Online Shopping Blog » New Products

Generation Android

Red — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 06:08:26 +0000

Google’s Android OS has made a big difference in the Chinese smartphone manufacturing industry in the last few years. There has been a definite shift in preference from the design and development of proprietary operating systems for their smartphones to designing their smartphones around the Android operating system.

This has allowed many Chinese smartphone manufacturers to reduce overall production costs and focus mainly on producing solid hardware bases with a wide range of features and with the kind of capabilities that can be expected from a modern smartphone. These improvements are definitely noticeable and Chinese smartphones become better and better with each new generation that is released.

The most recent generation of smartphones has been particularly notable – with the majority of Chinese smartphone manufacturers almost exclusively releasing smartphones running Android 2.2 or Android 2.3. A closer inspection of the hardware that these newer Chinese smartphones are running really shows how much the industry in China has improved – at least on the hardware manufacturing sector.

Most of the recently releases smartphones run on the MTK6516 mobile processor, which on its own is very capable and is able to run Android OS and any apps that are installed smoothly and easily. Although resistive touch screens are still being used, capacitive touch screens have clearly started to show up more prominently on Chinese smartphones, especially those above $175. With most brand name smartphones that use capacitive touch screens costing anywhere above $300, this is a significant development, as it really is hard to replace the impact that the ease-of-use of a capacitive touch screen makes on a users, especially those who will be using a touch screen phone for the first time.

Online wholesalers have been quick to snatch up these newer smartphones, and they have by all accounts become instant hits with their customers – something that doesn’t seem to come as a surprise to many of us anymore. Chinese smartphones have garnered a level of respect among many tech savvy users because they are easy to customize to suit ones needs. The deployments of Android that they utilize are easily rooted, so jailbreaking them to install a custom OS or other software that otherwise would not be available for download or use is a relatively easy task for those with some basic experience in working with Android OS installations.

Bigboxstore.com has definitely not been left behind in acquiring these new handsets for sale online. In fact, on closer inspection, the electronics wholesalers still offers the lowest prices on the internet for these new smartphones. Customers who are interested in the growth and development of the smartphone market in Asia will find really great deals here to fulfill all their Chinese smartphone fantasies. But if you’re simply looking for a great smartphone that will fit in with your lifestyle, whether you use it for business or to simply be up-to-date with the latest offerings in technology, you don’t have to stray any further, check out our catalog! There’s sure to be an Android smartphone there that will fit your needs exactly! Happy shopping!

Great New Sunglasses – Bring Retro Back Again

Red — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 16:43:35 +0000

If I’m looking for a piece of fashion “kit” that I can be sure will never go out of style, the first thing that usually comes to mind for me are sunglasses. Sure, there are times that they aren’t exactly considered standard fare in the world of high fashion, but leaf through the pages of any fashion magazine in the last 10 years, and it shouldn’t be much of a surprise to find at least 1 pair in each of them. This is because, aside from making you look good, sunglasses provided an additional benefit: utility. Sunglasses serve a practical purpose that shouldn’t be overlooked, that is, protecting your eyes from damaging bright light and ultraviolet radiation.

More recently, however, sunglasses are “in” because of fashion, fashion, fashion – that fickle setter of trends that never seems to make up its mind about anything. This year, it’s all about the wide lenses and wide-rimmed frames for ladies, thanks primarily to the eccentric, eclectic, but always flamboyant sense of fashion we’ve come to equate with the equally eccentric, eclectic, but always flamboyant female singer, musician, and songwriter, Lady Gaga.

I don’t think it’s even possible to miss her sunglasses, pretty much because she is hardly ever seen without one. If she’s not wearing it, it’s either pressed between her fingers or gently perched between her teeth; or like you’d expect from any rowdy, down-to-earth sex symbol, hanging from her garment between her breasts with one arm tucked comfortably down her cleavage.

