NEW DELHI: At a time when the smartphone market is filled to the brim in all the possible segments, it’s perhaps a pertinent question to ask: does any launch make a real difference? Things get worse when you enter the sub-Rs 20,000 price segment. There are brands like Motorola and Honor that are going all guns blazing against each other to catch the fancy of the customers. Samsung, on the other hand, has been quietly eating the pie with its Galaxy On and J series smartphones. This time, the ‘new’ Galaxy On7 Prime is supposed to be the torch bearer of the series and there’s a lot to be said about this one.
For the uninitiated, the Galaxy On7 Prime reached the Indian shelves few days after the Galaxy A8+ last month. This Flipkart-exclusive smartphone will set you back by Rs 12,990. While this is for the 3GB RAM variant, the 4GB RAM model will cost you Rs 14,990.
However, soon after its launch, curious minds on the web found it to be exactly similar, in both design and specifications, to that of the Galaxy J7 Prime, which came out in 2016.
If you ask us, this is not a bad move if you want to sell the remaining stock and generate easy revenue but it does prove to be a deal breaker for many. The only possible reason we can think for Samsung to launch the J7 Prime as On7 Prime is to bring Samsung Pay Mini to even more customers easily and debut its Samsung Mall app, all without working on a completely new device, saving the effort and time.
Whatever might be the case, we have reviewed the device on how it performed while it was with us and have not made the ‘Galaxy J7 Prime’ factor affect it in any way. We have been testing the smartphone since past one week and have found it to be a mixed experience most of the times. Here’s the complete review...
Design
Being a budget offering, it didn’t come as a surprise that the Galaxy On7 Prime is your typical ‘budget’ Samsung device, a trait that we certainly haven’t come to appreciate as appearances still matter. Back in 2016, this appearance perhaps would have been appreciated by most but not in the current climate. The moment you compare the device with the likes of Honor or Nokia, you immediately notice how quickly the On7 Prime loses its shine. We got the Gold colour variant that has a dark, earthy coloured front panel, giving it a slightly different spin to an otherwise stereotypical look.
You get the same fingerprint-laden physical button below the screen, accompanied by two non-backlit capacitive buttons. Volume controllers are on the left side, while the power button stays on the right. The 3.5mm headphone slot and micro-USB charging slot are at the bottom.
What users may find unusual is that the Galaxy On7 Prime has its speaker at the top right side. We do appreciate Samsung for this because with a side speaker, no matter if you hold the handset in portrait or landscape mode, the audio is not blocked.
What, however, didn't evoke a positive reaction from us was the placement of the volume buttons. For right hand users it takes a good stretch to reach them. For left hand users, it is still easy but then reaching for the power button requires them to adjust the grip.
Nonetheless, it does feel sturdy given its metal build and may resist a couple of drops from a couple of feet. Of course, it falling faced towards the ground may not save the display.
Talking about the display, as the general consensus on the Web and our past experience suggest, Samsung can't go wrong with its AMOLED display. But what if the handset doesn’t come with an AMOLED panel at first place?
The smartphone’s TFT LCD screen is certainly not the best, but still something on which we can’t argue upon given the price bracket in which it falls. The device sports a 5.5-inch TFT LCD screen packing 720x1280 pixels in a non-fancy 16:9 aspect ratio. This doesn't sound convincing as you always have the option to chip in a bit more and get an 18:9 aspect ratio display-featuring smartphone. But it still is not as bad as it may seem to many and can be a device on which you can watch your daily Netflix shows without cribbing much.
Since it’s classified as a ‘budget’ smartphone, Samsung has clearly cut corners in its Galaxy On7 Prime. One of them is the auto brightness functionality, a basic feature that you can find in its competitors. But then that is compensated with other usual ‘Samsung’ features such as an ‘Outdoor Mode’ that throws extra brightness to the screen for easy viewing in bright daylight. It also has other usual set of customisations that many, especially those coming from Android One or Android Go smartphones, may find useful.
