New reviews about Huawei Mate 8. does not burn or explode
The smartphone was first presented at CES 2015; on our website we have the first look at this model from Eldar Murtazin. The model will not be officially sold in Russia, but the device is interesting, so we decided to tell you more about it.
First of all, I would like to note that there will be two versions of the smartphone on sale, the price difference will be 100 euros, and you can see the differences in characteristics below.
Specifications
| HUAWEI NXT-L29 | HUAWEI NXT-L09 | |
| Size | Height: 157.1mm; Width: 80.6mm; Depth: 7.9mm; Weight: 185g (approx.) | |
| Colors | Moonlight Silver; Space Gray; Champagne Gold; Mocha Gold | Moonlight Silver; Space Gray |
| Display | 6" FHD Screen 1080p (1920 x 1080), 368ppi High contrast 1500:1 |
6" FHD Screen 1080p (1920 x 1080), 368ppi 16.7M colors, color saturation(NTSC) 95% High contrast 1500:1 |
| CPU | HUAWEI Kirin 950 (64-bit,16nm FinFET+), Octa-core (4 x 2.3 GHz A72+ 4 x 1.8 GHz A53) + i5 co-processor | |
| Operating System | Android™ Marshmallow 6.0 | Android™ Marshmallow 6.0 |
| Memory | 3GB RAM + 32GB ROM or 4GB RAM + 64GB ROM | 3GB RAM + 32GB ROM |
| Network | 4G TDD LTE:Band38/39/40 4G FDD LTE:Band1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/12/17/18/19/20/26 2G GSM: SIM1:850/900/1800/1900MHz SIM2:850/900/1800/1900MHz |
4G TDD LTE:Band38/39/40 4G FDD LTE:Band1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/12/17/18/19/20/26/28 3G UMTS: 800(B6,Japan)/800(B19,Japan) /850/900/AWS/1900/2100MHz (Band6/19/5/8/4/2/1) 2G GSM: SIM1:850/900/1800/1900MHz |
| Dual SIM | Dual SIM Supported | N/A |
| GPS | GPS/A-GPS/Glonass/BDS | GPS/A-GPS/Glonass/BDS |
| Connectivity | BT4.2, support BLE MicroUSB (High Speed USB) |
Wi-Fi 2.4G/5G, a/b/g/n/ac with Wi-Fi Direct support BT4.2, support BLE MicroUSB (High Speed USB) |
| Sensors | Fingerprint Sensor, G-Sensor, Gyroscope sensor, Compass, Ambient Light Sensor, Proximity sensor, Hall sensor, Barometer | |
| NFC | NFC supported | NFC supported |
| Camera | Main camera 16MP, F2.0 BSI CMOS Dual-tone flash PDAF+CAF auto focus Digital zoom, up to 4x Timelapse recording Front camera |
Main camera 16MP, F2.0 OIS (optical image stabilization) BSI CMOS Dual-tone flash PDAF+CAF auto focus Digital zoom, up to 4x Timelapse recording Photos: max 4608 x 3456 pixels Video recording: 1080p, 60 fps support 720P 120FPS Slo-Mo recording Front camera |
| Audio | Audio decoding formats: MP3, MIDI, AMR-NB, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, AMR-WB, WMA2-9, RA, PCM, OGG, and FLAC Audio file formats: MP3, MP4, 3GP, WMA, OGG, AMR, AAC, FLAC, WAV, MIDI, and RA |
|
| Video | Video decoding formats: 4K video, H.265, H.264, H.263, MPEG-4, MPEG-2, RV7-10, Xvid, VP8, WMV9 Video file formats: 3GP, MP4, WMV, RM, RMVB, and ASF |
|
| Image | Image decoding formats: PNG, GIF (static), JPEG, BMP, WEBP, and WBMP Image file formats: PNG, GIF, JPEG, BMP, WEBP, and WBMP |
|
| Emotion UI | EMUI 4.0 | EMUI 4.0 |
| Battery | 4000mAh (typical value) | 4000mAh (typical value) |
| In the box | Handset; Headset; Charger; USB cable; Quick Start Guide; Safety Information | |
| Disclaimer | Specifications may change without notice; images are for illustration purpose only. Colors may vary, colors and features may not be available in all markets, please check with local retailers for exact offer. | |
Equipment
- Smartphone
- Charger
- PC cable (also part of the charger)
- Wired headset
I really liked both the box itself and the packaging of the smartphone. See for yourself how beautifully everything is packaged, each accessory is in a separate box. Pay attention to the headphones, they resemble a proprietary Apple headset.
