Posh Mobile L640 Preview – This Phone is Yuge
POSH WHO?
If you’re anything like I was 30 days ago then you’ve probably never heard of Posh Mobile. If you are part of the new breed of budget phone buyers, however, you may want to give them a look. Posh Mobile is an American company that provides GSM unlocked devices in a variety of sizes and prices. Today we’ll take a quick look at the L640 – a massive 6.44 inch LTE enabled beast of a phone that can be had from Amazon for as little as $195 shipped.
IN THE BOX
Posh Mobile is something of an unknown quantity. Going into the review of this phone I wasn’t sure what to expect. First impressions can go a long way toward forming a favorable attitude around a brand and the L640 got off to a good start. The packing is nice and puts the phone front a center. There’s a clear cover that lets you see just how big the phone is. A sticker on the front of the phone lists the spec highlights – 6.4 inch screen, Octacore CPU, 5800(!) mAh battery, 32 GB storage, 3 GB RAM, etc. Little space is wasted and the packaging is well designed. You can tell that someone at Posh Mobile really wants to put the phone front-and-center.
Inside the box is the phone, of course, but Posh Mobile also includes everything you’ll need (except a SIM, of course) to get up and running. They’ve included a frosted translucent case and a clear plastic screen protector to protect against drops and scratches. There’s also a Mediatek quick charger and some decent earbuds. The package contents are very similar to what you’d get with a BLU Mobile phone.
IT REALLY IS MASSIVE
OK, so the Donald Trump yuge thing is a little tired at this point but it seems so fitting in this case. The phone itself is beautiful. We received the “Space Gray” (ahem) model but it is also available in gold and rose gold. A chamfered, not rounded, metal band wraps the phone. It’s like the giant offspring of a marriage between an iPhone 7 and an HTC 10. It has a very nice feel (not slippery at all) and is quite comfortable to hold. The back of the phone is a silvery-gray metal and there is a small camera hump. The whole thing feels quite premium.
The screen on the L640 is 6.44 inches – almost a full inch bigger than the iPhone 7 Plus or Moto Z. It comes in at 1920×1080 and works out to 344 PPI. That’s not horrible but this screen size just cries out for a 2K display. The display is IPS LCD and is serviceable. It looks slightly washed out in its default configuration but there’s a tuning feature in the settings to make it look a little better.
PROBLEMS
The wheels come off a bit when you look at the software. First, the L640 ships with Android 5.1 and there are no current plans to upgrade to 6.0. There are some included apps like the Posh Store and the Phenix launcher that cannot be uninstalled or disabled. On the bright side, there’s a very stock look to the phone once you replace the hideous included launcher. The notification tray and settings menus are mostly stock with some additions like the display editor, reboot options, etc. Most of that is pretty minor but being stuck on 5.1 could be a problem in the next year or so.
Issues on the hardware side include the lack of a fingerprint reader and the single rear-acing speaker. I haven’t tested the cameras so I cannot comment there but my expectations are that they’ll be just middling.
WRAP UP
I’ve enjoyed using the phone for the last couple of days. I was shocked by the size when I first started using it but then I found myself thinking it wasn’t THAT big. It is a little heavy thanks to the large screen and massive battery but that’s sort of what one expects with a device this large. Performance has been pretty good though I haven’t stressed the phone in any way yet. If you can get past the OS version it really seems like a good value. There seems like there’s a lot of bang for your buck here. Will that be true after using the phone full time? I’ll be back with a full review in another week or two with the answer.
If you’d like to take a look at Posh Mobile’s entire lineup head to this link at Amazon.
