So if you are unaware or have never heard of Archos, here is a brief history. Archos is a French multinational electronics company that was founded in 1989 by Henri Crohas.
Archos have been in the game for a long time and are known for their digital audio players, tablets and portable media players. in 2013 they made their way into the very popular smartphone market.
And thats what we are reviewing today, the Archos 50 Diamond.
Lets kick off with unboxing.
Unboxing
The 50 Diamonds box has to be one of the brightest I've ever seen. On the front you have an image of the phone along with a list of specifications. Up in the top left corner you have some Archos branding and bottom right the nomenclature. Bottom left features the Android KitKat logo along side some information about pre-installed Gameloft games, that you can choose to install or not. On the top you have some more information containing the IMEI number and some more technical info.
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| Front |
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| Back |
On the inside the first thing you are presented with is the phone and you'll get a quick glimpse of what it looks like and if you get the gorgeous yellow version you'll see its initial impact. Remove the phone and you are greeted with the usual USB cable, a selection of manuals and some included earphones.
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| Accessories |
All in all, its a very familiar and nice unboxing experience but the outer box design makes it a little more exciting than some other more simply designed boxes. All because of the vivid and eye catching design of the packaging. However if you opt for the black version that impact maybe a little subdued in comparison.
Design and In-hand
On the front the first things that really grabs your eye is just how vivid the yellow is, now it might not be to everyones taste but I quite like it as it makes a big departure from the usual more subdued colour schemes out there. On the bottom you'll also notice the Archos logo finished in a shiny grey that has some small metallic effect flakes in it. This gives it a nice glimmer in the sun and looks great against the yellow.
Bare in mind this image doesn't do the yellow justice and its much more vivid than the photo suggests. So if its too bright for you there is a black version as well.
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| 50 Diamond |
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| Front (top) |
The panel though is highly reflective, glossy and very prone to finger prints. But then again most screens are finger print magnets too.
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| Front panel |
Finally on the front, just under the screen you'll find a selection of off screen capacitive keys. These are unseen until you active them. Then they have a very subtle appearance, enough to see indoors but a bit more difficult outdoors. Also to note that the camera seemed to struggle to pick these up (hence the dark photo) whereas my I could see them much more clearly.
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| Off screen keys |
Turn the phone round the back and you get an even bigger hit of the glorious vibrancy (which looks more accurate here) of the finish. The back also features the rear camera, a LED flash and another Archos logo.
The camera module is slightly raised from phone, but that doesn't effect use when its laid flat on a table. The module also has a very thin silver metal surround and I think it does a great job at breaking up the vastness of the colour scheme.
The LED flash is slightly set back into the back of the phone and doesn't look too obtrusive at all. The Archos logo is finished in the same style as on the front and again helps to break up the back.
In the bottom left corner you'll find a rear firing speaker flanked by two bumps which help raise the phone slightly off the surface.
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| Back |
On the left side of the phone you'll your power button at the bottom and the volume rocker at the top. Coming from a 2014 Moto G this was a bit odd as its buttons are on the right side and the other way around. But after a few days use its easy to adapt to and quickly becomes second nature. The keys are nicely placed on the side and are easy to press using either hand. Using my right hand the buttons all nicely for my index finger and left handed use sits perfectly for my thumb.
On the left side you'll not find anything apart from a small notch so that you can remove the back cover.
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| Left side buttons |
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| Right side |
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| Top |
On the top of the phone you have a standard 3.5mm headphone jack and a secondary noise cancelling microphone. Which is my preffered location for these.
Its also here were you get to see the stark contrast between the two strong colours of the phone.
On the bottom you have your primary microphone and a micro USB charging and data connection port. All pretty standard really.
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| Bottom |
The dimensions of the phone are 146mm tall, 70.4mm wide and 8mm thick. A little bit bigger to the majority of other 5" screen phones, but that's thanks to the off screen keys and the thickish bezels. With the display size and size of the body you get a screen to body ratio of 67.4%. Not the highest I've seen but pretty respectable.
For me though that's a comfortable size, bare in mind I have a bout average sized hands for a UK male and for me it feels great. You don't have to do too many hand gymnastics to use the phone and its really nice and easy to use one handed. The only thing I did notice is that I had to slightly shuffle the phone a bit to use the off screen keys, but that can still be done one handed.
The phone has a fairly flat profile but to be honest its not uncomfortable in the hand at all. Also to note is that the sides are flat too, this made (at least for me) gripping the phone easy and it didn't un-secure at all. The finish of the phone although plastic isn't that slippery and has a surprising amount of grip in use. The Diamond also has slightly rounded edges which makes it comfortable to use when talking on the phone.
