The review praises the Fairphone as a surprisingly competitive and 'seriously cool' smartphone with a solid build and appealing design, despite minor issues like camera protrusion. The setup is easy, and it features unique functionalities like a quick-access apps screen and a complete mute option. However, the reviewer is unsure if it can fully replace their high-end smartphone used for both business and personal tasks, but is optimistic about testing it further.

1. or
First impressions, Day 1

2. 1. Is it a “seriously cool“ smartphone like
advertised?
2. Can it become my primary smartphone?

3. Unboxing & hardware
It comes in a pretty cool, small & flat box.
See iPad Air for comparison.
If you grew up in Germany during the 70‘s &
80`s, where anything made outside its borders
was considered inferior, bragging about
“Made in China“ feels a little weird.

4. Unboxing & hardware
Look & feel is great. The phone is heavier than my HTC One X+, but not too heavy – in fact, the
few extra grams add a feeling of “rock solid work“ to that first impression. Especially the metal
back cover makes it feel more valuable than all those plastic phones – most of them cost more
than the Fairphone‘s 325 Euro price.

5. Unboxing & hardware
They wrote a lot of stuff and the instructions
are designed nicely, but as always I wouldn‘t
read anything. A smartphone has to be
fully accessible without instructions.
The phone opens super-easily: it makes you
wonder if the back cover won‘t fall off after some
intensive usage. But for now - very cool. Also note
the two SIM slots for two cards.

6. Unboxing & hardware
Not so cool: the camera and the microphone stick out of the back cover. When the
phone lies flat on a table, it wiggles
massively.
No cables, no earphones, because you have that
stuff already. Probably. At least you get a postcard
with a drawing of a charger .-)

7. Unboxing & hardware
iPad photo of Fairphone in comparison to my 18-month-old HTC One X+, which was easily 70%
more expensive at the time. They don‘t feel so different that you could say one is an “upper class“
and the other a “middle class“ smartphone. The fairphone can compete.

8. First experience
Fresh design and a surprisingly fast loading battery. After less than 30 minutes it showed 76% I assume the battery was pre-loaded, this cannot be the standard loading time. When you start the
phone, a pretty cool animation with music starts. Watch it here starting at 4:10 min:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sW3T5qOjkuE

9. First experience
Set up is super-easy
as you know it from
other smartphones.
Google Apps are not preinstalled, though.
It is not so time-consuming as you
might think, all the installations and
updates work pretty fast.

10. Unique Features
Nice feature – one of the
home screens will give you
quick access to your most
popular apps.
“Enjoy some peace“ – you can access a feature that makes it easy
to completely mute your phone – no emails, no text, no notifications,
no nothing. I think i will use that more during meetings than for
some peace, but it seems useful anyhow.

11. Photos
Fairphone
Sufficient results, but nothing fancy. More
problems with light/darkness than you are
used to, but manageable.
HTC One X+

12. Camera
I guess it‘s the hardware that makes a camera expensive, because this one is loaded with
software and features. Panorama photos, multi-angle-pictures, smile recognition, you name it.

13. Camera
There‘s also a more-than-enough-offer of filters, editing features and whatever you can think of.
I‘d still recommend Instagram, but that‘s the same with my current phone.

14. Screenshots
Typical Android fun.
You can design your home
screens with apps and
widgets.
I seriously doubt close to
19 hours of battery time,
but my first experiences
are positive.
You can easily attach anything to
a text message, use up to 64GB
SD card, and there‘s a full
power file manager pre-installed.

15. Problems
I had problems connecting the Fairphone to
both my Windows 7 and Mac computers.
They did not simply recognize the phone
as a USB device.
Although several Android devices were
connected to the same PC already, I had to
find & download new drivers for MT65xx.
Then, phone and SD storage are accessible.

16. 1. Is it a “seriously cool“ smartphone like
advertised?
YES
2. Can it become my primary smartphone?
MAYBE
It really seems to be a seriously cool smartphone. Considering this is the first phone of a company
that was funded by people like me through Kickstarter, it is way cooler than I expected. This thing
is a competitive smartphone. And it works just fine. Plus it sends a message: You CAN build & sell
fair products that are actually good AND not overpriced.
I am not sure if it can replace my typical primary smartphone (that always comes from the 500 €+
range) since I use them for business as much as private, and I got very used to HTC sense over
the years. But I am convinced enough that I will try this out in a not-so-busy week soon.