Inexpensive tracker. Preview of Huawei Honor Band A2

Today's article is that rare case when the subject of our close attention is not a new gadget, although it is undoubtedly interesting, but the shell installed in it. Our editorial office received an exclusive, the Huawei Honor 2 smartphone with the so-called. Emotion UI, a launcher that is designed to replace the usual Android in the vendor's products.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: Design and Features

It’s not in vain that we lead the reader towards the software, because the exterior of the new product does not stand out in anything outstanding: before us is the usual monoblock body, which is distinguished from its comrades and competitors, perhaps, only by the inscription above the display, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Huawei Honor 2 has average dimensions and weight: 134 x 67.5 x 10.5 mm with 145 grams of weight. You don't feel any discomfort when working with the menu or during a conversation, although for our taste, the thickness (depth) of the body of the new product is somewhat excessive.

The principle of the design is a bath of body-forming plastic into which the core is inserted (inner part + closing front panel). We could see similar solutions from HTC and they worked well: on the one hand, there are fewer parts, on the other, the design is relatively monolithic. True, the situation with Honor 2 is not clear - if it is not easy to get the core, it sits tightly in the grooves, then this does not exclude gaps in the element and some creaking when squeezed. We hope these are problems with the test sample that are corrected in the commercial sample. The materials of construction, as you understand, are plastic. The bath has a soft-touch coating, the front panel is covered with protective “glass” with blackening around the display, and at the junction of the elements we see a glossy plastic outline that looks like metal. The smartphone is moderately soiled, to maintain its “sales appearance” it is worth wiping the front panel on clothes after a conversation.

There are not many design elements, like any touchphone, but first things first. The upper part of the front panel houses the earpiece mesh, to the right of which there is a charge indicator and a front camera, invisible when inactive. Below the display are the standard OS keys: return, home and menu.

The device’s display is a 4.5” IPS matrix with a resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels. The picture is clear, the colors are natural, and the backlight has a small margin of brightness. Viewing angles are not bad, but not ideal - when the device is tilted, the information is somewhat distorted. Multitouch supports up to 5 simultaneous touches, which is generally sufficient, and the sensitivity to data input is not satisfactory.

The side edges of the smartphone are moderately filled: on the left there is a micro-USB interface connector, shifted upward from the center, and on the right, also “at the top”, there are thin volume rockers and the power key. The bottom panel of Honor 2 has only a microphone hole, while the top panel houses a 3.5mm audio jack (both elements are shifted to the left of the center).

The rear panel is traditionally occupied by the upper and lower parts. At the top we find a camera lens slightly protruding from the plane of the body, a second microphone above it and two flash bulbs on the left. At the bottom there are two horizontal speaker grids (the speakers are truly stereo, there are two of them, and not just two slots for one element).

Let's remove the body-forming tray, after which we will see the battery (Li-Pol, 2230 mAh) in the corresponding compartment, which in turn blocks the SIM card compartment located higher on the body. There is also a microSD slot here, which is not connected to a battery, but to replace the card, the “bath” will still have to be removed.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: User interface

Let's move on to the highlight of our review, Emotion UI version 1.5. I would like to immediately say that the manufacturer plans to eliminate the familiar Android 4.1.2 interface, while leaving a number of applications untouched (recently, firmware with Emotion UI has already been released for the “old man” Ascend P1 and is available for download at http://en.ui. vmall.com/download.html).

The operating logic will change somewhat, the main menu will disappear, as is implemented in iOS and, for example, in the alternative (custom) Android firmware, Miui. However, some functions will remain unchanged, such as messages, notebook and the like.

The functional and basic lockscreen of Emotion UI is familiar from other products of the company: depending on the side of the lock, we can not only unlock, but also launch basic applications. The element is replaceable; when you select a theme, its graphic and functional components change beyond recognition.

There is no main menu in Emotion UI, which is why all applications, folders and widgets must be placed on desktops. By the way, there can be up to 9 of them, the number is determined by the user based on needs. In the table preview, you can choose which one will be the main one, but, alas, there is no circular scrolling (although there is an extensive selection of transition animations).

Since we are talking about the graphic component, we will note the choice of wallpaper for desktops and lockscreen: they can be identical or different, and also change when shaken.

Among the contents of desktops, the branded widget “Me Widget” is interesting, which is widely customizable in terms of elements and is the pride of the manufacturer: not HTC, of ​​course, but the element is curious.

The bottom line of screens is represented by the "dock" of the main functions. In addition to the ability to change elements in it, you can also add folders here (up to 5 elements in total), which expands the functionality of the interface.

The notification area now has the ability to select function activation buttons: i.e. Now you are not a hostage to the whims of the manufacturer, but can safely change and choose icons. It is important that the element is not limited to one screen, has horizontal scrolling and remembers the last position in which you left it before closing it.

The settings item has 2 tabs in Emotion UI: general and all. At the same time, the graphic component has changed somewhat, but the functional component has changed almost none; it was not too difficult to single out the desired item in the existing sheet, and besides, the “general” parameters are not customizable.

It is interesting to note the profiles, of which there are 4 by default: they are responsible for the light, sound and vibration components of alerts, as well as the operation of wireless modules, but there is no time connection - they cannot switch by the clock, but they are equipped with funny animation.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: Telephone service

In Emotion UI, the dialer has changed somewhat, but rather visually. Above the usual columns of keys is the usual log of recent calls, and the address book can be accessed both from the dialer and by tapping on the corresponding icon. The variety of data that can be assigned to a new contact is amazing, and the options for displaying and synchronizing the address book will satisfy even the most demanding user.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: Messages

The principle of constructing dialogs and correspondence is unchanged: messages are grouped in clouds by addressee, which is very convenient. There is, of course, no division into folders, and the types are not separated - when adding content, sms turns into mms, but they are also displayed in the general correspondence sheet. The settings are typical, reports, notifications, validity period and the like.

The standalone email client is standard: the interface is in light colors, the principle of building a list and messages is typical for the platform, the settings are standard.

Traditionally, Gmail has a separate application. It hasn't changed one iota compared to its predecessors, so just look at the screenshots.

The proprietary keyboard installed in Emotion UI is an ambiguous element: on the one hand, you can get used to it, on the other hand, replacements always exist. The symbols on the screen turned out to be of medium size, which is why erroneous clicks do occur, despite the increase in the tap area.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: Organizer, office

This subsection is represented by a familiar calendar, which implies synchronization with Google, a classic adding machine with an additional panel, notes, a file manager, alarm clocks with additional functions of world time, stopwatch and timer.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: Communications

The smartphone operates in GSM 850/900/1800/1900 MHz, UMTS 850/900/AWS/1900/2100 MHz networks, has support for HSPA+, WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 3.0, GPS/A-GPS and DLNA. Let us remind you about the extensive notification area, where customizable wireless network activation indicators are accumulated. There were no complaints about the performance of the modules themselves during testing.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: Maps and GPS

There is nothing new in our guest other than the standard and boring Google Maps with beta navigation. Maps are updated to the current version when you first connect to Google Play and are a completely working tool that can always be replaced, since there are already many alternatives.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: Internet

There are two Internet browsers: this is the unnamed default “browser” and the one familiar to users of desktop OSes, Chrome. The wealth of choice is good news, but by and large the functions of the applications are duplicated, although Chrome is more convenient due to the ability to synchronize between your devices.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: Camera

The standard camera interface has been expanded by the manufacturer with the following details: various facial distortions (a similar solution is used in iOS products), built-in filters ala Instagram and various shooting modes.

The camera leaves behind positive emotions: focusing is fast and relatively accurate, nearby objects are almost always in focus, “infinity” is also normal. In general, for an 8 megapixel module everything is more than good.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: Multimedia

The user has 2 players at his disposal: a branded one and Play Music, which, like email clients, differ only visually, the functionality is similar.

The sound quality was tested paired with Sony XBA-1 headphones and it must be said that it did not disappoint: the new Honor does not have enough stars in the sky, but it is quite ready to brighten up the subway ride with your favorite music.

Additional multimedia functions of the new product are a voice recorder with typical functionality and an FM radio receiver that works when a wired antenna is connected, acting as an antenna.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: Applications

From the manufacturer, in addition to the applications described above, you will get out of the box:

Flashlight: flash function, which will be useful in a dark entrance. There are only two positions, on or off, the brightness cannot be adjusted;

Weather;

Film studio: video editor;

Backups: backup, which saves, incl. application settings;

Facebook client;

Twitter client;

As well as various Google services (Yandex Search and Yandex.Maps will also be added to the final version).

The set is not redundant, but according to the manufacturer, the content of his smartphone should be provided by the user himself and it is not entirely correct to impose his choice on him.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: Hardware Features

The hardware of Honor 2 is based on a quad-core HiSilicon K3V2 processor with a frequency of 1.4 GHz, 1 GB of RAM and 8 GB of flash memory (not counting support for microSD up to 32 GB, which can be selected as the “default” memory in the settings). In general, for the stated price the performance is pleasant, and in benchmark tests the new product clearly strives to become a leader in the middle segment. We did not notice any slowdowns or freezes in operation; perhaps this is one of the “features” of Emotion UI.

