Can Obi’s Crane fly higher than Tecno’s Phantom in Kenya?

The new player to enter the smartphone market in Kenya is Obi Mobiles, co-founded by John Sculley, ex-CEO of Pepsico and Apple. Obi has recently launched their eight smartphone-models named after various animals that could pose competition to existing smartphone players in the Kenyan market. One of the leading smartphone players in the Kenyan market is called Tecno Mobile. In this review, we are comparing Tecno Mobile’s PhantomA+ Mini with Obi Mobiles’ Crane S 550, which are a very close match, but with some price and design variations. 

We start with similarities. Both, Obi’s Crane S 550 and Tecno’s Phantom A+ Mini are dual-SIM (GSM+GSM) smartphones and support a regular SIM and a Micro-SIM with 3G support for each. Obi’s Crane runs on the recent Android 4.4.2 KitKat and comes with a 5.5inch (540x960 pixels) qHD TFT IPS display. The Phantom A+ Mini too runs on the Android 4.4.2 KitKat but has a 4.5inch IPS display (540x906 pixels). This offers Obi’s Crane an edge over Tecno’s Phantom, as a larger display is always a plus to have.

Both the Crane and the Phantom A+ Mini are powered by a 1.3GHz quad-core MediaTek (MT6582) processor coupled with 1GB of RAM and with 8GB of inbuilt storage, which is further expandable via a microSD card (up to 32GB). Furthermore, if Obi’s Crane sports an 8 megapixel rear autofocus camera with LED flash and a secondary 5-megapixel front-facing camera, so does Tecno’s Phantom A+ with a flash and features like geo tagging and auto focus. But it is the quality of photos that distinguishes the camera in the two smartphones. The secondary camera in Crane gives you good output in low light, while the photos clicked through Phantom’s secondary camera come a bit grainy in the low light. However, on these indicators the two models are more or less comparable.

The two smartphones features the same Bluetooth 4.0 and WiFi options, however, there is an important difference on the connectivity front. While Obi’s Crane S550 offers 3G, GPRS/ EDGE, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Micro-USB and Bluetooth options, Tecno’s Phantom comes with 2G GSM: 900 / 1800 MHz 3G WCDMA: 2100MHz GPRS: up to 48kbps. Another significant front where Obi’s Crane takes an edge is the battery, as it packs a 2400mAh battery rated to deliver up to 6 hours of talk time and up to 180 hours of standby time. Tecno’s Phantom A+ Mini, on the other hand, comes with an 1800 mAh battery that is much lower, especially considering the price.

Besides the price advantage which may be rather small - Obi’s Crane S 550 at KSh 14,399 and Tecno’s Phantom A+ Mini at KSh15,799 – Obi’s Crane has three significant differences, which include a larger display (5.5inch), large battery (2400mAh) and 3G connectivity.  In addition, we suggest you also look out for the design and the feel that Obi models boast about, which is basically a matter of personal choice. However, the buzz is that Obi Mobiles likes to focus on exceptional designs as the distinguishing marks of their products.