Gadgetory

hi I'm Sarah metropolis Cena and this is a first look at the alcatel one touch evolve at $99 full out the evolved is an entry level smartphone available on t-mobile it's aimed at anyone still using a feature phone who's hoping to make the leap to a smartphone without paying a lot of money despite its low price the phone doesn't look cheap with its matt back cover and silver accents it's a tiny phone at just 4 inches tall two and a half inches wide and less than half an inch thick it's easy to use one hand it and can slip into most pockets up top you'll find the standard power/lock button and headphone jack along the right side there's a volume rocker on the Left there's the microUSB port for charging behind the back cover there's the battery you'll have to remove it to get to the SD card and sim card slots which is a hassle there are no physical buttons on the front of the Evolve just hot keys on the screen bezel the only light up when you tap them which makes it hard to remember which key is which at least until you get used to the phone the 4 inch 480 x 800 pixels screen looks dim even at max brightness text is easy to read but overall the screen doesn't look sharp it's also hard to read in direct sunlight and it picks up a lot of smudges the Evolve is running android for dot 1 an alcatel added its own colorful overlay with custom icons and a custom notifications menu there are also a few pre-installed apps from t-mobile such as visual voicemail and mobile hotspot there's a 5-megapixel back shooter and VGA front-facing camera on the evolved I major not against the main camera is it has a fixed focus lens which means that any up close shots you take will look blurry indoor photos from the camera had digital noise and lighting issues while outdoor shots looked much more natural the camera captures video at 720p and the clips I shot with impressively clear the Evolve runs on t-mobile's network in the US but can only access 3g connections that paired with the one gigahertz processor makes the phone sluggish when downloading apps are loading web pages mobile games like temple run to play without problems but the graphics didn't look as sharp as expected as cliche as it sounds there's nothing evolved about the evolve it's running an old version of Android has a limited camera and is slow yet for $99 flat out for $28 down and three dollar monthly payments for two years with t-mobile it's one of the lowest cost phones on the carrier which is sure to lure bargain-hunting smartphone shoppers you can read my full review on cnet com I'm Sarah Machop this has been a first look at the alcatel one touch evolve