Huawei Honor 2:: Review:: Impressions and conclusions

The battery life of the smartphone under classic user load conditions (up to an hour of conversations, a dozen or two messages, periodic checking of mail and social networks, half an hour of music and rare camera shooting) is about a day and a half. The indicator is not bad, but the battery is also impressive.

The level of network reception was not satisfactory: there were no unauthorized losses or interruptions in communication, and when leaving the metro, the smartphone quickly caught it. The call volume is not bad, but not ideal: it is enough for most usage scenarios, but we did not see any reserve. The vibration alert is similar, average in power. The speaker in tandem with the microphone did not disappoint: the interlocutors were heard both on a busy street and in an office environment, and the interlocutors did not ask us questions.

Let's sum it up: while the body and hardware features of a smartphone can rarely surprise anyone, something new in terms of the interface is always interesting, especially if the interface is not just a shell, which, moreover, cannot be turned off. The solution from Huawei is bold, but workable: it has some rough edges like the lack of circular scrolling and a limited number of desktops, but there are no fewer advantages, both functional and graphical. Judging by the responses of respondents, it will take a day or two to “relearn” from bare Android to Emotion UI, but then there are no problems in usability and even vice versa. Overall, Huawei Honor 2 for 14,000 rubles turned out to be an interesting product in the middle segment, the killer feature of which is not the hardware, but the software, which will even take into account the wishes of its users (the address for feedback, by the way, is https://www.facebook.com/ Huaweiemui).

What I didn't like

the body is loose, the quality of the soft touch on the rear roof is extremely poor - you can feel coating defects with your finger - in place of these defects the soft touch will most likely begin to peel off, there is no memory card included

What I liked

loud sound, everything seems to work

What I didn't like

External speaker sound quality (noise)
- The 1.4 GHz processor is not up to par
- There is clearly not enough charge
- Creaky body
- The screen breaks too easily (fell from 0.5 m and cracked)

What I liked

Warm body (you can warm your hands) - Sound volume - Sound quality in headphones and on the Subwoofer - Good 8 MP camera - Signal reception quality - High screen resolution - Small pixel size - Excellent flashlight - High-quality headphones (Not inferior to IPhone 5 headphones)

What I didn't like

1. some programs (for example Instagram) do not work correctly with his video camera, as a result of which problem 2 appears, which does not prevent you from filming with a regular camera and then poking around on Instagram
2. if you use many of the phone’s capabilities at once or load the processor with something or freeze the program, it starts to heat up in the camera area (apparently where the processor is), it freezes and can burn the SIM card if it is very delicate (there was one such case in a hot summer in Europe) - 4 I put it in terms of quality because of this.

What I liked

4 cores, excellent brightness, volume

What I didn't like

It's terribly slow, slows down every second, all programs lag, the phone lags, the android lags! I want to smash it against the wall. a bunch of unnecessary programs that cannot be deleted, you cannot turn off the camera sound and add a photo to a contact, the contacts are connected to Skype. Charging lasts about 4 hours.

What I liked

What I didn't like

on the second day after the purchase, the case began to creak on all sides (although for me this is not a big minus), I was very upset that it discharges VERY quickly (even if you don’t play games, surf the Internet, etc.), it takes longer to charge than The battery is consumed, it is heavy (a small minus, but still).

What I liked

price, powerful processor, a lot of memory, HD resolution, full HD camera, loud speakers. THE PERFECT THING FOR GAMES!!!

What I didn't like

The camera is a bit thick, the back cover creaks.

What I liked

Price, battery

What I didn't like

The battery runs out quickly, there are no firmware updates, wi-fi hangs constantly, there is always not enough memory.

What I liked

Good screen

What I didn't like

Unfortunately there were more of them. 1) Stock firmware is not interesting. 2) There are no updates over the air 3) The screen is pale with shades of green. The 4.5 diagonal differs from 4.3 only in the increase in soft keys in most applications, and not in the increase in the working area. Well, it's not that important. Loses in the picture HTC incredible S 4) The lid creaks at the ends 5) The battery is not the most powerful for such hardware 6) The glass, according to many, is a gorilla. BUT! Try pressing C3 or C2 from Samsung - with your fingernail on the screen - no reaction. On Honor 2 there are streaks, which means the glass is deformed, but what kind of gorilla is this... especially 2!?? 7) 1 GB PCT memory 8) low vibration

What I liked

The advantages primarily include 1) price/performance ratio. The quality suffers, but not much. 2) Fast processor 3) Original cases and films are already on sale. 4) The sound of the speakers is decent, but if you lay the speakers down, the volume drops significantly

What I didn't like

Overused buttons! After Samsung ACE, everything seems out of place! Separately, I would like to consider the typing of SMS: when typing, the letter “E” is located on the RIGHT (this is terribly annoying, because instead of “e”, you always press “E”) Also, when you write, for example, “hello)))”, it automatically writes “hello ((()))" For me this is the main disadvantage.

What I liked

Fast, excellent camera, large and durable battery, rigid body (if you close your eyes to the creaking back cover), excellent loud sound.

What I didn't like

There are plenty of disadvantages. 1GB of RAM is a bit heavy, instead of the promised two

What I liked

The presence of two speakers and their volume. All the advantages end there.

What I didn't like

I don’t like that you need to make a few extra moves to turn off the key backlight after a reboot (it annoys me): you need to go to settings, turn on auto contrast, uncheck smart backlight, hold it up to a bright light, press smart backlight again and you can change the brightness .

The screen is well calibrated, contrasty and slightly cold; color gamut is close to sRGB. Maximum brightness - 372.878 cd/m2, black field brightness - 0.293 cd/m2, static contrast - 1273:1.

Since the screen proportions are non-standard, third-party applications, just in case, are launched in FullHD with black fields at the top and bottom; you can switch them to full-screen mode with one touch (however, the application will be restarted). Of the applications that I managed to use, not one of them running full screen caused any problems. It's not worth watching FullDH video in full screen - the image is enlarged, but noticeably cropped in height.

The fingerprint sensor pleased me with its instant and clear recognition of fingers the first time - during a week of testing I never had to touch my finger again. The sensor can recognize gestures - moving your finger left and right works to scroll through photos in the gallery when viewing in full screen, and a top-down gesture opens the notification panel.

In addition to the usual accelerometer, gyroscope and other necessary sensors, Honor 7x also has a pedometer. Its readings are displayed directly on the unlock screen, next to the clock, and are also used in the pre-installed Health application, which will be discussed later.

EMUI 5.1 and pre-installed applications

At one time, the fifth version of the proprietary EMUI add-on became a big and pleasant discovery for me when I updated my Mate to version 5.0. And in 5.1 it became even better and more interesting. The smartphone interface is very thoughtful and flexible to configure. If you want shortcuts to all applications on the desktop, please, if you want a separate application menu, like in the “official” Android 7.0, here it is.

For older people who find it difficult to master modern technology, there is a special simplified interface with large icons and large font, reminiscent of Windows Mobile.

With a gesture from above, you can pull out the notification area. Any other movement will simply unlock the screen. By the way, you can unlock it by double tapping (this method is turned off by default), but the fastest way is using the fingerprint scanner (if it is active and if the phone is not lying on the table).

The system is thought out to the smallest detail. So, for example, you cannot simply press the volume down key for a long time to switch the phone to silent mode (in other phones this often happens by accident). That is, the signal volume will decrease to zero, but the vibration alert will remain turned on. To turn it off, you need to slide the switch on the screen. Apparently, adjusting the call volume on the lock screen does not work for the same purpose - so that the phone in your pocket does not turn off the sound itself. You can cancel a sent SMS or MMS message by double tapping within 6 seconds after “sending” (in reality, of course, sending is simply delayed for this time). When you delete a photo or video in the gallery, you do not lose it forever - the file is simply moved to the "Recently Deleted" folder and is stored there for another 30 days, just in case. Fortunately, the amount of built-in memory allows.

A top-down gesture on the desktop starts a search for any content on the smartphone - applications, contacts and notes. Well, my favorite thing is long screenshots. With one touch, you get a snapshot of all the information on a given page, including what's below the visible area. The phone itself scrolls the screen, takes screenshots and combines them into one. I don’t know how much this function is needed by the average user, but when writing reviews it can save a lot of time. Here, for example, are complete pages of the application menu and settings menu saved with one touch:

In the same way, you can save both web pages in the browser and application windows, except those that are combined from static and scrollable parts.

Much attention has been paid to saving battery power and Internet traffic. There are two energy saving modes - normal, with some background functions disabled, and "Ultra" - an analogue of the one that is turned on in the Lenovo P2 with a special switch. In this mode, wireless networks do not work, the display brightness is reduced, the backlight dimming time is reduced to a few seconds, there are no wallpapers on the desktop and lock screen, you cannot even take a screenshot, and there are only six applications available (but you can choose any others instead of those default).

