Reasons to buy ZTE ZMAX PRO

[horsecharles]

PS purchase alert-
Suggested retail price is $179. You will pay this when buying a replacement "within 90 days of purchase"...(or give up # / get a new line). Many will eschew insurance, given the usual deductible + this low promo price. Keep in mind...

OK... The main intent here is to encourage buys and dev work of this fine phone.

Maybe those on the fence can gather their info here without having to sift thru multiple scattered posts.

(Hopefully that mask-err dispelled the rampant pretentious, plagiarizing, post-flooding concerns.)

Positive qualities using original G Stylo as a point of reference:

Firstly, best $99 phone by far... possibly ever.

Screen Area- 6"- 5.75" = 1/4" BUT, you gain a lot more because of bezel button placement: @ 9/16" / .56
And if you discount LG soft button area(full screen scenario), you still gain @ 5/16" / .3

Resolution & Brightness- only seen in costlier phones.
The latter you can comfortably set almost at lowest setting.

Sound- also in another league. You can hurt yourself if you crank it up. Dolby controls are impressive.

Processing speed- ditto above, very snappy.

USB C & Host- ditto again. It's so convenient to plug in charger without looking... and to connect flash drives.

Battery life- despite comments elsewhere, here we feel it doesn't take a back seat to Stylo, which is renowned for this.
And fast charging works very well, plus "I think" it supports wireless charging.

FM Radio.

Data speed. Don't know if due to band aggregation, but this is hands down the fastest phone I've ever had. Play Store updates especially multiple times faster.
There is a tiny bug- network times out occasionally...you may need to toggle Airplane Mode off/on. I avoided this on Stylo by removing hipri from APN. We'll have to wait until someone can make Zmax System-writable... no big concern.

Camera-needs commentary. I'd recommend someone download MX Camera and provide their thoughts.

Please feel free to correct or improve anything.

 

[xyourxhighnessx]

Aka some intelligent human come help us root this thing.

I was waiting for a Nexus but the only things I'd gain that I'd care about with the Nexus is an AMOLED screen....gyroscope and one or two other things. But at 400 less I'm getting a really good experience.

Rooted/twrp and Xposed and this thing would be monstrous. Best 99 you can spend on a phone. Its superior to the Stylo one and two and 50 less.

 

[eddiekeyton]

Positive qualities using original G Stylo as a point of reference:

Firstly, best $99 phone by far... possibly ever.

Most horrid device I have ever used in my entire life. Had it for a week. Smashed it on the ground. Couldn't stand how freaking slow it was.

 

[tube517]

I checked out this phone at Metro and it looks like a great deal. The store I went to only had 2 left (not sure how many they initally got) but they are expecting this to be a hot seller. The sales guy had a Stylo 2 Plus and regretted not waiting.

$15 upgrade fee.

Paul Tch posted online about the YouTube playback but I really could care less about the Youtube resolution on a phone.

 

[dubdiablo77]

Got the G Stylo 2 plus as a gift.. And keeping as my daily driver.. Added a line and bought a case.. Since I didn't have the Stylo 90days.. Copped the Zmax pro And still only paid like 111 for it all..money well spent.. Great phone for the amount.. And I'm hearing the bootloader isn't locked.. So development may be soon.. Very happy with it so far.. Will basically be my media / game whore for work.. And a lot less awkward than toting my nexus 7 around

 

[xyourxhighnessx]

I don't like the fact everything looks so big on this phone. I liked having root on my Stylo and shrinking things down to fit more on the screen. Instead of having huge bulky icons.

This thing would benefit from gravity box in the worst way

 

[horsecharles]

Got the G Stylo 2 plus as a gift.. And keeping as my daily driver.. Added a line and bought a case.. Since I didn't have the Stylo 90days.. Copped the Zmax pro And still only paid like 111 for it all..money well spent.. Great phone for the amount.. And I'm hearing the bootloader isn't locked.. So development may be soon.. Very happy with it so far.. Will basically be my media / game whore for work.. And a lot less awkward than toting my nexus 7 around

I'm also looking to avoid carrying a tablet.
For some documents this almost works, need high x reading glasses.
Need just a little more, closer to Blu 7.

 

[horsecharles]

I don't like the fact everything looks so big on this phone. I liked having root on my Stylo and shrinking things down to fit more on the screen. Instead of having huge bulky icons.

This thing would benefit from gravity box in the worst way

Definitely. I was adding this point in another thread.
I spent this morning looking for launchers that minimize icons... settled on Go.

 

[averagewonder]

Definitely. I was adding this point in another thread.
I spent this morning looking for launchers that minimize icons... settled on Go.

I use apex you can scale down or up

 

[Masterchief87]

Definitely. I was adding this point in another thread.
I spent this morning looking for launchers that minimize icons... settled on Go.

I'm not gonna tell you that go launcher and everything made by go development is garbage, but I'm not gonna say it isn't either. I think nova launcher is the way to go. Then again a lot of people swear by apex launcher as so I'm sure it's pretty good as well.

 

[ZMAX4EVER]

I'm a heavy user and I'm a bit unhappy with battery life compared to the original ZMAX. When it came to a long lasting battery nothing could touch the original. The higher resolution screen is is a nice addition but I'm not sure it's worth it to me to sacrifice battery life. Especially since ZTE has made it a hassle to easily charge the phone with standard micro USB cables. They added a USB-C port WITHOUT adding a quick charge adapter? Does it even have quick charge capability?

I'm going to test the phone for a few weeks or months. If the battery and charging situation doesn't sit well with me, I'll re-activate my original ZMAX.

