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Software
The Asus Zenfone Live runs on Android 6.0 Marshmallow with company’s own Zen UI on top. Honestly speaking, I am not a fan of custom UIs but most of the OEMs have started streamlining their custom software after realising consumer’s inclination towards lighter softwares. Asus has worked on optimisation but the icon pack, quick settings panel, and settings menu still look flashy, which is liked and disliked depending on personal choice.
It comes pre-loaded with several bloatware apps, out of which, only few come to practical usage. The sad part is that you can’t remove these apps, instead you can disable them in the settings. If you prefer personal customisation, then this UI may be a decent choice for you. The animations and transitions are smooth but you might notice it slowing down after prolonged usage.
You get apps like Facebook, Messenger and Instagram apps pre-loaded, which is a good thing for those who want to save some MBs while setting up the phone.
It has several system optimization apps running in the background that gets annoying as it keeps sending out stats that most of us don’t use. I wish the UI felt as light as the smartphone itself.
Performance
At Rs. 9,999, the Zenfone Live serves you with a not-so-impressive set of hardware. It is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor coupled with 2GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage, which is expandable via microSD up to 128GB. Out of 16GB of storage, only 10GB is available at user end, while rest is pre-occupied by system.
SD 400 is a processor from the past, which will obviously leave you asking for something extra. However, it can easily make up to basic tasks like calling, texting, listening to music or watching videos. If you plan to play games on this smartphone, you better rethink once again.
In my case, I tried playing NOVA Legacy, which most other phones at around Rs. 10K can handle. It started off pretty smooth but I could see immediate frame drops where there was too much action on the screen.
Long story short, this phone is not for aggressive users. To get a better idea, you can check out the disappointing benchmark scores below.
- Geekbench 4: Single-core is 233, Dual-core is 544
- AnTuTu Benchmark: 12316
- Quadrant Standard: 6252
