Oppo Find 5 Review
Introduction:
You might know Oppo mostly via its California base for pricey Blu-ray home theater systems, which have by now picked an award or two, but the company entered a whole different ballgame becoming a maker of high-end Android phones, including the thinnest one at a point.
With this year's Oppo Find 5, however, the Chinese company, established 2004, proved that it can make world-class phones in the hottest consumer electronics category at the moment.
Has Oppo managed to prove that in this day and age any nimble electronics company can use Android to make itself known by slapping together high-end components? Are a 5” Full HD screen, quad-core processor and 13 MP camera enough to rank with the best out there? Read on to find out...
In the box:
You might know Oppo mostly via its California base for pricey Blu-ray home theater systems, which have by now picked an award or two, but the company entered a whole different ballgame becoming a maker of high-end Android phones, including the thinnest one at a point.
With this year's Oppo Find 5, however, the Chinese company, established 2004, proved that it can make world-class phones in the hottest consumer electronics category at the moment.
Has Oppo managed to prove that in this day and age any nimble electronics company can use Android to make itself known by slapping together high-end components? Are a 5” Full HD screen, quad-core processor and 13 MP camera enough to rank with the best out there? Read on to find out...
In the box:
- Stereo in-ear headphones
- Wall charger
- microUSB cable
- SIM tray pin
- Two NFC tags
Design:
Imagine a mixture of the white Sony Xperia S and a Nokia Lumia 920 and you'll get how the Oppo Find 5 looks and feels in the hand with its solid unibody polycarbonate housing. The phone is heavier than the first Full HD 5-incher, the Droid DNA, but is slightly thinner, so it feels fairly compact for a big-screen handset, also because of the elongated body - less wide than both the DNA and the Xperia Z.
You can compare the Oppo Find 5 with many other phones using our Size Visualization Tool.
While the back is tapered a bit, the corners aren't exactly rounded, and the Oppo Find 5 feels extra edgy in the hand, plus it is almost an ounce heavier than the DNA and the Z, so it will by no means go unnoticed in your palm or pocket, and that's the price we'll have to pay for this particular high-res 5-incher. Oppo Find 5 has a steel frame inside it, making it feel very solid, while the premium looks are enhanced by the metal plate nestling the 13 MP rear camera and dual LED flash modules on the back.
There are only two side keys – power button on the left, and a volume rocker on the right – which are metal and contrasting well with the white chassis, but have shallow tactile feel that takes getting used to. The SIM card tray is right above the power/lock key, and Oppo provides a pin inside the box for ejecting it with ease.
The front is taken almost entirely by the display, with very thin side bezel, and two-tone transition from the white chassis part at the bottom to the black fascia above it. The three capacitive keys below the display are lit in white, and responsive enough, while an LED notification light lets you know about missed calls or messages, as well as the charging state of the handset.
Display:
We've come to one of the best parts about the Oppo Find 5, and it is the 5” 1080x1920 display with integrated touch layer and 441ppi density. In short, the screen is brilliant, with bright colors, wide viewing angles, and more than sufficient performance outside under direct sunlight.
Granted, the difference between an HD and Full HD screen from a normal viewing distance won't elude only the screen purists among us, but the display is excellent not just because of the very high pixel density, but also as an overall package, covering all the rest of the criteria for a great mobile display like brightness, contrast and color gamut.
You'd be hard pressed to notice any icon jaggies, small text looks very distinct, and even fully zoomed in, letters' elements stay crisp and rounded, proving once again that these high-end mobile screens can now beat any other consumer-oriented display out there, be it on your laptop, TV, or desktop monitor.
OPPO Find 5 360-Degrees View
Interface and functionality:
The Find 5 is running Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean (an upgrade to 4.2 promised soon after launch), and the Oppo UI paint job on top.
Oppo's own interface is quite eye-friendly, with large, easy to press icons, and balloonish, transparent Time/Date, Contacts, Music and Calendar widgets, which still manage to stay aesthetically pleasing. The lockscreen displays notifications for missed calls or new messages, and lets you control the music player directly from it. We get a standard main menu with large icons, situated in a grid, and the dialpad, as well as the contacts scroll also sport large, thumb-friendly buttons and entries. We appreciate the small efforts, like putting the connectivity switches in the notification bar in a swipeable row for easy access, as well as the larger push for differentiation like the Settings app.
Multitasking is taken care of with snapshots of currently running apps appearing like cards at the bottom of the screen, which can be swiped up to close, or shut all at once with the handy sweep button underneath, where a bar shows you exactly how much of the available memory all are occupying at the moment.
Oppo has categorized all the numerous settings in four screens you can move sideways between – General, Sound, Display and Personal – instead of slapping everything in an endless scroll list. It takes some getting used to, but Oppo has marked all entries with large, well-drawn icons for easier recognition, and once you get the gist of it, finding what you need in the Settings app becomes a breeze.
A couple of gestures are thrown in, too, like tapping at the top of the phone to go to the beginning of a long list or a website, and asking the phone to automatically pick up an incoming call when you place it next to your ear. We also get a few preinstalled apps to make life easier, like a file browser, flashlight, compass, Adobe Flash installer and system updater.
