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MLAIS MX59 Smartphone MTK6589T 2GB 32GB 5.0 Inch IPS FHD Screen US $132.99 Delivered @ Pandawill

190

It's very cheap for the specs. If I haven't bought a mobile phone recently I will give this a go.

From the website:

Basic Information
Model MX59
Band 2G: GSM 850/900/1800/1900MHz
3G: WCDMA 850/2100MHz
Sim Card Dual SIM Card Dual Standby(one micro-sim card)
Service Provide Unlocked
Style Bar
Color Golden
Shell Material Plastic
 
System
OS Android 4.2.1
CPU MTK6589T, Cortex A7 quad core, 1.5GHz; GPU: PowerVR SGX 544MP
ROM 32GB
RAM 2GB
 
Screen
Display Size 5.0 Inch
Type IPS, capacitive screen
Resolution 1920 x 1080 pixels, FHD
 
Support Format
Ringtones Type Polyphonic/MP3
Audio File Format MP3/WAV/AMR/AWB
Video File Format 3GP/MPEG4
Image File Format JPEG/BMP/GIF/PNG/GIF
E-book Format TXT/CHM/DOC/HTML
FM Radio Yes, earphone needed
Earphone Port 3.5mm
Card Extend Yes, support TF card up to 16GB
 
Data Transfer & Connectivity
Data transfer USB/Bluetooth
Mobile internet WAP/WiFi

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PandaWill
PandaWill

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        • let me know how it goes, i did a quick netstat on mine and it looks to be normal no funny traffic I could see, also ran a few scans with the anti malware apps that you can get from the play store.

    • Battery life review:

      Got about 14 hours of usage before battery level dropped to 10%. of this 14 hours the screen was on for 3 hours.

      Screen brightness is also set to auto.

      17% power usage was from the wifi, it showed it was on for 7 hours. I have set the wifi to turn off when the phones on standby. So something is not right with the wifi. it should have been on for the similar time as the screen.

      Testing it again today, but with wifi switched off to see if there is any improvements.

      but overall, can't really complain as the 1080p screen is very bright and vibrant and its something im willing to live with. I can always drop the screen brightness to its lowest to get an extra 2-3 hours battery but it kind of defeats the purpose of having such a nice screen.

  • Hi,

    I bought the same phone from Pandawill and I am having the exact same camera issues like CyberGenesis and others.

    Just wanted to know if there is any way to make the camera work (flashing new ROM or whatever).

    Sending things back and forth to China takes an eternity and is not exactly cheap.

    Thanks for your feedback!

    Renard01

    • any way to make the camera work (flashing new ROM or whatever).

      Not that I could find. Using the inbuilt pre-OS hardware diagnostics I was able to test the the camera. I'm not 100% on this, but if it doesn't work there then no amount of ROM flashing will fix it ie it is faulty hardware. I'll be sending mine back to China.

      I think under law they should cover the cost of return postage?

      http://www.consumerlaw.gov.au/content/the_acl/downloads/cons… (page 23)

      • They are from China, Australia law does not apply, your bought from another country, cheaply you took the risk…hence why you pay more in australia, you have some protection when things go wrong.

        that said if they are a good company they will cover return shipping.

  • Hi,

    thanks, Cybergenesys!

    Could you please provide me with a link which explains how to use the HW diagnostics? Is it this MobileUncle app?

    I have bought a couple of devices from them. Defective devices need to be returned to China at the customer's cost and it takes ages to get the repaired device. The good news is that they actually DO repair it…

    regards,
    Alexander

    • I mentioned it previously

      https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/146290#comment-2055574

      It is not an app. When turning on the device hold down power and vol+ or vol- (I can't remember which one). The diagnostics are note very useful since they are all in Chinese I was able to muddle my way through it using Google translate.

  • mine still hasn't arrived :( stupid pandawill! will wait a month then open a paypal dispute.

    • did you try contacting them? they were pretty accurate in telling me when my phone gets shipped out as they did not have stock when i ordered, had to wait almost 3 weeks before they had stock. Delivery was quick, took about a week and a half with singapore post.

      • package apparently at home today, could be this or an airmouse.

        • Airmouse that I ordered more than a week later and apparently shipped out a week later…got here first…I got it shipped via TNT… Would have thought it should be here..