For each application, you can configure the method of issuing notifications and block Internet access via Wi-Fi, mobile network or completely, and also specify which applications will be closed when the screen is locked. In general, this is an unplowed field for boring perfectionists who want to keep every byte and every milliwatt under control.

If you need another account in an application that does not support multiple accounts, you can create a clone of the application. However, of all the applications installed on the phone, this function was available only for Facebook and Facebook Messenger.

As for pre-installed third-party applications, there is a lot of unnecessary stuff. For example, the Yandex, Yandex.Browser and Sberbank applications are not very relevant for Ukraine. Huawei still makes one firmware for Russia and Ukraine. Fortunately, these applications are not made system and can be easily removed.

Interestingly, the third-party SwiftKey keyboard is active by default. As for me, the standard Google keyboard is good enough and does not require replacement. True, it consumes battery power very actively, perhaps this is the case. By the way, here's another advantage of the Full View display - the Gboard keyboard with a row of numbers, text correction tips and an average key height takes up no more than half of the screen.

But what’s really interesting is the proprietary Huawei Health application. It's a virtual coach, like Adidas miCoach or Strava, for running, walking and cycling. You can enter data about your age and weight, set a goal (by the number of steps taken or by reaching a certain weight), connect a heart rate monitor and scales, and also select a ready-made training program, for example, prepare for a half marathon by a certain date. The application will ask for your previous results at a given distance (if you have any), specify the planned number of workouts per week, and create a personal plan for you. Naturally, all training data is recorded and detailed statistics are kept.

The application can be deleted if it is no longer needed. It is free and can be installed on any Android smartphone, but if you run or walk, it is advisable that your phone has a pedometer, otherwise some of the functions will not work.

Multimedia capabilities of a smartphone

Audio

The Music application plays loseless formats, shows song lyrics (if they are in the file), is controlled from the lock screen and looks quite nice, and also smoothly mutes the sound when you stop and remove the headphones.

The sound of the Honor 7x is quite decent. It doesn’t amaze with some magical purity and transparency, but with the default settings (effects are disabled and the appropriate type of headphones is selected), the music sounds pleasant, without any obvious distortions or distortions. There is no background noise (of course, if it is not in the recording itself). Among the built-in effects of Huawei Histen, you can use the equalizer to adjust the sound to your hearing and your headphones, but the bass boost and 3D are not impressive - the naturalness of the sound suffers. The volume level for music is sufficient, without obvious distortion at maximum. In general, there are no complaints about the sound.

The FM receiver is “nothing special” style. A simple interface, average reception and sound quality; wired headphones are required as an antenna for operation. The only interesting option is switching off by timer (useful if you listen to the radio before going to bed). The voice recorder records high-quality stereo sound. Recording of telephone conversations is not provided.

Photo

The main camera of Hohor 7x is dual, 16+2 megapixels. A two-megapixel module is used to speed up focusing and add a bokeh effect (blur). The matrix proportions are 4:3; in other available formats (1:1 and 18:9) the image is cropped. In good lighting, pictures come out clear, detailed and colorful, and phase focusing is truly instant and accurate. In artificial light and at night, the camera takes pictures quite decently, but don’t expect miracles, the lens aperture is not that high - 1: 2.2.

The pre-installed camera app has several special shooting modes. A Live Photo is essentially a short 3-second video with sound. Portrait mode includes two effects - skin smoothing and background blur (the first is customizable, the second can only be turned on/off). It turns out well, but there is a nuance - a photo in portrait mode is saved in a smaller size - 8 megapixels instead of 16. Here is an example of the portrait mode working (pictures are cropped and brought to the same size):

For more flexible control of blur, there is a wide aperture mode that simulates a lens aperture ranging from f/16 to f/0.95. Of course, the result of such software simulation cannot be compared with shooting with real ultra-fast lenses, but, nevertheless, this function helps to highlight the main object in the frame and blur everything unnecessary and unimportant. By the way, it is not at all necessary to accurately select the aperture at the time of shooting, you don’t have to waste time on this at all, the main thing is to focus on the desired object, and you can adjust the degree of blur and the position of the “spot of sharpness” later. Such pictures, as well as videos and “live photos” are marked in the gallery with the corresponding icons.

There is one selfie camera with a resolution of 8 megapixels. The same effects are available for it as in portrait mode described above. Example photo from this camera:

Swiping across the screen from left to right in shooting mode provides access to additional modes and effects, and from right to left - to image settings and camera controls.

You can take a photo in several ways - by touching a button, touching anywhere on the display, or using a hand gesture (this starts a timer so you have time to return your hand to its normal position). True, I was never able to get the camera to react to the gesture. There is also an “Audio control” option - a photo can be taken either by the voice command “Cheese”, or by any sufficiently loud sound (scream, blow, clap). In the first case, the camera fires with a noticeable delay, when the pseudo-smile caused by the utterance of this word has already disappeared from the face. But the automatic shooting function when a smile is detected works perfectly, only the smile must be full - the lips must be stretched, and the teeth must be at least a little visible. Well, of course, there is a quick shooting function: by double pressing the volume down key, the camera will turn on, focus and take a photo. This takes a little over a second.

Literally on the last day of testing, it was discovered that the camera can also take pictures by pressing the call button on a Bluetooth headset connected to a smartphone, although I didn’t find anything like that in the settings.

Of the settings available in normal auto mode, there is only exposure compensation in the form of a slider next to the focus point. The rest of the settings are hidden in the settings menu or are available directly on the screen in the “Pro” mode, in which you can manually select:

Exposure metering method (over the entire image, center-weighted and spot);

Sensitivity (ISO 50...1600 in 1/3 step increments);

Shutter speed (from 1/4000 s to 8 (!!) seconds),

Exposure compensation (±4 EV in 1/3-stop increments);

Focus type (single, continuous or manual)

White balance (auto, 4 presets and manual color temperature selection in 100K steps).

My only complaint about the professional mode is that the parameter buttons and scales that control their values ​​are too small and closely located.

The ability to set a slow shutter speed is priceless! If you securely fix the phone, you can shoot stationary objects in almost complete darkness with minimal sensitivity, which means minimal noise and natural color rendition. The first photo in the gallery below was taken in a room with curtained windows on a cloudy day (the phone is fixed, the “audio control” function is used to release the shutter). For comparison, the second photo was taken under the same conditions in auto mode without a flash, the third - with a flash.

And finally, about one more set of effects. Both the main and selfie cameras can take pictures with “augmented reality” - various kinds of ears, mustaches, noses, etc. All these accessories are positioned on the face with amazing precision and move with it when the head turns and tilts. True, the size of such photos is only 720x960 pixels, but they are only needed to send to friends on their phones, so that’s quite enough.

Examples of other photos taken with the camera of the Honor 7x smartphone:

Video

If you need 4K video, look for another phone, this one shoots maximum in FullHD. Stereo sound is present, localization of sound sources is good thanks to the microphones being as far apart as possible. There is no stabilization or protection from the wind. A simple video editor allows you to trim videos and reduce resolution.

An example of a regular video with the highest possible quality:

Shooting at night:

It is possible to shoot video with a slow motion effect at the right moment. As with wide aperture, the start and end of the slow motion sequence is selected after shooting. But the resolution of such videos is only 640x480 and the picture quality, frankly speaking, is terrible due to excessive compression.

Example video with slow motion effect:

Performance and autonomy

Although the hardware in the Honor 7x is not top-end, it seems that the only point where it lacks performance is in synthetic tests. During testing, the device never slowed down, crashed, overheated, and certainly did not turn off or reboot without a command.

Standard test results:

Autonomy is quite consistent with what is expected for a battery with a capacity of 3340 mAh. In “always online” mode (web surfing, social networks, some mp3 and Youtube, a lot of photos and a sea of ​​screenshots synchronized with Google Photo) the phone worked from 12 to 20 hours.

From morning until late evening there was always enough charge. With normal use, I think it will last up to two days, especially if you spend a little time adjusting the energy and traffic consumption of applications.

Impressions of use

It is unrealistic to study all the functions and understand all the nuances of the behavior of a modern smartphone, much less catch bugs in a week, but the first impression of the Honor7x is positive. A good display, good sound quality during calls, stable operation of the system and all wireless interfaces, a good camera and a well-thought-out proprietary shell with very beautiful pictures on the lock screen - this is what I will remember about the Honor 7x.

A Full View format display with thin frames is convenient and beautiful; I think that pretty soon the 18:9 format will cease to be exotic and will become the same standard as FullHD is now.

This is one of those cases when you don’t want to give away a test device and you can, with a clear conscience, recommend it for purchase if the purchase budget is limited to nine thousand hryvnia.