I liked the original ZMAX over the original STYLO for several reasons. Better battery life. Crisper, brighter whites on the display and better color tones. Better speaker.

The STYLO 2 Plus seems interesting. I may check one out to compare it to the ZMAX PRO.

Although, I don't like the fact that the STYLO series uses on-screen function buttons which steals screen real estate from some apps.

 

[horsecharles]

I'm a heavy user and I'm a bit unhappy with battery life compared to the original ZMAX. When it came to a long lasting battery nothing could touch the original.

First day - I just did exactly 8 hours of nonstop, interspersed fiddle with- settings, post here, browse, reinstall apps, YouTube movie... not one single food or even bathroom break... battery % went from 100 to 20. And I didn't realize to lower initial brightness level until halfway thru.

The higher resolution screen is is a nice addition but I'm not sure it's worth it to me to sacrifice battery life.

The only thing I can add is that the brightness slider almost all the way to lowest on the left works plenty for me.

Especially since ZTE has made it a hassle to easily charge the phone with standard micro USB cables.

Amazon sells pack of two adapter heads for $7...for me this is less hassling than before.

They added a USB-C port WITHOUT adding a quick charge adapter? Does it even have quick charge capability?

Qualcomm Quick Charge 1.0

I'm going to test the phone for a few weeks or months. If the battery and charging situation doesn't sit well with me, I'll re-activate my original ZMAX.

I liked the original ZMAX over the original STYLO for several reasons. Better battery life. Crisper, brighter whites on the display and better color tones. Better speaker.

A lot of people complained for the opposite reasons regarding screen and sound...and kept me from buying it

The STYLO 2 Plus seems interesting. I may check one out to compare it to the ZMAX PRO.

Although, I don't like the fact that the STYLO series uses on-screen function buttons which steals screen real estate from some apps.

Agreed. Loss of real estate is a bit over half inch, and a bit over quarter inch when buttons disappear.

 

[HallOfPromise]

Does the Zmax Pro have some sort of notification LED? If so does it have multiple colors?

 

[ZMAX4EVER]

Does the Zmax Pro have some sort of notification LED? If so does it have multiple colors?

Yes, the home button lights up and is your notification light.

 

[Masterchief87]

Does the Zmax Pro have some sort of notification LED? If so does it have multiple colors?

Yes, the home button lights up and is your notification light.

Yes, what @ZMAX4EVER said. No it doesn't glow multiple colors.

 

[HallOfPromise]

I'll take it. Thanks! I kinda miss having multiple colors to see what the notification was for. My old LG phones let me know if it was a missed call or text message or Facebook, etc., all based on the color. A nice perk, but not a deal breaker without it.

 

[xyourxhighnessx]

I agree . Having a notification light capable of blinking various colors is amazing. I'm not sure why all notification lights arent the multi color capable variety by now

 

[ZMAX4EVER]

I have a great idea for an App for the ZMAX PRO;

Some people like their notification light to blink multiple colors. Well, there are THREE light up function buttons at the bottom of the phone (back/home/menu). Perhaps an app could be written to blink different buttons depending on the type of message? I know the Back and Menu lights are just dots, but they would work great when blinking to designate the type of alert. For instance, the Back key for TXT and Facebook MSG's, the Home key for Calls/Voice mail, and the Menu key for ???. It could be user definable.

 

[averagewonder]

Yeah I loved that my old S4 had an LED I could manipulate the color with. Let me know if I wanted to even look at the message at the time. I do actually like this halo glow but would be cool if we could adjust the color or at least the speed depending on the type of notification

 

[Masterchief87]

Nice

 

[Masterchief87]

Yes, the number for the baseband and the build number are completely different.
The baseband is Z981B01 and the build number is Z981V1.0.0B08.

This is not uncommon.

 

[Spec2nirvash]

Bought my ZMaxP as soon as site would let me order it. I haven't switched SIM cards yet, but so far, aside from the ridiculous f***ing size of it, I like it. I'm very hard of hearing, and this phone cranks loud enough for my neighbors to hear my earbuds. Dolby app is a blessing and makes it even louder. Tired of unroot-able phones that limit maximum volume on me....

Totally worth the overall $100 spent, forget LG Stylo. But this is my first shot at ZTE ownership. Hopefully it's not one of them phones that suck after they get a cellular data connection.

 

[ZMAX4EVER]

UNLOCK Your Zmax Pro for as little as $3.23.
I just unlocked mines now I'm using my other sim and I'm so HAPPPY.
Why wait and give metro 90days of bad service when I can free my self now.

Go to YouTube and search $4 unlock ZTE Zmax Pro.
It Worked in 30 minutes.

Just spreading the word.

I love MetroPCS. It's the T-Mobile network. If you take the phone off of the T-Mobile network to AT&T, it will probably work most of the time... but may not have all of the required bands.

 

[5318008]

UNLOCK Your Zmax Pro for as little as $3.23.
I just unlocked mines now I'm using my other sim and I'm so HAPPPY.
Why wait and give metro 90days of bad service when I can free my self now.

Go to YouTube and search $4 unlock ZTE Zmax Pro.
It Worked in 30 minutes.

Just spreading the word.

This worked for me, just unlocked mine, took about four hours.

 

[horsecharles]

Here's another reason:
Just connected phone to computer(4yo win7), was immediately recognized by Explorer w/ correct model name, ready to go.
This is initial Zte / have not installed any of their software before.
Did not have to change any settings in the phone, didn't even need to enable usb debugging.

If only everything was this easy.