Auto brightness (ambient light sensor) is just one, Samsung has also been stingy by not including the compass and gyroscope.
Performance
While the design and the display together was a mix of positive and negative wavelength, performance is one section where our Galaxy On7 Prime unit was able to impress us the most. Before we tell you what processor and RAM combination the handset boasts of, we would like to tell you that it was used as a daily driver for over a week with over 90 apps installed. At no point did our unit face a single instance of stutter. Jumping from the app listing to heaviest of the games and photo-editing apps was nothing less than a breeze.
However, launching heavy applications such as Mortal Kombat will make you wait for a couple of minutes, which can be annoying at times.
Powering the Galaxy On7 Prime is a two-year old octa-core Samsung Exynos 7870 processor. Although the Exynos 7870 is not new in the chip market, it still managed to perform better than what we expected. While the majority of the credit goes to the processor, a part of it also goes to the on-board 4GB RAM. Mali-T830 takes care of all the graphics and animations you see on the screen.
Running the smartphone through GeekBench and AnTuTu gave us 62732 score and 723 (single core)/3552 (dual core) results, which are in no way impressive. Although these numbers don't really matter to majority of the users, they do to some nitpicks.
For those joining the Samsung smartphone family for the first time, Android 7.1.1 Nougat-based Galaxy On 7 Prime is fairly easy to get hold of. It runs Samsung Experience version 8.5, which is straightforward and gives you easy access to everything that you want. There’s also space for Bixby Home cards, edge-of-screen alerts, if you are into all of that. The Bixby Screen can be accessed by swiping right from the home screen. For everything else you get Google Assistant, which shows when you long-press the home button.
Also, don’t expect Android 8.0 Oreo update for this device.
Since we’re talking about the software side of things, it is important to mention the Samsung Mall app that makes a debut with the Galaxy On7 Prime. The firm is heavily marketing the smartphone just because it has this particular app.
So what is Samsung Mall app?
It is a pre-installed app that simply lets you scan a product from the device’s camera. It scans and shows you similar products on its store from where you can buy them. In our tests it was more of a hit and miss. It does work in low light situations but you would need to turn on the handset’s flashlight.
It is not necessary to click a product in order to buy. You can just browse through the categories, pay online and get it delivered to your home. To make this platform work, Samsung has joined hands with some of the major e-commerce giants including Amazon, Shopclues, Tata CLiQ and Jabong. The list will likely get bigger in future.
Since the company shows results from these e-commerce portals, choosing the product directs you to that e-commerce firm’s product webpage from where you can checkout. This way none of your payment details are stored with Samsung. In addition, if you have chosen three products from the Samsung Mall app from three different e-commerce companies, you would have to check out separately for each of them.
While this is the highlight on the software front, another feature worth mentioning here is the Samsung Pay Mini. This feature is not new and is already there in some of the budget Samsung handsets. The app lets you pay easily, cutting all the time you waste on taking out your plastic money and doing a transaction. The transactions with Samsung Pay Mini take place through UPI or e-wallets, specifically Paytm or MobiKwik.
The unit we received was the 64GB one but then as is the case with every smartphone, you don’t get all of it for your use. We received around 41GB for app and content storage, while the rest was reserved for the OS and other preloaded files. In case you are one of those who likes to download movies and other heavy media content, you can expand the storage space of the device using a microSD card (up to 256GB).
Like the design, display and the processor, camera too is one of the make or break factors in a handset. In Galaxy On7 Prime, it is slightly above average. The 13MP rear camera is not the best in the class but is good enough to post them on social media. The daylight shots are nothing extraordinary but the low light shots were still better than expectations. This is mostly because of the f1.9 aperture that lets in more light, giving out images that are bright and show better colours than other usual camera sensors.