Appearance, materials, control elements, assembly
What might be of interest to a smartphone, most of which is occupied by the display? Except for how exactly this display was fit into the body. The Mate 8 has no problems with this; note how great the device looks when it’s turned off. It seems as if there are no frames on the sides of the display at all, but in reality this is, of course, not the case.
Above the display are the front camera eye, light and proximity sensors, and an indicator light.
The older version (for 700 euros) will be sold in four colors, but for the younger version only gray and silver are available, the latter is what we are testing.
Most of the body is made of aluminum, it is slightly rough and very pleasant to the touch. The manufacturer decided to highlight the ends with a glossy edging, which, of course, turned out beautifully, but this gloss will quickly become covered with scratches.
On the right side there is a volume rocker and a power button; both buttons protrude strongly, so they are convenient to use, and they are also easy to feel blindly.
Hidden on the right is a tray for a SIM card and memory card.
A 3.5 mm headphone jack was installed on top, and a microUSB port and speaker grilles were installed on the bottom. As it turned out, one of the meshes is decorative; in fact, the sound comes only from the right speaker. It remains a mystery to me why the company did not install full-fledged stereo speakers.
My sample had no assembly problems, including the plastic inserts that Eldar Murtazin mentioned in his first look. The device is perfectly assembled, there are no backlashes, creaks or gaps.
Dimensions
As you can see, the device is a little thicker than its key competitors, but I was surprised to find that it was more comfortable for me to hold it in my hand than the same Nexus 6P, despite the fact that the latter has an advantage in size in all respects. The device barely fits in the hand, and working with it with one hand is out of the question. It’s all the more fun to see the one-handed mode available in the settings. There is almost no practical sense in it. Even if you type with your thumb, you will be forced to grab the device with your other hand.
Compared to Lenovo Phab Plus
Compared to Asus ZenFone Selfie
Compared to Apple iPhone 6
Screen
Before testing, I didn’t look at the characteristics of the Mate 8 and was sure that it was QHD resolution that was used here; I really liked the picture on this screen. I usually write that at six inches FHD resolution is not enough, but in the case of the Mate 8 such a statement would be unfair.
The screen has a wide range of brightness, natural color rendition and good behavior in the sun. If you wish, in the settings you can change the color scheme of the device to suit you. Frankly, I really liked the display in this smartphone, much more than the screen of the same Nexus 6P.
I would like to draw your attention to an interesting detail regarding the display frames. When turned off, it seems that the frames are almost completely absent, but in fact this is not the case. In addition to the frames themselves, you can see a small black bezel around the screen, which does not look so impressive.
operating system
The device operates under Android control 6.0 along with the proprietary EMUI 4.0 shell. Huawei has traditionally overhauled all of Android in its desire to improve it and make it more functional. They partially succeeded, for example, Swype instead of a built-in keyboard seems to me much more appropriate, the dialer supports Russian and Smart Dial, there are many settings for the behavior of the smartphone, there are proprietary applications for most tasks (from a file manager to notes).
But I didn’t like the white rims around the icons at all, I already wrote a separate post about this phenomenon in our Android blog, I won’t repeat myself, but will refer you to that article http://android..
Another unpleasant feature of the model is attempts to control Push notifications of instant messengers. Because of this willful behavior, messages from the same WhatsApp or Telegram sometimes reached me with a long delay or did not arrive at all. So, when you turn it on for the first time, I recommend immediately turning off all these economizers.
I also can’t help but note the beautiful constantly changing wallpaper on the lock screen. Huawei has been using this feature for several years now, but that doesn’t make it any less impressive.
Fingerprint scanner
The speed and accuracy of the fingerprint scanner of this smartphone is comparable to top models (iPhone 6s Plus, Nexus 6P), you just need to lightly touch it with your finger, and the smartphone is already unlocked. If desired, you can configure to receive a call or turn off the alarm when you press the scanner.
Performance
After a couple of weeks of use, I had no complaints about the device’s performance. It behaved perfectly in everyday use (browser, launcher, settings, third party applications), and with productive games. Great fast smartphone.
Autonomous operation
I really liked the autonomy of this device, and this is not only due to our synthetic tests. With everyday use, I get one and a half to two hours of display time per day, this includes web surfing, reading email and social networks, messaging in instant messengers and literally ten minutes of navigation.
Daily use
Reading mode
HD video viewing mode
Smartphone discharge overnight
Usually devices react differently to my generally very light mode of use - most are discharged by 50-75%, but the Mate 8 is discharged by only 25%, in my opinion, this is an excellent result. And in sleep mode, the smartphone hardly discharges, only 2-3% per night.
