Gigaset GS170

Gigaset generally manufactures DECT phones and it is no surprise when users outside of the EU don’t recognize its name. It should be noted though that Gigaset is actually a subsidiary of Siemens AG. It’s quite common to know when they say the android market is over saturated it means there is going to be some lesser known brands vying for a slice of android’s market share. With that said just what is Gigaset offering with its GS170? For a blunt start the GS170 is equipped with a Mediatek MT6737 which is usually found on budget smartphones, 2GB of memory and 16GB of internal storage with expandability options via the microSD card slot. It also has a dual sim card slot for users who have multiple numbers but only wants one device. While the Made in Germany sticker does tempt users who knows what the Germans can do it is only by brand name because the production of the actual phone is still exclusively based in china which is already a strike 1 in terms of quality credibility, although let’s not jump to conclusions just quite yet. Having a feel of its build and construction reveals nothing impressive other than your generic plastic build budget android smartphone, however the actual device surprisingly does have a removable battery which most manufacturers have omitted in recent times. Another additional feature of the GS170 is actually the inclusion of a fingerprint sensor which seems to be finally trickling down the budget stack.

The camera included in the GS170 is of the 13-megapixel kind which is highly dependent on external factors such as good lighting in order to produce a somewhat decent image, although as with most budget camera sensors out there, it does suffer in quality when lighting is bad. That being said with HDR turned on it can somewhat compensate its already lackluster camera, nonetheless users should not over expect much from its camera other than being used for general usage. As for preloaded software, the GS170 does come with a stock android 7 nougat which should help with its performance since bloatware is probably going to overwhelm its processor. Being a budget smartphone means there is going to be some corners cut although nothing too drastic such as the screen only being an IPS 720p HD display, then again this should be a given for a device of this class. However, one plus point of its display is the brightness which is good, overall colors still do remain rich and vivid to the users viewing pleasure. Lastly to top it off is the Gigaset GS170’s battery life, included is a 2500mAh removable battery which is about average when it comes to capacity but because it’s hardware isn’t power hungry users should be able to get by a day and a half with general usage as claimed by the manufacturer although there seems to be some discrepancy whereby the battery does lose its charge extremely fast even when not in heavy usage. The Gigaset GS170 presents a very mixed result as it isn’t able to perform to its specs but seems to manage a very average score throughout which is analogous to an average student in a classroom. There are many other phones to checkout at the same price range. Some with much better offerings.

Hands-on article by Jagadisa Rajarathnam