  • well after a week using it here is an update.

    the bad news:
    GPS does not work, it worked once and that was the only time it ever worked, tried all the solutions i found from googling. Could not get the damn thing to work.

    the good news:
    * battery life is still good, has goten better now after i started using lux to manage the screen brightness
    * everything else still works, phone is still very fast, wifi very good, camera still works

    so now im deciding if i can live without the GPS or send it back for RMA.

  • Another update. I flashed the phone with miui v5 ROM and now I get almost 2 full days battery life!

    Highly recommend changing to miui. So much better than the ROM it came with.

    • Thanks i wanted to flash as i dont trust the firmware on there, this seems to be one step up…now all i gotta do is set up a seperate network to test hardware… although that said im not going to be able to test 3g just wifi…and if they were smart spyware would go via 3g when other data is being sent out…

      Is your gps better with the firmware?

      • Did u have Any instructions on how to flash it with that….never done it before?

        • typically put the zip file on an SD card, after inserting the SD while the phone is still off, press vol+ and Power on button until you see the mlais logo, then install from SD card… though im having a little bit of an issue with my recovery so may need to reflash it, let me know how you go, and if it has a custom recovery program or if you also have issues…

          I think mine has issues cause I tried to install CWM… and change some settings in there.

        • ended up re flashing my recovery -
          with this one:
          http://www.needrom.com/mobile/mlais-mx59/
          u/p justdownload

          downloaded the phone drivers from here:
          http://www.pandawillforum.com/showthread.php?25922-ROM-ROM-f…

          • note I only downloaded the recovery even though it gave me a warning and unchecked everything else…

          had issues with the flash tool… fixed it by following this:
          http://mychinesephone.com/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=197
          got my recovery working, then installed this one:
          http://www.needrom.com/mobile/mlais-mx59-miui-v5/
          from the zip file on the SD card… I did however have to feel my way though the new recovery which was in Chinese…

          will now try install CWM over the default recovery…

          for anyone wondering the second item on the main menu of the above recovery that said zip obviously is used to install the zip (then click the first item to select the zip from the sd card)
          the one below that formats you data partitions… (which you need to do after a flash)

          although I cant see how to access the menu for this rom… (or to get the the playstore…)it should include them "Gapps include – Rooted"
          and i cant for the life of me get the keyboard up..? - Im REALLY not liking this ROM!

          pretty sure i'll just go back to the new one posted today on the pandawill site if its rooted.

      • Nope GPS still doesn't work. It can see the satellites but can. get a lock on any of the satellites. So the gps chip is definitely faulty.

        Wisc I installed my miui ROM from needrom and it works flawlessly. Had to replace the launcher as it has issues with the screens touch sensitivity.

        Also WiFi and 3g seems to work a lot faster with miui

  • +1

    Bargrin after searching around i found this modified version of cwm that worked. Word of caution its not 100% stable and can crash half way through

    Run a backup using the tool if it doesn't crash continue with wipe/zip install.

    Again use at your own risk

    http://droidchina.com/guides/how-to-install-cwm-to-any-mtk-d…

    Wisc don't bother with the mlais ROM. Its identical to the one you get from pandawil but with even more bloatware.

    Also Wisc you have to sideload google play with miui it already has google services framework

    • your right it crashes like a mofo… looks like mine is going back anyways as the mic doesn't appear to work :(
      keyboard wasn't working on the rom above, and I also cant seem to get a lock…

      there is a version 2.4 as well which didn't seem much better…

      • +1

        Probably explains why it is so much cheaper than all the other Chinese branded phones with 1080p screens. The soc mediatek chips they use all have some sort of issue. They are either deliberately using chips that didnt not pass quality control with other vendors or they have horrendous quality control.

        Such a shame if they have better quality control on the hardware these are very good phones as the android OS is very mature and you can get a very good user experience

  • well I have fixed the GPS issue!!

    it is the EPO files, the epo files would not download from the GPS-Epo settings menu since the download location of the mediatek GPS has changed to:
    http://epodownload.mediatek.com/EPO.DAT
    http://epodownload.mediatek.com/EPO.MD5

    i was using the mediatek epo gps fix app to download the epo files but looks like the app was not downloading the correct files.

    so i decided to try manually downloading the epo files from the above links, you need both files, save to your /data/misc folder.

    now my gps will get a lock in about 3 mins in doors, havent test it outdoors but at least it works now.

    just have to find out an easier way to update the epo files as it needs to be updated monthly.

    • This app sounds like it should take care of that for you.

      • Unfortunately that app doesn't as for some reason it needs the epo.md5 file as well and the app only copies the epo.dat.

