Ulefone Armor 2
- ?
- Anonymous
- n67
- 30 Sep 2022
The low light video performance is surprisingly good due to variable frame rate. Normally, it films at 30 frames per second, but in low light, the frame rate drops to 10 frames per second to prolong the exposure time per frame, which triples the brightness! That's clever!
It beat many more expensive phones in low light video because those only had constant frame rate at 30fps.
- ?
- Anonymous
- n67
- 17 Sep 2022
After lots of experience with Samsung phones, here are some observations on the camera of the UleFone Armor 2:
While the camera unfortunately produces somewhat noisy images, even at daylight, at least it launches quite fast and has a low shutter lag. Sometimes, oddly, it has a lag of a few seconds until launched, possibly due to interference from a background process, but it launches quickly most of the times, say 19 out of 20 times.
The dynamic range and exposure setting is surprisingly good. Samsung phones in the past had an annoying tendency to underexpose pictures, forcing the user to compensate using the exposure value feature, but the exposure of the Armor 2 works well.
Tapping into the viewfinder conveniently adjusts both focus and exposure.
The focus is somewhat slow, especially in low light, presumably due to lack of phase detection. However, at least it does almost never focus on windshields like Samsung devices. If a camera focuses on a windshield, the photo is ruined, no matter how high the resolution is. A 108 megapixel photo of a windshield (when not intended) is less useful than a properly focused 5 megapixel photo. 2000s digital pocket cameras even had a "landscape" scene mode dedicated to preventing exactly that! Yet modern smartphones lack it!
Unlike Samsung, the Armor 2 even lets me adjust the exposure value with HDR enabled. Also, the exposure value compensation range is significantly wider than on Samsung phones. However, the camera software lacks manual exposure.
The camera shutter button unfortunately is only single-level, meaning it can not be used for point-and-shooting intuition like on the Samsung Omnia 2 from 2009 (arguably the best phone at its time). But better than none.
The camera is faster launched by double-pressing the power button than by holding the shutter button, since the latter requires a five-second hold. Needless to say, that defeats its use as a quick launch shortcut.
While the Armor 2 lacks slow motion, the third-party camera software "open camera" allows filming in slow motion. It lets me set anything up to 1080p at 120fps, but it only is effective up to 480p at 120fps and 720p at 60fps. The frame rate does not go above that, even if a higher setting is selected. Possibly that is due to hardware limitations. Strangely, the Galaxy S7 with the same GPU (Mali T880) is able to film at 720p at 240fps and 2160p at 30fps.
- ?
- Anonymous
- 0}C
- 18 Aug 2022
Burst mode can be disabled by enabling HDR or auto scene detection, though that adds a slight shutter lag.
What makes burst shot especially annoying is that it does not end when releasing the shutter button. One needs to press it again,
- k
- kk111
- n67
- 16 Mar 2021
Further observation: Strangely, the fingerprint scanner disengages after 16 days and around 10 hours of uptime, which was the most common reboot reason for me (next to the camera server freeze glitch, which occurs on varying uptimes).
I am not sure why that happens, or if it only affects me.
- k
- kk111
- n67
- 22 Feb 2021
6 GB of RAM is also generous for this price range, especially in 2017. (If only apps could be pinned so they are never closed in background, so they never need reloading.) But I forgot to add few observationsand:
The third-party camera app "Open Camera" has a long shutter delay (around an entire second) between photos, but it can do something the precluded camera software can not do:
Slow motion!
That's right! It can record smoothly at 864×480@120fps and 720p@60fps.
Higher settings such as 720p@120fps, 1080p@60fps and 1080p@120fps can be selected, but the framerate is unstable and sometimes stuttering.
I wonder if it supported 240fps at an even lower resolution, if OpenCamera had such option. Or maybe the image sensor offers these options (read by OpenCamera).
But this makes me wonder: Other phones with the same GPU such as the 2016 flagship Galaxy S7 (GPU: Mali T880) do support 2160p@30fps (2.5 years after Galaxy Note 3), 1080p@60fps(Note 3 had that too), 720p@240fps, and smooth 1080p@120fps playback.
The Helio P25 CPU allegedly supports 2160p 4K, according to MediaTek: https://www.mediatek.com/blog/mediatek-helio-p25-expands-the-p20-family (makes me wonder where their MT6795 1080p@960fps plans of 2015 went).
The Armor 2 smoothly plays 1080p@60fps, 720p@120fps and 1440p@30fps. 2160p plays smoothly for a few seconds, then may halt completely. Also 1080p@120fps does not play smoothly, despite the same chipset.
Fast charging surprisingly works while using the front, but not the rear camera, except if the elevated voltage (9V or 12V) is manually applied through a KW203 USB multimeter which has shortened data lanes on port 2 (do not try unless you have knowledge about electrical engineering).
