Ringing Bells, a company based in Noida, near Delhi, has created quite a stir with its new Android smartphone, the Freedom 251. It is priced at Rs.251, and that is enough to boggle the mind. This is the first true Android smartphone in India under the price tag of Rs.1,000, and that too by a comfortable margin. But is it really any good?
First, the brand name on the phones is that of Adcom, which was hidden by what seemed like white-coloured correction fluid. Sanjeev Bhatia, founder and chairman, Adcom, said, “Some Adcom phones were sourced by Ringing Bells, which is why they carry the Adcom branding.” Adcom is not exclusively manufacturing the phone for Ringing Bells, he said, adding that their Adcom Ikon 4 is being sold by Ringing Bells under the name of Freedom 251. Bhatia, however, refused to share details about the cost at which each handset is sold to Ringing Bells, owing to a non-disclosure clause. He added that he did not know why the Adcom branding was covered in the preview handsets given to the media. Ringing Bells did not respond to our query about this.
The good stuff
This super-affordable phone runs a pretty recent Android operating system, and the design is similar to some previous versions of the Apple iPhone. But that is about it.
Software: old Android with an interesting interface
The Freedom 251 runs the Android 5.1 (Lollipop) operating system (OS). This is definitely a positive, given the fact that a lot of sub-Rs.10,000 smartphones are still running Android 4.4, which is now a three-year-old OS.
But what you notice immediately is the interface customization by Ringing Bells. The default icons for apps such as the Web browser, email, camera and contacts are exactly the same as the icons Apple has on the iOS in the iPhone. We aren’t entirely sure if they have permission from Apple to use the icons, but that is for the legal teams to decide.
You will get the usual Android app drawer, a drop-down notifications panel and options for some customization. You can also add widgets on the home screen.
The company claims the phone will come preloaded with apps designed and maintained by the government, such as the Digital India app, an app for women’s safety, and a weather forecast app for fishermen and farmers. But these were not pre-installed on the test unit.
Unique circular home button
The usual set of navigation keys present in almost every Android smartphone have been left out. A single circular button serves as a multitasking button— it’s both the home button and the back button, and looks similar to the Apple iPhone. Pressing the home button once takes you back to the previous page in an app, and pressing it twice takes one to the home screen. Pressing it twice on the home page opens the multitasking window, from where you can swipe-close apps.
Middling stuff
A dash of patriotism cannot hide some genuine build quality issues. And the performance just about gets by.
Poor build quality but compact form
The iPhone-like design means it is compact, and tips the scales at just 116g. The phone’s build quality is a bit shoddy though. The plastic used is flimsy and does not feel as though it will hold during rough use. The back panel is removable but you need to be very careful not to break the plastic panel. Inside sits a 1,400 mAh battery, a micro SIM and standard SIM slots and a micro-SD card slot as well. The interiors too are shoddily built and every time we opened the back panel to install a SIM, the battery popped out by itself.
The back panel has the Indian national flag printed on it, and it was already peeling off after a few hours of use.
Not meant for the power user
The Freedom 251 is powered by a 1.3 GHz Spreadtrum SC7731 quad-core processor and has 1 GB RAM. The internal storage stands at 8 GB and is expandable to another 32 GB with a micro SD card. The phone can handle most day-to-day apps and games, such as the Play Store, YouTube, Maps, even Netflix streaming. Even switching between apps was smooth as long as we didn’t have more than 8-10 apps running in the background. Some of the apps crashed often. There were some issues too with the phone’s micro SIM slot, which was not able to detect the SIM card even after several attempts. However, the standard SIM slot worked well. The sound quality in the call was a bit low but overall it was clear and there was no heating up on the back even after 10 minutes on a call.
The not-so-good stuff
The super-affordable Android phone is just not up to the mark in terms of screen and camera quality and battery life.
Small and blurry display
The company says the 4-inch display has a screen resolution of 960x540 pixels. But according to two different Android benchmarks (AnTuTu 3D by AnTuTu and CPU-Z by Qualcomm), the display has a screen resolution of only 800x480 pixels. The display looks dull and washed out and visibility from odd angles is poor. It is too small for comfortable movie viewing or even reading for a long time. The display smudges a lot as well.
Poor battery backup
The smartphone relies on a 1,440 mAh battery (the battery labelling claims 1,500 mAh capacity though), which barely lasted half a day on one charge. Keep a charger or a power bank handy.
Sluggish camera struggles even in daylight
The 3.2-megapixel camera is slow and the slightest of shakes sends the object out of focus. It clearly does not have image-stabilization features. The picture quality even in daytime shots is poor, and look washed out. A front-facing camera is equally blurry—even individual selfies look blurry. It checks the specification sheet, but there isn’t much in terms of real-world performance.
Verdict
The Freedom 251 is, on paper, the most affordable Android smartphone in India. But there are some genuine doubts about who actually manufactures this phone, and the fact that some of the specifications aren’t as claimed. It is better to stay away, even though you may think that Rs.251 (plus Rs.40 for shipping charges since the phone is only available on www.freedom251.com ) isn’t a lot of money.
