Karbonn A21 Android

Hitesh Khandelwal

@hitesh_dilijiti

Friends, I felt sad to read all the recent reviews on KARBONN A21. I bought mine cash down at Magnet, Vile Parle (W), Mumbai, for the then Internet price of Rs.9999 in December 2012. May be the build quality has gone down somewhat of late, as A21 is no longer the flagship smartphone (it was, the day I bought it). I too faced problems initially but overcame to a great extent. Here is how. 1. Battery charges fast but discharges even faster. True. I installed "Battery Notifier BT Free" to constantly show the battery level in big numbers on the top left screen always. Keep an eye on it all the time. Whenever runaway discharge occurs, power on and power off the phone, may be once, twice or thrice till such time discharge becomes normal. This is one cure that definitely works for A21. Have perseverance for some time. It's like a medicine for loose motions you see. You don't need it once intestines recover. 2. In System Settings, Battery, normal usage pattern means "Screen" and "Android OS" should be top items. In abnormal discharge, "Phone Idle" and "Cell Standby" will be at the top necessitating your action to power on and power off. 3. A21 is classified in web circles as Generic form of Android Version 4.0.4. So the OS should correct itself when rebooted. I once had "Juice Defender" app with all its sophisticated logic but runaway discharge did not stop even then unless I rebooted. And that app was overactive and increased discharge. Now I no longer use it. 4. I also took help of "CPU Spy" and "Wakelock Detector" but frankly I never had to uninstall any rogue app for excessive battery drain. I discovered that my CPU works either at 1152 MHz or Deep Sleep state most of the time. That's really ideal you must agree. Wakelock showed me that A21 shouldn't be used for wakeup Alarm. The clock is active throughout the night and drains battery a lot. Use instead any old feature phone at bed side for this purpose. I use my old Micromax X288. 5. My "Data" is ON only when needed and switched "OFF" rest of the time. I do it automatically as a reflex action all the time. Many Android apps activate their "Service" when Data is ON. You may not loose much Data Balance but your battery definitely discharges. 6. My Screen Brightness is "Full" in broad daylight, "Minimum" in a dark room and "Automatic" the rest of the time. It helps to make this a habit. A21 discharges fast with GPS "ON". Use appropriately. 7. Two schools of thought exist on how best to charge Android batteries. Old school is you discharge as much as possible, then charge as full as possible and then use. New school believes in random, haphazard and on the go charging with once a month full charging. Well, I think A21 is old school. Most of my chargings are from 10% to 100%. Android OS has remembered my habit and optimized my discharge. Besides, New School believes that Android performance is more efficient in the upper half (50%-100% battery level). Well, I have discovered that A21 is somewhat lavish in the top half and very very vigilant in the lower half (50%-0%). This is what I mean by generic Android. True I have a leisurely lifestyle but even if I were to be in an active city life, a better idea would be to keep an extra fully charged battery in the pocket instead of the charger and stick to the 10%-100% charging discharging cycle. You can always take care of the charging at home every evening/night. You can prolong the life of the phone and both the batteries this way besides enjoying a quality smartphone user experience. All cool and no tension. 8. I use "AVG AntiVirus Free" for daily scanning and Task Killing. This is ideal for A21. In its Performance/Task Killer menu, never kill any Process. Apps misbehave on A21 if you do so. Do not press "Optimize" either, as firstly, this does not kill all tasks and secondly most services it stops restart almost immediately. What is to be done is to press the × mark for each task and kill the apps. This can be done as frequently as needed to reduce false battery drain. I do not stop Opera Mini ever as it stops itself automatically after sometime. 9. A21 runs best on Opera Mini browser (not Opera Mobile or Opera Classsic). In fact this should be your default browser. It is really fast, leaves no Cache, stops itself when over, is small in size and can be stored on SD card. I get the advantage of many apps without actually installing them by using the "Bookmarks" feature of Opera Mini. This is how. You all know that "Accuweather" is the best but its app for Android is not so stable. Load m.accuweather.com, seek your location, go for hourly forecast and then save that URL as a bookmark in your Opera Mini options. I have done it and every time I need weather update I just touch Opera Mini icon, open Bookmarks and touch "Weather". Lo and behold you have it latest and detailed weather. Another example. Hindkhoj is a Hindi English Dictionary and quite popular. They have an app but why clog our phone memory? I have m.hindkhoj.com main screen URL as a saved bookmark. Same with news sites other than TOI, as TOI is a built in app for A21. 