How Indian Android Device Manufacturers are Fooling and Misleading You

Micromax Canvas 4, a mid-range smartphone is seeing hype and excitement comparable to the likes of multinational brands — perhaps for the first time for an Indian manufacturer. Promising specifications better than many high-end devices, it has led people into thinking that this company is offering much more value at much lesser price.

Which is wrong.

For a nation that has always been highly price-conscious, it’s very easy to mislead people by advertising the number of cores a phone or a tablet has.
Same goes for Lava, Karbonn, Intex, Spice and all other Indian manufacturers, which are having a dream run this year. From a meager handset market share of less than 3% in 2012, they now account for nearly 30% of it (source). This obviously could not have been possible without Android, which has been lately driving an explosion of budget smartphones and tablets.

Being an Android enthusiast for long, here are a few important tips from my side that you should keep in mind while you are looking for Android devices.

Unaware of how microprocessors work, the biggest misconception among the non tech-savvy crowd is that a device’s performance is measured by its number of CPU cores and the speed at which they’re clocked.
Thankfully, CPUs don’t work this way. A detailed explanation of their working is taught in colleges (I personally hate the subject which deals with this), but for the laymen — what actually matters is the architecture of the processor.
Think of CPU as a group of engineers working on some project. Each worker is a separate core. The amount of work done by the group does not depend on the quantity of the engineers, but on their skills as well as their speeds. A group of two highly skilled engineers can finish their assigned project faster than a group of four less skilled engineers working on the same project.

In a similar fashion, it’s totally possible for a dual-core or single-core CPU X to outperform a quad-core CPU Y. The single-core Lava X1000 might be the best example for this, which performs 10% better on the quadrant benchmark test.
Taking advantage of this unintelligence, manufacturers lure customers by releasing multi-core phones of mediocre architecture at 1/4th the price of high-end phones having the same number of cores. This leads people into believing that they’re providing the same level of performance at comparatively dirt-cheap rates.

+1 to that.

These companies are still growing because you don't have any choice in sub 15k android phones from reputed manufacturer. And all these local companies exist there only.

you need to look at the chipset and apps
>all intel chipsets will not support all games but you can easily go for cortex a9 and so on
>the reason samsung and other brands are expensive is because they use the latest chipsets and spend a lot of money on testing.
Indian brands get their phone chipsets made by another company/s like mediatek and get the phones manufactured and designed by 3rd party companys. later get all of them assembled in china and release them in India. Its a cheap deal.

Gollum said:
you need to look at the chipset and apps
>all intel chipsets will not support all games but you can easily go for cortex a9 and so on
>the reason samsung and other brands are expensive is because they use the latest chipsets and spend a lot of money on testing.
Indian brands get their phone chipsets made by another company/s like mediatek and get the phones manufactured and designed by 3rd party companys. later get all of them assembled in china and release them in India. Its a cheap deal.

If by Samsung, you mean cortex a5 based proccys, then you are gravely mistaken.. (in 15k price segment)
Id say sony is a much better example

I too read the article this morning and dropped the idea of cheap quadcore android

Nice article !! ty for sharing.

Gollum said:
you need to look at the chipset and apps
>all intel chipsets will not support all games but you can easily go for cortex a9 and so on
>the reason samsung and other brands are expensive is because they use the latest chipsets and spend a lot of money on testing.
Indian brands get their phone chipsets made by another company/s like mediatek and get the phones manufactured and designed by 3rd party companys. later get all of them assembled in china and release them in India. Its a cheap deal.

Totally Agreed on that

$Right on the face of Karbonn, Celkon, Spice, Lava(iris) & Micromax.

Yeah. But the article is 100% right.

now all cheap android phones should pre-install Antutu/Quandrant benchmark app & display its score in showrooms to customers to get real-world performance & to prevent fooling with cores :-D

Nerevarine said:
If by Samsung, you mean cortex a5 based proccys, then you are gravely mistaken.. (in 15k price segment)
Id say sony is a much better example

+1 ...

