Spice S-5420 Mobile Phone

Spice has not always been one of those companies that stands out in today’s competitive market, however they still manage to offer a plethora of features with all their handsets and still offer them at reasonable prices which makes them aces in my book. But here’s how their S-5420 budget multimedia handset fared.

Form Factor
The S-5420 comes equipped with a 2.0-inch display that sports a 240 x 320 pixel resolution, which is great for a handset in this price range. The keypad may seem a little small but it’s easy to use and the buttons are comfortable to use for typing. The five way nav-pad is fashioned in a metallic dial above the keypad and adds a certain class to the otherwise all black plastic handset. A mini USB port is located on one side of this slim handset. Thankfully it’s not a universal port as the S-5420 has a 2.5mm handsfree socket on the other side. The handset also supports up to 4GB of external memory via microSD cards for which there’s a hot swap slot under the rear panel. The handset also comes with a VGA camera.

It’s a very neat handset, light weight, slim so it’s easy to carry around and with a crystal clear display and easy to use keypad the S-5420 fares quite well in the build section.
Features and Performance

Interface
I have to say that the UI on this baby is excellent. It’s sharp, bright and the large fonts (default) make it extremely easy to navigate and read. The built-in themes are quite vibrant and add quite a lot of color to the handset. Users can opt to switch the language to Hindi and that’s when the ‘Hinglish’ keypad comes in handy of course.

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Media
The handset’s music player is well equipped with features that include EQ presets with fully customizable 8 band graphic EQ settings for a more personalized listening experience. It also has a few animated themes which look quite funky. Unfortunately the problem is volume. It’s just too low. At peak volume you’ll never be able to enjoy the otherwise good quality audio. The handsfree set is quite comfortable but would have been more so with a set of foam ear covers. Another handsfree option is via the built-in speaker that’s no problem when it comes to hearing anyone on calls which is what it’s meant for, and NOT music.

The FM radio has good reception and also comes with an FM recorder that has a scheduling option so you can record specific shows at a designated time. A voice recorder is also present for taking voice memos when necessary. The clear display is once again a feature that ‘shines’ when it comes to watching videos. The handset has support for 3GP and MPEG4 video file formats. A few games have been thrown in as well.

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The default WAP browser works out quite well, it’s nothing fancy but gets the job done for basic browsing. If that doesn’t work for you, a version of Opera Mini is also onboard. Bluetooth with A2DP will make your audio and handsfree experience a lot better. Spice has also loaded this handset with plenty of connectivity freebies that include apps like Nimbuzz for chatting, ibibo and Spice’s own Spice Gang app for Social Networking, MGurujee for students, Reuters and even the NgPay application.

Misc. Features
What I’ve always liked about Spice handsets are the freebies. The company makes it an important factor to include quite a few relevant and free applications aside from just those designed for web connectivity. Spice’s Email2SMS is available and so their mobile tracker feature, Private menu, an application called the Panic Button and a Contacts Back up feature as well. They’ve even included some quick access shortcuts of their proprietary services designed for specific service providers for listening to music or Devotional songs from an online database. IVR Rates will apply depending on the provider.

All other regular features like the Calendar, Calculator, Alarm, Stopwatch, World Clock, To Do List etc. are also present and accounted for.

Camera
The VGA camera comes with a few of the average settings like White Balance, Exposure, Self Timer, Night Mode etc. It’s a bit slow so most of time I kept seeing a blur of the stationary object unless I kept the handset absolutely still.

Image quality was not too great, but I didn’t expect too much considering it’s a VGA camera and its price bracket.

Battery
Don’t expect too much from the battery life. On an average it provided me with just about 2 hours and 20-25 minutes on a single charge.

The Bottom Line
Spice’s S-5420 comes with a price tag of Rs. 3,800 which makes it a pretty decent handset. It has quite a few multimedia features to offer and a whole lot of extras. Of course the music player (low decibel output) and battery were my disappointments. Everything else about the handset is absolutely fine and makes it well worth the money.