T-Mobile announced the Alcatel ONE TOUCH Fierce back in late-September. At the time they offered some details in terms of the specs, pricing and release date. And well, judging from the specs and pricing, we knew this handset was going to fit squarely into the mid-range lineup. While we realize that may not sound all that exciting to some, there may be a something here with the Fierce. We have recently been carrying the ONE TOUCH Fierce and have been pleasantly surprised. Read on to check out the full review below.
Hardware
Alcaltel has the ONE TOUCH Fierce equipped with a 4.5-inch display with a resolution of 960 x 540 at 245ppi. The handset is then powered by a quad-core 1.2GHz MediaTek MT6589M ARM Cortex-A7 processor with 1GB of RAM. One drawback here is the internal storage. Alcaltel has this listed as being 4GB, however in our testing we are only seeing a little more than 1GB as being free and available.
Thankfully though, there is a microSD card slot if needed. The memory card slot is tucked away under the battery door cover. This brings two points that while we will point out, they may not matter much for those in the intended audience. The battery is non-removable and the memory card slot is not hot-swappable, which means the phone will need to be powered down to add/remove a card.
Those few quirks aside, the phone measures in at 5.13 x 2.64 x 0.35 inches and weighs in at 4.59 ounces. Overall, the ONE TOUCH Fierce feels really comfortable to hold. It is not all that heavy and the soft-touch on the back and sides feels good. This is made of plastic, but at the same time it feels solid and although we didn’t test this — it feels like it could hold up if accidentally dropped.
A tour of the outside reveals a VGA quality camera and capacitive buttons on the front, a power button and 3.5mm headphone jack up top, microUSB for charging on the bottom, a volume rocker on the right side and 5 megapixel camera with flash and speaker sitting on the back. The handset is gray on the back and sides, black on the front and with the expected brands. That is to say the Alcatel logo on the front with the ONE TOUCH and T-Mobile logos on the backside.
Software
The ONE TOUCH Fierce is running Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean and while the install is relatively clean as far as manufacturers go, there are some noticeable differences. To begin with, the app icons are slightly more playful looking. This isn’t a bad thing by any means, but something that may take a day or so to get used to if you happen to be switching from another Android handset.
You can get a look at those icons in the images sitting above and below. This is where another good point comes in. There are some T-Mobile branded apps, however all things considered — there was not much in terms of pre-installed on the Fierce. You will see the four app screens sitting below, however we should point out that our testing adding one full (20 app) screen.
Some of the pre-installed apps included Emergency alerts and a Flashlight, as well as those from T-Mobile. Like or dislike those, they are a part of buying a carrier branded handset. In this case we feel the T-Mobile apps do have value. Or at least the potential for value depending on the user. One example would be T-Mobile TV. There is also a Mobile HotSpot as well as T-Mobile Name ID, T-Mobile My Account and a few others.
Perhaps in an effort to keep users from having to dive into the settings, there is also a W-Fi app (which is really just a shortcut to the settings). Users will also find an FM Radio app, though truth be told we would rather prefer to download and use the TuneIn Radio app for that sort of listening.
The T-Mobile TV app offers viewing of select channels including Fox News, Fox Business, ABC Mobile, NOW, Disney, a selection of sports related channels and quite a few others. Using TV requires dropping WiFi and sitting on T-Mobile 4G so the experience will likely vary depending on your connection speeds. In our experience, this was acceptable, but not great.
Otherwise, a few other highlights include the Swype keyboard, WiFi Calling and for those in need, M3 and T3 heading-aid compatibility.
Benchmarks
Benchmarks, a topic that has been rather hot lately. Needless to say, we understand some like to see the numbers so we went ahead and did tests with three of the more popular benchmarking apps. In this case that means AnTuTu, Geekbench 3 and Quadrant. Given the specs of the phone we have to say these numbers and placements were sort of expected.
AnTuTu returned a score of 13,721, Geekbench 3 returned a score of 326 (single-core) and 1092 (multi-core) and Quadrant had the handset sitting with a score of 4776. Simply put, this is not a high-end device. But again, the specs and the pricing already gave us that bit of information. These benchmarks simply offer further confirmation.
Putting the numbers aside. What we can say is that the handset performs reasonably well in day to day use. It is not a screamer in terms of performance, however given the audience that is likely to choose this model — it should serve them rather well. Our daily use included some voice calls along with plenty of messaging (text and Hangouts) as well as social networking, using the camera, some audio streaming and a bit of video streaming.
Battery Life
Alcatel has the ONE TOUCH Fierce loaded up with an 1800 mAh battery. This one is not removable which means those with heavy usage patterns will be forced to carry a charging cable and remain on the hunt for a plug. We prefer to see smartphones with a removable battery, but that likely goes back to our usage patterns — heavy. In this case we suspect those looking towards this phone (based on a low-price) would be more willing to carry the included power cord as opposed to shelling out any additional money for a spare battery.
