Gadgetory

have you ever heard of the uncanny valley well it's a term used in video games to describe characters and avatars that don't quite make it all the way to being truly realistic there's just a few things about them that you can't unsee and thus it kind of breaks the illusion well for a phone that's supposed to be made for gamers I thought that this was a poignant term to use to describe it it's Josh of Agora what's going on everybody and this is our full review of the razor phone comparisons to the next bit Robin are going to be pretty obvious here after all the company was acquired by Razer and what you have now is a phone made for gamers now that's different from being a gaming phone but that also means that razor's influences are clearly seen here nonetheless you have a phone that is actually a bit unique in design compared to other competitors and it's also a bit reminiscent of the original next bit Robin you have the angular corners and also flat sides all around making for a blocky device which is a design aspect we don't really see a whole lot these days but one thing I want to tip my hat off to is the symmetry of this phone the speaker grilles on top and below the 5.7 inch screen take up the exact amount of space in those particular areas the power button on the right has a fingerprint reader embedded into it much like the original next bit Robin and it was actually pretty easy to use even when using my middle finger on my left hand in order to quickly unlock the device after pressing the button the USB type-c port on the bottom is centered as it should be but there is no headphone jack here instead you get an adapter that you plug into here or a headphone jack but it does come with a 24 bit DAC installed and we'll talk about the audio experience in a little bit and finally on the back there is the camera optic package dual lens is over in the corner on top of the razer logo that is prominently displayed on this black slate design it's actually a very handsome device but the main problem we have with it is just the handling with a 16 by 9 aspect ratio screen it's a little bit wider than it probably should be and mix left to right or right to left handling in one hand a bit difficult this is certainly going to be a two-hander especially when you're trying to type but that screen is one of the main draws of this phone and it is a quad HD IPS display that includes ultra motion technology now that means that this display can get up to a 120 Hertz refresh rate but it is also synced up with the GPU in order to give the best possible experience no matter what kind content you are using I've played a lot of games on this device and there are quite a few triple-a titles I take advantage of everything the razor phone provides there are some games that don't quite take advantage of the full spec list but they still look great because of that ultra motion technology so if you're playing a game that runs at 30 60 or 90 frames per second it's going to look great on this display still because the refresh rate adjusts accordingly but the great motion in this display which is derived from razor's own laptop displays is really apparent even in simple tasks like scrolling through Google now or through websites like Andrew Authority comm or going through apps like Reddit it's really easy to see how high quality this display is and razor might just have unlocked a new trend and smartphones moving forward the only problem that I really had with the display was its brightness this is an IPS display but it's somehow doesn't get as bright as other IPS screens in the market this is mostly noticeable in broad daylight situations where we pump to the brightness to full but still kind of had to squint or move the phone around in order to see certain elements but it is a small price to pay for a phone that is overall of beast and the specification list shows that the Snapdragon 835 is backed up by eight gigabytes of RAM and 64 gigabytes of on-board storage that does include a micro SD card slot you have the very best specifications here that is only really matched by the one plus 5t currently thus work in place speed along swimmingly so that gamers aren't the only ones who are going to enjoy using this phone on the daily you also have a lot of power for multitasking as we use multi-window for YouTube and other applications but of course when Android Oriol finally makes it to the razor phone you'll also be able to enjoy picture-in-picture we've already mentioned that gaming is great on here no matter what game you're playing but the Triple A titles that are supposed to come out that take advantage of the razor phone specifications are still a little bit limited for example Final Fantasy 15 is still not out on this phone and it was one of those games that they really hyped for when it came to using this phone to its fullest potential but that's not to say that the razor phone isn't finding itself in the best possible position when it comes to mobile gaming because it truly is publishers like Sega and Nintendo are getting into the mobile space putting not only games from their previous library but also putting in new games like Nintendo's newest offering in Animal Crossing it's a great time to be a gamer and it's great to see Razer getting into the mobile space at this time of course those games are not just a visual aspect there's also an audio aspect involved and razor put a lot of thought into it in a partnership with Dolby and their Atmos app you have dual front-facing speakers that provide a great amount of sound seriously this is some of the best sound that we've had from a smart phone ever it's enough to actually replace cheap Bluetooth speakers so you don't have to have it in your arsenal all the time it certainly past the shower test but it still has to be outside of the shower doors because there is no IP certification but there is a little bit of a compromise in the audio experience when you talk about the headphone jack now this is a contentious point for pretty much anybody but what I do adore about razors approach to it is that they finally did something I've been saying everyone should do the USB type-c port on the bottom also powers a 24-bit DAC that is built into the adapter which provides a great sound especially if you're using high quality headphones this is