Camera
The device takes excellent pictures during the day, but in artificial light the quality of the photos deteriorates, they turn out “noisy”, plus they lack sharpness. Night photography with a smartphone is also not always good; out of three shots, only one of mine was successful (on the road). It also seemed to me that the device had a separate “food mode”, I even specially ordered a “Philadelphia” to test it! But, apparently, it wasn’t added to this particular device, so I had to take a regular shot, and, as it seems to me, there are no problems with photographing food even without separate “food modes.”
04.11.2016
On the eve of the upcoming holidays and sales, I think my story about the main phablet (for Huawei, of course) of the outgoing year - Mate 8 - will be very relevant. I've been using this smartphone for two months now, it's good that I didn't rush to write this review after two weeks of using the G8. The result would probably be an accurate, but not the most honest story. The smartphone makes me happy with its work constantly, from the moment I receive the parcel from the courier. Perhaps, for me, the Mate 8 has become the most uncompromising device. A smartphone without unnecessary excuses and excuses, worth 100% of its price (not Russian, of course).
By the way, the price for a “gray” device in the range of 25-30 thousand rubles from foreign online stores seems quite optimal. At the same time, as far as I know (hello, Google; hello, official Huawei website), the gadget is no longer sold in our country. It seems that it was once even officially imported into our country, but in a limited edition. I won’t guess why local distributors and hucksters didn’t like it (sorry, but sometimes you can’t call a Russian retailer anything else), but I liked the smartphone. Therefore, it makes sense to pay attention to it, even my copy, which became the hero of the review, was not developed for the Russian market, but still works perfectly with all Russian cellular operators.
The smartphone is delivered in a white box. You can immediately see the scope of the box - for businessmen, for brutal, serious people, for accomplished comrades and ordinary Russian students like me. In general, the design of the box goes well with the smartphone itself. The cardboard is thick, does not scratch or wrinkle. At the bottom of the box you can find three small boxes with documentation, a cable and charging adapter, and headphones.
No, this is not a letter from Hogwarts. What a pity to realize this... Inside it is not an invitation from Dumbledore, but some explanations in Chinese.
In the box you can find a dense soft silicone case. This case has almost maximum protection against falls and impacts. The case itself is soft and will not be scratched. If you put this case on your smartphone, the dimensions of the device will increase so much that you will begin to feel discomfort. The coating is soft, which means that such a case cannot be taken out of a tight trouser or jeans pocket. If you still manage to push it there at all, then something is wrong with you. The case is just for show, it dilutes the package, but there is not much real use in it due to the inconvenience of operation.
The charging unit is 2 A. The smartphone charges in about two hours to 100% (the website states that in 2.5 hours). Fast charging really is that. During charging, the device body does not heat up, and the charging unit does not heat up.
The headphones have as many as 4 holes on the body, thanks to which a stereo effect is supposedly created. I didn’t feel any stereo effect, nor did I feel comfortable using these headphones. They constantly fall out of my ears. Yes, appearance 100% original (almost), but these headphones have only two use cases: a desk drawer or a trash can. I just don't understand how Huawei manages to continue making such uncomfortable headphones for two years. By the way, there were traces on the wire from the black box in which they were lying, which I could not wipe off. Black boxes are evil, headphones like these are evil.
By the way, the control panel with three buttons is capable of simultaneously adjusting the volume and controlling playback (including flipping through songs in both directions).
Before moving on to a detailed study of the device’s body, let’s dwell on the mistakes of mine and the people who developed this device. I am almost always careful with devices. This is a premium device. There is not only the highest price segment, but also special manufacturing materials. As far as I understand, the body is made of steel (it turned out to be an aluminum alloy), at least definitely metal. The metal at the ends is brittle. It crumbles into small pieces when dropped. Of course, the entire body will not be able to crumble, but it will still be unpleasant. Aluminum bends and creases, metal crumbles, but you can’t please, sir?
To please. At least don't get scratched. I tried to show it in the photo, but in the low resolution photo it is difficult to notice the scratches on the ends. There are many of them, they are here. The polished edge is too large in size, it seems to cut into the hand, and the smartphone sits securely in it. The smartphone sits even more confidently in your hand in the cold! It just freezes. It is completely made of metal, now it is becoming more and more difficult to hold it in your hand. But we will return to the cold in Krasnodar even later. I'm already starting to miss the plastic flagships on the Snapdragon 800, which heat up to the temperature of a kitchen frying pan on the stove when I log into Facebook.
