Not all modern smartphones have protection even from moisture, not to mention such harmful for mobile electronics factors like dust, water and falls. While the appearance of current models of communication are unified as to optimally fit both women and men.
However, there are instances of this rule are not related, and one of them is the latest BQ Shark, new smartphone for the Russian market. From first glance, it becomes immediately clear that this bar is unlikely to bend in your pocket like the iPhone 6, and he certainly is not afraid of high humidity or rain.
Even in the specs of the BQ Shark claimed increased resistance to external factors, which can not boast of 99% of smartphones in 2017. Stressing his brutality and reliability, BQ has released it exclusively in a dark color, and this shade this smartphone today in our test. Let’s get started.
Packaging
As you know, the BQ has long has your corporate identity package design of their smartphones – design, combination of colors and so on. In the case of Shark, it was decided to move away from the traditional version, retaining all of its advantages.
Box BQ Shark is decorated very nicely – there is a picture of the smartphone, and the overall ambiance alludes to the protection from moisture. The monoblock exterior can be viewed from all sides, and in addition to renderam added to the basic specification and list of accessories supplied.
Total packaging design and its informative new BQ Shark ahead of even top-end flagships, which one and all are sold in plain boring boxes, which immediately want to get rid of.
Equipment
Given the specificity of the smartphone BQ Shark, namely its reinforced hull, the manufacturer put in the box with it such a desired accessory, screwdriver. It will be very useful when you insert a SIM card and microSD storage, as the respective slots are closed with the special cap with two screws.
In the rest of the equipment smartphone can be dubbed scarce – available only manual, warranty card, data cable and charger, plus, if you look closely, on the front panel you can notice the pre-applied by the manufacturer of the protective film.
In our view, this brutal smartphone are lacking some stylized headphones that would complement its rugged look, and an extra sealed case with 100% protection from water, for example, for time outings. Yes, this would increase the cost, but with accessories such smartphone would look much more interesting.
Features
At the time of testing BQ Shark was estimated by the manufacturer in 7500 rubles, which at the current exchange rate is around 130 us dollars. The recommended cost of the device can be found on the official BQ website, and Yandex.The market, and there we found detailed information about the hardware stuffing smartphone, the short version is duplicated on the box and in the complete instruction.
In our opinion, taking into account the specifics of the Russian market of mobile gadgets, the obvious advantage of this smartphone, in addition, of course, reinforced hull, is the pre-installed Android OS 7.0 Nougat – almost the most modern version of this firmware. In this price category are usually only found Android 6, which is almost two years. At the same time, BQ Shark does not support LTE, and it’s a very big omission. Detailed specs sheet of the smartphone is presented below.
screen: IPS, 5 inches, 1280×720 pixels;
– processor: MediaTek MT6580, 4 core, 1.3 GHz;
– video: integrated in CPU, Mali-400 MP, 1 -;
– memory: 1 GB RAM, 8 GB ROM, microSD up to 128 GB;
– interfaces: 3.5 mm microUSВ 2.0, microSD card, 2xSIM;
– wireless interfaces: WI-FI 802.11 n, Bluetooth 4.0, GPS, FM;
– work in networks: GSM, 3G;
camera: front 8 MP, primary 8MP;
– battery: non-removable 3200 mAh;
– features: moisture protection IP65, strengthened glass Gorilla Glass;
– housing: plastic, black;
– dimensions: 154х79х14 mm;
weight: 224 grams;
– OS: Android 7.0 Nougat, the interface Yandex.Launcher.
Appearance
BQ Shark looks very hard, every element of its design screaming about the reliability of the case. The appearance of smartphone the developers tried to move away from the concept of the classic candy bar touch while remaining true to this form factor.
The result is a very interesting bezel design, but the look it attracts the back panel: right here the brutality of the apparatus itself on the 146% at the expense of the original texture, a variety of screws and deliberately rough forms. The plastic of the shell, resembles that on the front of the SUV Renault Duster, and he immediately gives the impression of a monolith. At the end of the phone there’s no texture, but they are common men’s style. The front panel is very actively collects fingerprints and poorly cleaned from them (all because of a protective film), and soiled rear cover is reduced to zero – it does not get dirty.
