Hey guys, I just received my Pipo M6 today so I thought I'd offer my experience so far. Keep in mind that I am coming from an iPad mini and my daily driver is a HTC One X running Cyanogenmod 10.1.
Build Quality:
TBH, I was hoping for something a little better after reading some user reviews. It's still quite good overall but there's just a few too many seams and the edges are a little rough at certain points. Nothing major but it just feels like a made and designed in China product. It doesn't bother me so much though since I won't notice it after putting it in a case.
I was glad to find that underneath the temporary screen protector which comes with all new products these days, there was another one underneath it which means you won't need to bother with putting on one yourself.
Screen:
VERY pretty. Viewing angles are good and colours really pop. Brightness level is amazing and will surely be sufficient even if you are in the dessert. In terms of resolution, you can set it to HD mode or Normal which requires a restart. I couldn't really notice any differences although I might if I had another one sitting side by side. Only thing is, I used both AnTuTu and Android System Info to find out the resolution and there seem to be some discrepancies.
Under HD Mode, both apps reported a resolution of 1536x1952 with 320dpi. Now that's still within Retina level territory but they were advertising 2048x1536. Not a huge difference I know but still a little annoying.
At Normal Mode, AnTuTu reported 1600x1128 and Android System info reported 1200x1528. Not sure why the two differed but the difference is negligible when you do the math.
User Interface:
As you may know, you have the choice of using the standard Jelly Bean interface or the special Pipo interface which makes everything look a bit like Windows 8. I chose to go with the latter. Everything is quite smooth although perhaps not quite as flawless as my iPad mini but with Android devices, I've come to accept that.
I really like where they're going with this interface although there are some definite rough edges. It comes preloaded with 5 home screens labeled: Home, Media, Apps, Office and Web. These can not be removed. Within each, there are some widgets which corresponds to their respective headings. These widgets cannot be changed or removed. The other objects that cannot be changed or removed are the boxes ala Windows 8 which are predetermined to be either editable shortcuts or folders. I find this a bit annoying because sometimes I don't need so many folders and would prefer to just launch an app immediately when I tap it. You can add more homescreens and name them how you like but you can't change their colour or the types of boxes they contain. Overall, it all looks very nice but needs to be more customisable.
Performance:
I haven't had a chance to install any games yet but so far the "feel" of the device seems very solid. I do have a problem when trying to install N.O.V.A. 3, i can't even find it in the Google Play Store. After finding it through Google, it says that my device cannot support it. I don't get it. My One X can install this game and it's far below the specs of the M6. If anyone can let me know why this is, I can install it and let you know how it performs.
Battery Life:
When I opened the box, it was already switched on and showed that it had been running on battery for about 28 hours (so it was probably opened by customs since it was posted out a week ago). Since then I've had the screen almost constantly on doing various things for the last 5 hours and it still has 40% juice left. Pretty good then!
Conclusion:
Overall, I'm quite happy. It has some small niggles but then it was pretty cheap. For the people who are worried that the RK3188 can't handle a retina display, I think you can relax. Everything runs smoothly enough. Plus, if you really prefer a lower resolution, you can change it in the settings to conserve battery life and increase performance. It beats having an M7, M8 or M9 purely because they have much smaller batteries. The 2x5000 mAh battery in the M6 was designed for the retina screen so if you use the normal resolution, it would wipe the competition clean.
Build Quality:
TBH, I was hoping for something a little better after reading some user reviews. It's still quite good overall but there's just a few too many seams and the edges are a little rough at certain points. Nothing major but it just feels like a made and designed in China product. It doesn't bother me so much though since I won't notice it after putting it in a case.
I was glad to find that underneath the temporary screen protector which comes with all new products these days, there was another one underneath it which means you won't need to bother with putting on one yourself.
Screen:
VERY pretty. Viewing angles are good and colours really pop. Brightness level is amazing and will surely be sufficient even if you are in the dessert. In terms of resolution, you can set it to HD mode or Normal which requires a restart. I couldn't really notice any differences although I might if I had another one sitting side by side. Only thing is, I used both AnTuTu and Android System Info to find out the resolution and there seem to be some discrepancies.
Under HD Mode, both apps reported a resolution of 1536x1952 with 320dpi. Now that's still within Retina level territory but they were advertising 2048x1536. Not a huge difference I know but still a little annoying.
At Normal Mode, AnTuTu reported 1600x1128 and Android System info reported 1200x1528. Not sure why the two differed but the difference is negligible when you do the math.
User Interface:
As you may know, you have the choice of using the standard Jelly Bean interface or the special Pipo interface which makes everything look a bit like Windows 8. I chose to go with the latter. Everything is quite smooth although perhaps not quite as flawless as my iPad mini but with Android devices, I've come to accept that.
I really like where they're going with this interface although there are some definite rough edges. It comes preloaded with 5 home screens labeled: Home, Media, Apps, Office and Web. These can not be removed. Within each, there are some widgets which corresponds to their respective headings. These widgets cannot be changed or removed. The other objects that cannot be changed or removed are the boxes ala Windows 8 which are predetermined to be either editable shortcuts or folders. I find this a bit annoying because sometimes I don't need so many folders and would prefer to just launch an app immediately when I tap it. You can add more homescreens and name them how you like but you can't change their colour or the types of boxes they contain. Overall, it all looks very nice but needs to be more customisable.
Performance:
I haven't had a chance to install any games yet but so far the "feel" of the device seems very solid. I do have a problem when trying to install N.O.V.A. 3, i can't even find it in the Google Play Store. After finding it through Google, it says that my device cannot support it. I don't get it. My One X can install this game and it's far below the specs of the M6. If anyone can let me know why this is, I can install it and let you know how it performs.
Battery Life:
When I opened the box, it was already switched on and showed that it had been running on battery for about 28 hours (so it was probably opened by customs since it was posted out a week ago). Since then I've had the screen almost constantly on doing various things for the last 5 hours and it still has 40% juice left. Pretty good then!
Conclusion:
Overall, I'm quite happy. It has some small niggles but then it was pretty cheap. For the people who are worried that the RK3188 can't handle a retina display, I think you can relax. Everything runs smoothly enough. Plus, if you really prefer a lower resolution, you can change it in the settings to conserve battery life and increase performance. It beats having an M7, M8 or M9 purely because they have much smaller batteries. The 2x5000 mAh battery in the M6 was designed for the retina screen so if you use the normal resolution, it would wipe the competition clean.