another instance where Razer might be setting an example that we might see more of from other manufacturers moving forward call quality for the most part was good on the razor phone at least in my experience and I was using it on the t-mobile network but I do have to mention something about the microphone when it's right next to my mouth for more conventional calling everything sounded fine but when the phone is farther away from me for video calls and also for speaker phone calls the people on the other line said that I was noticeably quieter that tells me that the microphone needs a little bit more sensitivity but you know mileage might vary on this we've heard differing reports from multiple sources about what the call quality is like on the razor phone so things might be a little bit different with different units so maybe your experience is gonna be different and finally we have a large 4000 milliamp hour battery which razer claims was possible because of the exclusion of the headphone jack i was never really able to get more than 5 hours of screen on time at least on average which is not great but I was doing a lot of gaming on this device if you turn down the settings in the game booster you might get a little bit more out of it or if you're just using it as a Productivity device then you might get more screen on time but of course your experience might be different speaking of which that game booster app is one of the only additions that Razer put into the software suite here the game booster allows for tweaking of everything from the display refresh rate to the clock speed of the sesor and you can also change it for full performance or for full power saving modes and you can go into each game in the application in order to change the different settings this allows for a little bit more control and it also shows that razer was really trying to put its best foot forward in providing performance and customization and personalization into the razer phone experience and that continues with the software suite that has been out sourced to a great third party in the Nova Launcher now the best part about the Nova Launcher here is that you get all of the great benefits of it including a pro license that gives you access to all of the different features that Nova provides if you pay a little bit of extra money which you don't have to because it's included with this phone you have all of the customization options like animations on the home screen icon packs even gestures that you can do on the home screen itself and you have a lot of different options to really tweak this operating system to make it look like your own so overall we've had some really good things to say about the Razer phone and it looks like the company has done a great job in the wake of next bits acquisition in order to bring a great first attempt into the smartphone space but then we have to talk about that uncanny valley and we're gonna talk about the camera now you have dual 12 megapixel cameras on here that have F 1.8 aperture in the regular lens and F 2.6 aperture in the telephoto lens and unfortunately we already had some qualms with the camera in our hands on when we noticed that there weren't that many modes and there wasn't even an indicator to show you which lens you were using and how far you were zoomed in for how much time the razor phone has had up until market release it's a little bit of a bummer to see that razor hasn't really added a whole lot to the experience and even then the camera app is one of the slowest that we've used especially if you use HDR and it does not have an auto setting you're going to have to hold the phone very steady especially in lower than ideal lighting situations and if you move even just a little bit you're going to get some blur in the photo now in broad daylight situations you could get a pretty good photo but those are the only times that you can really do so and that's kind of the mark of a subpar camera the fact that it can only work in the brightest of conditions unfortunately for the razor phone it's just not a phone that we can mention in a list of good cameras in the Android space especially considering in the last year or so we've been having a continual rise in photographic quality and so there you have it the razor phone this is a powerhouse powerhouse is a great term to describe this device because it does so many things right but it just falters in one very key aspect after all the razor phone looks and feels like a flagship device it even looks like a beloved phone from days past an expert Robin there are certain things that you can easily look past even the lack of a headphone jack considering that great adapter they have in there and the size of the device is something that you could for the most part get used to but the biggest issue with the phone might be described best by the uncanny valley it's just the one thing that you can't unsee and unfortunately it's one of the most important parts of a smart phone and it's the camera experience so that makes the camera this phone's uncanny valley as always thank you guys very much for watching I hope you enjoyed this review of the razor phone razor claims that they're going to put a lot of updates out for the camera and hopefully they're going to change the experience at least a little bit but as smartphone history has shown us updates don't really change too much about the camera experience even further down the line but from there without the camera you have one of the best phones that we've used this year and that display technology is something we hope to see in a lot more smart phones moving forward keep it tuned to Android authority for even more about the razor phone and maybe a couple of comparisons after all one of its main competitors in the spec sheet is the 1 + 5 T so you can look forward to that and even more from Android Authority com head on over to the website or download our app from the Play Store so you can keep up with us in a very easy fashion then bring it on back to this YouTube channel and subscribe to the channel if you haven't already drop us some likes on this video and don't forget to comment in the sections down below so we can continue the discussion on razors first phone so keep it tuned here and remember that we are of course your source for all things Android