The only other phone at this price I can compare it to is the Moto G 2014. The Moto G has a slightly curved profile which feels a bit nicer to hold as it curves more towards the shape of your hand. The Moto G is a bit smaller too and a little bit easier to handle one handed and the smaller form factor I found a bit better to use. But that's not to say that this doesn't feel great because it does and its one of the nicest phones I've handled, including some higher end flagships too.
All in all though the phone is very nicely designed, I love the vivid yellow and black combo, the phone feels great in the hand and the button layout is great too. The only design issue I have is with the rear firing speaker, I wish they would have included front firing ones but I guess we'll talk more on that later.
Build
The 50 Diamond is a mostly plastic construction apart from the glass on the front panel, the camera and internals. The outer construction feels very solid and the chassis doesn't flex at all in general use.
The front glass feels decent quality, nit quite as high as the glass on the Moto G but its impressive considering the low cost of the phone. The display has a different feel than that of the Moto, its not bad different, just different. Maybe it utilities a different type of glass or maybe an older version of the popular Gorilla glass. I can't be sure but its impressive nevertheless. The glass covers the majority of the phones front apart from the small area of plastic on the bottom. This area feels nice too and doesn't flex and feels generally solid.
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| Front panel |
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| Back panel |
The buttons are nice, they have a good feel that isn't mushy or too hard. They don't move around or have any issues with rattling. They also feel pretty tactile and have a nice amount of travel too. There are also no issues around the ports and to be honest everything is very well made and assembled.
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| Buttons |
Overall I am very impressed with the build quality of the device.
Screen
Now in this review and my video I stated I thought that this was I thought to be Gorilla glass. Unfortunately I haven't been able to verify if that is true or not. However on closer inspection it does feel different to my Moto G which does use Gorilla glass. So maybe its panel from a different company. If I do find out I will amend both this review and my YouTube one as well. But for now I can't be sure which type it is.
That aside though the screen is lovely, its fairly vivid, the colours look great. They are neither too full of contrast or over saturated and from what I can tell fairly accurate. Colours don't pop quite as much as on Samsung displays but they are very nice, blacks are fairly deep and white looks white. Now sometimes you may notice on phones that whites either have a blue (cool) or yellow (warm) hue to them but this display seems to sit right in the middle.
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| 1080p screen |
Text looks great thanks to the screens 440PPI and you can't see any rough edges or blockiness at all. Even blown up and zoomed in text remains sharp and very easy to read. This means that note taking, browsing through websites and general reading is a breeze.
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| Icon text |
The display also features some interesting technology called OGS which is suppose to make visibilty better outdoors, however I didn't see this at all. The screen is far to reflective and prone to glare that the screen is unfortunately not the greatest to look at when outside. Even putting the screen to max brightness doesn't make the experience any better. This is made worse if you're in an extremely bright environment or in direct sunlight. Go into a less bright area and its better but still not the best I've experienced but its actually usable.
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| Bright light |
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| Shaded area |
To note the above pictures where taken with the same settings, the only difference being the level of light.
Indoors though you can turn down the brightness and really enjoy the display. Its quite possibly one of the nicest 1080p screens on a phone in the same price bracket and on any budget phone. The only screens that I have experienced that are nicer are the Nexus 5, The HTC one M9 ,the LG G3/G4 and the Galaxy S6. But bare in mind most of those are three times the price, so taking that into account its a very nice display.
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| Minimum |
The top image is on minimum and from the image you can see even indoors with just natural light its still very dim.
Its a little better when there isn't as much natural light but still not great.
The second image shows the screen on 50%. This is a vast improvement over the minimum.
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| 50% |
Finally the last image shows the screen maxed out and you'll a little better of an idea about how bright the screen goes. It does go very bright but like I said its only really outdoors when you need to make use of it.
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| Max |
Video playback is again impressive, thanks to the high PPI count. It just so happen be one of the nicest screens for video playback I've seen. Blacks look fairly deep, whites are crisp and if you adjust the screens settings colours really can impress too, again they aren't overblown with contrast and saturation but they're nice enough to keep things interesting. Text in video looks great and there are no noticeable issues what so ever. I mean to me it looks great.
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| Webpage Source: Archos UK website |
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| Max zoomed in text |
Viewing photos back on the phone is something I did often as images are rendered really nicely on the display and look significantly better than on my PC too. You can clearly tell that this is an impressive display and if you're coming from a 720p or lower screen you'll really appreciate the quality.