Now these local brands will soon issue statements to save their a$$e$ like "We're innocent, iss mein Padosi Mulk ka Chopsticks hai"

For a layman, "the more the merrier". So, unless they're informed about the specifications & functionalities (as like the shared URL in the first post), they will still think Quad-core's (irrespective of the brand) are the best.

It maybe a offtopic, but still some people compare 1GB Android mobile to a 512MB WP, and say WP will lag because of low RAM..

J

Reputed brands should really step up their game in the mid-range. There used to be so many good phones in the 10-20k range. Nowadays there are hardly one or two good ones. That too if we are lucky.

I think indian brands got lucky they found Android.
Remember their earlier phones had JAVA based os.

The mobile phone business is now like assemble PCs ones. Get the hardware, port Android (which is pretty easy now a days) flash it and there u go... you got full feature pack phone. Android take cares of everything u need.

While u will notice diff in local branded phones and reputed brand phone when u check camera quality of both phones (just one ex.) reputed bands have done more software work than local ones.
Also local brands use low quality h/w (can't say 100% right). i have seen many local brand phones getting dead in a year.
(I also read that local/Chinese brand phone use LCD panels which are rejected by other reputed brand during manufacturing due to quality. I can't confirm on this. read on forum )

The funny thing is, Digit Mag themselves seem to promote this ..
See this article Lemon Aspire A4 - Build & Design Mobiles & PDAs Online Videos
a 5 star rating.. come on -_-

Very well said.
Unfortunately it's not good to argue on this topic with Idiots.They'll not listen to us and will not understand why these crap phones s**k big time..

krishnandu.sarkar said:
How Indian Android Device Manufacturers are Fooling and Misleading You

Gearbox said:
For a layman, "the more the merrier". So, unless they're informed about the specifications & functionalities (as like the shared URL in the first post), they will still think Quad-core's (irrespective of the brand) are the best.

It maybe a offtopic, but still some people compare 1GB Android mobile to a 512MB WP, and say WP will lag because of low RAM..

Dumb will always stay Dumb , no matter how much you brief the'm with specs and all tech. things.

It's not just digit, most of other indian magazines, TV shows review it. Recommend it. Don't even bothering abt hows their after sale service.

I really want to say thanks to the Author , for posting something like this finally. Man , I am fed up with non-techie people hanging around me with those pieces of chinese crap telling me how poor my Atrix 4G is.... :gawd:

Who cares. What matters is whether it performs well or not. My Lava 501 retails for 7k and plays almost all games flawlessly except graphically demanding games. Much better than the crappy Xperia E my friend has which costs 2k extra.

srkmish said:
Who cares. What matters is whether it performs well or not. My Lava 501 retails for 7k and plays almost all games flawlessly except graphically demanding games. Much better than the crappy Xperia E my friend has which costs 2k extra.

FYI , a lot of people care.And I am one of those.

Everybody has got different requirements and budget, so different options. No one has got the right to bash one's choice.
And if the mighty apple can do false marketing, then why can't our own companies? At least they're providing users their dream device which was impossible for them at a point of them. Of course, with it, comes some negatives, but c'mon, you can't get everything right?

^Agree with you ..
Also take into consideration that the phone may be bad but the chipset is capable FOR THE MONEY..
You guys seriously need to take that into consideration.. I have mentioned this in another thread, mediateks are a good alternative to qualcomm but it's the manufacturer that must implement the build quality and optimisations..

And when you get a fault in the device ( which happens more often in those cheap mediocre, middle-class piece of phones.) , then we get all kind of posts Crying "Don't buy MMX,Lava,etc,etc.They are crap , they don't have A.S.S. , they are so and so.....and all kind of things..."
If you buy one of these and they fail at it , should love to live with the fact.Stop crying for things you didn't paid for.

TBH , there's still a line between really cheap piece of hardware and cheap bulk production (made in china).
All I gotta say is that these cheap droids are forcing the brand companies to reduce the production cost so as to stick to the competition and thus they are also forced to follow the same route.

