Fake Gadget Tuesdays: Identity Crisis

By Benedict Wee

Gadget: Hantel777

Place of Origin: China

"Inspired" by: Unknown

If -like me- you're constantly thinking about swapping that recently purchased mobile for a one with a different form factor then you might want to think about multiple phone purchases. Or you could get the Hantel777 which couldn't decide what kind of phone it wanted to be so it chose to be both a bar and clamshell mobile.

First impressions of the phone are that it looks like one of those budget under-$100 mobiles you can buy from a telco provider that can only call and text but once you realize that you can flip the keypad and screen up; touchscreen goodness awaits under its deceptive cover.

Well "touchscreen goodness" might be stretching it too far. From what I can tell they're using one of the many poorly made China MTK touchscreen phone OSs which are slow, clunky and overall difficult to use. The Hantel777 comes with standard Chinese mobile features like dual SIM card slots, FM radio, Mp3/3GP/Mp4/Avi player and it runs on 900/1800 MHz networks.

The price of the phone: 705 RMB/ NZ$150.56 which does seem a bit on the expensive side for a non-smartphone with the most basic of functions. No score for almost-the-real-thing-ness and it gets a B- for creativity, a good concept but it's been poorly executed and if it looks cheap in pictures, think about how badly it'll look in real life.