But summer’s over, you say, and winter is just around the corner – there is neither real utility nor fashion for sunglasses when you’re not under the sun. The Gaga’s likely answer, “Well there is still the blinding snow glare!” And this is true, at greater intensities snow glare can result in damage to the eyes that may lead to blindness later on, so it’s always a great idea to protect your eyes with sunglasses, even in the winter.

Allow me to get sidetracked here for a bit, since we’re on the topic of snow glare, I have a bit of useful information you ought to know. Many sporting goods companies attempt to attract customers with the false claim that polarized lenses are the best for winter use – don’t believe this! Snow glare is not polarized, so wearing polarized lenses will do nothing but decrease the total brightness of the scene by half – something that most ordinary glasses can usually do without polarization and for a fraction of the cost of polarized sunglasses!

So. . . Yeah, winter’s coming up, and we’re stocking up on some cool new sunglasses for women that you can buy from China at wholesale prices! Whether you’re looking them up for fashion or utility, be sure to check them out. We’ve got a small, but great collection we’re sure you’ll enjoy ranging from the classy and fashionable to the geek but cool and even to novelty designs we’re sure you will enjoy! So what are you waiting for, forget that the sun is out less in the winter, get a pair of sunglasses now!

Halloween Strikes Anew!

Red — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 10:19:31 +0000

Halloween often comes up whenever people talk about their favorite holiday, in fact, it consistently ranks within the top 3 holidays in the United States. This comes with little surprise because, especially amongst kids, who can resist the temptation of free candy – even if the entire concept of getting the free candy revolves around what would otherwise be a scary event. Halloween also marks the start of a series of much anticipated holidays, hence the term “Holiday Season”, that occur within a month of each other, namely Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas (or Hanukkah, if you’re Jewish), and New Year’s Day.

What really sets Halloween apart from most other holidays is the chance to be creative – to dress up in different costumes and to decorate the house to make it look haunted and scary. It is a practice that many participate wholeheartedly in, taking the time to find or design the best costumes for themselves. Homeowners setup different Halloween props to give their houses an eerie and creepy feel to excite trick-or-treaters or guests who come over for a Halloween masquerade party.

A lot of people choose to spend a lot of money to look scarily amazing or decorate their houses to be frighteningly astounding, but that’s not always the case for everyone, especially with the anticipation of more expenses for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Buying Halloween costumes, masks, and props from a Chinese online wholesale shop is one of the best ways to save money on Halloween, and still manage to look scarily amazing or decorate frighteningly astounding.

There are a host of online wholesalers who carry items especially for Halloween, like the standard witch hat or ghoul mask, for cheaper than they are available for from retailers. They are also a great place to look if you’re looking for something different this Halloween. Among some of the more exotic items they offer are Osama bin Laden masks and plastic and silicon analogs of severed limbs. If you’re looking for something more classic, then there’s the ever popular Scream or Frankenstein mask and pirate’s hat or headdress. And for those who like to mix sexy with scary on Halloween, there are some sexy Halloween costumes as well.

People who are planning a Halloween party will find a lot of items that will go well with their themes. If you’re serving ghoulish green lime punch in a witch’s cauldron, dropping in a few water-activated flashing green ice cubes will make the eeky concoction seem like a real glowing witch’s potion. The eerie look of a dimly lit room can be accentuated by using some black light to make skeleton shaped paper garlands glow or by hanging up some skull-shaped Halloween lanterns. And for that dark Gothic look, placing some electronic braziers around the room can make it somewhat more castle-like.

So whether you’re looking for that perfect addition to your costume or a decorative accent that will really make your house look spooky, go ahead and check out the selection at a Chinese online wholesale shop and you might be surprised at the variety of different costumes, masks, and props, and how affordable all these items are from them.