Anyways , the article focuses mainly on the false marketing practices. And if someone thinks Apple does false marketing then they should also know that even Apple get bashed for it on the net.

P

I was searching for the Canvas 4 in the market recently to have it but everyone is criticizing it like hell here :-(

:'(
Now i'm all messed up whether to buy it or not? This was the only choice left to me at this price range.
Anyone's there to help me on that? You say performance won't be up to the mark and all. I seriously was looking for some good brands than micromax but did not got any other option at this price range?
I'm now thinking to go on Nokia Lumia 720?
Would that be an Alternative for Android?

prateek said:
I was searching for the Canvas 4 in the market recently to have it but everyone is criticizing it like hell here :'(
Now i'm all messed up whether to buy it or not? This was the only choice left to me at this price range.
Anyone's there to help me on that? You say performance won't be up to the mark and all. I seriously was looking for some good brands than micromax but did not got any other option at this price range?
I'm now thinking to go on Nokia Lumia 720?
Would that be an Alternative for Android?

Your money, your choice.
Try Windows phone. If you like it, buy it.

One size doesn't fit all.

These cheap companies give VFM phones. Take Xolo Q700/800, both are just awesome for its price(9k n 10k). 1GB Ram n A7 quad core......much better than other phones in that range. Camera isn't good but its good for its price nowadays. Better or atleast comparable to phones from reputed companies.

I once checked camera quality of Canvas 2, i must say, it was good, i compared it with S2, i think it was as good or even better than Xperia U(my friend has it). For a 10k phone, that's good.

First thing these indian manufacturers need to do is improve their aftersales service support.Without a good aftersales service they won't get too far.Not all of us want good specs at low price brand trust is also important.

M

Rishi. said:
And when you get a fault in the device ( which happens more often in those cheap mediocre, middle-class piece of phones.) , then we get all kind of posts Crying "Don't buy MMX,Lava,etc,etc.They are crap , they don't have A.S.S. , they are so and so.....and all kind of things..."
If you buy one of these and they fail at it , should love to live with the fact.Stop crying for things you didn't paid for.

TBH , there's still a line between really cheap piece of hardware and cheap bulk production (made in china).
All I gotta say is that these cheap droids are forcing the brand companies to reduce the production cost so as to stick to the competition and thus they are also forced to follow the same route.

Anyways , the article focuses mainly on the false marketing practices. And if someone thinks Apple does false marketing then they should also know that even Apple get bashed for it on the net.

A.S.S of Samsung and Sony too is not great My brother's Galaxy Y is having display problems and service center is asking 2k for fixing it which is pretty lame considering a new galaxy Y is available for 5k.
Only exception is Nokia who provides very good services.
Even these companies don't have good phones within 10k range crappy A5 dual core or sometime even A5 single core take example of Xperia E now these small companies are providing very good options within 10k price range for example Xolo Q700,Q800,Q1000 and play both build quality and internals are better than Xperia E.
Due to steep completion for these companies Sony is starting to use meditek Chipsets And some good phones are going to released from their stable.

mohit9206 said:
First thing these indian manufacturers need to do is improve their aftersales service support.Without a good aftersales service they won't get too far.Not all of us want good specs at low price brand trust is also important.

Indian Manufacturers?
These local companies just rebadge & sell chinese phones!

M

prateek said:
I was searching for the Canvas 4 in the market recently to have it but everyone is criticizing it like hell here :'(
Now i'm all messed up whether to buy it or not? This was the only choice left to me at this price range.
Anyone's there to help me on that? You say performance won't be up to the mark and all. I seriously was looking for some good brands than micromax but did not got any other option at this price range?
I'm now thinking to go on Nokia Lumia 720?
Would that be an Alternative for Android?

Get a Xolo Q700 for 8.5k and don't be sorry for your decision because its lot better than phones from Sony,Samsung within this price range.
Don't give priority to brands buy what ever is value for money. I got Sony Tipo about a year ago for 10k and I am now regretting upon my decision crappy screen resolution, Single core A7 processor which even can't play a 720p videos , very bad camera etc.