4 reasons to buy Honor 7x:

• You need a beautiful, durable, fast and not too expensive phone
• Do you want a bigger screen and a smaller body?
• You need a very fast camera with bokeh mode
• You want a smartphone with a fast, functional and well-thought-out design

3 reasons not to buy Honor 7x:

• Do you need 4K video capability?
• Do you prefer a front-facing fingerprint scanner?
• You plan to use Android Pay, so a smartphone without NFC is not suitable for you

Specifications Honor 7x (BND-L21)
Display	LTPS LCD, 5.93 inches, 1080x2160, 407 ppi, Corning Gorilla Glass
Frame	glass (front panel), aluminum (back panel), dimensions 156.5 x 75.3 x 7.6 mm, weight 165 g
CPU	HiSilicon Kirin 659, 4 x Cortex-A53, 2.36 GHz and 4 x Cortex-A53, 1.7 GHz, Mali-T830 MP2 graphics
RAM	4 GB
Flash memory	64 GB (built-in), MicroSD (installed instead of one of the SIM cards)
Camera	Main: dual 16.0 MP + 2.0 MP, F2.2, phase focusing, LED flash. Video 1080p@30 fps, 17 Mbit/s. Front: 8.0 MP
Wireless technologies	Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n 2.4 GHz, Bluetooth 4.1, A2DP, EDR, LE
GPS	Eat
Sensors	gravity, proximity, illumination, magnetic field, pedometer
Battery	Li-Ion, declared capacity 3340 mAh
operating system

This inexpensive smartphone in an aluminum case was the first in the popular Honor line to be equipped with a “high” screen (18:9), occupying almost the entire front surface of the case. Among other features, it is worth noting a dual main camera, a fast fingerprint scanner, as well as functional software with support for audio effects. In this review of Huawei Honor 7X we will discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the new product.

Huawei has set a goal to make Honor the “No. 1 brand” for a youth and active audience. While maintaining a balanced ratio of price and functionality, Honor devices are constantly being improved. So, to replace the mid-price segment model (our review) is the Honor 7X, which in its updated hardware is closer to (our review).

Huawei Honor 7X review: technical specifications

• Model: BND-L21
• OS: Android 7.0 (Nougat) + EMUI 5.1 shell
• Processor: 8-core, 64-bit HiSilicon Kirin 659 (4xARM Cortex-A53, up to 2.36 GHz + 4xARM Cortex-A53, up to 1.7 GHz)
• Graphics coprocessor: ARM Mali-T830 MP2
• RAM: 4 GB LPDDR3
• Storage: 64 GB, hybrid microSD/HC/XC memory card slot (up to 256 GB)
• Screen: capacitive, LTPS matrix, 5.93-inch diagonal, FullHD+ resolution (2160x1080 pixels, 18:9), pixel density per inch 407 ppi, protective glass with 2.5D effect
• Interfaces: Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n (2.4 GHz), Wi-Fi Direct, Bluetooth 4.1 LE, USB 2.0 (USB OTG, charge/sync), 3.5 mm headphone jack, FM radio
• Rear photo module: main camera - 16 MP, wide-angle lens, phase detection autofocus, f/2.2 aperture, secondary camera - 2 MP, autofocus, LED flash, video 1080p@30 fps
• Front camera – 8 MP, wide-angle lens, f/2.0 aperture
• Network: 2G, 3G (HSPA+, up to 42 Mbit/s), 4G (LTE Cat 6, up to 300 Mbit/s), LTE-FDD: 1, 3, 7, 8, 20; TD-LTE: 40
• SIM card configuration: nanoSIM (4FF format) + nanoSIM (4FF format)/microSD
• SIM card operating mode: Dual SIM Dual Standby (DSDS)
• Navigation: GPS/GLONASS/BDS, A-GPS
• Sensors: accelerometer, light and proximity sensors, compass, fingerprint scanner
• Battery: non-removable, lithium polymer, 3,340 mAh
• Colors: black, blue, gold, red
• Dimensions: 156.5x75.3x7.6 mm
• Weight: 165 grams

Review of Huawei Honor 7X: design, ergonomics

We discussed in detail about the “species” features of smartphones whose screens were stretched “in height.” In particular, one of the distinguishing features of such devices is improved ergonomics. Indeed, the streamlined aluminum body of the Honor 7X, with an almost 6-inch screen embedded in the front panel, lies quite comfortably in the hand. Unlike, for example, a regular “shovel” with the same diagonal. Even compared to its 5.5-inch predecessor, the new device, purely geometrically, looks quite good - 156.5x75.3x7.6 mm versus 150.9x72.6x8.2 mm. For obvious reasons, it turned out to be a little taller, almost the same in width, and even thinner. At the same time, the matte surface of the metal body is almost smooth. For Russia, the new model has four colors - golden, blue, black and elegant red.

The somewhat “bulging” lenses of the rear camera duo are somewhat reminiscent of steampunk glasses. Perhaps the fact is that the “eyes” of the dual photo module are not located vertically, like, for example, the . The plastic inserts for the antennas on the rear panel are also straight, not curly. However, in terms of overall dimensions and weight, these two rather elegant 5.93-inch smartphones differ slightly - (156.5x75.3x7.6 mm versus 156.2x75.2x7.5 mm) and (165 g versus 164 g).

The front panel of Honor 7X is covered with protective glass with a 2.5D effect that flows smoothly around the perimeter.

Above the display, around the decorative grille of the conversational speaker, there is an LED indicator on the right, and a front camera lens on the left, as well as light and proximity sensors.

On-screen touch control buttons “Back”, “Home” and “Recent applications” are represented by “triangle”, “circle” and “square” icons. In the settings you can change their location and also add another icon (for the notification shade).

A small plate under the display is occupied by the “chrome” Honor logo.

On the right edge of the case there is a volume rocker and a power/lock button,

the variety of sizes of which makes it easy to distinguish them by touch.

On the left edge there is a closed combination slot with a tray for two places, one of which is intended only for the subscriber identification module of the nanoSIM format, and the other can be occupied either by a second nanoSIM or a microSD memory card.

Between the heads of two screws with star slots, a microUSB connector was placed at the bottom end, to the right of which (viewed from the screen side) there is a decorative grille for the “multimedia” speaker (four round holes), and next to it there is a small hole for a “talk” microphone, with On the left is a 3.5 mm audio headset connector.

At the top end there was only room for a second microphone (noise reduction).

The main dual photo module is closer to the upper left edge of the rear panel. A little lower, and already in the center, there is a round platform for the fingerprint scanner, slightly recessed into the body.

From the inscriptions at the bottom of the rear panel, decorated with another Honor logo, you can find out the name of the manufacturer, model number and country of production.

Despite the ergonomic form factor of the Honor 7X, the settings retain a set of proprietary controls to compensate for the large screen size. To emphasize the reliability of the smartphone and its components, the manufacturer indicates that the drop test was performed 4,800 times. By the way, the Honor 7X kit includes a clip case that protects the perimeter and back panel of the smartphone.

Huawei Honor 7X review: screen

The Honor 7X smartphone is equipped with a 5.93-inch screen with FullHD+ resolution (2160x1080 pixels) and a pixel density per inch of 407 ppi. The display occupies almost the entire front panel. According to the manufacturer, this screen aspect ratio (18:9) is better suited for watching widescreen movies with a 21:9 aspect ratio. Recall that 16:9 = 1.77:1, 18:9 = 2:1, and 21:9 = 2.33:1.

To manufacture the matrix, we used LTPS (Low Temperature Poly Silicon) technology. As is known, replacing amorphous silicon with polycrystalline silicon allows one to achieve wider viewing angles, a better color palette, lower power consumption and response time.

The capacitive touch screen recognizes up to ten simultaneous clicks, which was confirmed by the results of the AnTuTu Tester program . The backlight level can be adjusted manually or using the "Auto-Adjust" option. A small reserve of brightness is available. Enabling full-screen mode allows you to stretch "part-screen" applications to the entire display.

You can change the color temperature in the “Screen” settings, making the images on the screen warmer or, on the contrary, colder, using a color wheel with two presets. The vision protection mode reduces the level of ultraviolet radiation and is designed to relieve eye fatigue, while the color temperature can be adjusted independently. You can also adjust the size of images, text and icons on the screen in steps. Unlike, there is no option to increase the sensitivity of the touch layer for working with gloves in this smartphone. The oleophobic coating allows you to remove small stains and fingerprints from the protective glass, the manufacturer of which is not specified.

Huawei Honor 7X review: cameras

The dual rear photo module of the Honor 7X has the same characteristics as the . Thus, the primary camera with a 16-megapixel sensor and an f/2.2 lens aperture is responsible for the shooting itself, and the 2-megapixel auxiliary one determines the depth of field, which is required for wide aperture mode and shooting portraits. The maximum image resolution for the main camera is 4608x3456 pixels (16 MP) with an aspect ratio of 4:3. It is also possible to shoot with frame proportions 1:1 (3456x3456 pixels, 12 MP) and 18:9 (4608x2304 pixels, 11 MP).

