YU Yureka Black Review by Team Digit

[amitcemk.cse]

Hey All,
This post revolves around the score given by Team Digit (70/100) for the newly launched YU Yureka Black.
Just for the sake of reference, i have been using YU Yureka AO5510 for past couple of years which got a well exaggerated rating of 76.Only owners of this phone could realize later about the pain in their(you know where)- Buggy software, hell like heating issue, absolute no support for update from cyanogen OS, inconsistent RAM usage , unreliable hardwares etc etc.
Now, reading this new review is make me even more confused!!!
So many demerits team digit has explained.another handfull will come as someone will use the device for certain amount of time and Yet Digit thinks to rate 70/100 when compared to 69/100 for samsung C7 pro!!!
Why so much of kindness towards YU even when none of the handsets by the company could perform that well to be appreciated.

I have been a digit reader for almost a decade and sadly thinking to switch to someplace better for these kind of information.Need to know how other tech lovers feels to what i feel

 

[Nerevarine]

Digit reviews have been mediocre, for as far as I remember. They do not give importance to build quality at all. I saw them recommend expensive zebronics PSUs with no certification, a few years back.. only after the outrage and gaga in the forums about how bad elcheapo psus are, they stopped recommending.

The killer rigs configuration is also another dissapointment, considering the fact that the recommendations on the forums are much much better. Hats of to saiyan_goku and hell even bssunilreddy for consistently replying to rig building posts

The actual user reviews on the forums is a much better source for accurate information, and there are some high quality product reviews among user posts.
If you want good reviews, then go for a more neutral sources. Android Authority is a good source, but they dont review Micromax devices I guess.

Lastly I wish the Digit team, did an actual comprehensive review for PSU, I dont know what they are doing right now, but last time i remember, they had no actual data when reviewing PSUs.
Comprehensive review = open the PSU, measure ampherage, temperatures etc, report quality of capacitors, use signal generators to map out conversion loss..

600 Watt budget PSUs Battle

 

[amitcemk.cse]

Apart from android authority, i am preferring and actually comparing the reviews and compares by gsmarena, ndtvgadgets and gadgetsnow

 

[Raaabo]

Let me get you a reply from the reviewer of the phone. I'm sure there's a logical explanation that you're not considering.

And yes, we don't test / review PSUs, because we don't have equipment to convince us that we would actually be doing justice to the reviews.

 

[Raaabo]

I asked Prasid, and he might come here and reply as well, but the scores are because of prices.

There's a value score involved in the phone's final rating. For the Galaxy C7 Pro, the price is high, which reduces its value score. This is because the value score is a factor of all other parameters. So, a 25k phone rated at 69, is rated so because that's how it is against its competitors. Competitors at the time being phones like OP3T, Honor 8 and more. For the Yureka Black, despite its various faults, it's a cheaper phone and outperforms many others. That, and better looks and build gives it higher scores than many in that price bracket. Hence, its value score also goes up.

About the bugs you pointed out. The issue with Cyanogen was unforeseen, and no one could have predicted them. Up until CM joined the Yu brigade, it was one of the most trusted ROMs out there, so there was no reason to expect otherwise when we reviewed the phone.

That said, Yu phones have indeed had other issues as well, and we've been working to include a company's past record and customer support in our reviews and scoring systems. For instance, for the Xiaomi Redmi 4 review, we specifically included a note about the camera, mentioning that Xiaomi cameras in review and final sold models have often been drastically different. Similarly, in almost all of our recent reviews, we've noted that phones running on Android M should NOT be accepted anymore. We also mention, whenever needed, that one shouldn't buy phones with 16GB storage. Etc.

Does this solve your query?

 

[Jefferson Hope]

Hey All,
This post revolves around the score given by Team Digit (70/100) for the newly launched YU Yureka Black.
Just for the sake of reference, i have been using YU Yureka AO5510 for past couple of years which got a well exaggerated rating of 76.Only owners of this phone could realize later about the pain in their(you know where)- Buggy software, hell like heating issue, absolute no support for update from cyanogen OS, inconsistent RAM usage , unreliable hardwares etc etc.
Now, reading this new review is make me even more confused!!!
So many demerits team digit has explained.another handfull will come as someone will use the device for certain amount of time and Yet Digit thinks to rate 70/100 when compared to 69/100 for samsung C7 pro!!!
Why so much of kindness towards YU even when none of the handsets by the company could perform that well to be appreciated.

