Samsung's 6.3" Galaxy Mega
It isn’t very often that we see knock offs of mainstream products that are really good ones, and it isn’t very often that they come forward to us and proudly exclaim how well they’ve managed to copy a popular product, but today we got both. The company that contacted us, Transtar, proudly exclaimed how they’ve managed to make a 1:1 copy of the Samsung Galaxy Mega 6.3″ phone. And to be honest, by looking at it, it is actually really hard to tell the difference between the phone they’ve made and the phone Samsung makes. The Galaxy Mega itself isn’t an incredibly complex phone, or one that’s especially high end, which may be the reason for copying it.
Ironically, the Samsung Galaxy Mega on Samsung’s site is actually only powered by a dual core 1.7 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 SoC, which makes it almost bottom of the barrel for large screen phones. However, Transtar’s phone, the M666Q “6.3” Quad core IPS phone tablet pc”, is actually sporting a Mediatek quad core A7 chip at 1.2 GHz, the MTK6589. This Mediatek chip is incredibly popular with Chinese manufacturers that make generic Android smartphones or knock-offs of Samsung hardware, like this Transtar M666Q. What is really nice, though, is that Transtar’s phone has 1GB of RAM and 4GB of local storage in addition to having a 720P display and a 5 MP camera, along with a 0.3 MP front-facing camera. This is obviously less than the 1.5 GB of RAM on the Galaxy Mega and less than the 8GB of local storage on the Galaxy Mega as well. The cameras on the Galaxy Mega are also 8 MP and 1.9 MP respectively, which means that this knock-off is really a cost-down version of this phone. The battery on the Transtar version is also a 2600 mAh battery versus the 3200 mAh (3.7v) on the Galaxy Mega as well, so in every way this phone is a lesser phone than the Galaxy Mega, but there’s a reason why.
The M666Q phone that is a 1:1 copy of the Galaxy Mega is actually only selling for $120, yes, $120. That is compared to the $475 that the Samsung Galaxy Mega is selling for on Amazon. That is quite literally 1/4 the price of what Samsung is selling theirs for, and this phone isn’t that outrageously underpowered compared to the Samsung. In fact, maybe Samsung should consider making these guys a partner in building their low-cost phones because it appears as though they may be able to make Samsung’s phones cheaper than Samsung themselves and there’s no training necessary. Obviously, they cut some corners, but it doesn’t change the fact that the Galaxy Mega copy is $120 a pop and is a working phone, not a fake demo device or some piece of plastic with a qHD screen.
What makes this fake all the more impressive other than the mere replication of external hardware and incredibly low price, is the fact that they were also able to replicate Samsung’s own interface. Which, if anyone that uses their interfaces knows, they aren’t really that hard to replicate in terms of performance because they all seem to slow down Samsung’s phones. So, naturally, someone that can emulate Samsung’s software as well as their hardware is going to be able to build a pretty damn good copy, like this one.
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- Transtar’s M666Q Front
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- The M666Q’s Back
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- The Transtar M666Q’s Side
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- And more copying of Samsung’s interface as well
The truth is that Transtar, like many, comes from Shenzhen and there’s no denying the manufacturing capability of that beautiful metropolis of manufacturing. It is slowly becoming a center for knock off manufacturers and legitimate brands to either launch from or at least a place to have the majority of their manufacturing capacity.