The wide-angle aperture (f/2.0 aperture) front camera lens based on an 8-megapixel sensor provides a resolution of self-portraits of 3264x2448 pixels (8 MP, 4:3).

For both cameras, the maximum video resolution is Full HD (1920x1080 pixels, 16:9) with a frame rate of 30 fps. Interval shooting (“Time Lapse”) is supported only in HD quality (1280x720 pixels). But in the “Slow motion” mode, a video slowed down 4 times is recorded from the main camera with a VGA resolution - (640x480 pixels) @ 120 fps. All content is saved in MP4 container files (AVC - video, AAC - audio).

The interface of the Camera application has also remained virtually unchanged. So, swiping left opens the settings panel, swiping right opens a list of shooting scenarios, including professional (photo and video), panoramic, HDR, etc. modes. But, for example, the parameters for the “delicious food” scene had to be set additionally. The professional photo mode provides manual adjustment of parameters such as exposure metering method, ISO and shutter speed, exposure compensation level, focusing method, and white balance. However, there is no option to save pictures in RAW format. For the main camera in wide aperture mode, the emulated aperture value can be changed from 0.95 to 16.

Portrait mode enhances the beautification effect in the range from 0 to 10, and also turns on or off the blur effect (resolution 3264x2448 pixels, 8 MP). In the "live photo" mode, along with the photo, accompanying short clips are recorded, which can only be viewed in the standard "Gallery". For proprietary artistic shooting modes "Light" you must use a tripod. In the "Effects" mode, you can apply funny masks to portraits. You can change the focus point, select the depth of field, and also apply filters to the image after shooting. You can see examples of photos from the main camera.

Huawei Honor 7X review: sound

The standard Music application plays, in particular, high-quality audio files (SQ - Super Quality) with the FLAC extension. But listening to them through a “multimedia” speaker, with clearly budget sound and a small volume reserve, is perhaps not the best thing to do. Huawei's proprietary Histen sound processing algorithms implement audio effects that can only be accessed when headphones are connected. In this case, in the “Sound” settings, you should select the type of audio accessory to be connected. By refusing to turn on the 3D audio mode (near, front, surround), you can use a 10-band equalizer with bass boost, five presets and individual settings.

The new product comes with an FM tuner, which will require a wired audio headset as a shortwave antenna. It is not included in the kit, so you will have to worry about its availability additionally. The Voice Recorder mobile application records conversations and monologues in M4A (AAC, 48 kHz) files, allowing you to leave quick and photo tags on these recordings.

Review of Huawei Honor 7X: hardware, performance

Compared to the previous model, the “engine” of Honor 7X, of course, has been upgraded. Now, instead of HiSilicon Kirin 655, an 8-core HiSilicon Kirin 659 chip is used, also created taking into account the design standards of 16 nm (FinFET+). By the way, exactly the same one was installed, for example, in a smartphone. It remains only to recall that the clock speeds of the quartets of 64-bit ARM Cortex-A53 cores reach 2.36 GHz and 1.7 GHz, respectively. At the same time, the ARM Mali-T830 MP2 graphics accelerator with two execution units works in tandem with the processor. The Kirin 659 chip also integrates a memory controller and an LTE modem (Cat. 6, 300/50 Mbit/s). But the amount of RAM on the Honor 7X is 4 GB.

TestingHuaweiHonor 7X . Results in the AnTuTu benchmark

TestingHuaweiHonor 7X. Results in the GeekBench benchmark

Due to the same basic hardware, the test results and Honor 7X differ only within the margin of error.

Built-in storage of 64 GB can be expanded with microSD/HC/XC memory cards up to 256 GB. In addition, USB-OTG technology allows you to connect USB flash drives to your smartphone.

Two subscriber identification modules in nanoSIM format alternately work with one radio channel in DSDS (Dual SIM Dual Standby) mode. Of course, the “Russian troika” of 4G frequency bands are available (1,800 MHz, 2,600 MHz and 800 MHz). But there is no mention of support for the Bluetooth interface (version 4.1) of the aptX codec. The NFC interface and the second frequency range (5 GHz) for Wi-Fi were also among the irreparable losses. Let us recall that the NFC interface supported NXP Mifare Classic technology, thanks to which, using the Moscow Transport Cards application, it was possible, for example, to find out the balance of Strelka and Troika.

The Wi-Fi+ option remains in the Honor 7X settings, which, in particular, makes it possible to improve the quality of the connection by automatically switching between mobile and Wi-Fi networks.

GPS, BDS and GLONASS satellite systems can be used for positioning and navigation. For coordination over cellular and Wi-Fi networks, A-GPS mode is offered.

Huawei Honor 7X review: autonomy

The capacity of the non-removable lithium-polymer battery in Honor 7X remains the same as its predecessor - 3,340 mAh. For testing, the smartphone was presented to us without a corresponding AC power adapter, but Huawei’s ghtcc service told us that the device is supplied in Russian retail with a 5 V and 2 A charger.

The AnTuTu Tester program rated the energy efficiency of Honor 7X at 6,589 points (it earned 7,569 points on this test). At the same time, according to the manufacturer, you can listen to music for 91 hours on one charge. But our set of videos in MP4 format (hardware decoding) and Full HD quality at full brightness played continuously for about 6 hours. In general, you don’t have to worry about one day of active use of your smartphone (even without recharging).

The Battery settings provide options for optimizing and monitoring energy consumption. It is proposed to reduce battery consumption, for example, by limiting the activity of background applications. When the battery level is low, it is recommended to switch to Ultra mode, where only selected programs are available.

Huawei Honor 7X review: software features

The new smartphone runs on the Android 7.0 (Nougat) operating system, the interface of which is hidden behind the proprietary EMUI 5.1 shell.

The "navigation button" settings are designed to change the order of the icons on the control panel, as well as add a fourth icon that controls the notification/quick settings shade.

The wide functionality of the EMUI launcher allows, in particular, to easily activate HD screencasts (video recordings from the screen), quickly change the working display size, and also facilitate input by sliding the virtual keyboard.

A tap and hold on the "Recent Applications" button divides the smartphone screen into two parts to simultaneously display the operation of some pairs of programs (not all). As usual, there is a so-called “control button” that makes it easier to operate the smartphone. Searching for apps, contacts and messages opens by swiping down from the top of the home screen.

The fingerprint scanner, according to the manufacturer, unlocks the smartphone in just a quarter of a second. In addition, after registering up to five fingerprints, it is easy to increase the level of security for access to personal folders and applications. By the way, the scanner’s touch pad will help you answer voice calls, turn off the alarm, open the notification panel, scroll through images, and activate photo or video shooting from the Camera application. Fingerprint registration is not required.

Huawei Honor 7X review: purchase, conclusions

The main feature of the new Huawei Honor 7X, made in a pleasantly designed aluminum case, is, of course, the “high” screen (18:9). In addition to its visual appeal, the smartphone’s hardware includes a dual main camera, a fast fingerprint scanner, and functional software that includes support for audio effects. An undoubted advantage of the new product is also the significant amount of RAM and built-in memory.

It is the capacious storage that somehow compensates for the conflict that usually arises between installing a second SIM card and expanding the memory. But the absence is high frequency rangeWi- Fi(5 GHz) and the NFC interface are difficult to classify as the positive aspects of the smartphone. Slow charging of the installed battery also does not add positive emotions.

In the company's online store, at the time of testing, they asked for 17,990 rubles for Huawei Honor 7X, compensating for this amount with a gift (Huawei AP007 external battery). But purchasing other new products with a “high” screen, such as the 5.7-inch Asus ZenFone Max Plus (M1) or 6-inch Oppo F5 Youth in large retail chains would cost 16,990 or 18,990 rubles, respectively. The Asus ZenFone Max Plus (M1) has a less fast processor (Mediatek MT6750T) and less significant amounts of memory (3 GB/32 GB), while it also has a dual rear camera, and a higher battery capacity (4,130 mAh). In turn, the Oppo F5 Youth, at a higher price, also cannot boast of memory capacity (only 3 GB/32 GB), and it has a single main camera. True, the front photo module with support for SelfieTune technology has a 16-megapixel sensor with a fast lens (f/2.0 aperture). However, a more advanced model - Huawei Nova 2i with a dual front camera - would cost lovers of self-portraits the same amount (18,990 rubles).

Review results of the Huawei Honor 7X smartphone

Pros:

• Sleek aluminum body design
• "High" screen (18:9)
• Significant amounts of RAM and internal memory
• Fingerprint scanner
• Functional software with support for audio effects
• Attractive price

Minuses:

• Mandatory choice between installing a second SIM card and expanding memory
• One Wi-Fi frequency band
• No NFC
• Slow charging

Heir to the popular mid-range smartphone

Exactly a year ago, our editorial office visited the Huawei Honor smartphone. It gave the impression of a well-built, productive, convenient and, at the same time, inexpensive communicator, in a word - the optimal purchase for a thrifty buyer. Fans of mobile devices formed a similar opinion and voted for the product of the Chinese company Huawei with a wallet, despite its little popularity in the Russian market at that moment. The popularity of Huawei Honor was also influenced to a certain extent by the lack of worthy rivals, in the form of the same inexpensive Chinese smartphones that now flood the market. But the main reason for the popularity of the ancestor of the current review hero is, of course, the excellent price-to-functionality ratio.