Processor and memory:
The 1.5 GHz quad-core Snapdragon S4 Pro seems to be the law of the land for these 5” Full HD handsets recently, and the Oppo Find 5 is no exception. It is fast, the UI moves smoothly, and, coupled with Jelly Bean's Project Butter, never feels laggy or underpowered in both the interface or any apps thrown at the phone.
RAM amount is the trendy 2 GB, and there are 16 GB of internal memory that come with the handset, of which about two are available for app installation, and 11 GB are free for your videos, music and other personal files.
| Quadrant Standard | AnTuTu | NenaMark 2 | |
| Oppo Find 5 | 7357 | - | 54,4 |
| HTC DROID DNA | 7888 | 13917 | 59,1 |
| Samsung Galaxy S III | 5335 | 12016 | 58,6 |
The biggest drawback is the lack of a memory expansion slot, which is a shame with such a pretty screen and powerful camera, both of which presuppose a lot of high-def video capture and playback. There is, however, a 32 GB version listed for $70 more at the Oppo USA website, so that drawback can be easily taken care of.
Internet and connectivity:
Oppo Find 5 uses Chrome as the default browser, and it is a joy to explore websites on the large 5” screen with the amazing 441ppi pixel density. The handset doesn't stutter for a bit rendering complex pages, and you get to see small text as distinct as it comes on a phone. Naturally, there is no Adobe Flash support, so you'd have to resort to some 3rd party software and sideloading if you need it.
We get a rich set of wireless connectivity options on the Find 5 – a 42 Mbps HSPA+ radio comes standard with pentaband support in the international version, including T-Mobile's 1700 MHz band. There are also Wi-Fi (2.4 GHz and 5 GHz), Bluetooth 4.0, A-GPS, DLNA, FM and NFC radios, while wired connectivity is taken care of by the MHL port at the bottom of the handset.
Camera:
Oppo has graced the Find 5 with a 13 MP camera sensor from Sony, which, judging from the ability to shoot Full HD HDR video, is of the Exmor RS variety, that has HDR hardwired. The same sensor is present on the Xperia Z, and will likely be into a lot of flagships this year, so Oppo has gone with the flavor of the month here.
The camera interface is a bit plain, with just HDR (both for pictures and video) and face recognition switches, but no scene modes, exposure compensation, contrast or saturation sliders are present. The phone takes shots very quickly, and the burst mode allows up to a hundred frames in 20 seconds to be taken. There were issues with focusing at times on our cloudy day, which required us to tap on the object front and center beforehand.
There were white balance issues making the clouds seem purplish at times, but color representation is quite accurate. The level of detail and amount of noise are well balanced, and the objects in the frame come up overall well-focused and distinct. In light-dark parts of the frame the brighter section gets overexposed, as often happens, which can be fixed by shooting with the HDR mode on, and the performance is rather quick then, too.
Indoor shots are average, with a bunch of noise in the frame, but no white balance or focus issues, until we tone the lights down, and the colors become colder, with greenish overcast. The dual LED flash is not particularly strong for anything beyond 5 feet, and illuminates somewhat unevenly.
That HDR mode seems to be a godsend for video, too, especially during nighttime, when car and street lights halo is avoided, and the footage is much more distinct, whereas with normal mode the phone can't focus well. The camera focus actually always wanders a bit when panning around, but especially when shooting in insufficient lighting. The framerate also drops significantly then, down to 17fps at street lighting in the evening, while in daytime it manages 30fps without a hitch. Another downside of low-light video capture with the Oppo Find 5 is that the footage is unusually noisy when the light goes down.
Oppo Find 5 Full HD Sample Video:
Oppo Find 5 Full HD HDR Sample Video:
Oppo Find 5 Full HD Night Sample Video:
Oppo Find 5 Full HD HDR Night Sample Video:
Oppo Find 5 Indoor Sample Video:
Multimedia:
The music player of the Oppo UI is somewhat barebones, only categorizing songs by the basics like albums, artists and playlists, but it does offer to display album art and lyrics, if available, and has a bunch of equalizer presets to choose from in the internal settings.
Oppo has licensed the Dirac HD audio technology for improving the sound reproduction from the handset, and indeed a huge difference can be noticed when you turn it on in headset mode – the sound becomes much stronger and cleaner, while for loudspeaker mode there is Dolby Mobile to make the unit perform way stronger and fuller than your typical smartphone speaker.
The video player is pretty basic in terms of interface, too, but quite functional, as it runs everything thrown at it, including MKV/DivX/Xvid files up to Full HD definitions, and with subtitles, if available.
As far as the picture gallery, it is grid-based, and you have the obligatory sharing options for the social networks. The rich editing app is integrated in the Gallery with the Oppo Find 5, letting you crop, resize, remove red eye, add color effects and annotate on the go.
Oppo has graced the Find 5 with a 13 MP camera sensor from Sony, which, judging from the ability to shoot Full HD HDR video, is of the Exmor RS variety, that has HDR hardwired. The same sensor is present on the Xperia Z, and will likely be into a lot of flagships this year, so Oppo has gone with the flavor of the month here.