A Revolution in Media Players: Dual-booting MP5 Players From Ramos and Benss

Red — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 15:04:21 +0000

If you’ve ever thought that the large touchscreens that come with MP5 players should be used for much more than just touch playback of movies and music, and for turning the pages of an occasional e-book, then you’ll be glad to know that the future of MP5 players is quickly catching up to you. There is a revolution brewing in the media player world that is merging the MP5 player and Android tablet markets closer together. This revolution is the inclusion of two operating systems in one MP5 player device, allowing users to chose to boot either to the standard OS of a high-definition media player or into a version of Google’s Android OS.

Two leading MP5 manufacturers have been on the forefront of this new generation of MP5 players with dual boot capabilites: Ramos and Benss. Both companies have had extensive experience in the design and development of media players and are two of the most well-established media player manufacturers in the Asia-Pacific region, with avid followers within the region and around the world.

While the development of MP5 players in this direction comes with little surprise, the quality of these first generation of dual-booting MP5 players is really a thing to behold. Between the two manufacturers, 5 new dual-booting MP5 players are currently out on the market.

Ramos is the clear winner when it comes to the number of models it has released that are capable of dual-booting between the HD media player operating system and Android OS 2.1 Eclair. Ramos’ selection of dual-booting MP5 players includes the T8Pro, the T11Pro, the V70Pro, and the T20. The Ramos line feature MP5 players of varying specifications and prices. When purchasing the dual-booting Mp5 players from online wholesalers, Ramos starts with the 4.3-inch T8Pro pricing in at $65.65 at the lowest end of the line and finishes off at $130.09 for the 7-inch T20 at the highest end of the food chain.

Benss has decided to take a more conservative path by releasing only one dual-booting MP5 player, however, it has shown its desire to be competitive in this new area by releasing its modestly priced $49.25 B3 with Android OS 2.3 Gingerbread instead.

All 5 Mp5 players share several things in common. First, instead of having the Android OS installed directly onto the hardware, booting into the Android operating system is instead accomplished by inserting an SD card loaded with Android into the SD card slot and selecting the OS of choice at the start-up screen.

Second, although capable of booting into Android OS, none of the 5 MP5 players are tablets in the true sense of the term. All 5 dual-booting MP5 players do not have WiFi capabilities, so installing any software is once again done via the SD card slot and some basic rooting. All 5 MP5 players also do not have the sensors that come standard with almost any tablet at the moment, like an accelerometer or G-sensor, so games and applications requiring this won’t work as expected.

Ramos had released a more advanced version of the T11, called the T11AD, with WiFi capabilities, an accelerometer, G-sensor, compass, and other more tablet-like hardware specifications, however, this is dual-booting MP5 player is more correctly classified as a tablet rather than a true MP5 player by both users, critics, and Ramos themselves alike.

Give Dad a Gift Outside of Father’s Day

Red — Sat, 13 Aug 2011 16:37:43 +0000

Father’s Day is long overdue, but in the same way that we say that the spirit of Christmas should carry on with us throughout the year and in how we say that every day should be Valentine’s Day for the one that you love, Father’s Day should really be something we commemorate all year round! It is truly difficult to overlook the undeniable sacrifice and concern that fathers have for their children every single day of the year. Indeed, being a father, with all the responsibilities that come with it, is hard, so why not take the time to show your father how much you appreciate him with a great gift from an online wholesaler. We’ve recently added some new items to our catalog that would make great gifts for that special man in your life – whether you call him Dad, Daddy, Pa, Pap, Papa, Pappy, Pop, Father, or whatever else.

Our most recent additions to the catalog are a selection of fashionable, high quality neckties. Well, we understand that neckties are probably the most overused and abused gifts to given to men – and especially fathers. But if you know that your Dad doesn’t seem to have enough neckties and always seems to be using the same neckties again and again throughout the week, then you can be sure he will be happy to receive one as a gift from you anytime. To make the gift even more special, the neckties we’ve included in our catalog come as a set with a matching handkerchief and cuff links. Giving him a set is a great way of saying thank you for providing for your needs all these years.