10. By the way, I store every possible app on SD Card. A21 shuffles super fast and I haven't experienced any lag ever. Even my Opera Mini is on SD Card. By SD Card I mean the memory card which A21 calls "External SD Card". Access your phone's "System Settings", "Storage" and observe. Your "Select Default Storage" should be "SD Card". Your "System Space" should be either for apps that cannot be moved to SD Card or free ("Available"). At this moment, mine is 295 MB apps and 223 MB available. That makes it a total of 518 MB, 63 MB less than the declared "System Space" of 581 MB. This 63 MB is not your worry. Treat this as a breathing space for the system for high speed functioning. Many have complained that "Internal Storage" is not 4GB but only 2.57GB. Yes they are right. So what? My "Internal Storage" is also 2.57GB, it's all free and it will always be 2.57GB free. My "External SD Card" is a 8GB piece. I had 32 GB before but it crashed. I lost all data and the card also became useless. Can't say whether card was substandard or A21 has trouble supporting a 32GB piece. I recommend that you use an 8GB one and keep backup also. OK now, my "External SD Card" has total 7.41 GB, of this Apps are 403 MB, Pictures,Videos, Audio, Downloads, Miscellaneous are all here only and I have 4.93 GB free. That's quite a space for any extra Apps, Videos, Games or whatever you will agree. Follow this "Storage" strategy. My phone works super fast all the time. 11. RAM is 386 MB and not 512 MB. So we better clear the Cache as and when convenient. A simple but efficient small size app is preferable for this purpose. I used "Easy Cache Cleaner" (the one with a green icon) till recently, it became slow and now I use "App Cache Cleaner" (the one with a blue icon). 12. Too many Widgets on Home Screen increase battery discharge. Mine has a clock and 10 Widgets in main Home Screen, left two home screens are empty, the first right home screen has just three icons (Camera, Gallery, Music Player) and the second right home screen is again empty. I quickly add and delete widgets on the main screen from time to time depending on the intensity of usage of specific apps. I avoid live wall papers. In fact I found 6 out of 12 normal Wallpapers supplied by A21 perfect in aesthetics, clear visibility and stylish look. People are impressed when I unlock my phone. 13. Screen resolution of A21 is actually qHD (960×540) and not 800×480. Video Player should naturally play videos up to this. I suggest "MX Player" be your default Video Player. You can play HD (1280×720) without lag but not Full HD (1920×1080). This is good enough for me as the old videos I watch are rarely available beyond 640×360. Even modern ones, 1280×720 should be decent enough. After all, it is the quality of the uploaded video on YouTube that usually matters. 14. By the way I use "TubeMate" to download YouTube videos and renaming them is done using "ASTRO File Manager" which should be your ideal File Manager on A21. 14. A21 works well in freezing temperatures. I live in Himalayas. Winters it is around 0°C for long periods but my phone never stopped. 15. My place has no 3G. But I used "Skype" on my 2G data BSNL SIM and video called successfully a nearby friend on BSNL Broad Band PC. So A21 is good enough. Of course I couldn't video call my mother in Andhra Pradesh because network signals are weak. 16. Some one had problems with the Gallery app. Well, sometimes when you delete an image you are watching from within Gallery, a black screen appears with a message "No Thumbnail". Even if you scroll right or left, same message persists but other images do not appear. No need to panic. They are all there. Just press the Back Arrow Hardware Key. All images get reloaded. For massive images management, better use "ASTRO File Manager". 17. I suggest "aNdClip Free" as a clipper and "ColorNote" as a notepad for your A21. They work well. 18. Default Music Player of A21 doesn't play Wave format (OK, even Intex Woofers and DVD players fail here). I suggest you use "VLC Beta for Android". I recorded many old songs on FM in .WAV format using my old Micromax X288 and they play well with VLC on A21. 19. I have "Fast Racing", "Speed Moto" and "Temple Run 2" loaded on my SD Card. They all play well. Perfect graphics, no lag whatsoever. 20. I have "Flashlight" app for emergency use in darkness. It guzzles battery so I use it only in an emergency. A21 drains battery fast while downloading Google apps and YouTube videos. Plan them for the evening or when you are near a power source. GPS ON also is a fast drainer. 21. I never found the need to root my A21. But then to become a super user you need brains also you see. 22. Well friends, A21 is my only smart gadget. I do not have access to a PC or laptop or tab and I do not have access to Broad Band. My only window to the world is a BSNL 2G SIM with 700 MB 21 Day Rs.98 data plan on my KARBONN A21. I thought you might be interested to know and appreciate how I conduct myself. May GOD BLESS YOU and wish you all the best. By - SARASWATI SWAMI

Alok gupta

Anonymous

Never buy this phone Carbonn A-21

Horrible experience. Every time one sim is down or the other. Second sim is not being supported now at all within four days of purchase. battery backup is very poor.when people call me my phone is always shown as out of network coverage area. where a Rs. 600 mobile is showing excellent signal strenth, Carbon A21 shows no signals. Karbonn products are very unreliable. so better watch out.

Vivek Garg

@vivek_heqidezu

Service Center Very Poor

Karbonn mobile service is very very poor .he just take the 45 day fixing the problem and after repayer the mobile hs reture with new fault