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| Boat shot with Canon EOS M |
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| Pink flowers shot with Canon EOS M |
The only exception is the slight and I mean slight increase in saturation over my monitor.
But thats not to say that they don't look really impressive when viewed back on the display.
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| Waterfall shot with Canon EOS M |
Viewing angles are good too and I didn't notice any odd colour distortions when moving the screen around. Maybe that's the tech that Archos included doing its job to make the viewing experience as good as possible.
Overall I am very impressed with the quality of the display. And I would go out on a limb and say the display is almost on a par with the Nexus 5, which just so happens has one of the best 1080p screens period. So for Archos to get a similar experience from this is impressive indeed. So very high praise for the screen from me.
User Interface
The Diamomd 50 is running Android 4.4.4 KitKat and is pretty much left untouched by Archos. That means all the menus, settings, transitions and so forth are exactly the same as stock Android. Now I know not everyone likes stock android but for me personally I love the clean aesthetic of stock. If you don't like it thought you can always install a third party launcher.
All the icons remain the exact same and Archos really haven't done anything to the stock experience.
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| UI |
The same can be said for the app drawer which looks exactly like it does on stock KitKat. Like I said Archos hasn't but a slow skin on the UI and it runs like a stock Nexus device.
There is a plus to that though as the slower releases usually have less bugs and work smoother than the early released versions.
The pull down menus and settings all look as they do on stock as well. So you get a really clean and uncluttered experience.
The purists amongst us though will really enjoy the untouched experience.
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| App drawer |
The only major differences I noticed is one extra setting, which I think more companies should include it on their phones. The difference I am talking about is the ability to adjust the screens appearance. This means you can tailor the screen to your preference.
Here you can choose from Standard, Vivid or Custom. Standard is essentially as it comes out of the box, Vivid gives the display a slight contrast and saturation boost. I'm not overly keen on its effect but I suppose if you like that then its good that its included.
Then you get to the Custom mode in which you have a greater flexibility to get the screen to look exactly how you want to look.
In my opinion its a nice feature and a welcome addition to the experience.
The next big difference I noticed is the equalizer in the pre-installed music player.
It has a much different look to it than any other I've seen and it also has a few more settings too.
The only issue though is that it doesn't really match the rest of the UI.
I think a little more effort could have gone in to keep the features but just to tweak its apperance to match the rest of the experience.
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| UI differences |
For the camera, see the camera portion of the review where its covered more in depth.
One thing I forgot to mention is pre-installed apps. Well there are a few, these include an Archos video player, a file manager and an FM radio app. So not really what I would call bloatware as I found myself making use of them all. One final thing is that during installation and set up a option comes in which you can choose to install a bunch of Gameloft games. I chose to opt out as any games I want can easily be downloaded from the Play store. But if you wanted, you could choose to install them but in my opinion they would take up useful storage space.
As a whole though, the look and feel is a great stock like experience with a few nicely welcomed additions from Archos.
Hardware and Specs
All you can really see is the camera module, the flash, the two sim card slots and the slot for your SD expansion. The sims are compatible with micro sims and the SD card you'll be needing is a Micro SD. The two sims is something I can't see myself using but I can see the benefits. Having one regular sim and then one for abroad or work would be useful, but for me one was all I needed.
The SD slot can take cards up to 128GB in capacity so if you're a big consumer of media then that is pretty great. For me though for the minute the 16GB is plenty but I like the option of having a slot to expand my storage.
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| Inside |
- Snapdragon 615 A53 Octa core 64bit CPU (4 cores at 1.5GHz and 4 at 1GHz)
- Andreno 405 GPU
- 2GB DDR3 ram
- 16GB on board storage (expandable to 128GB)
- 5" IPS 1920 x 1080 screen (440PPI)
- 4G LTE (Cat.4 150mbps / 50mpbs)
- 3G
- NFC
- WIFI
- Bluetooth
- 2 x Micro SIM
- 1 x Micro SD card
- 16mp rear camera
- 8mp front camera
- 2700mAh non user removable li-poly battery
- 5V 1A Micro USB
Performance
So how does those specs effect performance. Well performance is actually pretty impressive. The UI runs really smoothly and has no issues with lag when switching between screens or menus. The package can handle multiple apps with ease and it can switch between very quickly too. Now this is due to the specs and the fact that there is no heavy skin bogging down the experience.