Aside from the new neckties, we have a lot of other men’s accessories that go great as gift items for Dads that we introduced earlier, like belts and men’s loungewear. But if you’ve got the kind of Daddy who likes to be outdoors and in touch with nature, we’ve added some new hiking and camping gear that’s sure to get any outdoorsy Dad riled up and excited to pack up for another adventure! Aside from the tents, sleeping bags, and rain jackets that we have been offering for a long time, we also added camping lights, binoculars, and barbecue grills to our hiking and camping gear section. Our camping lights use high power, low energy consumption, long lasting LED lights and are brilliant for use in any environment and in almost any weather. The selection of binoculars that we’ve added feature a wide variety of binoculars that are great for use when bird watching, navigating, mountaineering, and other outdoor activities. And specially for those fathers who love to cook outside, our selection of sturdy barbecue grills comes in a wide variety of shapes and sizes to suite the needs of any aspiring chef dad.

And finally, for those with beach-going fathers, we’ve added a selection of flip-flops, as well. All of our flip-flops are guaranteed to be sturdy and will withstand frequent use at silky white sand beaches or abuse on rocky ones. They come in a wide variety of designs and you can be sure that there is a pair there that your Dad will surely enjoy using.

So if you’re looking to surprise your Dad with a great gift outside of Father’s Day or his birthday – if you’re looking to give him something that won’t break your bank, then look no further. We’ve got them here for you at Bigboxstore.com!

Men’s Apparel Selections

Red — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 15:17:29 +0000

Recently, we’ve noticed a lot more men showing interest in Bigboxstore, and the Audience Demographics statistics on Alexa.com have clearly shown that trend. This last few months, we’ve left men almost completely out of the equation in our apparel sections, focusing mainly on women, who enjoy our large selection of accessories, boots, underwear, and swimwear. To fill in the void for our now largely male demographic, we’re putting up some new sections and bringing back some older sections of apparel for men.

New to the men’s apparel department, we’ve added a section for men’s belts. The selections vary greatly in terms of style, and cater to men from every walk of life – giving them a choice of belts for every occasion. Men will see the standard fine leather belts that will look great with any business outfit, but we’ve also added canvas belts for less formal occasions and as well as belts with novelty designs for men who are a little more daring and experimental with their fashion.

Also new to men’s apparel, men now have a selection of swimwear that has come in just in time for the hotter months of the summer when people will be out on the beach or at the pool. The current selection of men’s swimwear features heavily on the boxer brief type trunks that are popular and fashionable at the moment. However, there is still a chance that we might also add the ever popular board shorts to our catalog if can get our hands on new stock. [Update: Men's board shorts swimming gear have already been added to the catalog as of July 16, 2011.]

Men will also see that two older sections that were previously removed are now being put back again. We’re bringing the men’s loungewear section back and we’ve stocked it up with luxurious, high quality pajamas made either from fine mulberry silk or comfortable pure cotton. The current line up comes just in time for the warmer summer months featuring thinner, softer fabrics in mostly short sleeve varieties.

The other older section we brought back is for men’s underwear. We’ve totally rethought our selection and now feature a more refined collection of boxer briefs and sexy low rise briefs. We’ve also expanded our product line to include underwear of different materials giving men better choices that are representative of their preferences.

These 4 sections are just the start of what we have in mind for our male customers. Look out for a wider selection of products in the sections I mentioned and for other sections for men’s apparel to open up as well. Rest assured, we’re committed to becoming the best online wholesale shop for men’s apparel on the internet.

The Response

Red — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 11:38:56 +0000

I’m glad that my boss got a chance to take a look at the other day’s blog post because he did confirm that we’re not actively being listed on Google right now because we have been penalized for some reason. I wasn’t able to find out exactly what reason Google found to penalize us but he did mention that my posts up till now are still great and unique so they shouldn’t be a problem at all and should shoot back up to the top of Google’s PageRank as soon as the penalty is lifted. So there’s still hope on the horizon for this online wholesale shop‘s happy little blogger. Ah, that makes me feel a lot better, my work is secure and I know what I’ve done is being appreciated (doesn’t it just feel bad when no one seems to notice your work, ie. there are no comments or trackbacks)!