The arrangement of the elements from BQ Shark almost everything is standard, except for the number of points: input under earphones and microUSB port placed on the upper end and hidden under the massive rubber plug, and the microphone is located in the lower part of the front panel. At its upper edge has a selfie camera, voice and speaker sensors proximity and brightness of exterior lighting. The power button and volume controls moved to the right side, and rear-located camera with dual flash, nothing protected the main speaker and the compartment for SIM card and microSD, closed by a plug with two screws. The battery in this unit is non-removable.
Ergonomics
BQ Shark is male smartphone. Such a restriction based on gender is dictated not only by its appearance but also size and weight: the device is very large and quite heavy, and the weight of it felt in hand very well. The smartphone is in man’s hand like a glove – the original design of its back cover and the ends don’t allow him to slip out under any circumstances.
BQ Shark bigger than other 5-inch devices, but despite this, it is very convenient. However, the upper and lower frame of the screen is very large and not doing anything – not even the bottom touch buttons, who does it virtual, so that the dimensions could be reduced.
Plug the upper connector is made of rubber, making it resistant to wear and she is very firmly seated in the grooves, not passing water, but if necessary, it is very easy to remove and to access the 3.5 mm and microUSB. Note that when listening to music through headphones plug will be opened and will not protect from possible moisture.
As for cap slots under the card, even if you removed the screws it just doesn’t come off due to tight fit. This means reduced to zero, the probability of falling under it water drops. For the same and the battery is made removable in order to minimise the risk of damage from H2O.
The durability of the case
Consider the degree of protection from Shark BQ factors harmful to modern electronics. The standard of IP65 provides protection from dust and moisture, but not water. The difference is that protection from water means the possibility of full immersion of the device under water and remain there for some time. With BQ Shark is to do the impossible: you can leave it in the bathroom on the shelf and take a shower, exposing the cell to the exposure to elevated humidity and temperature, and even speak on it at a slight rain, but nothing more.
The strength of the case we tested by swipe BQ Shark off the table at normal room linoleum. The smartphone fell from a height of about 1 meter, and nothing happened, and later he survived the planning for the same coating from a height of 1.5 meters. Even scratches does not remain, and the screen is kept 100% uptime.
Important clarification: the BQ is not stated in Shark protection fall under military standard MIL STD 810, so the flight on concrete or asphalt with high probability will be fatal for him, and to exchange under warranty for you, of course, will not.
Screen
Display BQ Shark is a IPS panel with HD resolution and a diagonal of 5 inches. Just note that it lacks brightness, and in the sunshine it fades completely to a mirror state. At the same she has very good viewing angles, and color inversion are almost invisible, except that the black color slightly faded at the critical angles, but the little things, not worthy of attention.
Grainy and, on the contrary, tamilanadu the screen does not suffer, the image is rendered at a sufficiently high level of quality. The touch layer responds to 5 simultaneous touches, but does not recognize touch with wet hands and gloves, although this is not stated by the manufacturer.
Now a little about the color. In this model, unlike many state employees, including those from the BQ, the white color is displayed correctly at any brightness. Usually it is offset in a warm tone, a kind of pale yellow, but here it is – absolutely full of cold white color. That’s a plus.
But on-screen buttons – this is a big minus for this smartphone, since the wide part at the top and bottom, they visually reduce the size of the display, uyeda part of it. In fact, it’s a trivial savings at the three touch-buttons and three LEDs.
Sound
In terms of volume of the main loudspeaker BQ Shark can put 4 out of 5 points. Water protection had not, therefore, reproduced sound does not interfere. The lower frequency is at least a little, but still felt, while high and mid frequencies are reproduced just fine.
The microphone in the smartphone we rated satisfactory: the sound settings in the engineering menu it picks up directly, and the interviewee had or to listen, or to ask something.
