SHOULD YOU STILL BUY THE GALAXY J3 2016?

Samsung is generally known for making great quality phones and tablets. Take the S8 for example. I didn't have time to do the J3 2016 review in 2016,despite getting it 1 month after its launch. It's been sitting pretty in my drawer until I decided to do this "review". It's not a review per se,but just a post on what to like and what not to like in the J3.

So.....what's to like?

THE DISPLAY

The display is your custom Samsung AMOLED display. So what's up with AMOLED? Well,the AMOLED and IPS battles have been going in for years now,and some manufacturers like Xiaomi stick to IPS over AMOLED,while NO Samsung phone can ever dream of IPS. Well,AMOLED screens give deeper,more vibrant blacks. Why? Because the screen is capable of turning off all the pixels since each pixel depends on itself for lighting,whereas IPS screens use a backlight for lighting. 

See also:IPS vs AMOLED:The differences explained

The backlight is actually blue,but a filter turns it to a bright white light,which is then picked up by an RBG filter,and each pixel takes up the light to display an image. This leads to washed out blacks in IPS screens,as the backlight produces the black light. In summary the J3 2016's screen is damn good. Blacks are awesome,color reproduction is badass and the general quality of the screen is good. It's a 5 inch 720p display,so 294ppi is no joke. It does get plenty bright ,but sunlight slaps this feature down and you'll have to crank up the brightness to max if you want to see outside. Still,its a pretty good display for a phone in this price region.

THE BUILD QUALITY

Stop. Did I just say I like the build quality of a phone whose backing is plastic? Yes. Plastic. But no ordinary plastic. It's coated with some,well,coating that makes it feel just like metal. Plus,the side a thick metal,so suck on that.

Power button is on the right hand side

Volume button is annoyingly on the left

USB -regular is on the bottom,next to a mic.

Earpiece jack is thankfully present up top.

And finally,the clicky Samsung button is available right up front. And it's damn clicky.
The metal feels very sturdy,but the phone creaks when bent. Probably because of the plastic back. But,the quality is more than sufficient for the price. The ports are placed exactly where you want them,and the buttons travel with enough depth and is satisfying to touch and press.
CAMERAS
Yes,the cameras. It has an 8MP rear camera and a 5MP front camera. These don't sound like much,but they take exceptional photos with great dynamic range and deep color saturation. Don't take my word for it,let the pucs do the talking:

Selfies aren't lacking either ,as it rocks a 5MP FFC with f2.2 arpeture. Awesome quality. 

BUT.....

It's not all roses and custard and cream. There are some parts that Samsung has no excuse to fail given the price of this phone. But,they still failed. These are:

SNAPDRAGON 403. SERIOUSLY SAMSUNG?

Snapdragon 403 was a great chip and all,but that was in late 2014

 There are better snapdragon chips found on cheaper phones. At least,the 625 isn't that bad. That said,the phone scored 20000+ in AnTuTu. Poor for the price(just to chip in:the Infinix HOT S which costs 45000 clams scored 39000+ in Antutu. See?) The chip also causes the phone to overheat when playing light games for long,and when using the camera. Meh. 45000 is "mid range" price.

THE BATTERY

It's only a 2600mAh battery,and is also removable,but is crappy. It hardly gives 3 hours of SOT ,and when it does,it's so hot you can't handle it. But on the bright side,should it drain completely,you can slap in a new one.

So,that's it. I'll try to review the phone this week,and no cutting corners. What do you think of the phone?

Quick specs rundown:

NETWORK
Technology	GSM / HSPA / LTE

LAUNCH
Announced	2015, November
Status	Available. Released 2016, January

BODY
Dimensions	142.3 x 71 x 7.9 mm (5.60 x 2.80 x 0.31 in)
Weight	138 g (4.87 oz)
SIM	Single SIM (Micro-SIM) or Dual SIM (Micro-SIM, dual stand-by)

DISPLAY
Type	Super AMOLED capacitive touchscreen, 16M colors
Size	5.0 inches (~68.2% screen-to-body ratio)
Resolution	720 x 1280 pixels (~294 ppi pixel density)
Multitouch	Yes
Protection	Asahi Dragontrail Glass

PLATFORM
OS	Android 5.1.1 (Lollipop)
Chipset	Spreadtrum SC9830 Exynos 3475 Quad - J320A
CPU	Quad-core 1.5 GHz Cortex-A7 Quad-core 1.3 GHz Cortex-A7 - J320A
GPU	Mali-400 Mali-T720 - J320A

MEMORY
Card slot	microSD, up to 256 GB (dedicated slot)
Internal	8/16 GB, 1.5 GB RAM

CAMERA
Primary	8 MP, f/2.2, autofocus, LED flash - J3109, J320F 5 MP, f/2.2, autofocus, LED flash - J320P, J320A
Features	Geo-tagging, touch focus, face detection, HDR
Video	1080p@30fps (J3109), 720p@30fps (J320P, J320F, J320A)
Secondary	5 MP, f/2.2, 720p@30fps - J3109, J320F 2 MP - J320P, J320A

SOUND
Alert types	Vibration; MP3, WAV ringtones
Loudspeaker	Yes
3.5mm jack	Yes
	- Active noise cancellation with dedicated mic

COMMS
WLAN	Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Wi-Fi Direct, hotspot
Bluetooth	4.1, A2DP, LE
GPS	Yes, with A-GPS, GLONASS/ BDS (region dependent)
Radio	FM radio, RDS, recording
USB	microUSB 2.0, USB On-The-Go

FEATURES
Sensors	Accelerometer, proximity
Messaging	SMS(threaded view), MMS, Email, Push Mail, IM
Browser	HTML5
Java	No
	- MP4/H.264 player - MP3/WAV/eAAC+/Flac player - Photo/video editor - Document viewer

BATTERY
	Removable Li-Ion 2600 mAh battery
Stand-by	Up to 349 h
Talk time	Up to 22 h
Music play	Up to 77 h

MISC
Colors	White, Black, Gold
SAR US	1.17 W/kg (head)     1.12 W/kg (body)
SAR EU	0.48 W/kg (head)     0.42 W/kg (body)
Price group	3/10