Of course, I did figure out that Google was penalizing us before my boss told me about it, but I just wanted to rant about it then to let the sour feelings out so we can move on to more informative content (and also because I had nothing else I felt like writing about that day. Hahaha!). My mood was so bad about the Google penalty that I failed to see the bigger picture.

So, now on to real news!

I failed to mention a while back that Bigboxstore is actually in the process of reviewing its entire catalog right now. I guess there’s no better way to spend down days from having the site penalized than by reacting positively and productively to refine the services and products that we offer.

To tell you the truth, I just missed out on the opportunity to write about it a month ago when I was informed by my boss about the product catalog review. I was so excited about seeing new items in the catalog that I just to write about them and forgot to highlight this fact. Of course, for those of you that still visit the site despite the Google penalty, you probably have noticed this already. What really excites me about it now is what unique visitors will think about it when Google lifts the penalty in the near future. I can’t wait to see our Alexa ranking spike when that happens (I also can’t wait to see the comments on the blog start to come in). Users will be treated to fresh new releases across many of our categories. It’s easy enough to see that we’ve added more cellphones, more Android tablets, more car DVD players, etc. in the existing categories, but to top it all off, we’ve also added some new categories, as well. We’ve widened the product range and now offer products for pets and clothes and toys for children as well. Cosplay costumes, candles, silk flowers, and badminton and tennis equipment are few more categories that have been added, amongst several others. Outdated products have also been removed from the catalog and we’re trying to source newer products from the manufacturers that produced them.

Tough times such as the one’s we’re facing right now are enough to prove the resolve and determination of a company to survive a crisis. I’m sure Bigboxstore has survived several crises of its own before I arrived on the scene, and I really feel great that when the company is met with trials, it responds not by simply advertising and marketing itself more vigorously and aggressively, but by seeking to refine its image amongst consumers.

Other more obvious changes to the site include a Facebook social plugin, so that we can find out the actual number of people who like us. We’ve also added a Google +1 button to the site’s pages so we can keep track of how many people like the site, of course, as well as the individual products and pages, and of course, to increase our PageRank while we’re being penalized. Bigboxstore also believes in the power of social networking to respond to our customers’ wants and needs, so if you do use us, please like us on Facebook and +1 us on the homepage and the pages of the products you like so we can make sure that we will be able to keep them in stock as long as the products on those pages are still up-to-date.

On a lighter note, if you’re a Google user and have been invited to beta test Google’s new social networking experiment, Google+, your +1s will show up on your profile so you’ll have an easier way to get to those products you really like from Google+. Oh, by the way, if anyone’s interested in receiving a Google+ invite, just leave a comment below with your Gmail e-mail address (just customize it like address at gmail.com so that spammer’s crawlers don’t pick up your e-mail address) and I’ll send you an invite.

You’ll Never Run Out of It Away From Home Again

Red — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 03:18:51 +0000

It’s probably happened to all of us. If you ever say it hasn’t happened to you, you’re probably in denial, have never left the house, are so extremely careful that you probably have obsessive-compulsive disorder, or you don’t own a cell phone or other portable gadget. Not sure what I’m talking about? Even now I can sense that a long “ah” will evolve in your head as soon as I tell you that you’ve probably run out of battery power on your cell phone or other portable gadget while you were away from home at one time in the past.

The SCUD L910 4100mAh Portable Charger can be used to charge your iPad, iPhone, or any other mobile device even if there is no clear power source around.

So have you? I can guess that the answer is probably yes, and it most likely has happened more than once – and might even be an ongoing issue. Thinking back, didn’t you wish back then that there were public electrical outlets everywhere where you could plug in a charger so that you could make that call you really needed to make or reply to that text message you really needed to reply to? We’ll I’m here to tell you that although the title of my post is “You’ll Never Run Out of It Away From Home Again,” I’m not here to announce that they will indeed be making sure that there are public electrical outlets everywhere specifically for charging cell phones and/or other mobile devices. But I am here to tell you that with the right equipment and proper preparation, never running out of battery power away from home ever again can quite easily be achieved.

