable while surfing the web with watching videos, switching between tasks, etc. Yes, it is clear that the tablet doesn’t react to commands at all instantly, but these are not blatant lags that would indicate poor optimization of hardware and software.
In AnTuTu Benchmark, the tablet scored almost 14,000 points, not bad.
Go to the games. In Asphalt 8, the default settings were given by iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD with difficulty, sagging below 20 FPS was regular. But it was worth putting “low”, as the gameplay “normalized”, without losing much in the effects: smoke, shiny metal, sparks remained in place.
Shadowgun: DeadZone by default set “LOW”, giving out under 30 FPS. However, I did not agree and chose "MEDIUM". The frequency of frames dropped by 5-8, but the picture still remained smooth, and the visual component improved noticeably.
In Riptide GP2, I immediately set the maximum, although in reality a number of settings were limited to the game itself. The failure of frames was noticeable in some places, although in general it was possible to play. But I would still recommend lowering some settings.
Moving on to the video, as usual I turn to the IXBT methodology.
I could not make up a single opinion about the ability to play HD video, but the tablet played all files without exception, and this happens very rarely. A selection of HD and Full HD clips came to the rescue, which allowed us to state unequivocally: iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD normally loses 720p (up to 3 Mbps) in hardware mode, and it copes well with 1080p (up to 5.3 Mbps). Thus, the "video" will remain satisfied.
Battery capacity iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD - 2 800 mAh, not much even by the standards of modern smartphones. This is enough for about 4.5 hours of video playback (HD - up to 4 hours), about 2.5 hours of 3G Internet and up to 4.5 hours of Wi-Fi. All operations were performed at maximum brightness, video - with 100% sound. The results are not particularly outstanding, "middling" as it is. If you go hiking or a long journey, it is better to grab an external battery with you.
Wireless connection
The tablet supports Bluetooth 4.0, Wi-Fi 802.11 b / g / n and 3G / HSPA / HSPA +. I note that in budget tablets support for HSPA + was added recently. Responsible for the navigation module hybrid GLONASS / GPS, with him and start. The “cold” start is excellent, right after switching on (literally - in 2-3 seconds), the tablet found 6 satellites and immediately put them all into operation. In navigation programs, location has never exceeded more than one minute. What especially pleased me was that iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD had almost no misunderstandings with 2GIS. For example, I visited Moscow on the May holidays and used a GLONASS / GPS smartphone based on Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 as a navigator. Sometimes he behaved very capriciously, forcing him to spend time trying to “motivate” the navigation. With iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD everything went smoothly, the tablet had no problems with switching the module on / off as it interacted with the program.
Voice calls are answered by GSM: 850/900/1800/1900 MHz. 3G - 900/2100 MHz. In budget tablets with 3G, the support of 900 MHz is often saved; as a result, the towers of operators are overloaded in the range of 2 100 MHz. The result is worse reception quality, and here iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD has an opportunity to save the situation with switching to 900 MHz. Plus, if my memory serves me, in Russia 2,100 MHz like to use the military and simply “jam” these frequencies for civilian use.
The program interface of calls and SMS has not undergone fundamental processing, some standard icons have been changed. If localization touched all menu items - it would be quite good.
Managing SIM-cards is the same as in any Android-smartphone without branded launchers. With the only difference that in the absence of inserted SIMs in the settings list, the item “Manage your SIM card” will never appear. By default, voice calls, SMS, etc. can be assigned to the card. I checked the communication on the SIM-cards of two operators, the stability of signal reception was good. As for voice calls, the speech of the interlocutor is legible, the volume margin is enough for a conversation on the street. The voice is a bit "flat", in quality - at the level of "dialers" for $ 40-60. The second microphone for noise reduction would not hurt, in case of strong wind, the audibility of the iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD owner's speech is reduced - “interference”.
System
Android 4.2.2 is installed in the tablet, I can’t highlight anything special about the software, except the file and radio manager with a non-standard theme. Yes, more - wallpaper, as many as 29 pieces. Practically everything is not “stock”, but really aesthetically pleasing pictures.
Conclusion
I do not like to review budget tablets - I constantly have to tune in to the awareness of compromises and their cheating on the price of the device. With iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD, it was different, for about two weeks I was too lazy to charge my 10-inch tablet, and the 7-inch tablet replaced it with success. I spend almost two hours on a tablet for about two hours in games, videos, and web surfing, and with iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD, I didn’t have much discomfort, except for the subjective preferences of the diagonal. Not very high priority for me, but the model also performed with dignity important for someone the functions of the phone and GPS-navigator. Games, videos - also without complaints, albeit with reservations on 3D titles. Even the camera I can not write to the cons.
Without drawbacks, of course, not done. I was not particularly impressed with the screen, in fact, OGS does not particularly let me know about its presence. Ordinary design, flash appearance iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD does not work. Finally, the battery - yes, normal by the standards of 7-inch tablets. But if you recall the 3G, calls and GPS, it becomes clear that with particularly active use it is better not to be away from the outlet for more than four hours. Or, as I said, you need to fork out for an external battery. I would like to note a paradox - I was waiting for a great screen and lag due to the small amount of RAM, but everything turned out the opposite. The display is not particularly remarkable, but the actual performance of the device deserves a positive evaluation.
The price of iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD is about 4,600 rubles (~ $ 131). I will not once again list all the "buns" of the model, I can only say that it is entirely worth its money. And, what I liked most of all, in iconBIT NetTAB SKY 3G QUAD there are not many moments about which you would have to speak with an eye to the price tag.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/226013/
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