Another Shenzhen Special: 15 Minutes with the MAFAM M11

Thanks to an excitingly mis-sold internet purchase, we are now in possession of the latest in exciting mobile technology - the MAFAM M11. (If you’re mentally incapacitated, you could have one of your very own for 24 whole US dollars!) Let’s jump in and see what this technological marvel has in store.

Four (4) SIM cards! Four! Ideal for the drug dealer in your life. Utterly bizarre for everyone else! Also: WhatsApp. Really? OK, say I believe you. Let’s try this.

Unboxing!

Pretty standard, except those four SIM slots! Two are mini-SIM, two are micro-SIM. Now I normally wouldn’t even bother with these, especially not trying to align my nano-SIM card in the slot, but it looks like nowhere on this phone’s spec sheet does it mention WiFi, so if we’re going to WhatsApp on this thing we’re going to need to get our GPRS on.

OK, let’s get started. No startup jingle, so that’s a bonus. Company logo isn’t centered on the screen though, which as we will see, is emblematic of the quality assurance standards that we’ll see throughout this phone’s design.

And before we carry on, take a moment to enjoy this menu. “Wha…“!

OK, let’s get this thing online.

Helpfully, you can set it to dial up to the internet automatically. Advanced! But first, the default APN settings - usefully named using characters it can’t display - need to be replaced with my real ones.

Typing text on a numeric keypad was just great, wasn’t it? Remember that? Remember how nice it was to not do that anymore?

Right, let’s see how the internet experience looks on this phone. Google from the browser? Kind of… early 2000s feel here, but still usable. That Facebook icon on the home screen? It opens a browser window just like you expected. It’s Facebook’s mobile site, and it just about works. And finally, WhatsApp. That service that doesn’t work at all unless you have an Android or Apple phone. Let’s see how they managed this!

It… opens in a web browser. With helpful download links for your Android or Apple phone. No functionality whatsoever. Not… really… deserving the “Whatsapp” logo on the box, and the “Wha…” icon with pride of place in the menu.

Alright! Let’s try out the camera. Its quality settings menu includes “Low”, “Medium” and “Advanced”, so naturally we’ll see where the latter gets us.

Embedded below are a daylight and a low-light shot for comparison, both at the camera’s native, er, 320 by 240 resolution. As you can see, better quality pictures can be obtained from the average potato, though astoundingly the low-light shot actually looks better.

And to finish up, let’s check some of the other exciting features this phone has. First up: Filearray! What is a filearray? We’ll never know, because it’s empty and no option on the phone seems to actually save a file here.

Next: Magic sound! I can select the Magic Sound of a man, woman, young, old, child or cartoon! The phone produces no sound when any of these options are selected.

We get games though! Check out Sokoban, and this file named Bubble_Bobble_320x240.jar which can’t be run because the phone doesn’t have any storage.

And that’s a wrap! Don’t buy this.

MAFAM? Nah, fam.