Symphony Mobile is one of the pioneer phone manufacturing brands in Bangladesh. The company started its journey back in 2008 by rebranding Chinese handsets. Symphony ventured into the Android smartphone market in 2012. Since 2018, the company has been assembling the devices right here in Bangladesh.
In its illustrious decade-long history in the industry, the company kept stride in providing affordable smartphones to the masses. In that commitment, the company launched its newest offering, the Symphony Z47, on 15 November 2022. Here’s our detailed take on the device.
Key Specifications of Symphony Z47
Before getting into the details, it is important to note that being a local company, Symphony has always undercut the competition in price. The story is somewhat true for the Z47 as well.
Design and Build Quality
Now moving on to the build quality of the display, users will be getting an all-plastic build device with a glass front. The design element falls in line with other launches from Symphony. With the squared-off edges, square camera housing, and a thick water drop notch display, the device is a typical Symphony in every aspect. However, it’s not necessarily a bad thing.
Read More: DT8 Ultra Review: Does it clone Apple Watch Ultra?
Even though the device is made of plastic, it feels very durable in hand. The back part is made of glossy plastic, which gives it a distinct glass look, albeit making it a fingerprint magnet.
Ports and button choices are all standards for a budget smartphone. However, the volume rocker felt to be a bit higher than it should be. Other than that, the Type C port, headphone jack, and dual sim slot with micro SDXC support make for a complete package.
Overall, the design can be called generic at best. But the build quality is pretty good for the price it comes at. Now let's look at some of its other features.
Read More: HONOR 70 5G Review: Is it worth high midrange price
The Display
A first look at the 6.6-inch display of the Z47 won’t excite any excitement. The thick bezels and an IPS LCD INCELL HD+ display might sound about right for its price. It sports a resolution of 720 by 1600 pixels.
What makes this display an uncontested winner in its category is the 90 Hz refresh rate. In a sub 12K budget, Symphony somehow brought a 90 Hz refresh rate to the masses. It is a game changer, considering how smooth the OS and general usage feels. It makes for a pleasing experience scrolling through stuff and provides a snappier feel.
The color metrics of the display are also satisfactory. The colors looked sharp with a hint of a warm tone. There is no visible color shift at angles. There is no dedicated HBM on the Z47, as expected, but the display gets relatively bright in outdoor usage.
Read More: realme 9 5G Speed Review: What’s special about it?
The Camera
Symphony also made some notable changes in the camera department. From the outside, the device comes with three sensors on the back. But the main 52 MP sensor does all the work. It's obvious that the accompanying sensors are there just for marketing, as Symphony didn’t provide detailed specs on them.
But the Samsung sensor-built main rear camera is no slouch. In our test, it was able to take pretty accurate and color-correct shots on outdoors. The sensor can pick up high details and preserve the dynamic range. The only gripe with the outdoor shots is that the contrast could’ve been a bit better, as sometimes pictures look soft, even in well-lit environments.
The camera faces similar issues in the darker environment as well. For a 52 MP shooter, the low-light photos were a bit disappointing. The exposure worked well at times but also failed miserably at others.
Read More: realme C33 Review: Key specs, pros, and cons
The front camera is your generic 8 MP shooter. It’s good enough for the occasional casual selfies.
The camera features include Burst, AI, HDR, Portrait Mode, Night Mode, Enhance lowlight photo, Slow-Motion, Panorama, Pro mode, Qr Code, Audio Note, Face beauty, Watermark, and Time laps.
The videography is limited to 1080P at 30 fps. It isn’t really that good, considering there are no external or internal stabilization options.
In summary, the camera experience differs from the display experience, but the results are passable for casual shots and social media posting.
Read More: Walton Orbit Y50 4G Review: Does it offer value for money
Processor and Performance
The Symphony Z47 comes equipped with a Unisoc Tiger T606 processor. The choice of Unisoc is completely understandable as they have become the go-to option for ultra-budget smartphones.
The processor is a 12nm one based on a cortex-A75 chip. Users will also be getting 650 MHz speed GPU along with the processor.
So how does it perform overall? While the processing power isn’t exactly promising, it does fairly well in day-to-day use. If you use this device for media consumption and occasional browsing, the device won’t have any problem keeping up.
Read More: Xiaomi Redmi A1+ Review: Budget phone with fingerprint sensor
We even tried a few high-end gaming titles like Asphalt 9 and COD, and needless to say, they were almost unplayable in the highest graphics settings. If you bring it down to mid or low, you might be able to have a go at them. Even then, the low GPU unit causes the device to heat up drastically.
The saving grace for the processor is the high refresh rate display. It evens out the lags and frame drops and provides a uniform experience.
It has 4GB RAM combined with 64 GB of internal storage which can be expanded up to 256GB.
Read More: vivo Y22s 4G Review: Will it survive competition?
Battery and Charge Time
The Symphony Z47 comes equipped with a 5030 mAh battery. The battery can last about 6 to 8 hours of continuous usage. Unfortunately, the device has no fast charging, so users must settle for long charging hours.
Price of Symphony Z47 in Bangladesh
The Symphony Z47 comes in a single configuration of a 4/64 GB variant. The price of the device is 11,499 BDT excluding VAT.
Verdict
Symphony has always been one of the prominent brands in the ultra-budget smartphone market in Bangladesh. Over the years, the market got saturated in low price points with repetitive design and specs. So it's refreshing to see Symphony bringing changes with its high refresh rate display.
Read More: Xiaomi launches Redmi Note 12 series: Can it hold the legacy?
As for the camera, the 52 MP sensor sounds good on paper but fails to deliver in actual usage. The rest of the specs are on par with the price.
There might be a few minor aspects that could be better, but it's mostly a bang-for-buck device, especially if you consider the price. To wrap things up, who is this for? The Z47 is best suited for people looking for a practical smartphone on an affordable budget. As a daily driver, the Symphony Z47 can be an excellent choice in its price category.