Kata M4-5.5-inch Full HD IPS Octa Core International Unlocked Smartphone Android 6.0 - Super Slim Full HD 1.3 GHz Dual Sim Card 4G 18MP Camera (Gray)

Luxury On A Budget!I wrote this April 1, 2017. No not a April Fools prank! Hahah! There will be a video companion to this on YouTube.Please keep in mind that I am NOT an expert! I'm just an average user and customer. But this isn't a Day ONE review. I've had this since March 28, 2017.The Pros. A list of what I think are this device's good points.The OK. Not bad but has room for improvement.The Cons. A list of what I think are this devices faults.The Pros.The build quality. This thing is gorgeous!The look and feel of luxury WITHOUT the hefty price tag! I mean damn! Looks like the Nexus 6 had an affair with the iPhone!The body is made of metal and the screen is glass. It's thin and very light weight.Will it survive a drop test or dunking?Sub zero and heat temperature tests? Not sure. Sorry I'm not brave enough for that.The display. It has a lovely 5.5 inch screen. The screen is IPS LCD. No matter how I twist and turn this I can still see what's on the screen. I keep the screen brightness level at 50% and I can still see what I'm doing out side in full sun.That must be the ambient light sensor kicking in.The screen resolution is 1,920 x 1,080 pixels.The cameras! 18 mega pixels in the back and 13 in the front! I freaking love it! Samsung Galaxy 8 and 8 Plus only have cameras with 12 mega pixels in the back and 8 in the front. Not sure what the deal is, just going by reviews on YouTube.I've been having fun going out and taking pics and video with the Kata M4. All in various lighting conditions . Sometimes with the flash and sometimes without.I also personally think this is perfect for gamers who like to record their game play.Some of us gamers use our phones to document our epic wins and fails. This is because not all of us have a capture card.Just watch the video on YouTube. Its on my 9Tailsfan channel. That should give you guys some idea of how good the cameras are. But this is one of those things you need to see in person.Not only is the display in HD, but you can film video and snap pics in HD too. As long as you have good lighting, your good to go.Some of those higher end products may have 4k, but let me ask you this.What's the point if your viewers can't see it? I have a pretty good gut feeling that most of my followers don't even own a 4k device. Are they even gonna care? Not really.The speed and horsepower.According to the specs sheet I'm looking at this is what the Kata M4 is rock'n.OS Android Marshmallow.Chipset: MediaTek MT6753CPU :1.3GHz Octa Core Cortex- A53GPU: Mali-T720 MP3RAM : 3GB.I think this is pretty damn fast! When I first got this phablet. I downloaded and updated 9 different apps at the same time. It only took about 8 minutes to complete the task. Not to mention the UI, applications and other tasks don't feel sluggish at all.Video streaming apps like Twitch and YouTube run smooth.The finger print sensor. Easy to configure. Its located on the back in a neutral position so the right or left hand index finger can use it. Best of all it doesn't get in the way of the back camera. It can be used add an extra layer of security or to swipe through the home screens.Camera As stated before 18 mega pixels in the back and 13 in the front. The rear has auto focus. Both have LED flash. More on that later.Storage. Internal 32GB. About 8 to 10 gigabytes is actually used for the OS.Storage can actually be expanded with a micro SD card. Once again Android kicks iPhone's ass here!For me personally this has always been a deal maker/breaker. SD card expansion=BUY. NO SD card expansion= kiss my ass!Connectivity.WiFi 802.11 b/g/nI had no issues connecting to my WiFi at home and work.The internal Wi-Fi antenna seems to be pretty strong. While out in the garden , I tested this by walking around playing Pokémon GO. My router is in the kitchen and my garden is petty big. Didn't loose the signal. Not only that, the Kata M4 also detected some of my neighbors' WiFi too!FM radio. Very nice! No data or Wi-Fi required! Just plug in the head phones. The head phones will act like an antenna. But if you remove them the radio will automatically shut off. I personally like the record feature. If I like the song I can record and save it.Bluetooth is supported but it's only v4.0.I tested it by sending a pic and a song from my other phone to this one. Both files transferred just fine.It says that this phablet can be used as a WiFi hotspot, but at the moment I don't have a data plan on my account. I can't test it for myself. I'll just have to take Kata Digital's word for it. Just letting you all know the option is there if you need it.USB. It uses micro USB 2.0. Pretty self explanatory right there.OTG is supported! Oh My God! You guys have no idea how much this makes me happy!FYI OTG means On The Go type connection. You can take something like an old web cam, connect it to the Kata M4 then transfer the video from the web cam. Or you can transfer files and from a USB thumb drive. I have tested this and I can testify that it works!Hot Knot technology is supported! What is Hot Knot? Well it's basically a technology that's very similar to NFC. For more details please check out this link.