If you’ve used a Samsung device earlier, then the camera interface would be familiar. You get quick buttons on the screen to access the settings, flash, expanded screen mode and switch to front-facing camera on one side. On the other end you get options to open Samsung Mall, add stickers and use the Instant Share feature. This is in addition to the shutter button, video recording button and image preview option. You’ll find the camera snappy enough and the interface light and easy to understand.
The camera performance is average when it comes to video recording. You can see the jerks and shakes in a video with handheld recording. Zooming and taking stills while recording a video is possible and so is adjusting the brightness. Manual adjustment of brightness is possible in addition to the auto brightness adjustment, which is activated by default. The results are decent though but nothing more than that.
For selfie lovers, the front-facing 13MP shooter does a good job. You get all the usual options to make your skin smoother, change the colour intensity, make your cheeks look thinner than usual and even make your eyes slightly bigger. The resulting images are bright and sharp, whether taken in low light or broad daylight. Both the front and rear cameras can shoot videos in up to full-HD resolution.
What probably is the strongest suit of the Galaxy On7 Prime is its battery. The smartphone has a 3300mAh battery, which can run for a complete day without asking to get charged. In our day-to-day use we observed the battery to give 6 hours or more on-screen time on an average, which is impressive as compared to what we have usually observed in Samsung’s Galaxy On series. Heavy usage of the smartphone will still make it run for around 8-10 hours.
But this is not all, Samsung generally gives you several other options to save battery. That comes as the ‘Power Saving’ mode. There are two power saving modes - Mid and Max, which deactivate animations, apps and some other functions to extend the life of the device.
Verdict
We are not saying that the Galaxy On7 Prime is the best smartphone you can get in the given price bracket right now. However, we are also not giving it complete thumbs down as it performed well enough in some of the areas. For a daily user who does a little bit of everything on the device including gaming, watching movies, listening music, posting images on social media and more, this device works. But for those who want a device specifically for editing content or playing heavy games, this is not the best option.
Although the design is outright boring and the display doesn’t have the ‘wow’ factor in it, the low light photography and battery performance are what is worth the appreciation. You also get features like Samsung Pay Mini and Samsung Mall, which is not yet there in any other handset.
However, at the end of the day, it is the same as the Galaxy J7 Prime, only slightly better in certain aspects. Something like an old wine in a new bottle.
For the uninitiated, the Galaxy On7 Prime reached the Indian shelves few days after the Galaxy A8+ last month. This Flipkart-exclusive smartphone will set you back by Rs 12,990. While this is for the 3GB RAM variant, the 4GB RAM model will cost you Rs 14,990.
However, soon after its launch, curious minds on the web found it to be exactly similar, in both design and specifications, to that of the Galaxy J7 Prime, which came out in 2016.
If you ask us, this is not a bad move if you want to sell the remaining stock and generate easy revenue but it does prove to be a deal breaker for many. The only possible reason we can think for Samsung to launch the J7 Prime as On7 Prime is to bring Samsung Pay Mini to even more customers easily and debut its Samsung Mall app, all without working on a completely new device, saving the effort and time.
Whatever might be the case, we have reviewed the device on how it performed while it was with us and have not made the ‘Galaxy J7 Prime’ factor affect it in any way. We have been testing the smartphone since past one week and have found it to be a mixed experience most of the times. Here’s the complete review...
Design
Being a budget offering, it didn’t come as a surprise that the Galaxy On7 Prime is your typical ‘budget’ Samsung device, a trait that we certainly haven’t come to appreciate as appearances still matter. Back in 2016, this appearance perhaps would have been appreciated by most but not in the current climate. The moment you compare the device with the likes of Honor or Nokia, you immediately notice how quickly the On7 Prime loses its shine. We got the Gold colour variant that has a dark, earthy coloured front panel, giving it a slightly different spin to an otherwise stereotypical look.
You get the same fingerprint-laden physical button below the screen, accompanied by two non-backlit capacitive buttons. Volume controllers are on the left side, while the power button stays on the right. The 3.5mm headphone slot and micro-USB charging slot are at the bottom.