I have been a digit reader for almost a decade and sadly thinking to switch to someplace better for these kind of information.Need to know how other tech lovers feels to what i feel

Hey,

There's a value score involved in the phone's final rating. For the Galaxy C7 Pro, the price is high, which reduces its value score. This is because the value score is a factor of all other parameters. So, a 25k phone rated at 69, is rated so because that's how it is against its competitors. Competitors at the time being phones like OP3T, Honor 8 and more.
For the Yureka Black, despite its various faults, it's a cheaper phone and outperforms many others. That, and better looks and build gives it higher scores than many in that price bracket. Hence, its value score also goes up.
Essentially, a buyer looking for a phone under 10k, won't compare it to phones priced at 30k. Hence, the ratings are w.r.t. a particular phone's competitors. Not every phone possible, which we think is a sound way to rate phones.

About the bugs and other issues on Yureka Black. The review did speak about an unstable ROM on the Yu Yureka. The other issues with Cyanogen were unforeseen. No one could have predicted them. Up until CM joined the Yu brigade, it was one of the most trusted ROMs out there, so there was no reason to expect otherwise. We did hear of heating issues later, but that's a problem with CM and some other ROMs. Subsequent changes often lead to problems etc. In fact, with CM going the Cyanogen Inc. way, one expected things to be better, but internal company relations broke eventually and hence the issues. The same can't be predicted in advance. When it was launched, the Yureka Black was indeed a decent smartphone. In fact, it was the only half-decent (in hindsight) smartphone from Yu. If you notice, we even mentioned bugs etc. on the Yutopia later, their flagship.
That said, Yu phones have indeed had other issues as well, and we've been working to include a company's past record and customer support in our reviews and scoring systems. The thing is, these records are difficult to use objectively. For example, almost every company will tell you they have X hundred support stores over the country. But there are complaints against everyone's service. Truth be told, "good service" is a myth nowadays. For now, wherever we have valid and noted reports (from many users or our own), we mention such issues.
For instance, on the Xiaomi Redmi 4 review, I specifically included a note about the camera, mentioning that Xiaomi cameras in review and final sold models have often been drastically different. Similarly, in almost all of my recent reviews, I've noted that phones running on Android M should NOT be accepted anymore. We also always mention that one shouldn't buy phones with 16GB storage. Similarly, OnePlus' denial of Nougat on OP2 was factored into the OP5 review, and so on.

 

[SaiyanGoku]

Hey,

There's a value score involved in the phone's final rating. For the Galaxy C7 Pro, the price is high, which reduces its value score. This is because the value score is a factor of all other parameters. So, a 25k phone rated at 69, is rated so because that's how it is against its competitors. Competitors at the time being phones like OP3T, Honor 8 and more.
For the Yureka Black, despite its various faults, it's a cheaper phone and outperforms many others. That, and better looks and build gives it higher scores than many in that price bracket. Hence, its value score also goes up.
Essentially, a buyer looking for a phone under 10k, won't compare it to phones priced at 30k. Hence, the ratings are w.r.t. a particular phone's competitors. Not every phone possible, which we think is a sound way to rate phones.

About the bugs and other issues on Yureka Black. The review did speak about an unstable ROM on the Yu Yureka. The other issues with Cyanogen were unforeseen. No one could have predicted them. Up until CM joined the Yu brigade, it was one of the most trusted ROMs out there, so there was no reason to expect otherwise. We did hear of heating issues later, but that's a problem with CM and some other ROMs. Subsequent changes often lead to problems etc. In fact, with CM going the Cyanogen Inc. way, one expected things to be better, but internal company relations broke eventually and hence the issues. The same can't be predicted in advance. When it was launched, the Yureka Black was indeed a decent smartphone. In fact, it was the only half-decent (in hindsight) smartphone from Yu. If you notice, we even mentioned bugs etc. on the Yutopia later, their flagship.
That said, Yu phones have indeed had other issues as well, and we've been working to include a company's past record and customer support in our reviews and scoring systems. The thing is, these records are difficult to use objectively. For example, almost every company will tell you they have X hundred support stores over the country. But there are complaints against everyone's service. Truth be told, "good service" is a myth nowadays. For now, wherever we have valid and noted reports (from many users or our own), we mention such issues.
For instance, on the Xiaomi Redmi 4 review, I specifically included a note about the camera, mentioning that Xiaomi cameras in review and final sold models have often been drastically different. Similarly, in almost all of my recent reviews, I've noted that phones running on Android M should NOT be accepted anymore. We also always mention that one shouldn't buy phones with 16GB storage. Similarly, OnePlus' denial of Nougat on OP2 was factored into the OP5 review, and so on.

