OPPO Find 5 Review
by Vivek Gowri on May 29, 2013 6:55 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Qualcomm
- Mobile
- APQ8064
- OPPO Find 5
The Find 5 relies on Qualcomm’s Fusion 3 platform, which in this case is a combination of APQ8064 and MDM8215M for cellular and voice communication. We’re pretty familiar with the 28nm MDM9x15, after seeing it in basically all of the Krait handsets last year. The MDM8215 is also a 28nm baseband, with the primary difference being the lack of LTE capability in the DC-HSPA+ only MDM8215. That’s the primary ding against the Find 5 hardware, though for a phone that was designed for Asian markets (except Korea), this is unsurprising as LTE networks have yet to hit China and the coverage is still very limited in India. Also on board are the WTR1605 radio transceiver (with GPS, GLONASS, and BDS) and Qualcomm-Atheros’ WCN3660 802.11abgn dual-band 28nm WiFi chip.
Like most of the rest of the Find 5 internally, the cellular hardware is pretty similar to the Nexus 4. Other than MDM8215M in place of the LTE-capable MDM9215M, much of the list reads identically. The network band support is also very similar, with the international/North American model of the Find 5 supporting 850/900/1800/1900 MHz GSM/EDGE and 850/1700/1900/2100 MHz WCDMA. It’s interesting to note that the Find 5 doesn’t have pentaband WCDMA, with Band 8 (900MHz) missing on both the international as well as the Chinese domestic models. The primary hardware difference between the two is the presence of Band 4/AWS WCDMA in the international model, which as a T-Mobile user makes me happy (though almost the entirety of the Seattle area has T-Mobile PCS WCDMA coverage at this point).
No pretty speed graphs this time around, because I forgot to send the Speed Test results to my email before wiping the phone during one of the software updates and I didn’t want to run another 100 speed tests. Suffice to say though, performance was right where I’m used to in this area; T-Mobile’s DC-HSPA+ network is faster around here than it is in Tuscon, where Brian does a majority of his testing. The averages were right around 12Mbps down and 4Mbps up, with some expected variance due to environmental factors as well as quirks in T-Mobile signal strength in my area - the bottom two floors of my apartment building have terrible T-Mobile signal and always have (and the garage and elevator don’t get T-Mobile signal at all). The entirety of the Seattle area is consistently excellent, but my building specifically somehow is awful.
What is probably the most important thing to talk about with regards to the OPPO’s lack of LTE. The decision makes sense, as the largest regional market for this phone basically doesn’t have any LTE networks, but in terms of using it in the US where most devices have LTE these days, it’s a bit of a hard sell. If you use AT&T and live in an LTE-covered area, I’d recommend against. AT&T’s 16QAM HSDPA 14.4 network is not the greatest (Brian’s podcast rants about the lack of AT&T DC-HSPA+ are the stuff of legend) and network throughput absolutely pales in comparison to LTE. If you’re on T-Mobile, this isn’t a problem for now - DC-HSPA+ is pretty solidly quick and the LTE network is only just being rolled out. If you’re not in one of the 7 LTE regions, it’s not a bad idea, though it's worth noting that Seattle, San Francisco/Bay Area, and New York City, amongst other major metropolitan markets for T-Mobile, will likely get these networks sooner rather than later (and in Seattle particularly, we’ve seen the LTE lit up for a week or two earlier this year). So think pretty carefully about your choice of air interface and how important you think LTE capability is for you before picking the Find 5.
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VivekGowri - Friday, May 31, 2013 - link
Yeah okay, that was supposed to be polycarbonate, my apologies. It got missed among the other eight thousand words, Klug read over it twice before it posted too so we had enough internal editing, this just slipped through.Sertis - Thursday, May 30, 2013 - link
The button layout isn't too bad, having the power on the left side makes it less likely you'll turn off the device if you suddenly grip it tightly (if you're right handed, you'll apply much more pressure with your thumb than the other 4 fingers on the opposite side). Still, i'd rather have the button on the top. My (more agile) thumb can more easily pick and choose closely spaced buttons than my fingers so having buttons that won't "punish be by turning off the device if I hit the wrong one" on the right side is okay with me.Death666Angel - Thursday, May 30, 2013 - link
Wow, that's a lot of annoying software bugs. The cheap Chinese phone my wife has looks pretty good compared to that. Granted, it has and old dual core A9 SoC and only 720p (basically an SGS3 rip off), but it cost 165€. The Oppo Find 5 is currently listed for 466€ here (1 listing only). Not a good deal. If I don't want to deal with importing a cell phone (which one has to do to get the good deals on the Chinese stuff), I'd rather take an SGS3 for 330€ or spend up on the SGS4 for 550€ (HTC One is listed at 590€).Death666Angel - Friday, May 31, 2013 - link
Quote: "This is obviously less of a factor in Europe and Asia, where the prices are more equivalent"I can get the Nexus 4 for 299/349€ in the play store (+9€ shipping) here in Germany. That's about as pricey as the US variant, is it not (including the VAT thing)? :)
BeauCharles - Thursday, May 30, 2013 - link
Wow, strange that Oppo would get into this market. I own an Oppo DVD player and still use it regularly in this Blu-Ray era. Shame the phone doesn't live up the same level of performance (right now anyway) its DVD/Blu-Ray players do. Oppo is very good about firmware support with those and customer service in general - hopefully that'll be the case with the phonesmars2k - Friday, May 31, 2013 - link
Oppo may be unheard of in the phone sector but they have unheard of status in the home theater segment. They have completely re-written the book first with DVD playback and then with a series of giant killer BlueRay players. One player after another they have blown the competition out of the water in price/performance. They now make a universal player, BDP-105 whose performance cannot be beat without going into the stratosphere on cost. So much so that spending more is essentially pointless.If they pursue the phone market the way they went after DVD and BlueRay playback we will all soon be using Oppo phones.
Death666Angel - Friday, May 31, 2013 - link
The Oppo BDP-105 is going for 1340€ here in Germany. Isn't that stratosphere cost already? :P Seems like it integrates A/V receiver stuff as well. I don't like that. More hassle to upgrade. Oh well.tom5 - Saturday, June 8, 2013 - link
They recently started shipping this in Europe, unfortunately it doesnt support UMTS 900 MHz band that is widely used in Europe.But the biggest show stopper for me is the battery life - today this is the biggest problem in phones so the manufacturers must do everything to make battery life longer. This is where you experience matters, Oppo don't have this experience so we see the results: a phone that won't last you a day.
aranyak - Wednesday, December 2, 2015 - link
Oppo Find 5 is definitely one of the greatest creations of the company, however, Oppo recently made a announcement about Oppo Find 9 which i heard in http://www.techvicity.com/ .. well the phone is believed to be the flagship phone of the company in 2016 with 3 GB of RAM and 64 GB internal storage, that is something else man, really can't wait for it