What users may find unusual is that the Galaxy On7 Prime has its speaker at the top right side. We do appreciate Samsung for this because with a side speaker, no matter if you hold the handset in portrait or landscape mode, the audio is not blocked.
What, however, didn't evoke a positive reaction from us was the placement of the volume buttons. For right hand users it takes a good stretch to reach them. For left hand users, it is still easy but then reaching for the power button requires them to adjust the grip.
Nonetheless, it does feel sturdy given its metal build and may resist a couple of drops from a couple of feet. Of course, it falling faced towards the ground may not save the display.
Talking about the display, as the general consensus on the Web and our past experience suggest, Samsung can't go wrong with its AMOLED display. But what if the handset doesn’t come with an AMOLED panel at first place?
The smartphone’s TFT LCD screen is certainly not the best, but still something on which we can’t argue upon given the price bracket in which it falls. The device sports a 5.5-inch TFT LCD screen packing 720x1280 pixels in a non-fancy 16:9 aspect ratio. This doesn't sound convincing as you always have the option to chip in a bit more and get an 18:9 aspect ratio display-featuring smartphone. But it still is not as bad as it may seem to many and can be a device on which you can watch your daily Netflix shows without cribbing much.
Since it’s classified as a ‘budget’ smartphone, Samsung has clearly cut corners in its Galaxy On7 Prime. One of them is the auto brightness functionality, a basic feature that you can find in its competitors. But then that is compensated with other usual ‘Samsung’ features such as an ‘Outdoor Mode’ that throws extra brightness to the screen for easy viewing in bright daylight. It also has other usual set of customisations that many, especially those coming from Android One or Android Go smartphones, may find useful.
Auto brightness (ambient light sensor) is just one, Samsung has also been stingy by not including the compass and gyroscope.
Performance
While the design and the display together was a mix of positive and negative wavelength, performance is one section where our Galaxy On7 Prime unit was able to impress us the most. Before we tell you what processor and RAM combination the handset boasts of, we would like to tell you that it was used as a daily driver for over a week with over 90 apps installed. At no point did our unit face a single instance of stutter. Jumping from the app listing to heaviest of the games and photo-editing apps was nothing less than a breeze.
However, launching heavy applications such as Mortal Kombat will make you wait for a couple of minutes, which can be annoying at times.
Powering the Galaxy On7 Prime is a two-year old octa-core Samsung Exynos 7870 processor. Although the Exynos 7870 is not new in the chip market, it still managed to perform better than what we expected. While the majority of the credit goes to the processor, a part of it also goes to the on-board 4GB RAM. Mali-T830 takes care of all the graphics and animations you see on the screen.
Running the smartphone through GeekBench and AnTuTu gave us 62732 score and 723 (single core)/3552 (dual core) results, which are in no way impressive. Although these numbers don't really matter to majority of the users, they do to some nitpicks.
For those joining the Samsung smartphone family for the first time, Android 7.1.1 Nougat-based Galaxy On 7 Prime is fairly easy to get hold of. It runs Samsung Experience version 8.5, which is straightforward and gives you easy access to everything that you want. There’s also space for Bixby Home cards, edge-of-screen alerts, if you are into all of that. The Bixby Screen can be accessed by swiping right from the home screen. For everything else you get Google Assistant, which shows when you long-press the home button.
Also, don’t expect Android 8.0 Oreo update for this device.
Since we’re talking about the software side of things, it is important to mention the Samsung Mall app that makes a debut with the Galaxy On7 Prime. The firm is heavily marketing the smartphone just because it has this particular app.
So what is Samsung Mall app?
It is a pre-installed app that simply lets you scan a product from the device’s camera. It scans and shows you similar products on its store from where you can buy them. In our tests it was more of a hit and miss. It does work in low light situations but you would need to turn on the handset’s flashlight.