Looking at the Geekbench scores and its clear that although these tests don't tell the whole story they are a useful tool. The first shot is of the scores it achieved and then if you look in the middle you can see how it compares to other phones. The middle shows that the 50 Diamond is on a par with the Moto X (older one) and the Galaxy S4, both flagship devices when they were released. The far right shows multi-core performance and according to the scores it manages to out perform the Nexus 5 and Galaxy S4 again. To me that is very impressive for an affordable phone.
But like I said these numbers aren't the full story, but the numbers are impressive to say the least.
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| Geekbench scores |
Media playback is again impressive, it copes very well with 1080p footage, which looks very impressive on the display. I didn't notice any issues in this department what so ever. To see it in action you'll have to check the YouTube review which will be linked at the bottom of the review.
Gaming performance is again impressive. Playing Injustice Gods Among Us I didn't notice any lag or any other performance issues and gameplay was pretty fluid. The same can be said for Asphalt 8 as well. Again check my YouTube video for the gameplay.
Taking a look at the Antutu benchmark and you'll get an idea of its gaming performance, you can see it scored a respectable score of 28554. Looking on the right you can see where it stands. The 50 Diamond sits between last years LG G3 and the first generation HTC One. Not too bad considering at their release dates they would have been three times the price.
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| Antutu scores |
Web browsing is pretty fluid and I didn't have any issues with performance, well apart from again my internet letting me down.
Its altogether a good performing phone and for the average user it will be perfectly capable. If you are a real power user and crave the best performance then this maybe not for you. But for an everyday phone that you can throw the usual social media, web browsing, music playback and so on it will do all that and more.
Battery
The Diamond has a non user removable 2700mAh battery which is actually a large capacity for such an affordable price point. The battery life I found is very impressive, even with the moderate power and 1080p screen. I never noticed not having over 1 full days use and on more than one occasion I managed to get over two days with around 5 hours screen on time. Bare in mind that was fairly light use as I wouldn't consider myself a power user. Below you can see two examples of the battery life I managed to achieve whilst testing the device. The first day was mainly social media, YouTube, light gaming and music playback. All done on about 60% screen brightness. The second time (right) was a little heavier use with more gaming and internet browsing with again the usual social media, YouTube and music. All again at 60% screen brightness.
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| Sample battery use |
However like I said all my testing was done at around 60% screen brightness with mostly indoor use. If you go outside you'll need your screen brighter which then in turn reduces your battery. So what I'm saying is my attained battery life will be different to yours depending on how you use the phone. So bare that in mind.
In brief the battery life is impressive and will more than likely get you through a full day no problems at all.
Connectivity
The Diamond 50 is packing some pretty nice features in this department. The phone is packing NFC, which is very uncommon in phones at this price and sometimes you don't even see it on flagship phones. So the fact its included is brilliant as more and more tech like cameras and Bluetooth speakers are becoming NFC compatible.
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| Settings |
On the phone you also get your usual array of connections like Bluetooth, WIFI, GPS and the rest of that good stuff phones are packing.
Another welcome surprise is the inclusion of FM radio. Yes FM, maybe not useful to you but I found myself listening to radio one quite often. The signal is pretty good too as long as your in good reception area.
Call quality is fairly decent, if a little on the quiet side. So if you're in a noisy location you may find it a little difficult to hear. Find a quiet area and its much easier to hear. The quality though is clear and doesn't sound too tinny which is nice. Its actually impressive if like I said a bit quiet.
On EE 3G I didn't have any issues with connections and I pretty much had signal everywhere I went, that includes the woods where I got this photo. Also it works great in cities too as reception is usually better there. But overall it didn't experience any issues what so ever. No dropped calls or quality issues either, just a pretty decent experience.
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| Call test |
Camera
The camera is a 16mp shooter and for me was a little disappointing, I mean its capable but to get good photos its a fair bit of work. The auto mode which the majority of people use is hit and miss. It tends to either over saturate, over expose or have off colour accuracy. Also something I noticed as well is that it only seems to output photos in a 4:3 aspect ratio, I did spend a while messing with the settings to fix this but nothing worked. I'm a little disappointed that I couldn't at least shoot in 16:9 at a lower resolution, but to not have it at all is bad. Something else to note is that HDR only activates on resolutions under 13mp, not a bad thing really but something I thought I should mention.
As a bonus though it does focus quickly and the shutter speed is pretty quick too. There isn't much delay between taking a photo a saving it unless you've added effects or put it in HDR mode.
As a bonus though the camera is pretty feature packaged, its not the most attractive of looking camera apps but it gets the job done. Its well laid out and very easy to use.
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| Main app |
To the right side you have your settings shortcut (top) the shutter button (middle) and finally the mode toggle (bottom).