Did you forgot to include a copy-paste factor in the review? Yureka Black a rebranded Wiko U Feel Prime (Wiko U Feel Prime vs. YU Yureka Black - GSMArena.com ). You should deduct atleast 50% points for this only.

Also, they launched a 2016 phone in 2017.

 

[Raaabo]

I don't know as much about phones as you guys, so bear with me. But why does who copied who matter? Everyone knows about the Chinese manufacturers who will rebrand anything for anyone. So what?

Isn't the only thing that matters the hardware and performance, reliability and after sales? Why would you take away 50% of a score for copying? It's a copy of a phone not available in India, now made available in India through a different manufacturer. What do we know about the backroom deals happening there? As for 2016 phone launching in 2017, that's again subjective. All that matters is the price and performance in comparison to what's available.

Hypothetically, a phone that was an identical copy of the Samsung S6 Edge (2015) being sold today for 10K should still get tremendous ratings. Right?

Again, I'm not into phones, I'm just trying to use cold logic, that's all.

 

[Jefferson Hope]

Did you forgot to include a copy-paste factor in the review? Yureka Black a rebranded Wiko U Feel Prime (Wiko U Feel Prime vs. YU Yureka Black - GSMArena.com ). You should deduct atleast 50% points for this only.

Also, they launched a 2016 phone in 2017.

To answer, I'll cite what is literally the first paragraph of the review.

"Much like the Yu Yureka, the Yureka Black is essentially a phone called the Wiko uFeel Prime with the Yu logo instead of Wiko’s. You could criticise the company for that, but really it makes Micromax no different than any other, with their similar looking smartphones. For what its worth, the Yureka Black at least doesn’t look and feel like any of its competitors in the Indian market. It’s a sad fact, but the smartphone market literally has no innovation anymore."

As Robert said above, copying doesn't mean scores should be reduced. Barring Samsung, Apple, Sony and HTC, literally no one is producing their own designs. There are small and unknown Chinese companies, who make most of these phones. They sell to anyone, and I mean ANYONE. Even you can go pay them, put your brand name on them and start selling phones here. Each time I go to MWC Shanghai, I meet at least five of these companies. So, what you call copying is actually how the market itself functions.
If I were to cut 50% marks for "copying", every phone would get less than 50, barring the Galaxy S, Galaxy Note, Xperia, HTC and Apple phones. For what it's worth, the OnePlus 5 isn't an iPhone lookalike, it's the Oppo R11, rebranded to OnePlus. BBK owns these brands, and they choose to use the designs this way. Similarly, the OnePlus One was a rebranded Oppo Find 7.
With all due respect, you're trying to penalise Yu because there's a mental block (often for very fair reasons) against Indian brands. No one bats an eyelid when Xiaomi, Honor, Lenovo and everyone else does it. In my opinion cheating on benchmarks is a serious offence, copying other's designs isn't. The final vote goes to you, the consumers. You vote with your money. Don't buy phones that don't come with Nougat out of the box, that have no new design value, have 16GB storage and so on. You'll see them fade out eventually if you do that. The consumer's buying what's cheap and companies are happy providing cheap. New design takes R&D, which costs money and hence adds to eventual price of product.


Lastly, the idea of how a phone "looks" is subjective. And a reviewer's thoughts on what a phone looks like does figure into the score. However, what I find good looking may not be true for you. I could give you the complex mathematical formula that Euclid himself would be proud of, but I'd also have to kill you if I did that. Suffice to say, the formula is created in such a way that subjective elements affect ratings less than the objective ones. We believe a reviewer's opinion is important, but it cannot tip the scales in a device's favour if the objective part isn't done right. So, a poorly build, but good looking phone will get less marks than a well built but utilitarian looking phone.