It is not necessary to click a product in order to buy. You can just browse through the categories, pay online and get it delivered to your home. To make this platform work, Samsung has joined hands with some of the major e-commerce giants including Amazon, Shopclues, Tata CLiQ and Jabong. The list will likely get bigger in future.
Since the company shows results from these e-commerce portals, choosing the product directs you to that e-commerce firm’s product webpage from where you can checkout. This way none of your payment details are stored with Samsung. In addition, if you have chosen three products from the Samsung Mall app from three different e-commerce companies, you would have to check out separately for each of them.
While this is the highlight on the software front, another feature worth mentioning here is the Samsung Pay Mini. This feature is not new and is already there in some of the budget Samsung handsets. The app lets you pay easily, cutting all the time you waste on taking out your plastic money and doing a transaction. The transactions with Samsung Pay Mini take place through UPI or e-wallets, specifically Paytm or MobiKwik.
The unit we received was the 64GB one but then as is the case with every smartphone, you don’t get all of it for your use. We received around 41GB for app and content storage, while the rest was reserved for the OS and other preloaded files. In case you are one of those who likes to download movies and other heavy media content, you can expand the storage space of the device using a microSD card (up to 256GB).
Like the design, display and the processor, camera too is one of the make or break factors in a handset. In Galaxy On7 Prime, it is slightly above average. The 13MP rear camera is not the best in the class but is good enough to post them on social media. The daylight shots are nothing extraordinary but the low light shots were still better than expectations. This is mostly because of the f1.9 aperture that lets in more light, giving out images that are bright and show better colours than other usual camera sensors.
If you’ve used a Samsung device earlier, then the camera interface would be familiar. You get quick buttons on the screen to access the settings, flash, expanded screen mode and switch to front-facing camera on one side. On the other end you get options to open Samsung Mall, add stickers and use the Instant Share feature. This is in addition to the shutter button, video recording button and image preview option. You’ll find the camera snappy enough and the interface light and easy to understand.
The camera performance is average when it comes to video recording. You can see the jerks and shakes in a video with handheld recording. Zooming and taking stills while recording a video is possible and so is adjusting the brightness. Manual adjustment of brightness is possible in addition to the auto brightness adjustment, which is activated by default. The results are decent though but nothing more than that.
For selfie lovers, the front-facing 13MP shooter does a good job. You get all the usual options to make your skin smoother, change the colour intensity, make your cheeks look thinner than usual and even make your eyes slightly bigger. The resulting images are bright and sharp, whether taken in low light or broad daylight. Both the front and rear cameras can shoot videos in up to full-HD resolution.
What probably is the strongest suit of the Galaxy On7 Prime is its battery. The smartphone has a 3300mAh battery, which can run for a complete day without asking to get charged. In our day-to-day use we observed the battery to give 6 hours or more on-screen time on an average, which is impressive as compared to what we have usually observed in Samsung’s Galaxy On series. Heavy usage of the smartphone will still make it run for around 8-10 hours.
But this is not all, Samsung generally gives you several other options to save battery. That comes as the ‘Power Saving’ mode. There are two power saving modes - Mid and Max, which deactivate animations, apps and some other functions to extend the life of the device.
Verdict
We are not saying that the Galaxy On7 Prime is the best smartphone you can get in the given price bracket right now. However, we are also not giving it complete thumbs down as it performed well enough in some of the areas. For a daily user who does a little bit of everything on the device including gaming, watching movies, listening music, posting images on social media and more, this device works. But for those who want a device specifically for editing content or playing heavy games, this is not the best option.
Although the design is outright boring and the display doesn’t have the ‘wow’ factor in it, the low light photography and battery performance are what is worth the appreciation. You also get features like Samsung Pay Mini and Samsung Mall, which is not yet there in any other handset.
However, at the end of the day, it is the same as the Galaxy J7 Prime, only slightly better in certain aspects. Something like an old wine in a new bottle.
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