MAXIMUS iX KANE Budget Big Bang

Last year, Maximus took us all by surprise. From the feature phone market, it jumped into the world of smartphones. The plan was simple: to reinvent the budget smartphone experience. Hence they launched the iX series, the premium line of handsets by Maximus. This year's flagship model in the company's crusade with cost is: iX KANE.

Starting the review with iX Kane's display: the IPS capacitive gorilla glass-3 clad display comes in at 5 inches. It's an HD panel with a pixel density of ~294PPI. The clarity of the display was impressive. Color rendition was accurate and viewing angles were pleasant. Sharpness of the display was a bit off the because of the lower than 320ppi pixel density. Just above the display are the earpiece grills, a gesture sensor and the front facing camera.

The phone is made of light weight plastic. Our test unit was white. It wasn't the best color on a phone we saw but we could easily live with it. The front side had three Android navigation buttons on it, right under the display. The back-cover has a huge logo of iX KANE and Maximus on it. We also found the loudspeaker grill here. The back camera and the Xenon flash are encircled on a metal bezel. The material of the side panels of the phone is probably the most interesting design feature: Japanese bamboo sheets. The bamboo sheet side panels certainly add flare to the design.

The processor that runs the device is a MediaTek MTK 6582 Quad-core 1.3 GHz. The processor was able to run games and apps smoothly. Honestly; we are not big fans of MediaTek. We hope to see Qualcomm processors next time on the flagships of the iX series. It has 1 GB RAM which is good enough for regular use. GFX intensive games like Modern Warfare and Asphalt stuttered a bit. This is one time we missed some extra boost from RAM.

The phone comes with Android 4.4.2 Kitkat. The custom UI is plain and bland. The icons are not cartoonish (it must be mentioned that most custom UIs have terrible icons). Rather it's almost similar to the stock android. The phone comes preloaded with several apps such as Skype, OfficeSuite, Video Downloader, Bangla Dictionary etc.

The camera of this phone is something that we absolutely loved. Putting a Sony sensor and a 5-glass-lense certainly paid off. For a phone of this price it was able to take amazing snaps even in low light conditions. The sample images that we took were sharp and vivid when checked on a 24-inch screen display. The front facing camera was good too. Regular selfies? Check. Skyping? Check. Duckface? Yep.

We generally don't talk about GPS performance of smartphones. But this is no ordinary phone. Why do I say so? It's a phone that we found has GLONASS…in long time. The GLONASS is the Russian equivalent of GPS systems. When combined, GPS and GLONASS provide accurate and faster lock on your current position. 

The battery is 2100 mAh. For a 5 inch IPS paneled phone that's OK. It lasted a day and half with a battery saver app. In this entire period we streamed 2 hours in YouTube over Wi-Fi, 1 hour in 3G, had nearly 1 hour of talk-time. The call quality was pleasing.

This phone also has OTG option. So you can directly access pen-drives or thumb drives from your phone. 

Verdict 
iX KANE's greatest asset is that its light, playful and comes with a small price tag. It has a more than decent performance. Camera performance is stunning and can easily compete with a 30K+ price tag smartphone. The UI was good. The2100 mAh battery can handle all the everyday tasks with ease. Priced around Tk. 14 thousand, this device is definitely bang on a budget. 

SPECS
Display: 5 inches, HD (1280 X 720) ~294 ppi
Camera: 13-megapixel, 2-megapixel secondary
OS: Android OS, v4.4.2 (KitKat)
CPU: Quad-core 1.3 GHz
GPU: Mali-400
Sensors: Accelerometer, proximity, G-Sensor
ROM: 8GB, RAM: 1GB
Battery: 2100 mAh 

Price: Tk. 13,999/-