We were able to get through a work day without running the battery dry, but we did have to pay attention to what we were doing. We suspect the same will go for most users, and really, the daily battery struggle will come down to how you use your phone. Those doing more streaming will see the percentage drop quicker than those using the phone for calls and messages. Either way, the 1800 mAh battery is pretty much what we would expect to see in a handset such as the Fierce.
Camera
This ONE TOUCH Fierce has a 5 megapixel rear-facing camera with auto-focus and an LED flash. Launching the Camera app and diving into the settings will bring the expected features. The are options to adjust the scene mode, white balance and image properties as well as face detection, timer and more. Users will also find an auto-mode, HDR mode, panoramic mode and multi-angle view mode.
Needless to say, we launched the camera and took our sample shots using the default settings, as we suspect many regular users would do. We took a mix of shots in different lights with some indoors and some outdoors. As you can see, the outdoor images are a bit nicer as compared to those taken in low light. As well, the camera seemed to suffer a bit when trying to get close up.
Along with the sample images, we also have a sample video (sitting below). The video was captured using the default settings and was just a simple stroll through a few different areas, trying to get a mix of light and dark as well as bright sun.
The images and video were all uploaded and presented without editing.
Wrap-Up
All said and done we can say this — the Alcatel ONE TOUCH Fierce may not be our personal favorite. In fact, it may not be one that we would even consider purchasing. Still, we do see some value. The handset has a real solid build, it runs smooth, has Android 4.2 Jelly Bean and other decent features such as the camera. Bottom line here, the ONE TOUCH Fierce, combined with a low price point and the T-Mobile Simple Choice plans should be enough make a budget shopper really happy.
As for that pricing, T-Mobile has the ONE TOUCH Fierce priced at $163.99 (full retail) and available for $19.99 down and 24 monthly payments of $6. The handset will be widely available beginning on October 23rd. Review concluded, there are several more images of the Fierce sitting in the gallery below.
horrible….
Has anyone else found that chrome doesn’t have a menu bar on this phone? I watched the tutorial for the android chrome setup and it shows where the menu bar is supposed to be, but it’s actually not there in the chrome browser on my phone.
I like to know where the menu icon is also, want to change ringers, I seen it once, and don’t know what I did to find it. Why can they just be simple and have a menu button. Also how do you customize your or receive your voicemails on here, Got the phone from a friend don’t have the manual, don’ t really want to download, just read about it.
I really do not expect anything on a phone like that. It’s too bad. Actually there are many other phones it better, more beautiful redesign,
I just got this phone today and for my basic needs a it seems suitable. I do have an issue with it not having a menu button on the bottom face of the phone which makes adding friends on Skype impossible. I was curious to know what app you used for video conferencing on this device?
al u have to do is hold the history button
You may either hold the history button located on the bottom right of the phone. Or, you can use Google Hangouts which, I highly recommend. Google Hangouts it completely free and runs through your Google account. Which, you had to have when downloading apps from the Google Play Store. Hoped this helped!
Ur mom
Yo mama so fat, she sat on an ipod and made the ipad
Yo mama so fat, she sat on an ipad and made the iwhale.
Yo mama so ugly, everyone died.
my Aunty Lily recently got a stunning green Volvo XC60 SUV hop
over to this site www.BIG29.com
I got the phone and am returning it because I can not replace the batter like my other phone.
They charged me hundreds of dollars for it, but Extremely low quality and I lost 5,000 photos worth $10 each trying to transfer them to it. Buying this phone is the most screwed up deal there is. If you are a photographer and want to keep your photos do NOT buy an Alcatel. I would give them a rating of negetive 1,000.
just got the phone today can’t figure out how to delete some contacts i had transfered from old phone. anybody know how to delete a contact?
Yes, go to your contacts and hold down the 2 screens button on the bottom far right of the phone. A menu should appear and I believe the first option is delete. Select delete and go from there. Hope this helped! Sorry it is so late.
can’t not see any button for it. Besides deleting contacts problem, I am not able to find the SETTING for email – sound for notification – and ringtones for incoming calls. Does anyone know there are those features and how to find them?
To delete a contact, go to “People” in the “APPS” list, click on the single person on the top middle of the screen, how down the double screen button on the phone, and the top choice should be “Delete contact.”
Where is the hyphen button on the keypad ive tried everything but cant find one
I know, how can it NOT have a hyphen option? I too have tried everything, can’t find it. Anyone know how to find it, or did they REALLY not include – ?
will the square reader work on this phone,any help will be appreciated
can someone tell me why I cant send or download picture messaging?
Alcatel Fierce How do I delete a phone contact? Thank you for the help.
stuck on emergency calls only
Me to I can only make emergency calls, it’s say that I have a slot has been permanently locked. Help me out please.
Could not read the article as a popupinurface keeps following my sight line
I have the Alcatel One Touch Fierce 2 and every picture I take will get doubled. Anybody else have this issue?
take picture and can’t load them on my computer or facebook. plug it in to my computer, it don’t see the driver and can’t find none that will work it.