Gadget review: LeEco Le Max 2 to buy or not?

In just five months of its entry into the Indian market, Chinese internet and technology conglomerate LeEco has practically dominated the mid-range Rs 8,000-Rs 15,000 segment. Now, with Le Max 2, the company is set to create ripples in the slightly high-end price band too.

Le Max2 that is in direct competition with Rs 24,999 Xiaomi's Mi5 and Rs 27,999 OnePlus 3 comes in two varients: 32GB and 4GB RAM for Rs 22,999 and 6GB RAM and 64GB variant for Rs 29,999.

Let us see what works for the device.

The company is playing its card on CDLA (Continuous Digital Lossless Audio) technology -- a first for the Indian consumers -- which has kissed the traditional 3.5 mm headphone jack goodbye.

You do not need to insert headphone into a 3.5 mm rounded socket as before. You can hear your favourite music with the USB Type-C port which is used to charge the device. The phone comes with a LeEco proprietary headphone set. The company has also provided a small adapter to connect other headphones.

The metal unibody device has a 5.7-inch Quad-HD display with 1440x2560 pixels resolution and a pixel density of 515ppi -- it ran 4K videos smoothly -- and runs on EUI 5.6 based on Android Marshmallow.

While Le Max 2 has a single slot for two nano-SIM cards at left, it has volume and power buttons at right. The device does not have slot for microSD card. On top of the device, one could find an infra-red blaster (meaning it can work as a universal remote for your home).

The back panel has a centrally-aligned protruded camera and a fingerprint sensor just below it. Le Max 2 uses Qualcomm's "Sense ID" ultrasonic fingerprint technology to identify its owner.

No question of lag with multi-tasking thanks to the quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 processor clocked at 2.15 Ghz with 6GB of RAM and 64GB storage. For me, nearly 4GB RAM was free even after I used it extensively. No heating problems as such -- not even during gaming.

Similar to the curated news items on Samsung Galaxy S7, a right swipe took me to LeView -- an online video gallery where you can select the genre by a simple drop-down menu.

A "Live" onscreen button took me to LeLive service that lets users stream popular TV channels while "LeVidi" app lets user stream movies. Both are LeEco's "supertainment" ecosystem services and the content worth Rs 4,900 is free for a year.

The 21MP rear camera works fine under ample light conditions. The phone features a 3,100mAh battery which lasted nearly 10 hours in video loop test.

What doesn't work.

Low-light photography disappoints. The protruded camera makes it vulnerable for damage. Also, the fingerprint sensor takes time. Either you wait for some more time to let it identify you or you need to press a bit harder to unlock the phone.

If the device is charging, you will not be able to listen to your favourite music as the port is the same. Also, heating issues with a metal body remain which, of course, is an issue with almost all metal-body devices.

Conclusion: Overall, Le Max 2 is a good device. A free LeEco membership (access to over 2,000 movies in 10 languages and over 100 live TV channels) is something that will make you think about it.