TECNO Camon C7 review – a moderately trimmed down Camon C9

TECNO over the past years have evolved and positioned itself to become a relevant smartphone brand in Nigeria and other parts of West Africa, first it began with the Phantom series, which has over time stood tall as the flagship then the Boom and Camon series followed through as dedicated music and camera phone respectively.

The Boom series have two devices in its lineup, the Boom J7 and Boom J8 while it is safe to say that there are 4 devices in the Camon lineup. The Camon C7 being the most recent also boast of same similar specification like the Camon C9 which is touted as a camera phone but does it really qualifies to be a camera phone or it’s just a basic smaller version of the C9?

Design: Slim and light weight

Holding the TECNO Camon C7 in the hand sends something straight to the head, its light weight slim and very handy. I would have used the word small but the that’s just as relative as it sounds. I am a fan of devices with 5.5 – inch and above screen size devices (tablet not inclusive) but this size can pass for me as a secondary phone.

The device comes in several colours which serve to give users options depending on choice, colours include elegant blue, sandstone black, champagne gold and rose gold. I prefer the sandstone black.

The physical buttons are placed on the right side of the device which makes saves the stress of having to stretch fingers across the screen to reach for other side. USB/Charging port is at the bottom while the headphone jack is placed at the top.

Three soft keys are below the screen and the home key also functions as notification light as it breathes whenever there is a missed activity on the phone.

Display is small but natural

The Camon C7 has a 5.0 – inch screen size but the display is just about 4.6 – inches which may not present certain people adequate real estate to watch movies or consume multimedia on the device. However the resolution is HD at 1,280x720pixels, offering standard display quality. Colour looks real, text is crisp and viewing angle is impressive.

Using the device in the sun does not leave one with visibility issues buy the screen often times collects smudges and finger prints.   

Camera:

Surprisingly, there is no trade off in camera pixels on both the front and the back camera even though the phone is a ‘mini’ version of the Camon C9. Both front and back camera remain pegged at 13MP. Both cameras gives good result under natural and abundant lighting conditions but pictures taken under low light remains noisy and sometimes blurry.

Just as it is obtainable on the Camon C9, the camera also allows light come in when taking pictures.

Software:

The Camon C9 runs on the Google Android 6.0 Marshmallow operating system with TECNO’s own HiOS user interface over it. Apart from the Google apps, it also comes with some TECNO apps such as Hi Manager, Hi Theme pre-installed. The HiOS interface is simple, icons look well-spaced in the UI. It also offers certain level of customizations to activate gestures under the micro intelligence app, users can decide to take screenshots by sliding down three fingers from the top of the screen, other gestures include the ability to pause a music or change track even when the screen of the phone is off.

It also has a T-Band app which the phone can sync with TECNO T-band, TECNO’s own wearable device. I also like the find phone feature on embedded on the T-Band.

Performance:

Equipped with MediaTEk’s 64-bit quad-core processor clocked at 1.3GHz and 2GB RAM, the C7 delivers a decent performance. It can handle certain games well without slowing down the device, social networking is on a breeze, HD movies play well and it deals with more than 10 apps running in the background without slowing down the phone.

Eye Scanner is also present

The newly introduced TECNO eye scanner is also present on the Camon C7. This allows users unlock their phone by scanning the eyes with the front camera, the eyeprint technology not only works for unlocking the device but also for encrypting data on the phone.

Battery life is decent

Battery capacity on the Camon C7 is pegged at 2,500mAh which can last for almost a day on a moderately heavy use. A normal user who is light on social networks can have a full day of battery juice.

Battery here is removable and this serves some sort of advantage, heavy users can decide to by an extra battery for support if there is limited access to power source. The phone also features a battery-save mode which restricts use to a few apps and functions such as calling, SMS, calculator, this can give users extra battery life to enable them stay in touch.

Verdict:

The is a trimmed down version of the Camon C9 and its interesting that the basic features of the C9 are embedded in it. Such features include the 13MP front and back camera, eye print scanner. It offers near same features of the C9 at a reduced price.

It offers smooth performance with decent ability to handle basic task required from a smartphone.