This 1500mAh External Battery Case for the iPhone 4 fits around the device just like any other case, but it provides the iPhone 4 with up to 12 hours of usage time when using a 2G network.

Recently, advancements in battery technology in China have allowed the manufacturing giant to become more competitive in the world of electronics. As you may well know by now, China produces a lot of electronic gadgets that are marketed and used the world over, whether it be cell phones, laptops, tablets, MP4 and MP5 players, you name it, China has been producing it. But until only recently, the battery life of most Chinese electronic devices hasn’t been very good, forcing some Chinese inventors and engineers to look for other alternatives. It was because of this that the portable power charger was born.

Portable power chargers are little devices, about the size of an external HD drive with powerful batteries big enough to charge portable devices. The come in a variety of sizes and specifications. Some portable power chargers can charge a variety of gadgets. There are chargers that are built to charge PSPs. And there are even specifically designed chargers for the iPhone that simply connect to the docking port, continually providing the extra power it will need – some of these are chargers that look like iPhone cases.

You can never go wrong by carrying a portable power charger around. Nothing is better than the assurance that even if you run out of power watching movies on a transcontinental flight, perhaps, you can still charge your cellphone on the go and have enough power once you get to your destination to stay connected with family and friends, as well as whoever it is you will be meeting there. The best thing about portable power chargers is that they are relatively cheap, never really exceeding $70 from any Chinese wholesaler online.

A Copy of the Eken M009S and It’s Actually Better Than the Original?!

Red — Sat, 02 Jul 2011 05:22:26 +0000

When the Chinese manufacturer EKEN released it’s M009S 7 inch Android 2.2 tablet around the end of March 2011, we were quite excited. EKEN after all still continues to carry about its reputation for producing the M001, which has risen to somewhat of a legendary status amongst Android tablet users. The M001, although a much outdated model, continues to be recognized as being exceptionally well thought about Android tablet both because of it’s sleek unibody design that put all the ports at the bottom of the tablet and because it was divergent from the trend that other manufacturers were following of copying the design of the iPad. The M009S caught our attention as being a small 7 inch Android 2.2 tablet that was able to bring to the market performance and features that could otherwise only be found on more expensive Android tablet models.

When the EKEN M009S hit the market, we were not disappointed. Despite being in the sub $100 price point the EKEN M009S sported a VIA MW8650 800MHz processor, 256MB DDR2 RAM, a clear 7 inch 800 by 480 pixel resistive touch screen display, 2GB of internal storage, a functioning accelerometer, 270° degree screen orientation, Wi-Fi connections over 802.11 a/b/g/n, and support for 3G dongles and ethernet connections via an adaptor. After getting our hands on the M009S and trying out, we were quite well convinced that the tablet’s sub $100 price point was deceiving and that it really should have been worth much more. Clearly, we thought, EKEN is in a league of its own to be able to produce such a great tablet at such an affordable price. Little did we know that a clone, a near exact replica, of the EKEN device would soon be out on the market and would include improvements to the M009S but still be able to stay within the same price point as the original.

The EKEN M009S Clone is easily distinguishable due to its green LED here.