        I wil make an app that can do it properly with schedules so it runs automatically on a daily basis.

        • hmm, nice, just a shame that its going to require a data connection… do the other agprs download from the net too? how do they work?

    • http://www.chinaphonearena.com/forum/Thread-Question-EPO-Dow…

      just keep trying to download…worked for me after the third try. odd that it takes so long, I also set it to download once a day. (you only need it once every 30 days.)

  • Now find a way to fix the mic!!!

    • "Dear customer,

      Good day, Thanks for your information,we have seen that,could you pls sent it to your local shop to test?
      any repairing cost, pls advise us in advance,if the cost is proper, we will bear it
      otherwise we will give you the RMA code and returned address to send it back for warranty
      but the shipping fee you should cover,can you accept that ? thanks for your support to pandawill,have a nice day !
      Best Regards
      Jennifer"

      yeah wont be using pandawill in the near future, the customer service is appalling.

      I guess this is pretty standard, but still pretty disappointing…i guess when something appears to be too good to be true it usually is.
      given most places will want to charge you to provide a quote if you don't go though with it and if they can fix it minimum would be a couple hundred bux, i cant see it being feasible to get it repaired.

      given the cost to ship it back, (approx 20 bux from previous experiences). it really is starting to bump the price up where it would have been better to get a standard off the shelf Australian phone…

      if only that moto 4G was available in that ebay deal BEFORE i committed to buying this crappy phone!

      • +1

        so P'd off with this response, I thought I'd crack it open on the off chance of a dry joint or dodgy mic…

        lo and behold a loose wire… few minutes with the soldering iron and all good, although that said I'm recording the TV (2 meters) and can hardly hear it, but can hear talking close up no problems, I have played around with Mobileuncle MTK Tools might have to see if it resets to default if I reflash the ROM…

        also using "z device test" (-see awesome app) got a GPS lock.

        now all I need to do is pick a decent fast ROM… de bloat it, load an awesome launcher and give it to the wife…

        • Awesome news interesting to hear that they still use wires to connect these parts I would think they have gone with single PCB and all parts are soldered directly onto the board.

        • @r33tom:
          yeah, I thought they would have too… basically its just this one:
          http://www.moretels.com/5microphone-replace-parts-for-all-mt…

          while I had it opened I also noticed one of the antennas was unplugged, though that could have been cause I knocked it off in an attempt to get the phone open… just interesting to note.

          ended up putting this ROM on: (as I think it may be the latest one, the one on needrom lists as version 1.0 - however there have been multiple updates)
          http://www.pandawillforum.com/showthread.php?25922-ROM-ROM-f…
          then did an OTA update to MLAIS OS 2.0.1 - I was pretty impressed there was an OTA update! (just wish they would release 4.4, but I know that wont happen)

          interesting to note quadrant advanced scored the phone 5868 (second run) my Nexus 5 got 9116(second run) although I have seen it go much higher with subsequent runs…
          so for a phone 1/3 of the price its scoring about 2/3rds of the score… add to that I think the screen on the Mlais is nicer than the nexus 5… (both 1080P screens) - so pretty happy with this buy.

          I've loaded on the kitkat launcher (with google now) when I open the app draw the first time I scroll through there is a .25/.5 second noticeable delay - however when I scroll back though its gone… no major drama though…
          and the only other minor issue is that kitkat gallery app has the direct link to the autobackup file, with earlier versions of android you need to use the photos app…again no major drama.

          GPS is still taking a while to lock…but I can see it is locking, will be interested to see what you come up with… also don't forget to add a feature wifi only or wiFi/3G if you make a script/app :D

        • +1

          @wisc:

          give this rom a try if you decided to not use the stock rom:
          http://www.anzhuo365.com/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=641406…

          it is meant to be based on jelly bean 4.3 instead of 4.2.1, 4.2.2

          i am pretty impressed with the miui rom so far, the simple UI is deceiving as it is loaded with features and is quite a steep learning curve compare to stock JB.

        • @r33tom: does it have an app draw? Is the recovery in English? Bit late now anyways, wife has the phone and is now using it…. Pretty awesome, day of use, still had 64% battery free.

        • @wisc:
          yeah the battery life is surprisingly very good if you take into account the screen as that is what chews up all the battery.

    • http://iists.it/saturs/how-fix-low-mic-volume-issue-cubot-gt…

      interesting thread about the mediatek chips…

      doubt it will help with my mic issue but worth a shot…

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