Durban - For most phone-makers, releasing one or two smartphones a year is a big deal. Huawei has unveiled five in a week: a flagship smartphone, a big battery “phablet” and three phones between entry-level and upper mid-range.
Huawei P9
Its big international reveal was the P9, the eagerly-awaited sequel to its hugely popular P8.
According to Charlene Munilall, general manager for consumer business group SA, it sold 100 000 P8s in South Africa over the past year and is hoping for similarly stellar figures for the P9 when it arrives in June.
Judging by what I’ve read, I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s another hit.
Taking its design cues from the attractive aluminium body of its predecessor, the P9 is even better looking. I like the look of the diamond-cut edges and ever-so-slightly raised, contoured screen – 2.5D glass in industry jargon.
Featuring a 5.2-inch 1080p display, the P9 is powered by a Kirin 955 2.5GHz 64-bit ARM-based processor, and runs off a 3000mAh battery.
If there’s a stand-out feature, it’s the dual-camera design with Leica optical lenses, which Huawei says “work in tandem to enable users to create images of superior detail, depth, and colour”.
Huawei also unveiled a P9 Plus version, which sports a 5.5-inch “press touch” display and a bigger 3400mAh battery.
According to Munilall, both models will be coming here. Prices start at around R12 000 on prepaid or R500-a-month on contract.
Huawei Mate 8
Locally, the big news was the launch of the Mate 8.
I’m a huge fan of its predecessor, the Mate 7, which was one of South Africa’s best-selling “phablets” over the past year, thanks to its battery life and premium touches like a metal body and fingerprint unlocking, all at a reasonable price. The Mate 8 takes all of this to a new level.
The 6-inch, full-HD screen is as big as the Mate 7’s, but the phone feels smaller, thanks to its smaller bezels. My hands are not big, but the Mate 8 fitted comfortably in them, although to say “nestled” would be pushing it. It’s still a big device, although ridiculously slim and light for its size – a mere 7.9mm deep and weighs just 185g.
Huawei claims the fingerprint reader is among the best in class. As with the Mate 7, it’s located on the back of the phone, under the camera lens. Some don’t like that placement, but I find it ideal, in easy reach of where your forefinger naturally rests when you’re holding the device.
As anyone who follows tech news knows, security is a big talking point and the Mate 8 is no slouch in this department. Huawei’s endowed it with built-in, real-time encryption/decryption to keep prying eyes at bay, and there’s a microSD card lock feature that prevents unauthorised access to information kept on this storage device.
The camera looks to be another winning feature, judging from my brief hands-on encounter at the launch in Johannesburg.
Huawei’s taken a 16MP image sensor from Sony – a leader in the mobile imaging field – and beefed it up with a proprietary processor of its own for faster focusing, higher clarity, and more accurate colour representation. Not satisfied with that, it has added its own optical image stabilisation with “intelligent light level monitoring and anti-shake technology to create sharp, bright, and detailed images in low-light conditions”.
The pics I snapped at the launch bear out the hype, but I’d need more time to be sure. A dual-tone LED flash, 4K video recording capabilities and an 8MP front-facing camera round out an impressive imaging package.
The Mate 8 runs on Android 6.0 Marshmallow and Huawei’s Emui 4.0, and features the Chinese phone-maker’s new Kirin 950 chipset which has four 2.3GHz processor cores, and four 1.8GHz cores.
The Mate 7’s hero feature was its marathon battery life and the Mate 8 promises to continue this. It’s beefy 4000mAh battery offers more than one-and-a-half days of heavy use, nearly two-and-a-half days of regular use and 22 days’ standby time.
“Should the need arise, you can watch 17 hours of continuous HD video, or navigate the web non-stop for 20 hours,” Munilall said.
These are bold claims and I look forward to testing them when I receive a review unit. But if the Mate 7 is anything to go by, I have little doubt its successor will pass with flying colours.
The Mate 8 is available now at a prepaid price of R12 999 or on monthly contracts starting from R579. It’s available in 32GB dual and single-SIM variants in four colours: champagne gold, moonlight silver, sky grey and mocha brown.
Huawei G8, GR5 and GR3
If you’re looking for something more pocket friendly – in both senses – one of three other Huawei smartphones is sure to meet your needs.
The G8 looks to be, in my opinion, one of the best value mid-range smartphones going. It’s got a 5.5-inch 1080p display and 16GB of storage space. Throw in a 3000mAh battery and rear-mounted fingerprint scanner and things look even better.
A Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 chip, 3GB of RAM and 13MP rear camera and 5MP selfie snapper round out a compelling offering.
The price? A refreshing R5 499.
The GR5 features a Snapdragon 615 processor, 2GB of RAM, 16GB of storage and a full HD 5.5-inch display. Other features include a 13MP rear camera, 5MP front-facing camera, a rear-mounted fingerprint scanner and a 3000mAh battery. It’ll set you back R4 999. It’s the only phone in this price bracket I know of that comes with a fingerprint reader.
With a price tag of just R3 499, the GR3 is also great value for money, boasting the kind of features and specs found in flagship phones just a few years ago – an octa-core processor, 2GB of RAM and a 5-inch 720p display, a 13MP/5MP camera combo, 2200mAh battery and 16GBs of storage space.
According to Munilall, Huawei grew its share of the South African mobile market from 4.5 percent to 10 percent over the past year. She believes the latest crop of devices will help take this to 20 percent over the next 12 months.
“We’ve got a device at every price point and they’re not there just for the sake of it. Each of them is competing aggressively with other makers’ handsets. There’s never been a better time to be a Huawei customer,” she said.
From what I’ve seen so far, I’d have to agree.
@alanqcooper
Sunday Tribune