[What Is Hot Knot?|https://www.google.com/amp/s/blog.chinavasion.com/34848/what-is-hot-knot-and-how-to-use-it/amp/]The microphones. They had no trouble picking up my voice and other sounds.The battery charge time. For me it don't take more then an hour to juice up.Personally I like to let it charge while in sleep mode or shut down. Haha Kata is like " Damn girl, I know I'm handsome but let me sleep OK!?"The OK.The accessories.The M4 came with some white ear buds.They aren't as good as Skull Candy or Beats but they aren't terrible.SIM/Micro SD tool, power brick , USB cable, and 1 year Warranty card.The LED flash. Both the front and back cameras have them.There's an option to use it like a flash light.But they aren't very bright. I tried them in dim light and it was OK. I tried them at night in the garden and the results were meh. But at least its better then nothing.The battery is a 2800mAh Li-on. While I personally don't mind it, there are some folks who would consider this a little under powered. I can get 14 hours on a single charge. Your mileage may very.Yes its sealed but I can live with that.The sound is decent. The speakers are at the bottom. Not at the front or back which means that the sound will not be muffled if you set the unit down on it's back or face down. The only problem I can see happening is if you hold it in landscape mode with both hands.There are no physical home, back and task buttons. Its all in screen. Some may be put off by it but not me.Kata Digital has omitted the app drawer.Again some may be put off by it but not me. I never cared for it anyways. You can always root and run your own custom ROM.The bloatware. In my option it's not that bad. The Kata M4 came with apps for the HISTORY Channel, PBS , and the CW. I actually like them. For the ones I didn't like, I just disabled them and hid the icon in a folder.The card slot. The SIM and Micro SD slot are one in the same.The specs say this is a Dual SIM device.The Kata M4 supports Micro and Nano SIM. But however it looks like if you want to use a Micro SD card, you'll have to forget the Nano SIM.I think it would have been better if the company made a separate slot for the Micro SD card.Networks. The device is unlocked and will work on any carrier that uses SIM cards like T Mobile, AT&T ect.The specs say it supports 4G LTE.... well not quite... at least here in the US. It may get 4G LTE in other countries.Right now I'm getting 3G and pretty satisfied. I have an AT&T Go phoneplan. After I cut down my SIM from normal size to Micro, popped it in. Made a couple of calls. None have been dropped.If you can't get your SIM to work with this device, its probably not the phone but the SIM. Take the phone and the SIM to your carrier's local shop. Perhaps they can help. You might need a new SIM or your settings adjusted. It shouldn't cost more then 10 bucks, the last time I checked.Will the Kata M4 get Android N or O? That remains to be seen. To be fair this thing came out December 2016. Android N came out in August. At the time of writing this its now April 2017. There are still some bigger name brand Android devices that haven't got Android N yet either. I have contacted Kata Digital about this topic via Face Book. A Rep replied " We currently do not have upgrades to higher versions of Android."Hey if you guys don't want to wait for an official upgrade, like I said before you can always root and run your own custom ROM.The Cons.There is no physical owners manual.The so called "Quick start" guide only shows how to put the SIM and Micro SD card in. Since I have experience with smart devices, especially Android , I had very little trouble figuring stuff outBut a first timer will need lots of help.The USB cable is too short in my opinion. It's roughly 2 and a half feet long. Kata, listen make some longer cables. 5 foot ones would be nice.There's only one case for the M4 and it's a "clear" TPU one. Those kinds of cases always turn a nasty yellow brown.In conclusion, just try it.