Rumors started emerging of a tablet that looked exactly like EKEN’s M009S about a month after the M009S was released. Initially, it was discovered that some of the tablets that could clearly be identified as M009S tablets were exhibiting features that the M009S was not designed to have. The first, and most noticeable improvement came in the way of the touch screen. The original M009S does not support multi-touch with its resistive touch screen, but the unknown clone was capable of multi-touch and did it rather well. Then other reports also started to emerge about the tablet being unable to upgrade its firmware using the official download from the EKEN website without losing its ability to use the touch screen because of a difference in drivers. And finally people began to recognize differences in some of the design choices that were implemented on their tablets. The original had a blue LED for indicating that the unit was powered on that changed to red when the unit was charging. The clone, on the other hand, had a green LED light for indicating that the unit was powered on that also changed to red when the unit was charging. The original EKEN M009S’s USB adapter had the USB ports pointing toward where the earphones plugged in that resulted in a collision of cables if ever anyone tried using both the USB and audio ports at the same time, whereas the clone avoided this by pointing the USB ports in the opposite direction. And finally that the audio jack on the original M009S was green, whereas on the clone it was black. The improvements made on the M009S moved a lot of people over to the side of the cloned device with better features, and who could blame them, it was indeed better.

Luckily, we were also able to get our hands on some stock of the M009S clone, as it has been selling, almost literally, like hotcakes from online electronics shops since it first appeared. A word of warning, however, the company that produces the M009S clone is quite obscure, so getting support from them will probably be in vain. But if you still think that you don’t mind the risk, there actually is a great support community on the Slatedroid.com forum for both the EKEN M009S and its clone. Furthermore, Roger Calver, the head firmware developer for the Slatedroid.com community and who is also well known for his Vestinious line of custom Android OS firmwares, publishes his Vestinious firmware updates for the M009S. The Vestinious custom OS improves on the EKEN firmware, giving it access to the Google Android Market, removing a lot of the bloatware, and improving the tablet’s performance by using another loader that uses less resources.

If you’re on the lookout for an inexpensive tablet that will do everything (and more) that you expect it to do for the price you paid, the by all means get the EKEN M009S or its clone.

A Quick Overview of the Latest Smartphones from Fly-ying Part 2

Red — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 11:10:03 +0000

We’re continuing on from where I left off the other day, we’ll continue to check out the latest phones from Fly-ying. We reviewed 2 of the lower-end smartphones Fly-ying recently released on the previous post. We’ll continue to move up the price range today, and we’ll be looking at 3 phones with better specs and features than the L913 and the F132. All three phones are already available from online wholesalers. So without further ado, let’s begin with a Fly-ying clone of Nokia’s flagship smartphone for 2010, the Nokia N8.

Fly-ying FN8

Fly-ying FN8 (black) at the Main Menu screen

If you’re a fan of the Nokia N8′s design, but can’t find any space in your budget for the $350 – 500 plus original phone, then you might want to consider the Fly-ying FN8. At $114.28, the FN8 gives you that distinctive N8 design for less than half the retail price of an original N8, without the same performance, of course, but with enough features to keep you satisfied with it considering you didn’t have to fork out quite as much.

To start you off, the Fly-ying FN8 draws its processing power from the same source as the F132, the MTK6235 processor. I failed to mention in the earlier post that the MTK6235 processor actually runs at 208MHz and has it’s own Digital Signal Processor. Now, 208MHz is really not a lot of power to run on, so before picking up the FN8, be warned that you shouldn’t expect it to do everything that the N8 can do, in fact, it’s best to consider them in totally different playing fields in terms of performance.

To offset the lack of power for the features it offers, Fly-ying have setup a custom OS on it meant to approach, although not totally resemble, the Symbian^3 OS of the Nokia N8. The low resource requirements of the custom OS allows the FN8 to allocate enough processing power to applications and to making the 3.3 inch 320 by 240 pixel 260 thousand color resistive touch screen display responsive and good looking.

In terms of the unit’s external design, it’s easy enough to distinguish a definite difference in layout – to be quite honest, any comparison with the N8 should have stopped here. Instead of the single multi-function button on the face of the N8, Fly-ying have included 5 distinct buttons on the FN8 that allow you to make and answer calls from any of the four SIM cards on standby, a home button, a back button, and a button to end calls. The camera on the front of the phone has also changed position, moving from the extreme right of the phone’s face over to an offset left. This 0.3MP camera complements the 1.3MP camera on the rear and is intended for video calling.

