Sunday 29 July 2018
One plus two You know about with review
One plus two You know about with review
OnePlus 2 release date and price
The OnePlus 2 release date is August 11 for the 64 GB model in the US and UK, but the 16 GB model wont be available until later in the year. The OnePlus 2 price is US$389, or �289 for the 64 GB version, and the 16 GB model (with 3GB of RAM) will cost US$329 or �239.
As with the OnePlus One, OnePlus 2 is available through OnePlus invite system. You can get a OnePlus 2 invite from somebody who has already purchased the device, as well as by participating in OnePlus promotions in its forum and social media channels.
Good
- ?Eye-catching design
- ?Great screen
- ?Fast performance
- ?Fingerprint scanner which works consistently
Bad
- ?Lack of battery options
- ?Lack of expandable storage
OnePlus 2 design and build quality
The OnePlus 2 design impressed me from the moment I looked at it, until the moment I rested the phone back on the table. The grainy charcoal rear and the metal sides look and feel great: its a really well-conceived design.
The handset has a convex rear, which contours into the hand, and good grip. Its a comfortable size, neatly fitting into both my hand and my pocket, and the metal sides are wide enough to feel flat and smooth, not sharp like on the Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge. All of the buttons are easily accessible and in the right places.
Unlike the OnePlus One, the OnePlus 2 does not come in the silk white color, but it does have a number of replaceable rear cover designs. The other covers felt a little slippy compared with the charcoal, but they are entirely optional.
The OnePlus 2 also has a physical alert slider on its left edge. This is similar to the iPhones mute switch, except it acts as a toggle for notifications, allowing you to switch between three different profiles. None disables all notifications, Priority enables notifications from your priority contacts, and All will, of course, enable all of them.
I didn�t have a chance to test whether this worked with incoming notifications, but it would surprise me if it didn�t. I don�t know how much of a benefit it will be, in the long run; I usually just use the volume keys on my device to change notification settings. Although since I can�t use the volume down key to make my device silent, maybe this would be a useful option after all.
There is one aspect of the otherwise premium design, however, that stuck out: the home button. It sits somewhere between capacitive and physical, and acts as both a fingerprint scanner and a home button.
Because it is physical, but does not depress or click, I felt myself waiting after touching it for some kind of feedback that never arrived. It made using it feel a fraction slow. These are just early thoughts though and I really can�t wait to sit with the device for a longer playtest, but right now, the way home button worked struck me as a little odd.
Another gripe is that, while the rear cover is easy to remove, the battery behind it is non-removable, and theres no microSD card slot.
Overall, I enjoyed having the device in my hand. I liked the grainy texture, the metal sides, the size, the easily accessible buttons. The OnePlus 2 offered everything I could ask for from a smartphone design � it felt comfortable and looked authoritative.
OnePlus 2 display
The OnePlus 2 houses a 5.5-inch Full-HD resolution (1,080 x 1,920 pixels) LCD display with Gorilla Glass protection, which it exceeded my initial expectations. Its borderline undersaturated, with a pale lemon tint perhaps, but it was largely unbiased and was a welcome change to the often highly-saturated displays Im used to seeing.
Unrealistically high-saturation displays have their place, of course, but the understated OnePlus 2 screen has a subtle charm. Its less showy than many screens, particularly more expensive Samsung ones, but the more realistic shades were to its credit.
As for the brightness, OnePlus has been shouting about its "600 nits bright display" in its marketing materials, so I made it my mission to test this. Its bright, no doubt, but not impressively bright: the Sony Xperia Z3 compact I had with me has a brighter display, and thats not a handset that was ever noted for being particularly bright.
The display is attractive though, and while the higher resolution of QHD technology does provide more pixels, it also requires more battery power, and Im personally not convinced of the overall benefit of QHD displays. I prefer better battery over a few extra pixels - pixels that very few apps and games even take full advantage of.
Note that I tested the OnePlus 2 in an indoor setting. Thoughts on outdoor visibility will follow soon.
OnePlus 2 special features
The OnePlus 2 houses a fingerprint scanner, which provides five unique profiles. In the 30 minutes that I held the device, they unlocked it on every attempt except one. It scanned my finger 20 times when I set it up, and afterwards, even in my hurry to test the hardware, the feature held up and was fast to unlock the phone from a screen off state.
The OnePlus 2 also comes with a reversible USB Type-C charger, which will soon become standard on Android, and fits perfectly into the intended charge port.
What the OnePlus 2 lacks, however, is NFC. It may not be such a big deal right now, because few people use it anyway, but if Android Pay becomes more widespread in the future, it might be missed.
OnePlus 2 software
The OnePlus 2 is running its own operating system, Oxygen OS version 2.0, which appears to be a very subtly improved stock Android. The icons and animations have an aesthetic softness, and there are some simple added features, such as the much-loved tap to wake, which wakes your phone when you double tap it.
The OnePlus off-screen gestures have made a return too, so I was able to launch the camera app from standby just by drawing a circle on the screen. It worked, and its a neat addition for those who crave a way to launch the camera from screen-off state.
The OnePlus 2 performed well during my playtest. Swapping between the different apps in the recent apps menu, and opening and closing browser windows, was all pleasingly swift. The only issue I may or may not have had was with returning to the homescreen, as outlined in the design section above.
In addition, the OnePlus 2 includes a new feature called Shelf, an area that is accessible from the left side of the homescreen � you know, where all of the most amazing features like Blinkfeed and My Magazine are held � and acts as a shortcut to your favorite contacts and most used apps.
OnePlus has admitted that this feature is a work in progress, or at least that its functionality would be extended in the future, but right now it didnt strike me as particularly interesting.
The next major Android version is almost guaranteed for the OnePlus 2, and the integration of dark mode and app permissions from the Android M developer preview tells me that OnePlus could deliver the update sooner than some of the competition this time around.
OnePlus Lollipop rollout suffered multiple delays, but I bet the company has learned a thing or two, and now that it has a little more experience and an apparent desire to take full advantage of the latest Google software, I�d guess that the next version will arrive fairly soon after Google launches it.