I really wanted to like this phone. It has a large screen which I liked, easy to handle and use.However, I had some notifications on opening screen that seem to sporadically jiggle several times. Wi-Fi would not automatically connect to my home Wi-Fi, had to do it manually. Notified several times that I had system updates and ask if I wanted to download it viaWi-Fi which I said yes but Wi-Fi was not connected and had to do manually after which the download screen disappeared. When I did get the download screen it used phone line which was very slow. Once downloaded I clicked on install which began. After a couple of minutes I got an 'error' notification which stayed on until I shut the phone down and restarted. Never could install updates. The phone would not connect to my PC. Dialog box said it "did not have correct network protocol". I tried several different ways but could not get phone to connect. Couldn't download pictures or upload music. When trying to move icons from one page to the next the pages flipped too fast causing you to be 2-3 pages over.I did get LTE coverage with the phone which was nice. Sometimes it would drop to 4G but pop right up to LTE again.There were some advertisements that kept popping up at random times but were not intrusive and easily moved.OWTEL did contact me and asked that I return the phone for replacement or refund which I really appreciated. Kudos to them. Also, Amazon made it extremely easy to return the phone. Just find the closest return center, print out the labels and drop it off. Quick as hell. I love Amazon for this service. Refund was very fast.All the best to Kata, OWTEL and the wonderful folks at Amazon.Hopefully they will get the bugs worked out and it will be a great phone for the price.

Great phone!!! It works perfectly with T-Mobile and metro.

The Kata M4 is an impressive smartphone. Excellent camera and screen, it runs everything I tried on it effortlessly.Overall one of the best products I've ever tried.But it has a few downsides.Its shape combined with its thin-ness makes it difficult to pick up sometimes without a case, and there aren't many cases for this phone out there.Also, its very vulnerable to drops destroying it.Mine fell approximately two feet onto carpet: this killed the volume up button, and rendered the power button very unresponsive.The next day it bricked. RIP.The Kata warranty doesn't cover accidents.Tried to fix it since it was dead anyway, but these are designed to not be opened. Made it worse. GG no re.

Great product! Delivery was fast and packing was perfect. My Kata M4 came in excellent condition and worked flawless out of the box. Very fast and it has a smooth scroll and crisp display. Easily on par with the leading brands without the price tag. I recommend this vendor and their wonderful products.

This is an excellent and affordable smartphone that is packed with features. The Full HD screen is in perfect size which is beautiful and large enough to read a book but can still fit in a pocket. Battery life is great and I don't have to charge it every day. The phone is super fast and the reason I like it is because of its large internal storage and you could even add a SD card to it. I highly recommend this phone.

This phone is not worth it....... For one it dies very quickly, second the when you're trying to call someone it not ringing, and you barely get any signal on it... Don't waste your money on this phone it may have a good camera but that just to get you hooked on it I wouldn't recommend this phone to anyone unless they want it to take pictures with it

The camera quality on this phone is amazing yet, when I record a video the audio sounds awful? I haven't dropped the phone and have had it for almost a month and a blue vertical line has appeared on the left side of the screen.. doesn't cause issue I just don't know why the line is there. Help???

I rely on GPS to get me through traffic each day so it's a big thing for me. I am pretty sure they would be able to fix it fairly quickly. But the customer service is just none existent.Original reviewI was fairly dubious before buying this phone as there was only one review. But I watched a few videos on YouTube and read a bit online about it. Love it so far. I had the iPhone 6 before this. I would say that Apple will be lucky to match the power of this phone by the time they're at the iPhone 15.The phone has a Octacore processor which is about as powerful as you are going to get at the moment. Bare in mind that most desktop computers are still only running a Quadcore or even a dualcore processor! I could see a huge difference in the speed, but not sure whether that was because my iPhone 6 had a measly dualcore processor.I read on a few blogs that people say that the camera isn't that great. I would have to disagree, the quality of photo I have found so far to be excellent. I suspect if you compared it to the Pixel that it would be slightly inferior but so far for me the picture quality has exceeded my expectations. The picture quality is certainly a lot better than the iPhone 6.If you get a name brand - Samsung, Apple, Google Pixel, you are going to pay 5-6 times the price for a phone with a very similar spec.So far, I literally haven't found 1 negative to say about the device. But will update my review if anything goes sideways!Hoping that Kata have more of a presence in North America, if the phone stays in one piece for the next 2 years, will definitely buy the newer model!

great device but filming indoors is average.