MONTHLY FAVORITES | DECEMBER ( ASUS ZENFONE 3 MAX)

By Athina Angliongto - 9:16:00 PM

Talk about being BLESSED! – last month, I won an Asus Zenfone 3 Max from Asus Philippines in collaboration with Davao Bloggers Society. The contest was about uploading a photo with a nice caption and using the hashtags #incredibleisnow #zenphone #maxyourlife. Lo and behold, my winning entry. (instagram: @i.am.mrs.a)

This was definitely a great early Christmas present. When I found out that I won, I was so excited that I immediately claimed the phone that very night (it was around 11 in the evening) and also made an FB Live post when I un-boxed it.

Before anything else, I would just like to share that around middle of last year, Mr. A and I scouted for new phones to replace our old worn out ones and we decided to buy the same phone. (Oh, you know… couple cheesy stuff). The guy at ASUS told us that there was an upcoming unit that was a powerbank at the same time, which was this unit. Mr. A really wanted to buy this one – the Asus Zenfone 3 Max - because of its battery’s capacity. That was really on top of our list. But when I saw the Asus Zenfone Selfie, I was impressed with its front cam specs (typical girl who likes taking selfies). We both agreed to buy the Asus Zenfone Selfie instead of waiting for the release of Zenfone 3 Max come August.

THE UNIT

*featuring my back stand given by my friend, Joanna.

has a fingerprint scanning feature just below the rear camera

dimensions: 149.5 x 73.7 x 8.6 mm (5.89 x 2.90 x 0.34 in)

where the cord is plugged

It’s been weeks since I started using the phone and I must say that I am very impressed with what this 5.2 inch gadget has to offer and made me understand why Mr. A really wanted to buy this is the first place.

What’s inside the box

1.) The usual unit, charger, earphones, ear buds

2.) Key Ejector Pin

3.) USB OTG (USB ON-THE-GO)

Size: Asus Zenfone 3 Max’s 5.2” LCD may be a bit smaller compared to my Asus Selfie’s 5.5” but it is more than enough to browse through the phone and look at pictures or read articles on the internet without the need to squint unlike the earlier smaller phones – which I had a really hard time with.

Weight: 148 grams or 5.22 ounces – not heavy for me.

Camera: 13 megapixels rear camera takes good pictures. Here are my sample pictures

Changed my bacon picture to this colorful picture of putos to really showcase how the camera captures different colors.

Mr. A and Perdita

Perdita's solo shot

As for the front camera - 5 megapixels

please excuse the obviously haggard face

Performance: I haven’t experienced any problem with lagging thanks to the quad-core processor and the 3Gb RAM.

Cellphone Built-In Speaker: The speaker is great during phone calls. But when music is played, the quality is fair to great, but I still prefer hooking it up with a Bluetooth speaker if I want it in a higher volume.

Bluetooth: the only problem I encountered with its Bluetooth is when I tried to pair it with our car’s, but we eventually figured it out.

Data: Manual Set Up was easy with the help of Google. No complications at all.

Wifi Hotspot: Looks great and the set-up is easy peasy.

Battery Life: For me, this is definitely the phone’s highlight. The Asus Zenfone 3 Max has a 4100 mah battery that can last almost up to a full day. This is what impressed me the most!

I remember going to Tagum for a client call and we were out of town almost the whole day. I left Davao with around 88% of battery percentage and went back home to Davao several hours later with more than 30% of battery life. And mind you, during the long travel, traffic was bad (like two hours going to and from Tagum – no kidding!) so I had to kill time in the backseat by browsing the internet, social media sites, and played my favorite game, Clash Royale. All these activities subtracted only around 50% of my battery life. Normally, my cellphone would be dying during travels and I need a powerbank to survive. But with the Asus Zenfone 3 Max, I never had a problem with that.

And if worse comes to worst, I can also use my Asus Zenfone 3 Max as a powerbank as well with the help of its OTG. It’s really not that complicated to use as a powerbank.

after the OTG is plugged in, this pops out, just choose the second option in order to be able to charge to other mobile devices

it's charging, ladies and gentlemen

tried charging Mr. A's Sony Z1 and it worked too!

the OTG cable is used to connect other phones to the Zenfone 3 Max to use it as a powerbank

I’m not a tech blogger and I’m pretty sure my review of the Asus Zenfone 3 Max is a very amateur one. I can only speak from honest experience that this phone is really one of the best out there. Plus, it is very affordable considering it costs less than P 10,000.00 – Imagine, getting a great quality phone for less than P 10,000.

Another feature that I like about this phone is that it can be unlocked using my index finger's fingerprint which is located at the back portion just below the camera. I just need to touch it and voila!... it unlocks in a jiff.

So if you’re looking into buying a phone that doesn’t die on you when you need it the most, the Asus Zenfone 3 Max keeps up with you, day ‘til night. My friends, this is the phone that you need in your lives. And I’m glad that it came into mine. Wooot Woooot!

Now I have two Asus phones that I really love and keep up with my life. Thanks ASUS Philippines for making great quality phones. Proud ASUS user right here.