The success of the first Huawei Honor led to obvious public interest in its successor, which was supposed to have the same features as the top communicators of 2012 and a traditionally very attractive price tag.

The second model in the Huawei Honor line was released last fall, it received the internal index U9508 and the expected name - Huawei Honor 2. Sales in the company's home market, China, started almost immediately after the presentation of the smartphone, but in Russia the international version of the communicator appeared only now . Such a difference in release dates could not help but result in numerous purchases of Huawei Honor 2 directly in China, and there is nothing surprising about this. The smartphone can be quite successfully purchased in the Celestial Empire, you just need to remember that models for the domestic market are filled with programs specific to China, they lack Google Play and support for many languages ​​in the system - all this is “cured” after receiving root rights. You can “remake” the communicator yourself or ask the seller about it. It should also be noted that there are two smartphone models: with 2 GB of RAM and with 1 GB, the first is more expensive, the second is more common. The international version and the Chinese version also differ in OS version; Huawei Honor 2 for the domestic market has already received firmware with Android 4.1, while the international firmware is based on version 4.0.4.

The editors have received a communicator for sale in Russia, so everything said below applies directly to the international version of Huawei Honor 2 - the most anticipated smartphone in the mid-price segment of the 2013 season.

Contents of delivery

The smartphone was received by the editor without packaging and accessories.

Characteristics of the Huawei Honor 2 U9508 mobile computer

• SoC HiSilicon K3V2 Hi3620: CPU - four ARM Cortex-A9 cores, frequency 1.4 GHz; GPU - 16 Vivante GC4000 video cores;
• Operating system Android 4.0.4 (Ice Cream Sandwich);
• IPS display, 4.5″ diagonal, 720×1280 pixels (326 ppi), capacitive, with multitouch;
• RAM 1 GB, main flash memory 8 GB (5.3 GB available);
• Supports microSDHC memory cards up to 32 GB;
• Communication GSM EDGE/GPRS (850/900/1800/1900 MHz);
• Communication 3G HSPA (850/900/1700/1900/2100 MHz);
• Bluetooth 3.0;
• Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n;
• FM radio;
• GPS + A-GPS, Glonass;
• Position sensor, accelerometer, magnetometer;
• CMOS camera with a resolution of 8 megapixels, autofocus, dual LED flash, an additional camera with a resolution of 1.3 megapixels;
• DLNA;
• Lithium-ion battery, capacity 2230 mAh;
• Dimensions 134x67.5x10.5 mm;
• Weight 145 g.

It is noticeable that the hardware characteristics of Huawei Honor 2 and Huawei Ascend D1 Quad XL are almost identical. The question of the logic of releasing two communicators on the market, the main difference between which is a slightly larger battery and MHL support, will be left open. The distinctive features of the review hero include support for the domestic Glonass satellite navigation system, which today, of course, is not uncommon, but is still not found in all smartphones.

	Huawei Honor 2	Highscreen Explosion	Huawei Ascend D1 Quad XL	Jiayu G3	HTC One	Samsung Galaxy S 3
Screen	4.5″ IPS, 326 ppi	4.7″ IPS, 312 ppi	4.5″ IPS+, 326 ppi	4.5″ IPS, 326 ppi	4.7″ Super LCD 3, 468 ppi	4.8″ SuperAMOLED, 289 ppi
Permission	720×1280	720×1280	720×1280	720×1280	1080×1920	720×1280
O.C.	Android 4.0.4 (4.1)	Android 4.0.3	Android 4.0.4	Android 4.0.4	Android 4.1.2	Android 4.0.4
CPU	HiSilicon K3V2 Hi3620 (4 ARM Cortex-A9 cores), 1.4 GHz		HiSilicon K3V2 Hi3620 (4 ARM Cortex-A9 cores), 1.4 GHz¹	MediaTek MTK6577 (2 cores ARM Cortex-A9), 1 GHz	Qualcomm Snapdragon 600 (4 Krait 300 cores), 1.7 GHz	Samsung Exynos 4412 (4 cores ARM Cortex-A9), 1.4 GHz
GPU	Vivante GC4000	ARM Mali-400 MP4	Vivante GC4000	PowerVR SGX 531	Adreno 320	ARM Mali-400 MP4
RAM	1 GB	1 GB	1 GB	1 GB	2 GB	1 GB
Camera			Rear 8 MP, front 1.3 MP	Rear 8 MP, front 2 MP	Rear 4 MP, front 2.1 MP	Rear 8 MP, front 1.3 MP
Battery	2230 mAh	2500 mAh	2600 mAh	2750 mAh	2300 mAh	2100 mAh
Dimensions and weight	134×68×10.5 mm, 145 g	137×71×11 mm, 150 g	130×65×11 mm, 150 g	135×65×10.8 mm, 131 g	137×68×9.3 mm, 143 g	137×71×8.6 mm, 133 g
Average retail price	N/A(0)	N/A()	N/A(0)	N/A(0)	$507()	$164()

¹ On commercial smartphones, the processor runs at 1.4 GHz, but the test sample we examined had its maximum clock speed reduced to 1.2 GHz.

Design and appearance

Huawei Honor 2 is a typical modern all-in-one communicator. The weight and dimensions of the device are optimal for a secure grip and placing the smartphone in various pockets, but it is difficult to control Huawei Honor 2 with one hand - the large diagonal of the display affects it.

The case material was black plastic in two versions: the stiffening rib and keys were made of glossy plastic, and the battery compartment cover was made of “rubber” soft-touch. The display is covered with Gorilla Glass II, the gap between it and the frame of the communicator is minimal. There are few complaints about the build quality and materials, the most important of which is the creaking of the battery compartment cover when it is squeezed tightly. The physical buttons are also not very convenient; they could be more prominent. The presence of an information LED deserves praise.

The objective part of the description of the design of Huawei Honor 2 ends here - and the subjective part begins. The hero of this review belongs to that category of modern communicators whose appearance does not evoke any special emotions. Yes, they all look good, fit well in the hand and are decently assembled; color, combinations of materials, body contours are verified and differ slightly from model to model. It’s worth looking at all the Chinese communicators from Huawei, Highscreen, ZTE that have recently been in the editorial office - most of them look the same. Time after time, the description of the design of a smartphone has to end with the same phrase, which can already be made the motto of the entire Chinese-Korean smartphone industry: as much as a communicator is universal, it is just as faceless in appearance. It’s simply amazing: why the Chinese industry, for a change, cannot “copy” the design finds of HTC or Sony; How long can the modified format of the iPhone 3G and Samsung Galaxy S be used?

On the front side of the Huawei Honor 2 case, in the lower part there are three standard backlit touch buttons. Above the display are: a telephone speaker covered with a grille, an additional camera lens, sensors and an LED.

The battery compartment cover is easily detached from the communicator body. It covers all the ends of the smartphone, so it has holes for all connectors, camera, speaker and microphones. Also glued to it are the smartphone's power and volume control keys.

The main camera lens, dual LED flash, additional microphone and dual speakers are located on the back of the communicator. Under the cover with the Huawei logo are the battery, SIM card and microSDHC memory card slots. The latter can be replaced without disconnecting the battery.

On the left side of the smartphone there is a Micro-USB-compatible connector. On the right side there are power and volume control keys.

Huawei Honor 2 has the main microphone at the bottom, and at the top there is a 3.5 mm jack for headphones and a headset.

It should be admitted that for a smartphone in the mid-price segment, in general, Huawei Honor 2 looks very decent. The answer to the question raised earlier regarding the design of Chinese communicators can be considered to be that buyers of such devices pay minimal attention to their appearance, assessing first of all the capabilities of a mobile computer and their relationship with price.

Software

The Huawei Honor 2 we received was running Android 4.0.4 - this is the latest firmware version for the international edition of the smartphone available at the time of writing. The “Chinese” Huawei Honor 2 runs Android 4.1, and these are the kind of smartphones sold in online stores.

Huawei has a proprietary shell called Emotion UI. Unlike the Huawei Ascend D1 Quad XL, where its full version was installed with 3D and 2D design, between which you could freely switch, Huawei Honor 2 has only a 2D version of the shell installed. The two most noticeable and convenient features that Emotion UI adds to the system's capabilities are additional quick access points from the lock screen and the ability to group application icons on the system desktop into folders “a la iOS”. From the lock screen of Huawei Honor 2 you can not only get to the desktop and the camera control program, but also open a list of phone calls or SMS messages.