Additionally, the Fly-ying FN8 has 14.6MB of internal memory, and thankfully, this can be expanded via SD card up to 8GB. This can be used for storing videos, music, and e-books or additional applications, as the phone is also capable of running Java. For connectivity, the FN8 is able to utilize 802.11g/b Wi-Fi connections for hot spot or access point connections to the internet, and GPRS for internet over a mobile phone network. Cross-device connections are also possible via Bluetooth, and the FN8 can be connected to a computer via USB. As with the L913 and the F132, analog and digital TV reception are the norm here. Also, GPS is advertised for the unit, however, how it actually works still has to be clarified.

With the a 1200mAh battery supplied with the FN8, it is able to stay on stand by for up to 150 hours, and it can provide up to 120 minutes of talk time.

Fly-ying F602 and Fly-ying L601

Fly-ying F602 showing the home screen of the Android 2.2 OS modeled after HTC's popular home screen design

The Fly-ying F602 and L601 is where it really starts to get interesting. At $130.83 and $149.99, respectively, they are designed for people who want to have the convenience and flexibility associated with the Android mobile OS for a fraction of the cost of name brand smartphones. The F602 is designed to look somewhat like a clone of a Blackberry device, however, in actuality, only the form factor is shared, Blackberry users will find it a totally different experience altogether. The L601 on the other hand, seems to draw inspiration for its simple design heavily from HTC phones, however, it is not a clone of any phone out in the market right now. Both phones run on Android 2.2 Froyo.

Although differing in price with the FN8 by only about $20 and $30, the F602 and L601 are able to bring a lot more processing power and better features to the smartphone playing field. They are powered by the significantly faster MTK6516 processor running at 416+280MHz. The 416MHz of processing power is dedicated entirely to making sure that the OS and all the installed applications run smoothly, and the other 280MHz is used by the radio for processing signal information. The MTK6516 processor is the exact same processor used by its counterparts from Star, so you can expect similar performance values.

Fly-ying, however, besides being able to implement Android 2.2 with the MTK6516 for cheaper than Star did with the X12, put their usual extra mile into the product by including a custom designed installation of the Android OS that is easily distinguishable at the home screen. Their customized user interface looks strikingly similar to the user interface made popular by HTC. If you’re not a fan of the HTC inspired user interface, with it large date or time display, then you can always go back to the original Android 2.2 interface with the Google search bar.

A further step up from the smartphones from Star, Fly-ying was able to implement a 3.2 inch capacitive touch screen on the F602 and a 3.5 inch capacitive touch screen on the L601. That basically means that you can expect a more responsive touch screen experience without having to “fight” the screen. The native resolution of the display is 480 by 320 pixels, making the F602 and L601 great even for reading smaller font.

Fly-ying L601 (white) at the home screen

The F602 and L601 can also be used for GPS navigation and support voice navigation as well, just in case you want to use it in the car. Besides the GPS navigation capabilities, the smartphones also come with a compass, just in case you do get lost out in the wilderness where GPS doesn’t always help.

Very few smartphones come without dual cameras for voice calling and for general picture taking, and gladly, both the F602 and the L601 aren’t any of them. On both the F602 and the L601 the rear camera comes with a 2 megapixel sensor that is able to produce outputs of up to 1600 by 1200 pixels and the front camera comes with a VGA sensor and produces outputs up to 640 by 480 which is pretty much all you really need for video calling.

For connectivity, the F602 and L601 are able to access the internet via 802.11g/b Wi-Fi connections, although there are some indications that they may also be able to use the N protocol as well. For wireless over cellphone networks, the they are both also able to connect via GPRS. Inter-device connectivity is achieved via Bluetooth v2.0 and they can also be connected via USB to a computer.

Fly-ying has chosen to use a smaller battery than Star, rated 500mAh lower at 1000mAh, however, the F602 and the L601 still manage to achieve a maximum of about 270 hours on standby, which translates to roughly 240 minutes of talk time.