Empirial said:
Indian Manufacturers?
These local companies just rebadge & sell chinese phones!

Yes, but no companies is manufacturing everything themselves . Even apple I phones are made by Foxconn. Even Nokia chargers are made in china.
These small Indian companies helps our country economically that's a good thing I agree on you that these companies should improve A.S.S.

krishnandu.sarkar said:
How Indian Android Device Manufacturers are Fooling and Misleading You

My cousin wanted to buy a Samsung Galaxy S3, an upgrade from his Galaxy S2. All that teenager does is use whatsapp and a few simple games, and very few pictures if any. I forced him to buy a Karbonn S5 Titanium. He is happy with the performance. Most people are like that... Phones are for bragging rights. Actual uses are few. He can happily show his Quad-core phone with 5" screen and 8 MP camera to his friends. I saved his father some money...

Yes, its a processor core race, like it was megapixel race in cameras... 95% of the people don't go into the details they won't understand.

But the biggest cheat are companies like Samsung, who began this multicore race and megapixel race. Samsung has devices like Galaxy Core and Quattro which have crappy A5 processors and Adreno 203 GPU which is a piece of sh*t. Who can blame Indian manufacturers when they do better than Samsung. A lot of Indian manufacturers use Mediatech A7 cores with PowerGR 531 GPU, at a lot more affordable costs than Samsung can.

My hope is our Indian/Chinese manufacturers will mature overtime, and improve quality the overall quality of devices. Its already happening. Micromax/Karbonn/Intex/Ceylon/Byond/iBall/etc have improved a lot in built quality compared to last year. This improvement will continue... Competition is good for the customer.

It's service only, most phones are made in china, some sammy and nokia ones in india. They all source components from the same group of companies. RAM will be samsung or Toshiba. Glass will be Corning or Asahi on mmx, karbonn, sony and apple. As rightly pointed out oem's design is superficial - connectors, buttons, screws. not gpu, cpu, touch screen controller, cameras... All those are licensed from third parties, and they are sourced from the same handful of companies in all phones.

T

Gearbox said:
It maybe a offtopic, but still some people compare 1GB Android mobile to a 512MB WP, and say WP will lag because of low RAM..

Yeah, I was one of them when I was reading the specs of Lumia 510 which has 256MB RAM. I thought , What the hell! This will not even play music :lol:

but after reading the differences between WP & Android, my mind was changed.

I think the article is misleading. Indian brands have made it possible to own a 5" smartphone within 10k range. That speaks a lot. Yes, people will then complain about the A.S.S. like all hell's broken loose but then again they have a right to ask questions, isn't it? Did anywhere the companies mention we are going to provide sh!t A.S.S.? No, so don't take away the rights of the customer.
My Samsung Galaxy Y S5360 was damaged badly after it was accidentally spilled onto soup

lol: I know). I was so fed up with the phone (would hang even if I installed whatsapp, tried all the tricks in the book Links2SD n whatnot) that I thought this is a good chance to ruin the phone for good & get a new one

twisted

. So, I cleaned it up with Water & made sure it cleaned every corner of the device

. Samsung said it would take Rs. 2850 to repair which would include replacing the motherboard. I dumped it instead :lol:

.

In my opinion the service offered by a product you purchase is more important than the product itself.That is why internationally Samsung,Sony ,Htc,etc are more popular than say Huwaei,Alcatel,etc even they are much more expensive.Even in India which is a very price conscious market people want good ASS that is why in India Samsung and Nokia are still number 1 and 2.Just because MMx,Lava,Karbonn offer good specs at low prices does not excuse their poor ASS.Customer satisfaction is most important which these companies have failed to achieve.I bought MMx phone last year and had network problem within 3 months gave it for service took 2 weeks to get it repaired and that too only partially but thankfully the phone is still working well for one and half years now.My next phone will be either Samsung or Nokia.