There are few additional applications in the memory of Huawei Honor 2, mainly various utilities. So, Backups- a program for saving system settings and applications to a memory card for their subsequent restoration in case of failure. Program Security Guard allows you to configure white and black lists of subscribers to automatically block incoming messages, as well as encrypt files or create a “safe” with important data.

Yandex maps and browser Google Chrome they don't need any special introductions.

The list of additional software is completed Flashlight and the company's proprietary keyboard with an unusual name Huawei Input Method. Overall, it's a good replacement for the stock Android keyboard. For example, for the Russian language there is input prediction, and the height of the virtual keyboard buttons can be adjusted.

Display

The screen of Huawei Honor 2 follows the fashionable Retina characteristic. With a physical size of the IPS matrix of 4.5″ and a resolution of 720×1280 pixels, the pixel density is 326 ppi. Impressions from the display of the review hero are extremely positive. The picture on the screen is clear, the colors are saturated, and the brightness of the backlight allows you to comfortably work with your smartphone in almost all lighting conditions. Only in the bright spring sun does it become difficult to distinguish anything on the screen of Huawei Honor 2, but even here the hero of the review differs for the better from his rivals. The display backlight power is adjusted automatically based on the sensor, but can also be controlled manually.

The smartphone display is covered with protective glass, which glares quite strongly and collects fingerprints. Unfortunately, Huawei Honor 2 does not have the best screen touch sensor. It recognizes only 5 simultaneous signals, and confuses the fourth and fifth touches. If there are one or two signals, then they are recognized unmistakably.

Alexey Kudryavtsev, editor of the “Monitors” and “Projectors and TV” sections, will tell you more about the Huawei Honor 2 screen.

The smartphone screen is covered with a glass plate with a mirror-smooth surface and, judging by the reflection of bright light sources in it, without an anti-glare filter. The surface of the matrix itself under the glass is slightly matte, so the screen reflects both direct light sources (by the external surface) and diffuse light (by the surface of the matrix), this negatively affects readability in conditions of strong external illumination. There is a special and quite effective oleophobic (grease-repellent) coating on the outer surface of the screen, so fingerprints do not appear as quickly as with regular glass, but are removed more easily.

With manual brightness control, its maximum value was about 430 cd/m², and the minimum was 8 cd/m². The maximum value is relatively high, so in bright daylight the screen will retain some readability. In complete darkness, the brightness can be reduced to a comfortable level. There is automatic brightness adjustment based on the light sensor (it is located on the front panel to the right of the front speaker slot). In complete darkness, the automatic brightness adjustment function reduces the brightness to 30 cd/m² (acceptable), in an artificially lit office, the brightness is set to about 80 cd/m² (comfortable value), and in a very bright environment the brightness increases to maximum (which is logical ). Note that choosing the power saving mode does not affect the brightness of the white field. At lower brightness, there is no backlight modulation at all, so there is no backlight flickering.

This smartphone uses an IPS type matrix, as a result the screen has good viewing angles without inverting shades and without significant color shifts, even with large deviations of the view from perpendicular to the screen. The black field, when deviated diagonally, is highlighted very little and remains close to a neutral gray color. When viewed perpendicularly, the uniformity of the black field is good. The response time for the black-white-black transition is 22 ms (12 ms on + 10 ms off). The transition between halftones 25% and 75% (according to the numerical value of the color) and back takes a total of 32 ms.

The contrast is typical for IPS matrices - about 640:1. The gamma curve constructed using 32 points did not reveal a blockage either in the highlights or in the shadows, and the index of the approximating power function is 2.08, which is slightly lower than the standard value of 2.2, while the real gamma curve deviates very slightly from the power dependence:

Note that depending on the selected modes (Smart backlight and Battery saving modes), the brightness of the backlight may change (or not change) in accordance with the nature of the displayed image - increase for light images and decrease for dark ones. Therefore, we measured the real contrast on a template in which one half of the screen was black, the other was white, and the resulting dependence of brightness on hue (gamma curve) may not correspond to the gamma curve of a static image, since the measurements were carried out with sequential display of shades of gray on whole screen.

Color gamut is sRGB:

The spectra show that the matrix filters moderately mix the components with each other:

Therefore, the colors on this screen are close to natural in saturation. The balance of shades on the gray scale is good, since the color temperature is close to 6500 K and throughout the entire significant part of the gray scale this parameter changes slightly, while the deviation from the spectrum of a completely black body (delta E) may be higher than 10, but the variation of delta E is completely small, which is more important for the visual perception of the balance of gray shades than absolute values. (Dark areas of the gray scale can be ignored, since color balance there is not very important, and the error in measuring color characteristics at low brightness is large.)

The screen has good brightness, adequate automatic adjustment of the backlight brightness, good color rendering and excellent black stability when looking diagonally. However, the anti-reflective filter is weak, the contrast is not very high, and visually in ambient light conditions it is even lower due to the slightly matte surface of the matrix under the front glass.

Sound

The three speakers built into the Huawei Honor 2 have very high volume. The quality of the telephone speaker and microphone is not satisfactory; the interlocutor can be clearly heard even in a fairly noisy room, and there are no problems with audibility on his side.

There is only one complaint about the paired main speaker of the smartphone. At maximum sound volume and the Dolby system is turned on, the speaker begins to rattle heavily, unable to cope with the level of bass. If you don’t mock it so much and leave the normal operating mode, then the volume and sound quality are quite sufficient for listening to the navigator’s prompts, playing ringtones and just unpretentious listening to music. The mentioned Dolby system is nothing more than a software “improvement” of sound by increasing the volume of low frequencies and mixing signals from stereo channels to create an effect “a la 3D sound”. This system works both through speakers and through headphones, including wireless ones. How necessary and necessary it is is an open question; in my opinion, it is better to listen to music without turning it on.

The headphone output power is high, and if you wish, you can try to hear music even in the noisiest places. When headphones or a headset are connected, the FM radio becomes operational. The signal reception quality is good, the control program is simple and convenient. You can enter a station frequency manually or search across the entire FM frequency spectrum. The program can also save the frequency of a station in the favorites list and transmit sound to speakers. There is no RDS support or audio recording.

Wireless Interfaces and Communications

The Huawei Honor 2 arsenal has all modern means of communication, with the exception of LTE. The cellular communication module is capable of operating in 2nd and 3rd generation networks, exchanging data using GPRS/EDGE and 3G/HSPA. In the latter case, the maximum connection speed can reach 21 Mbit/s for reception and almost 6 Mbit/s for transmission. Of course, in real network conditions such parameters are not always achievable, but the 1.8 Mbit/s obtained in the Moscow region allows you to feel quite comfortable on the World Wide Web.

The hero of the review is one of the few smartphones (of those I tested) that managed to connect to the TP-Link WR1043ND router via the 802.11n protocol. The maximum connection speed was 32 Mbit/s. There were no problems with the operation of the communicator either in the cellular network or in Wi-Fi networks.

DLNA support allows you to provide access to music, videos and photos located in the smartphone's memory to other devices on the local network, as well as connect to their media file libraries. The level of technology support, however, varies from one device to another. Thus, the contents of the Huawei Honor 2 memory (photos, videos, music) were easily viewed through the DLNA client of the Samsung Galaxy S 2, while the Samsung Smart-TV, although it detected the smartphone on the network and even connected to it, did not was able to demonstrate nothing more than the directory structure.

The operation of the Bluetooth module has been tested in several scenarios. In the simplest one, a file was sent from a laptop to a smartphone, the transfer speed was 1.2 Mbit/s. In another scenario, the smartphone acted as a wireless modem, and the laptop was connected to the Internet using its cellular connection - no problems arose. In the third scenario, a Sony MW1 wireless stereo headset was connected to Huawei Honor 2. Without any additional manipulations, I was able to use its basic capabilities: listening to music and answering incoming calls. The track names were displayed without errors right away, but the headset began to show the names of subscribers from the contact list instead of their numbers only after installing additional software.

In addition to American GPS, the Huawei Honor 2 navigation receiver can receive signals from satellites of the domestic Glonass system. Whether this was the reason for the extremely fast determination of the coordinates of the communicator when the receiver was first launched, or whether it supported A-GPS technology is an open question. But the fact, as they say, is obvious - the smartphone works with navigation systems without any problems and determines its coordinates in just a few seconds.

Camera

The resolution of the CMOS matrix of the main camera of Huawei Honor 2 is 8 megapixels. This allows you to take pictures with a maximum size of 3264×2448 pixels. The additional camera on the front panel of the smartphone is equipped with a matrix with a resolution of 1.3 megapixels.

The easiest way to launch the shooting control program is directly from the lock screen of your smartphone. The appearance of the program is simple and unpretentious: on the right side there are buttons for switching shooting modes and “shutter release”, on the left are the main settings and an additional menu. Among the parameters available for change are: HDR mode, artistic photography, white balance, ISO, face recognition, GPS tags and much more.

