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Camera

Moving to the camera department, the first thing to note is that video from the Smart Prime 7 is only 720p, which is a disappointment. On the one hand I guess most people won't need higher-resolution video, but on the other 1080p is pretty much the entry level now, with 4K being a nice option on high-end phones.

There are no frame rate options either; it's locked to something – I assume 30fps – but this isn't made clear. Ultimately, on a budget phone some sacrifices need to be made, and video is probably one area most people won't be that bothered about.

When it comes to stills the picture is a little brighter – at least when the conditions are bright, and that means outdoors in daylight really. The test photos I took with the Smart Prime 7's 8MP rear camera had decent colour for the most part – some bright colours lacked detail, but still looked reasonable.

If you zoom in on the fine detail though, even in well-lit shots, you can see that images are being post-processed fairly heavily, and that it's taking a toll on their sharpness. I've seen this often with budget phones – there's always a certain amount of 'mushiness' to fine detail – but it's not awful here, and photos will be good enough for most uses.

I don't think the autofocus is up to much either. I took several shots which looked okay on-screen, but which weren't correctly focused when viewed at full size. There's an HDR mode too, but this doesn't seem to do much, and I'd probably leave it switched off for most shots.

Things take a turn for the less-impressive indoors, and in lower light. I took test shots in a standard room lit by energy-saving bulbs; this is the sort of lighting you'll typically be shooting under, and the results from the Smart Prime 7 can best be described as "underwhelming" if you're being charitable, or "awful" if you're being less so.

There's a lot of noise, colours are muted and images lack sharpness. None of this is much of a surprise, though; indoors the camera is okay for things like tweeting and taking amusing pictures of your cat, but other than that don't expect too much.