mohit9206 said:
In my opinion the service offered by a product you purchase is more important than the product itself.That is why internationally Samsung,Sony ,Htc,etc are more popular than say Huwaei,Alcatel,etc even they are much more expensive.Even in India which is a very price conscious market people want good ASS that is why in India Samsung and Nokia are still number 1 and 2.Just because MMx,Lava,Karbonn offer good specs at low prices does not excuse their poor ASS.Customer satisfaction is most important which these companies have failed to achieve.I bought MMx phone last year and had network problem within 3 months gave it for service took 2 weeks to get it repaired and that too only partially but thankfully the phone is still working well for one and half years now.My next phone will be either Samsung or Nokia.

And what makes you say that samsung will have better service than Micromax?. My Friend's galaxy y is lying for 2 months now after being dead at service centre.

AndroidFan said:
My cousin wanted to buy a Samsung Galaxy S3, an upgrade from his Galaxy S2. All that teenager does is use whatsapp and a few simple games, and very few pictures if any. I forced him to buy a Karbonn S5 Titanium. He is happy with the performance. Most people are like that... Phones are for bragging rights. Actual uses are few. He can happily show his Quad-core phone with 5" screen and 8 MP camera to his friends. I saved his father some money...

Yes, its a processor core race, like it was megapixel race in cameras... 95% of the people don't go into the details they won't understand.

But the biggest cheat are companies like Samsung, who began this multicore race and megapixel race. Samsung has devices like Galaxy Core and Quattro which have crappy A5 processors and Adreno 203 GPU which is a piece of sh*t. Who can blame Indian manufacturers when they do better than Samsung. A lot of Indian manufacturers use Mediatech A7 cores with PowerGR 531 GPU, at a lot more affordable costs than Samsung can.

My hope is our Indian/Chinese manufacturers will mature overtime, and improve quality the overall quality of devices. Its already happening. Micromax/Karbonn/Intex/Ceylon/Byond/iBall/etc have improved a lot in built quality compared to last year. This improvement will continue... Competition is good for the customer.

Fantastic point man. Some of my friends with Nexus 4 and Galaxy s4 , all they do is listen to some music and chat on watsapp. It has now become a style statement and gives great bragging rights. OF course. i would have purchased it if i had that kind of cash to spend on luxury. But being a middle class indian, i have my priorities and happy with my Lava 501 which i actually use to play games

G

I also feel the same.. you get what you pay

I have galaxy s2 and my father recently got a Zen 701HD.

*Samsung GS2(Costs 25k now) has >> 1.2Ghz dual core ARM Cortex A9
701HD(Costed 12k) has >>1.2GHZ quad-core MediaTek MT6589 Cortex A7

Now when the 701HD was new, it seemed faster than my Galaxy s2.
But soon about 3months now, it has become slow ..even slower than s2.

*Not sure why its happening , i think our moderator Cilus
should pour some gyan on cpu arch.

*the software in these local phones are not upto mark.They use CM10
customized and also remove few features of standard code.
As rightly said has poor support in community.

*+Charger sucks big time.They have made usb cable
and charger into same thing.Like xperia.Sucks in length.

Its better to have branded phone anyday

Agreed with the article, added to my sig.

W

Made in China, but 100% Indian

These companies are now moving into the mid to high-end segments (price range of Rs 14,000 – Rs 20,000) and as such they need better technologies. For that, they either need to own the technology or have the patents in place.

home-grown vendor Lava has applied for two patents in India. “Our patents pertain to software related with audio and typing (in-built keyboards). It will take sometime for these patents to be cleared,” S N Rai, co-founder and director, Lava Mobiles, said.

Micromax, Lava, Intex and most of the other vendors have their own design studios. While the handsets are manufactured in China, the so-called research and development is being carried out in India. At the most Indian vendors can explore possibilities of having assembling units here in the country.

“None of the important elements of a mobile phone are manufactured in India. We do not have those facilities,” he said adding: “In short Indian handsets are actually not at all Indian. They are all made in China.”

In the meanwhile MMX co-owner got arrested! :wink: