Bucket Tech: Samsung Galaxy S21 FE 5G

Last week saw Korean electronics giant, Samsung launch their Galaxy 21 FE (fan edition) mobile smart phone, it joins the rest of the popular Galaxy 21 Series as its latest family member. The Fan Editions are made by Samsung by taking what users love the most about their phones and in such built a device that is inspired by you, their fans to experience their everyday passions to the fullest with this device. Basically with the S21 range, Samsung sus out what users like the most from the various S21 models and put it into one device. The design is much the same as the S21 with a full metal uni-body but with more colours on hand to choose from, locally the S21 FE is available in Olive, Graphite, Lavender and White. The S21 FE comes with a large 6.4" AMOLED 2x display with vibrant colours and brightness along with smooth scrolling thanks to 120Hz refresh rate that optimizes your experience with fast touch response times, this comes handy especially when gaming. The immersive display really gets you sucked into what you're watching that you'd forget what is real and what is on your phone, it also has Infinity-O technology which reduces the harmful blue light at night. The screen is made from some of the toughest glass available on the market, Corning Gorilla Glass Victus, so when you do have an oopsy, you need not worry about your screen shattering into a million pieces. The device is also IP68 rated making water and dust proof, allowing you to be in water of up to 1.5 meters for about 30 minutes. 

The Galaxy S21 FE 5G features a pro triple camera system that includes a 12MP Ultra Wide Camera, a 12MP Wide-Angle Camera and a 8MP Telephoto Camera. The camera features modes to make sure you get those pro like photos every time you shoot. With Portrait Mode, you select the subject to focus on and the camera will do the rest, there after you have a choice of 7 different effects that you can select and then you can upload the picture instantly to social media without further need to manipulate it. Night mode has been improved making low light pictures more brighter thanks to the AI multi-frame processing that brings in more colour and detail so your low-light pictures have less noise. The 8MP Telephoto lens has the capability of 30x Space Zoom to let you capture subjects from far away, it also features zoom lock to reduce shakiness as you zoom into your subject. On the front the phone has a 32MP selfie camera that captures more of your features and highlights, refining your selfies to look amazing.  Video wise, the S21 FE has dual recording mode which allows you to use both the front and rear camera to record at the same time! Thus giving you an extra feature when vlogging. 

At the heart of the S21 FE lies the fastest chip that Samsung have in their arsenal, the S21 FE features the 5nm Exynos 2100SoC chipset with 8GB of RAM which ensures that the phone will never slow down or heat up when in use. The S21 FE comes with 256GB on board memory which also assists with phone usage and multiple apps running. The device is fitting with a 4000mAh battery that can give the user up to 33 hours talk time on 4G LTE or up to 20 hours video playback. The battery has Super Fast charging that can charge the phone from 0 to over 50% in just 30 minutes, it also has Fast Wireless Charging 2.0 technology that ensures faster wireless charging when you're on the go. The phone also has reverse charge giving you the ability to charge other wireless devices from it. The Samsung Galaxy S21 FE 5G is currently available in SA starting at R14,999 from the Samsung online store or from mobile operators. 

Bucket Tech: Hisense C30 Rock Lite

Earlier this year I reviewed the Hisense C30 Rock, which is a mid range smart device which also is pretty rugged with it being  IP68 rating and IK04 shock resistant, my verdict on that particular device was that it was a great all round device for the everyday person, with standard features and it gets the job done. A few weeks ago Hisense sent me another device to review, this time the smaller brother to the C30 Rock, the C30 Rock Lite. With recent times, a lot of smart phone manufactures have been releasing Lite versions of their premium phones, with it offering slightly less in specs than the main device. Most of the times, it uses tech from the older generation devices which was replaced but of recent, the market has gotten more competitive so manufacturers had to up their game. 

STYLING

Like the C30 Rock, the design is very similar, with round edges which are rubberised, a nice metal finish on the side and a rubber back. It's got a decent weight and feels good in hand. Being under the Rock name, this phone is already Shock resistant, IP67 water resistant and dust resistant. So it's a pretty hardy phone, and if you have to look at the current offerings in the market, not many brands have a device such as this available. The phone comes with a 5.0" IPS Display which we'll chat about a little later. It has that old iPhone look to it and it's quite a decent size, not being too bulky and doesn't feel uncomfortable in your pocket. 

DURABILITY

Unlike the C30 Rock which is IP68, the Lite is IP67 rated which is still a good rating for water resistance. I wouldn't necessarily take it swimming but I won't stress over if it does happen to fall into some water. However, I did take this for a swim but unfortunately for me, I didn't save the pictures before formatting the device when I sent it back. Rookie error on the part of us! The device is also shock and dust proof, so if you're the outdoors type of person who loves going running/ hiking, this would be the perfect phone for you. 

PROCESSING

With Lite devices, this is where the main talking point comes in, processing power. While the bigger phones need faster processes to perform the tasks on demands, buyers of these devices aren't going to be using the phone for running multiple apps, editing spreadsheets etc. With the Rock Lite, it comes with still a decent chipset, having the Quad-core 1.3GHz  processor and has 2GB of RAM which is sufficient for a phone of this nature and size. For memory, it has 16GB of on board memory and a memory card slot up to 128GB Micro SD which also doubles as a dual SIM slot. The phone is primarily 4G but the secondary SIM slot is 3G. 

CAMERA

The camera on the light is also slightly downgraded from to the 8MP camera with LED flash. Still capable of taking great quality pictures in proper lighting environments. It records in 1080 @ 30 frames per second and has an auto focus feature. The front facing camera is a 5MP, perfect for all your social media needs and you don't have to worry about your battery running out quickly as the device comes with a 3900mAh battery, which gives you about a day's worth of use. 

VERDICT

When looking at this phone, while it might not win any contest against other smartphones, it boils down to pricing. This phone is available at retailers for under R2,500. That is an absolute steal compared to what you can buy from the bigger name opposition. And with Hisense great product support locally, should you have any issues, best believe it will be resolved without a fuss. Serious value for money with this device and for someone who spends most of his time on a construction site, I wouldn't mind one for myself.