After Xiaomi and Lenovo, Chinese smartphone manufacturer Gionee has also introduced a new a budget phonein the global market. Dubbed as “F103”, the new beauty from the company boasts a premium metal finish, and goes straight against the likes of players like Yu Yureka Plus and Lenovo K3 Note.Itlooks quite impressive and brings an ideal set of specs at a competitive price bracket.
This time around, instead of focusing on specific elements, Gioneehas given special attention on maintaining the overall quality of its latest smartphone.The F103 is a real masterpiece, but many of our buyers might confuse the new phone with another power-packed beast from Gionee, Marathon M4.
Although battery performance is a clear and major difference between the two phones, yet considering their prices and key specs, we’ll give a detailed comparison explaining which phone offers a better package. So, let’s check out which of these phones is better than the other!
Design Language
In terms of design, Gionee F103 looks slightly better than the hefty M4. With “F”dedicated to Fashion, the new handsetflaunts a sleek and compact design language for the youth of this country.It features ametal band running along on its edges, and boasts a solidrear panel, which gives a great gripwhile carrying it around from one place to another. On paper, it weighs around 136 grams and tips on the scale at 8mm, which is also quite acceptable at such an enticing price tag.
Gionee M4, on the other hand,houses a 5000mAh battery, and is a whole lot heavier and thicker than F103 and other budget phones. Its subtle, simple, and practical form-factor gives a great grip to the user, and metallic frame with brushed grey finish and silver border adds a premium touch to the overall design language. Although, it’scompletely plastic, yet you can say, it’s a phone which is built to last.
Display
In order to deliver an excellent visual trip, Marathon M4 and F103 bothfeature a sharp5-inch HD display. They both look quite remarkable and produce rich colors and better contrasts with the same pixel density of 294ppi. But, when you’ll get into details, the Super AMOLED panel of Marathon M4 might just look better than the IPS panel of F103.The powerhouse device creates an ideal ecosystem for dedicated gamers and movie-buffs, and is one of the only few smartphones that flaunts a Super AMOLED panel, apart from Galaxy Jseries and few others.
The display of Marathon M4 is incomparably impressive. The blacks are deeper, viewing angles are perfect, and you’ll not notice any color shift while watching media content from different angles. It’sa beast of a display, and you cannot ask for more at this price bracket.
Hardware and Performance
The hardware equipped withGionee F103 and Marathon M4 is good enough to handle heavy apps and games.Bothphones pack a strong punch in terms of performance, and deliver extremely smooth and glitch-free user-experience with no lags, snags or heating issues.
Thenew and more affordableF103 powers up by a MediaTek MT6735 chip with four cores clocked at 1.3GHz, while the powerhouse Marathon M4 houses an unspecified but a quad-core chipset clocked at the same frequency.They both pair up with 2GB RAM, and rise to the level of proficient budget phones rolling in the market. So, no matter with which phone you’re comparing them, there would be no issue while running heavy games or switching frequently between multiple apps.
Software
On the software front, both phones run Gionee’s own Amigo 3.0 UI right out-of-the box.This interface is based on Android 5.0 Lollipop, but it’s completely different from stock Android 5.0.It’s clean and full or colors, but while using, you might experience few snags in some basic operations such as unlocking the device with a pass code or switching between apps.Plus, it will not be getting OTA updates so frequently. In a nutshell, the quirky OS of this handset needs few more improvements to take on stock Android or other custom skins.
Camera
The camera setup packed with Marathon M4 and F103 is completely identical. Both phones pack an 8-megapixel rear and 5-megapixel front-facing shooter that can deliver brilliant still in different conditions. However, the daylight performance of both phones is slightly better than lowlight performance. In daylight, the images from these phones are sharp and well detailed, while in lowlight,theyproduce noisy images, and struggle while focusing on the subject as well.
The front-facing snapper, however, is a different story. It captures vivid selfies, and serves at its best during video calls on Skype, messenger, or other apps.
Battery Life
And now comes the biggest difference. The new Marathon M4 packs a 5000mAh battery, and gives more than enough juice for non-stop work and play.The device promises 50 hour backup on 2G, which is way more than Gionee F103 or any other phone in the same price segment.Even F103, packs a 2400mAh battery, which gives 28 hours of backup on 2G, andis quite good for standard users. However, in front of M4, it still extremely weak.
Final Verdict
So, whether you’re playing gaming at home or preparing docs at office, this handset will keep things moving without any breaking down at any point. Its battery backup is a major attraction for those who’re always on-the go.
Gionee Marathon M4 and F103both are really impressive, and offer full value for money.They pack top-of-the line specs, and go head to head in all major categories. But,in case you’re still puzzled in selecting the best from this duo, take a pick accordingtoyour own personal needs. If you’re looking for a decent phone with updated hardware and software specs, Gionee F103 available at 10k would be a better choice, else the power-packed Marathon M4 coming 15k with a Super AMOLED display panel andhumongous battery might just work out perfectly.