The autofocus system operates in continuous mode and constantly adjusts the camera's focus. You can also manually specify the focus area by touching the area on the screen. Launching the control program, setting up the camera and taking the first picture takes a few seconds, which is quite acceptable by the standards of the type of device under consideration.

The picture quality of the camera built into Huawei Honor 2 is acceptable. When there is sufficient lighting, the photos turn out bright and clear, HDR technology helps, but when they are enlarged, defects from the high degree of compression become noticeable. In low light, the pictures turn out dark and blurry, even the flash doesn’t help. With one of the main tasks of the camera built into a smartphone - taking pictures of objects from a short distance - the Huawei Honor 2 camera did an excellent job.

Video recording is carried out with a maximum resolution of 1920×1088 pixels and a variable frequency, its highest value for this resolution is 25 frames per second. Recording format - MPEG-4, AVC [email protected]/AAC-LC. The length of the video depends on the amount of free memory. An example video (27 MB) is located.

Battery life

The combination of a 2230 mAh battery (this is an average value in these days) with a powerful quad-core processor, the maximum operating frequency of which is as much as 1.4 GHz, cannot but lead one to think about the short battery life of Huawei Honor 2. To check all assumptions, it’s better All tests are suitable; the results of such “races” of the review hero in various operating modes are given below.

The test conditions were as follows: reading a book with 50% brightness; listening to music with the screen off; video playback with automatic backlight adjustment; Energy saving mode - saves energy in all cases.

Expectations were partially confirmed, but the test results can be assessed from two perspectives: “the glass is half full” or “half empty.” In the first case, the conclusion is this: Huawei Honor 2 demonstrated exactly the battery life that was expected of it - at the level of its class rivals. Pessimistic option: the maximum that the hero of the review can provide to its owner is one day of active work, while you will need to constantly monitor the screen brightness and “gluttonous” applications. In general, all of the above can be applied to any modern smartphone with powerful hardware. They provide an acceptable level of autonomy, but their operating time is inferior to that of less “overclocked” rivals based on the energy-efficient MediaTek platform. The choice here, in principle, is small: buy an additional battery, immediately purchase a smartphone with a more capacious battery, such as the Huawei Ascend D1 Quad XL, or sacrifice system performance (often not so necessary) and purchase a communicator based on the MediaTek chip.

The GLBenchmark 2.5.1 test drained the battery by 93% in 120 minutes.

Charging the communicator from a regular MacBook Pro port takes 5 hours.

Speed ​​and performance

We first encountered the HiSilicon K3V2 Hi3620 platform during a recent review of another Huawei communicator, namely the Huawei Ascend D1 Quad XL. This SoC is the development of a former division of Huawei, and judging by the tests of the mentioned communicator, HiSilicon engineers managed to create a balanced and productive chip.

It must be recalled that the K3V2 includes four ARM Cortex-A9 cores capable of operating at frequencies up to 1.4 GHz. The HiSilicon single-chip system also includes 16 Vivante graphics cores, grouped into two GC4000 chips. The amount of RAM in the tested Huawei Honor 2 was 1 GB, but on sale you can find devices with 2 GB of RAM on board. Unlike the central processor of the Huawei Ascend D1 Quad XL that was reviewed by the editors, which (the smartphone) turned out to be a test sample, the current hero of the review, HiSilicon K3V2 Hi3620, works at full capacity. Thus, with Huawei Honor 2 it became possible to find out the maximum performance of the HiSilicon platform. Traditional tests will help us with this.

Softweg Benchmark 1.03

	Huawei Honor 2	Highscreen Explosion	Huawei Ascend D1 Quad XL	Jiayu G3	Samsung Galaxy S 3	Huawei Honor
CPU	4×1.4 GHz	4×1.4 GHz	4×1.2 GHz	2×1 GHz	4×1.4 GHz	1.4 GHz
OS	Android 4.0	Android 4.0	Android 4.0	Android 4.0	Android 4.0	Android 4.0
Total graphics score	43,55	26,46	36,9	30,3	28,6	74,7
Total CPU score	4355,3	3790,51	3745	2993	4054	3201
Total memory score	1273,7	988,7	1186	361	988	551
Total file system score	378,1	160,1	414	231	468	280

Quadrant Standard

What can we say here: the performance of the HiSilicon K3V2 Hi3620 platform is almost identical to that of the popular Samsung Exynos 4412. In the old Softweg Benchmark test, which operates only with two-dimensional graphics, the HiSilicon chip is completely ahead of its opponent. In other, more modern tests, Huawei Honor 2 was slightly inferior to last year's flagship Samsung Galaxy S 3. An increase in the maximum frequency by 200 MHz also allowed the review hero to outperform the Huawei Ascend D1 Quad XL.

Thus, we can state that the communicator market has been replenished with another productive smartphone in the mid-price segment. It remains to look at a few more performance test results and how the reviewer copes with video playback.

NenaMark 2.4

Geekbench 2

The following are the video playback results. The list of videos and the reasons for their selection are detailed in the article devoted to the methodology for testing video signal display devices.

Format	Container, video, sound	MX Video Player	Standard video player
DVDRip	AVI, XviD 720×400 2200 Kbps, MP3+AC3	plays normally	plays normally
Web-DL SD	AVI, XviD 720×400 1400 Kbps, MP3+AC3	plays normally	plays normally
Web-DL HD	MKV, H.264 1280×720 3000 Kbps, AC3	plays normally	plays normally
BDRip 720p	MKV, H.264 1280×720 4000 Kbps, AC3		plays with minor delays
BDRip 1080p	MKV, H.264 1920×1080 8000 Kbps, AC3	plays with minor delays	plays with minor delays

Huawei Honor 2's rating for video playback is four. Hardware acceleration allows you to watch videos up to HD resolution without any problems. Full HD videos may already slow down, but they can still be viewed, even with a standard smartphone player.

Alexey Kudryavtsev, editor of the “Monitors” and “Projectors and TV” sections, will tell you more about video playback in Huawei Honor 2.

Using a set of test files with an arrow and a rectangle moving one division per frame (see Methodology for testing video playback and display devices. Version 1 (for mobile devices)), we checked how video is displayed on the smartphone screen. Screenshots with a shutter speed of 1 s helped determine the nature of the output of frames of video files with various parameters; The resolution (1280×720 (720p) and 1920×1080 (1080p)) and frame rate (24, 25, 30, 50 and 60 fps) varied. The results of this test are summarized in the table:

File	Uniformity	Passes
Screen
watch-1920x1080-60p.mp4	did not play
watch-1920x1080-50p.mp4	did not play
watch-1920x1080-30p.mp4	Fine	No
watch-1920x1080-25p.mp4	Fine	No
watch-1920x1080-24p.mp4	Fine	No
watch-1280x720-60p.mp4	average	a lot of
watch-1280x720-50p.mp4	average	a lot of
watch-1280x720-30p.mp4	average	No
watch-1280x720-25p.mp4	Fine	No
watch-1280x720-24p.mp4	average	No

Note: If in both columns Uniformity And Passes“green” ratings are given, this means that, most likely, when watching films, artifacts caused by uneven alternation and frame skipping will either not be visible at all, or their number and visibility will not affect the viewing comfort. "Red" marks indicate possible problems associated with the playback of the corresponding files.

It turns out that none of the files play back perfectly: the intervals between frames alternate unevenly, in two cases a significant part of the frames is skipped, and 1080p files with 50 and 60 fps are actually not played back. When playing video files with a resolution of 720p (1280x720), the video file image is displayed one-on-one, exactly at the edge of the screen in true 720p resolution. The brightness range displayed on the screen slightly does not correspond to the standard - in the video range (that is, in the range 16-235) in the shadows and highlights, 2-3 shades of gray are indistinguishable from black and white, respectively. However, the fall in shades is not very large and does not actually affect the quality of video playback.

conclusions

Like its predecessor, Huawei Honor 2 is an excellent communicator for its time and price segment. However, it must be admitted that the attractiveness of the hero of the review in terms of price and functionality is not as great as that of its ancestor - this is due to the appearance of a large number of inexpensive and productive competitors from China. Speaking of price: with the current pricing policy of Huawei in Russia, Honor 2 has much less chance of becoming a popular and mass-market smartphone. Its price in the Middle Kingdom seems to be more optimal and much more attractive, because it turns out to be slightly higher than the important mark of 10 thousand rubles, which separates the medium and budget markets for mobile computers. This is approximately what Huawei Honor cost a year ago, and this is exactly what its successor should cost.

In conclusion, it is worth once again listing the advantages and disadvantages of the current hero of the review. The first include: a high-quality display, productive hardware, and equipment with all modern communication modules (except for LTE). The disadvantages of the smartphone include: average battery life, a speaker that rattles at maximum volume, and the low quality of the built-in camera.

Huawei Honor 2 has already gained a bit of popularity, but so far only among a small group of mobile computer lovers who hastened to purchase it in foreign stores. Whether the hero of the review will be able to become as famous as his predecessor depends almost entirely on Huawei’s pricing policy.