Lenovo Vibe K5

The Lenovo Vibe  K5 is a low-end smartphone with an attractive design and reasonably good performance. The Lenovo smartphone has 2GB of RAM, a removable battery, and a 5-inch IPS touchscreen display.  The camera is basic and the performance in low light conditions is substandard when compared to more high-end mobile smartphones. This article takes you through the features/specifications of the Lenovo Vibe K5 as well as provides a Lenovo Vibe K5 review.

Design

Perhaps, one of the most striking details of the Lenovo Vibe K5  is the design. The K5 offers a rather elegant design despite being a low-end to mid-range handset. The housing, made of aluminum and plastic, offers a modern feel. Once can tell where the plastic starts and where the metal begins. There is a slight difference in color between the two but this is minimal and hardly noticeable.

Display

The Lenovo Vibe K5 smartphone has a 5–inch HD IPS touchscreen  with a resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels. The downside is that the Lenovo Vibe K5 screen does not provide Corning Gorilla Glass or any other type of screen protection. In the box, there is a screen protector and a case that can protect the screen and back of the smartphone respectively. At the bottom of the front side, there is a space for the three navigation buttons, and the upper space houses the secondary/front camera and the notification light. In the back of the device are the two Dolby Atmos sound system speakers, in addition to the main camera and LED flash. The only thing printed on the housing in this part are the Dolby and Lenovo logos.

On the right side are the volume controls and on and off button, and on the upper side we find the microUSB port for the charger and connection with computers and other devices. There is also the minijack port for headphones. The Lenovo Vibe K5, as you can imagine, offers a very clean and elegant design. This is uncommon in lower tier smartphones. The dimensions of the Lenovo Vibe K5 smartphone are, 142 mm long x 71 mm wide x 8 mm thick, with a weight of 142 grams (with battery included). The model is available in three colors: graphite gray, silver, and gold.

HD Screen and Dolby

The Lenovo Vibe K5 screen is 5 inches with IPS technology, and HD resolution (1280 x 720 pixels). The density is about 294 pixels per inch. No surprise here, although it is a fairly common feature in other low-end phones. As mentioned, there is no kind of protection built into the screen but there is a protective film & case that ships with the smartphone to protect it from scratches.

The sound, however, that’s a strong point for the Lenovo Vibe K5 model. The Lenovo Vibe K5 incorporates Dolby technology to deliver good quality sound. Specifically, there is a set of two speakers located in the rear of the phone that creates stereo sound. And for those who prefer to listen better, it has a minijack and ships with standard earphones.

Processor & RAM

This low-end Lenovo smartphone uses a Qualcomm Snapdragon 415 eight–core processor. Four Cortex-A53 working at 1.5 GHz and four Cortex-A53 cores working at 1.2 GHz. The phone responds very well to complex or resource – intensive tasks, especially by incorporating a 2GB RAM that holds steady when using demanding games or applications. If we consider the tests AnTuTu Benchmark power, we get 28369 points (with the Lenovo Vibe K5 at No. 30 in the ranking of devices). Geekbench tests 3 provide a score of 503 points in single-core and 2020 points for Multi-Core performance. The smartphone has an internal storage capacity of 16 GB which can be expanded with a microSD&tag=orduh-20&linkId=dea0f8d7b2817b838c7b9ff3b9ebe328&linkCode=ktl” rel=”nofollow” data-amzn-ps-bm-keyword=”microSD” data-amzn-link-id=”dea0f8d7b2817b838c7b9ff3b9ebe328″>microSD card up to 32 GB.

Dual SIM & Battery Performance

As mentioned at the beginning, one of the most interesting features of Lenovo Vibe K5 is its removable battery, at a time when the smartphones ship with a fully integrated battery without the possibility of removal seem to have dominated the market. Removing the back of the phone reveals the battery and, when removed, gives way to insert SIM cards in any of the  two microSIM cards slots. As for autonomy/battery life, considering that the screen has HD resolution (720 x 1080 pixels) and the battery capacity is 2750 mAh, the results are quite positive. With heavy use the phone can easily reach the end of the day or even a day and a half with normal use.

Operating System and Applications

The Lenovo Vibe K5 comes with Android 5.1 Lollipop and uses the  Lenovo Vibe UI. Although in general, the interface is quite clean and comfortable, there are not many options to customize the app drawer to user preferences (You can always opt to download Lenovo Vibe UI themes). From the pull-down menu for notifications, you can also see a list of switches and quick access options to quickly configure the WiFi access, airplane mode, the sound mode, the screen brightness or location, among other adjustments. These are the applications that come standard with the Lenovo Vibe K5:

• Google Apps: the search engine, Gmail, Google Maps, YouTube, Google Drive, Google Play,Play Music, Play Movies, Photos, Hangouts, Calendar …
• Photo Gallery and file browsers, videos and music.
• Basic utilities: camera, email application, sound recorder, calculator, FM radio, compass.
• McAfee antivirus
• Theme Manager
• Dolby App

Lenovo has several interesting apps to offer, such as SyncIt which allows you to store backups in the cloud via a Lenovo account – or ShareIT, which greatly facilitates the transmission of files between multiple devices (smartphone, tablet, computer ). The CLONEit option, with which you can migrate all data from a Lenovo phone to another with just a click or a touch. And with the Lenovo Companion app, you can access community forums, information about the device, technical assistance, and news about available updates.

• Communication and social networks: Lenovo Vibe K5 series comes with applications like Twitter and Skype, but you can uninstall these without problems. The same applies to Evernote & Navigate.
• To browse the Internet, the phone has Google Chrome and also comes standard with UC Browser, you can uninstall it if you are not interested.
• Games: on the device are Tap the Frog HD (get it here) and GameStore, a play center where you can be part of a global community of users and play games like Sudoku, Ninja Blade or Poker.

