The Card phone review: The future is modular

The future is modular

GSMArena team, 08 January 2017.

Unboxing

The retail box of the Aiek E1 has a clever design - it opens up like a book, you know the kind that has a hidden flask in it. Except, instead of giggle juice this book hides one of the most compact phones we're likely to review this year.

You also get a flat USB cable, which won't get tangled up like a new Apple user trying to figure out which dongle they need.

Card Phone review

Display

The bezels around the screen are a bit thick by Android standards, but they should make iPhone owners feel right at home. They do blend well with the minimalist user interface of the Aiek E1, its black and white theme with blocky aesthetics remind us of Microsoft's Metro/Modern UI.

Card Phone review

This works great with the OLED display which offers perfect black levels and theoretically infinite contrast ratio. Typically for OLED, however, the display has issues with color accuracy. We're sure you won't mind though, as it's unlikely that you would be viewing any images on this particular screen.

By the way, our E1 came with a pre-applied screen protector - you wouldn't want to scratch this beautiful screen, would you?

Battery life

We managed to get around 3 days of battery life out of the Aiek E1, something just about any smartphone owner will envy. Not bad for a 3,200mAh battery but even better for 320mAh, which is how much the E1 actually has.

Naturally, the phone is compatible with any external batteries, which serve as an extended battery module helping to increase E1's endurance. Have a look at the example below, which increases the battery capacity by over 900% and it costs less than $10 itself. Talk about cheap modularity.

Card Phone review

The Aiek E1 also has a unique feature that makes it great for emergency preparedness - a hardware switch at the bottom that disconnects the battery. This will minimize battery drain so you can charge the E1 and put it in your Zombie Apocalypse Survival Kit and forget about it until the time comes (December 31, 2030 anyone?).

Connectivity

The Aiek E1 works on both GSM networks in the west and the CDMA network of China Unicom. Bluetooth is used in a novel way as the E1 can turn from a phone into a BT headset to be used with other phones. Consider this - some tablets support voice calls, but they don't fit in your pockets. With the Aiek, you can make phablet owners feel inferior with your 10" tablet that you keep in your backpack, while accepting incoming calls on the E1.

You can't call that dual-SIM, not quite. But this is another example where the Rubber Bands™ platform shines - it's so easy to add a second SIM slot. You might say it's as easy as adding a second E1 to the back of your E1. How about that?

Reader comments

  • Anonymous
  • 23 Aug 2017
  • Mfx

it is possible to make sms messages to this phone or only for call?

  • Anonymous
  • 05 Aug 2017
  • rA@

Is there hotshot in this mobile and what is the cost?

Going back read the comments.. So hilarious