The settings menu is very well laid out and easy to follow and is packed full of settings to get the most from your photos.
You get a total of three sub menus all allow you to change various different aspects of the camera. The first focusing mainly on output quality, the second focuses mainly on colour correction and the third is for other settings. So you can tweak the settings as much as you like or leave it in auto mode and the camera do the work. Auto mode though to be honest was to hit and miss for me, but more on that later.
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| Settings menu |
The on-board camera is capable of shooting 1080p at 30fps, but its also capable of a lot more resolutions too. The video quality to be honest isn't that impressive. The quality is fine but the focusing isn't very capable and the shake is really bad too. Its much better if you're stationary but most of the time we don't video stationary subjects. Its a little bit of a shame but I suppose the phone couldn't be perfect.
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| Video mode |
The video portion of the app is not as packed full of features, but it has one that like in particular. That is the timelapse feature. Now you don't normally see that on budget phones or of phones running a near like stock android experience.
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| Video settings |
The camera app also has one more feature I'd like to mention and that is the panorama mode. Yes it has one, but its not that impressive. It takes far to much effort to get a usable shot and you will be have either very stable hands or place the phone on a tripod.
Now I'll show you a few samples of what the camera is capable of. First up some indoor shots in a very dimly lit room.
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| No flash |
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| Flash |
The colours are accurate to a degree but just very muted. Looking at the text in the background you can see that its fairly easy to read and clear. the main focus though is not too impressive.
There is a clear loss of detail and clarity and its really obvious that this isn't a low light performer.
The ISO was set to 100 to keep noise at bay, so maybe with an ISO boost it would have been better.
This time I took the image again but with the flash enabled.
The flash is not bad in terms of brightness but its a little harsh and uneven. You can see that the Joker is far brighter. Also to see is the wall in the background, its made the colour more yellow than it actually is.
The text on the box is clearer as is the detail of the overall image, but its still a little too harsh. On the plus the main subject is still fairly accurate in terms of colour and hasn't suffered the same yellow tinge as the background.
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| Red flower |
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| Sign |
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| Tree |
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| River |
Above are a few more samples I have taken during my travels while filming the review. If you want to see more click the link to see even more samples and video samples too http://westonreviews.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/archos-50-diamond-photo-and-video.html
All in all though the camera is capable of getting some decent shots, as long as you're willing to put in the work to get them.
Sound
The sound through the headphone port is good quality if a little on the quiet side. I think it could be because of the headphones built in amp being a little under powered and not being able to deliver high levels of volume. Personally though I don't like my music too loud, but even this was quiet for me. Its a little better with earphones but still on the quiet side. Maybe Archos did this for a reason as we all know loud music is one of the leading causes of hearing loss and maybe is a safety issue and not a issue with the hardware.
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| Headphones and Diamond 50 |
This can't be said for the rear speaker as that is capable of putting out loud levels of audio. The audio produced is loud and clear if lacking depth which to be honest is not surprising at all. Its perfectly capable of portraying audio from games, YouTube videos, general video and its not bad for music but nor is it great. To put it plainly it would be adequate for what you need day to day.
If you want a demo check out my YouTube review.
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| Rear speaker |
Summary
Now to wrap up this review. As a whole package this phone has really amazed me, its nicely designed, well built, has great screen, good performance, a nearly untouched UI, plenty of features and decent sound quality. The only thing that's a let down is the camera. Now like I said its more than capable of producing great shots but its too much work. I wanted to be able to put it in auto mode and let the camera do the work. If I wanted to do the work I'd use my EOS M, but with a phone you just want to be able to point and shoot and come out with consistent shots. I'm not asking for DSLR like shots just the ability to shoot decent shots to post online. Now sometimes it can deliver and other times it fails to.
But that wouldn't put me off this phone, its simply too good everywhere else to let a slightly ineffective auto mode put me off. And to be honest I wouldn't let it put you off either as this phone is still waiting for Lollipop which we know brought a raft full of improvements for the camera. And maybe that's all the camera needs, just a minor software tweak.
As for the video quality though I think that's more likely hardware than software, so if video recording is important this may not suit you.
But like I said the camera isn't enough to stop me liking this brilliant all round phone. At the end of it all I can easily recommend this phone for people looking for a great budget 1080p phone and with a price tag of only £169.99 (UK) its a damn impressive offering from Archos.
Thank you all for reading and have a great day.
Get yours here (UK) http://www.archos.com/gb/store/
Other countries (Availability may vary) http://www.archos.com/gb/change_country
Check out my YouTube review http://youtu.be/Ufw3_9YdgNc
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