The camera interface is a bit plain, with just HDR (both for pictures and video) and face recognition switches, but no scene modes, exposure compensation, contrast or saturation sliders are present. The phone takes shots very quickly, and the burst mode allows up to a hundred frames in 20 seconds to be taken. There were issues with focusing at times on our cloudy day, which required us to tap on the object front and center beforehand.
There were white balance issues making the clouds seem purplish at times, but color representation is quite accurate. The level of detail and amount of noise are well balanced, and the objects in the frame come up overall well-focused and distinct. In light-dark parts of the frame the brighter section gets overexposed, as often happens, which can be fixed by shooting with the HDR mode on, and the performance is rather quick then, too.
Indoor shots are average, with a bunch of noise in the frame, but no white balance or focus issues, until we tone the lights down, and the colors become colder, with greenish overcast. The dual LED flash is not particularly strong for anything beyond 5 feet, and illuminates somewhat unevenly.
That HDR mode seems to be a godsend for video, too, especially during nighttime, when car and street lights halo is avoided, and the footage is much more distinct, whereas with normal mode the phone can't focus well. The camera focus actually always wanders a bit when panning around, but especially when shooting in insufficient lighting. The framerate also drops significantly then, down to 17fps at street lighting in the evening, while in daytime it manages 30fps without a hitch. Another downside of low-light video capture with the Oppo Find 5 is that the footage is unusually noisy when the light goes down.
Oppo Find 5 Full HD Sample Video:
Oppo Find 5 Full HD HDR Sample Video:
Oppo Find 5 Full HD Night Sample Video:
Oppo Find 5 Full HD HDR Night Sample Video:
Oppo Find 5 Indoor Sample Video:
Multimedia:
The music player of the Oppo UI is somewhat barebones, only categorizing songs by the basics like albums, artists and playlists, but it does offer to display album art and lyrics, if available, and has a bunch of equalizer presets to choose from in the internal settings.
Oppo has licensed the Dirac HD audio technology for improving the sound reproduction from the handset, and indeed a huge difference can be noticed when you turn it on in headset mode – the sound becomes much stronger and cleaner, while for loudspeaker mode there is Dolby Mobile to make the unit perform way stronger and fuller than your typical smartphone speaker.
The video player is pretty basic in terms of interface, too, but quite functional, as it runs everything thrown at it, including MKV/DivX/Xvid files up to Full HD definitions, and with subtitles, if available.
As far as the picture gallery, it is grid-based, and you have the obligatory sharing options for the social networks. The rich editing app is integrated in the Gallery with the Oppo Find 5, letting you crop, resize, remove red eye, add color effects and annotate on the go.
Call quality:
Battery:
Oppo has equipped its flagship with a generous 2,500 mAh battery, which is more than its competing Full HD 5-inchers, and less than the giant Note II, for example. Exact talking times aren't listed yet, but we didn't notice any unusual battery drain, and you should be able to survive day, day and a half without plugging in, depending on usage.
We made a small experiment charging the battery overnight to break it in, and running a 1080 DivX movie at 75% screen brightness, and the phone lasted just shy of 5 hours until the battery died, which is about what one should expect with such a workload, but nothing exceptional either.
Conclusion:
It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that these days any electronics manufacturer can pick Android and slap together a phone or two with off-the-shelf parts. The real challenge, however, is to pick the right ingredients for polished performance in all aspects, and fuse it together with proprietary software overlay, so that the handset both delivers on the usability front, and differentiates you in the mind of consumers from the sea of Android phones.
The relatively unknown Oppo has done just that with the Find 5 – it got the best large screen on the market in terms of pixel density and the other criteria, powered the phone with a proven fast chipset, snatched one of the best mobile camera sensors, and enhanced the audio experience in both headset and speaker modes, as well as provided good call quality.
All of this is wrapped together in an appealing design, both for the hardware and the software overlay, while Oppo placed the largest battery in the phone's class to make sure the thing keeps on ticking longer. Moreover, Oppo USA lists a $499.99 price for the SIM-free 16 GB version, and $569.99 for the 32 GB, so the pricing is kept decent, too.
Only a few things are keeping the Oppo Find 5 from being the bee's knees – the lack of microSD slot means you are stuck with about 11 GB of user-available memory, which will be quickly filled with media given the drool-worthy screen and powerful handset. Also, the unibody phone feels solid, but quite large and heavy in the hand, and the side buttons go a tad shallow.
Still, the handset costs 20% less than the established flagship brands, and manages to stuff a larger battery than the competition. Moreover, the 32 GB version renders the lack of expandable storage point somewhat moot, so if you want top-notch specs for cheaper, the Oppo Find 5 deserves your careful consideration.
Natural competitors are the DROID DNA/HTC Butterfly, which is a tad larger, and comes with a smaller battery, as well as the Sony Xperia Z, which is waterproof, with premium compact design and microSD slot, but comes more expensive.
Software is not final retail one; version: X909EN_13_130125
Oppo Find 5 Video Review:
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