At the IFA 2015, Lenovo had announced two new Vibe branded smartphones with a focus on high capacity batteries. The Vibe P1m is the budget device and was announced a couple of weeks back in India. The phone comes with 5.0inch HD display and is powered by 64-bit MediaTek MT6735P 1.0GHz Quad-Core with 2GB RAM and 16GB internal storage. The phone comes with a 4000mAh battery which is one of the highlights of the device.
Here is the detailed review of Lenovo Vibe P1m.
Related Reading: Lenovo Vibe P1m Unboxing
Design and Build:
Design is one of the least considered aspects for a smartphone in the budget segment and almost all the budget phones looks boring. Lenovo Vibe P1m is a fairly decent looking smartphone and the build quality is also decent. Lenovo hasn’t done anything extraordinary with the design elements and the front panel looks similar to the A6000. The sides of the device has been given a faux metallic finish on top of plastic material. The rear panel also has decent quality, but the camera and flash unit is mounted on top of a small metal sheet. There is also Vibe branding along with Lenovo logo.
The power and volume keys are on the right side and the 3.5 mm audio port and micro USB charging slots are placed on the top panel. The speaker is located at the bottom while the left side houses a dedicated switch to turn on power saving mode. The three capacitive touch buttons on the front panel are backlit. While the rear panel is removable, the battery is a fixed one.
Overall, we would say Lenovo Vibe P1m has a decent and utilitarian design and feels good in hands.
The box packing also comes with a rear protective cover which is also quite good in terms of quality.
Display:
The Lenovo Vibe P1m comes with a 5 inch HD IPS display (1280 X 720p) and the display quality is quite good. But similar to other budget phones from Lenovo, there is no added protection for the display (like Corning Gorilla Glass) and you need to be careful using the display. The colors look quite punchy and the text is sharp as well. The touch response is decent although, in the first few days of usage, you might find the touch response a bit sticky and also you end up cleaning the display for smudges quite often. The auto brightness is also an issue with the brightness levels getting low at times.
Overall, for the budget smartphone, the P1m has a decent display.
Software:
Lenovo Vibe P1m runs on Android 5.1 Lollipop with the company’s custom Vibe UI. The Vibe UI on the P1m is different from what you see on high-end devices like Vibe Shot. It comes with multiple home screens devoid of an app launcher and a custom notification center with most of the quick toggles included. The toggles cannot be edited or rearranged. The icons look much more polished that what we saw on Lenovo’s other budget devices like A6000 and A6000 Plus.
The settings panel is also a custom one and does not have any resemblance to stock Android. There are some added features for the home screen including shake to rearrange icons, transition effects and more. You also have a theme app which offers few themes to customize the look and feel. But you do not get the option to choose the lock screen style or multi-tasking method like other Vibe phones.
Vibe P1m ships with lots of pre-installed apps including Twitter, Facebook, ShareIt and few other tools from the company.
Performance:
Lenovo Vibe P1m comes with 1.0 Ghz Mediatek Quad core MT6735P processor with Mali 720GPU and uses 2GB of RAM. While this is a budget phone, the performance was pretty good. The performance of the device as a daily driver was quite good with no lags or issues. Even when running multiple apps (tested more than 15 apps) in the background, there was hardly any issue with performance.
The gaming experience of the device was fairly good with most of the games performing very well with hardly any lag or issues. The device did not heat up while gaming and the maximum temperature during gaming was very less compared to most other smartphones. It is advisable to run heavy games in medium graphic settings to get the best results.
The phone comes with 16GB internal storage and around 11.5GB is available to the user. You can expand the storage via micro SD card and also install apps on the SD card. The call quality of the phone was decent and the speaker output was also loud enough for music lovers, but sadly this misses the Dolby Atmos feature found on A7000. There is dual SIM card support along with 4G LTE on the device.
The phone also comes with splash-proof, nano-coating technology protects the phone from everyday splashes and spills. The hydrophobic layer ensures superior liquid repellency, leaving no weak points to attract moisture and corrosion. The also support USB OTG.
Camera:
Lenovo Vibe P1m packs an 8MP rear camera with LED flash and 5MP front camera for selfies and videos. While most of the budget phones from Lenovo lacked good cameras, the Vibe P1m seems to have improved in this aspect. The camera interface is similar to what we saw on K3 Note and comes with all the bells and whistles you expect on a budget camera. You can take photos in 16:9 or 4:3 aspect ratio, but the video recording is limited to 720p and 30 minutes.
Unlike other Lenovo phones, there isn’t over-sharpening issue on the Vibe P1m. Daylight shots have good colors and decent clarity for a budget phone. While the contrast ratio seems to be slightly on the higher side, it still produces some good shots. The close up photos also have come good, but the issue is with the autofocus which takes quite a bit to get the focus and can be tricky for quick captures. On the whole, Lenovo has improved the camera when compared to A6000 and A7000. The front 5MP camera also produces decent selfies. Here are some of the samples taken with the phone.
Battery Life:
Battery is key USP of the device and the phone packs a massive 4000mAh battery. While a lot of budget phones have low battery capacity, Lenovo wants to tap the budget segment with a powerful phone with great battery life. The phone comes with great battery life and you can easily get more than 1.5 days with moderate usage which is pretty good for a budget smartphone.
Vibe P1M comes with a battery saver mode that can be toggled using the slider on the left side. The battery saver mode puts the phone into a lite mode where only essential apps work.
Verdict:
Priced at Rs 7,999 and available exclusively on Flipkart, the Lenovo Vibe P1m is an all round budget device with decent design and build, great performance, decent camera and mammoth battery life.
Vibe P1M is not without its flaws, the display could have been better and so is the camera, but in the highly competitive budget segment, the phone offers great value for money in almost all aspects. Vibe P1m is a well packaged offering below Rs 10,000 and we definitely suggest this device if you are looking for an all round performing device.