Camera & Video

The Lenovo Vibe K5 has the main camera (rear) of 13 megapixels with LED flash and a front camera of 5 megapixels. Overall the level of detail of the images in good lighting conditions is basic, and the phone falls short at night or in low light when it is very difficult to obtain good quality images even using specific scene modes or working with HDR.

In the general camera settings, you can activate or deactivate details such as sound at the time of capture, the capture function of the volume down button (which can be activated as a shooting button) or enable geo-location on images. The main camera offers three options for capturing photos: Normal mode, Panorama mode, and Effects mode.

Lenovo Vibe K5 Camera – Normal Mode

In this section, you can configure, to your liking, many settings for shooting or snapping photos & videos: from the ISO to the scene mode or image size (you can choose between 4: 3 or 16: 9). Most sections can be left in automatic mode if you do not want to complicate the process, but you can also use advanced settings to manually choose the options that best suit your needs.

The ISO can be set to automatic mode, or ISO 100, ISO 200, ISO 400, ISO 800 or ISO 1600. In addition to the image size, you can also select the image quality, which will influence the size & quality of JPG files: Normal, Good or Very high. And you can also select, in the Effects section, levels of brightness, saturation, exposure and sharpness.

White Balance can also be adjusted, and you can choose between automatic mode, incandescent light, fluorescent light, natural light or cloudy. You can also disable or enable the HDR option which allows balancing the differences between the areas of the image that are brightly lit and others that are very dark  plus choose between automatic flash, flash on or off right from the screen.

The Lenovo Vibe K5 camera also allows you to shoot via different scenes to suit your needs. They are as follows:

• Automatic mode: perfect to take photos if circumstances have no special features or details that may cause difficulty to obtain good quality images.
• Sunset mode: to get good pictures in hours near sunset or whether we will capture images back-lit by the afternoon sun.
• Sport and Action modes: are the most recommended for taking pictures in situations with much movement, either with people or vehicles moving.
• Vertical and Horizontal modes: These settings are very interesting because they allow you to force the mobile to detect certain images with a specific orientation. The vertical mode can be an interesting choice for portraits if you do not want to use the camera for selfies.
• Night portrait mode: this is the option you should select if you want to get good quality in low lighting (especially if, in the environment, there are lamps or other sources of artificial lighting).
• Candle Light mode: photography with this type of lighting is always quite difficult, so it is useful to set the phone automatically to detect.
• Night mode: to get the best possible images in low light, although usually, the Lenovo Vibe K5 camera struggles with photos in low lighting.
• AR and ASD modes: These options are very interesting to get the most out of dimly lit environments, as the phone is able to analyze the light and make the necessary adjustments.
• Still photo mode.
• Fireworks mode.
• Beach mode, party mode and snow mode: the three situations have conditions with various lighting and therefore it is recommended that you use the scene modes specially designated for indoor parties, activities in the snow and photographs on the beach.
• Light background mode: you can use it to compensate for back-lit images.
• Flowers mode: perfect for photographing plants, and also gives good results for photography of small objects at close range.

Lenovo Vibe K5 Camera – Effects Mode

The Effects mode of the K5 camera allows you to capture images while directly applying different filters, so you can select in advance what kind of picture you get. This includes Black & White, Sepia, Negative, Reverse etc.

Lenovo Vibe K5 Camera – Panorama Mode

As in almost all phones, the Lenovo Vibe K5 camera has a specific option for panoramic capture. Just press the button at the starting point of the image and move the camera along the baseline to complete the picture.

Lenovo Vibe K5 Video Recordings

The Lenovo Vibe K5 camera can record video in 1080p quality but is limited to a maximum duration of 30 minutes. In the Video Settings menu, you can enable or disable the maximum duration: 30 seconds, 10 minutes or 30 minutes. You can also manually set the image quality: you can choose between 1080p, 720p, CIF or QCIF. And you can enable or disable the EIS anti-shaking system stabilization. 

Front Camera

The manual configuration possibilities are significantly reduced in the case of the secondary camera. You can choose between a ratio of 4: 3 or 16: 9, and activate a beauty mode ( by sliding your finger on the scale bar to exaggerate or conceal corrections for your face). Moreover, a very interesting option we could find for this camera is the ability to enable or disable the “mirror effect”.  It is very useful if you want to manually select images in mirror mode or not.

In low light conditions, the secondary camera of the Lenovo Vibe K5 falls short: it is 5 megapixels, no flash and offers few options to adjust the brightness or white balance. There is also no way to customize the exposure and sharpness beyond beauty mode, although the phone still manages to easily recognize faces to focus on.

Review

After an in-depth analysis of the Lenovo Vibe K5, we can conclude that it is quite interesting in terms of design and performance for a low-end phone. The main advantages besides its price (180 euros) are the capacity for two SIM cards, the removable battery, and fluency in performance thanks to the processor and 2GB of RAM. In addition, the Dolby Atmos sound system supported by two stereo speakers creates a high–quality audio experience.

Among the disadvantages is, of course, the limited quality of images taken with the camera in certain circumstances. Although in daylight not too many details are lost, at night or in low light conditions, it is very difficult to obtain good images and that can become a factor on which we must reflect before deciding what to buy this Lenovo smartphone. Moreover, it is also worth thinking about the price and the options offered by the current market input terminals. The Lenovo Vibe K5 has a very reasonable price for all the positive characteristics we found. You can check out other Lenovo Smartphones like the Lenovo Vibe K3 Note.  You can purchase the Lenovo Vibe K5 on Amazon.

Lenovo Vibe K5 Specifications