The video recording can be paused and unpaused without delay, allowing to create videos with short sections from different locations for fun.
The lossless digital zoom for videos of the front camera can use the full image sensor resolution, while only 1080p equivalent on the rear (meaning no lossless digital zoom if the selected resolution is 1080p). But for photos, lossless digital zoom is supported. For both cameras, the viewfinder itself only supports lossless digital zoom if the ZSL (zero shutter lag) mode is enabled itself, strangely.
The camera flash is brighter during focus than when capturing the photo itself!
In "professional" (not really) mode, the ISO setting only works when ZSL (zero shutter lag) mode is enabled.
- k
- kk111
- n67
- 22 Feb 2021
While the rear camera's image sensor is not good, at least the camera software (package name: com.mediatek.camera) is very fast (low shutter lag), and low-light performance for video recording is improved with VFR (variable frame rate), where frame rate may be adjusted between 10fps and 30fps to extend exposure time when necessary.
Video recording in daylight has low noise.
Also, the front camera supports lossless digital zooming for video recording, which is a rather rare feature on smartphones.
Photos during video recording have the same resolution as the video itself, making the feature almost redundant.
Protip: Deactivating the zero shutter lag mode in settings may reduce shake blur in low light. Apparently, the software times the capture to a moment with low shake. They should have inverted it and named it "night mode" because otherwise the user asks themselves why they would ever deactivate zero shutter lag.
- K
- Keekay
- n67
- 14 Jan 2021
Another thing to add:
After around two years, the power button started getting unresponsive. One needs to push it very hard.
Usually, a failing non-replaceable battery is the death sentence of a mobile phone. On the Armor 2, the battery terminals are behind the motherboard, meaning that replacing it is dangerous and might inadvertently destroy the phone.
But on the Armor 2, the rubber band and power button failed first.
I searched for a case for the Armor 2, but it did not exist. Possibly the power button and rubber band being exposed lead to these problems. The irony of an outdoor phone.
- k
- keekay
- n67
- 11 Jan 2021
After almost three years, the rubber band started disintegrating.
But what I highly appreciate of the device is that, while the battery itself charges only at 10 watts (not 18W as advertised), the charging speed is unconpromised regardless of usage, just like on laptops.
In other words: Fast charging and using simultaneously, while my Galaxy Note 8 could not do that. In fact, it throttled total charging speed from 15 down to 6 watts.
But the rear camera of the Ulefone Armor 2 is exceptionally bad. I am not sure if it only affects me, or if it is just a bug. There is significant noise noticable in perfect daylight! My working 2006 Panasonic Lumix makes less noisy photos than the Armor 2. And a 2013 Galaxy S4 also makes noise-free photos at daylight.
- ?
- Anonymous
- n67
- 24 Aug 2020
BaryPro, 21 Jul 2020I've had this phone for almost 3 years now and It'... morePros: Fast charging during usage.
Cons: Bogus camera. It has these bugs: https://en.everybodywiki.com/List_of_issues_with_the_UleFone_Armor_2_camera
- B
- BaryPro
- p7$
- 21 Jul 2020
I've had this phone for almost 3 years now and It's a great phone.
PROS:
It's very fast, cheap, rugged and it has great speaker and a great battery life.
CONS:
Bad side is the charging port protector gets broken very easy and then the phone is no longer waterproof, also side buttons gets pressed very easily when the phone is in pocket but you can fix that with the app called "button remaper", also face proximity sensor is very bad and the phone is a bit bulky.
Better version of this phone is Ulefone Armor x5. GREAT JOB ULEFONE :)
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- N
- Nidzo Mont
- 3bm
- 09 Jul 2020
I have this great phone since beginning of September 2017 and it is best buy cellphone for me till now (I usualy buy phone every 5-6 mounts because i broke them working my jobs). It is tested on drop test from II floor when he falls me n concrete and nothing happens :). As a worker I can say very resistible phone with all specs Battery, display, water tests, temperature etc.
Root https://forum.xda-developers.com/android/development/root-ulefone-armor-2-easy-rooting-t3780055
And about Android above 7.0.0 I think it is impossible to upgrade for now.
P.S All spare parts you can buy and change by yourself if you needed, I change my loudspeaker because I have destroy him with iron dust.
- 👍2
- ?
- Anonymous
- 3Sq
- 23 May 2020
Do you like more Ulefone Devices?
- 👍
- T
- TechLord
- 0}d
- 08 May 2020
Sadly, the “18W” fast charging is just 10W.
But: At least, it uses the “spare current” charging method, which means that the charging speed is not affected at all by the usage of the device thanks to it drawing additional current needed to power the device itself from the charger.