Voice speaker in excellent BQ Shark – heard well even at medium volume levels, and no wheezing at maximum volume. Vibration motor for vibration force in the smartphone, as a microphone, 3 points out of 5 – would like stronger. To check the sound quality of the headphones were not because of their lack supplied.
Camera
Cameras in BQ Shark paid little attention, and the result is two 8-megapixel module, the quality of shooting in the sun is comparable to the 5-megapixel. The frontal matrix is running very slightly faster core, and they both begin to “make noise” in low ambient light. When shooting at night, the detail drops sharply.
However, the camera records good quality video, even without stabilization. Also note the presence of a dual flash on the back side of the case, she shines like a miniature spotlight and dusk can significantly improve the quality of the images.
Software
BQ Shark runs on OS Android with 7 pre-installed Yandex shell.Launcher. The firmware has definitely been optimized, because on a device with 1 GB RAM running tolerably well, without lags and delays.
As in the case with other smartphones BQ, this unit comes with a collection of third-party and, alas, non-removable software: 8 apps that take up ROM and RAM and without rooting clean will fail. In addition, AppsPress still fills desktops with shortcuts to games and apps for download from Google Play.
Small hint: to stop all third-party software program is suitable QuickShortcutMaker available in Google Play and completely free. You can use it forever stop unnecessary SOFTWARE and manual can be found online.
Additional features in the firmware BQ Shark was not found, except that there is the possibility to change not only text size but also the scale of the image on the screen, thereby increasing or decreasing the number displayed at one time information.
After the first boot in BQ Shark can use about 3.75 GB of internal memory of 8 GB and 1 GB of memory available is about 302 MB. Heavy programs such as navigators or browsers, this amount of free RAM will be enough.
Work offline
BQ Shark operates from a fixed note, the battery capacity of 3200 mAh. On the official website of the manufacturer does not the parameters of the autonomy of this smartphone, so we compare the resulting values we simply do not.
And yet, note that the AIO holds good charge in normal use at 50 percent display brightness and Wi-Fi it lasts for about 1.5 days, and if you operate BQ Shark in a sparing mode, without regular checks, updates in social networks, it is possible to do without charging a little more than 2 days.
Smartphone actively puts the battery in Navigator – two hours later, she was already almost at zero. Also noted a fast discharge in MTS network 2G, while in the Beeline and Megaphone, this was not.
The smartphone does not offer any quick charges, and therefore on the energy of the battery from the supplied AC memory it requires about three hours.
Performance
As mentioned above, on stock firmware BQ Shark is functioning tolerably well, without brakes. In simple games without fancy 3D graphics it 32-bit CPU and 1-GPU nuclear is also quite enough, but more components, such count is not necessary.
Meanwhile, BQ Shark was never game mobile – is a secure camera entry level for those who are constantly is not the best technique for the conditions, and those who wish to emphasize their masculinity. In the benchmarks it shows the expected results: 23609 points in AnTuTu, 8439 in Quadrant Standard, 1164 points in GeekBench and 1967 points in Ice Storm Extreme 3DMark from.
Conclusion
Smartphone BQ Shark copes with the main entrusted to him the responsibility – to look sternly at the man’s hand. In addition to this it good resists damage if dropped, although the defense of this level and not spelled out in its specifications, well protected from moisture according to the IP65 standard, while many models have already switched to full protection from IP68 water in this case is only an additional feature, but not a “killer-feature”.
At the end have a very stylish phone for men male appearance (forgive the tautology) on the latest firmware from Google, the hardware capabilities which is more than enough to fulfill the basic requirements of modern low-cost means of communication. Recall that the value of BQ Shark is 7500 rubles as of July 2017, and the money is well worth it. This smartphone is the choice for those who looking for an affordable and, most importantly, a lasting solution with a non-trivial design.
Pros BQ Shark
– excellent design;
– reinforced hull;
protective glass screen;
– modern OS;
– good sound.
Cons BQ Shark
– third-party software;
– on-screen control buttons;
– no headphones included;
– lack of support for LTE.
© 2017, paradox. All rights reserved.