Another point that bothers me is related to the glass on the front panel. Scratched? It gets scratched... Not quickly and not immediately, but micro-scratches gradually appear. The glass is made using 2.5D technology. But it’s somehow different here. The edges of the glass are sharp; it protrudes noticeably above the body. This is not the usual 2.5D glass, which smoothly flows into the side edges. In this case, it abruptly moves to the ends. I'm afraid to imagine what will happen if you drop your smartphone glass side down. Not a sandwich, but you may have to pick up the pieces.
The oleophobic coating on the display is good, but in the sun, fingerprints are visible on the glass. They are especially visible on the glossy black bottom insert, which is also covered with glass, like the display. I have to think about the rag from time to time. But this is a problem with all dark-colored smartphones.
At the ends everything is too traditional to comment on anything. The infrared port has disappeared somewhere... MicroUSB connector, only one speaker, two microphones, the slot can be opened with a paper clip. In general, everything is as Steve Jobs once bequeathed. The location of the buttons is convenient; they are made of metal.
What we have in front of us is an almost typical flagship phablet, it just doesn’t burn or explode.
The smartphone screen is good. The brightness is sufficient in the sun, auto brightness adjustment works accurately. Indoors at night, in the absence of artificial lighting sources around, you want to reduce the brightness of the display. The minimum brightness limit is quite high for comfortable use; it takes some time to get used to the screen in the dark. There are no questions about the display and its quality. This is a 6-inch IPS matrix with FullHD resolution. I consider this resolution optimal both for my eyes and for the autonomy of the device. Of course, VR on such a screen will cause rejection, but for the purposes of virtual reality You should choose other devices.
The frames are thin, and the display area relative to the entire front panel is almost 79%. The unusual 2.5D glass, covered with Gorilla Glass 4, has not only a marketing charm, but also a very real one. The pixel density is 367 ppi, there is a polarizing layer, the aspect ratio is 16:9, 10 simultaneous clicks are supported. In other words, the display is good in everything, from the naturalness of the colors (they can be adjusted) to the contrast of the picture at maximum viewing angles.
The trend of the season is a protruding camera. It sticks out slightly, the lens does not get scratched during everyday use.
The dimensions are as follows: 80.6 mm / 157.1 mm / 7.9 mm. Quite normal dimensions that do not interfere with the comfortable operation of the device. The weight of the device is 185 grams. The only thing that confuses me a little is that from time to time there are visible stains on the back panel, which are noticeable in the light. The cloth has to be actively used.
The most strong point a smartphone of this size and thickness - autonomy. Yes, there are examples when it was possible to fit a more capacious battery into a similar case, but here everything is fine over time battery life. The 4,000 mAh battery is capable of giving any flagship a head start. The smartphone will last two days with moderate use without any problems. I charge my phone every day in the evening, and the smartphone always has about 40% charge left. In my mode of use, the battery will last for a day and a half. For me this is an important indicator, if not the main one at the moment. I stopped carrying a power bank in my bag and feel freer. This makes me happy. Perhaps this is what attracted me to the smartphone in the first place.
If the battery charge is rapidly approaching the border between life and death, then the screen resolution can always be lowered to HD. Fonts become looser and more contrasting, but the autonomy of the smartphone increases. In general, no black and white modes (and these are compromises) are needed with normal battery capacity. There is also no point in worrying about switching battery energy saving modes in the settings; at best, you will gain 30 minutes.
Talk time in 2G is approximately 19 hours, in 3G - approximately 17 hours. The battery is non-removable, and the charging adapter has the following characteristics: 9 V / 2 A. The battery is discharged the most while watching a video; this parameter is traditionally not very well optimized in the company’s devices. However, one battery charge will last you an entire season of The Walking Dead.
The “heart” of the smartphone is the proprietary KIRIN 950 processor (16 nm, 64 bits, 8 cores, 1.8 GHz and 2.3 GHz), and the “atrium” is the Mali-T880 (4 cores, 900 MHz). LPDDR4 RAM - 3 GB (in my case, 4 GB in the premium version). It seems that in the regular model the RAM is single-channel, in the premium version it is dual-channel. The RAM operating frequency is 1333 MHz. The RAM coprocessor - i5 is responsible for its smooth operation.
What does all of this mean? This means that your smartphone (if it is a Mate 8) is very cool for absolutely any task. Practical tests showed that the smartphone is very fast. I also noticed one important feature - the smartphone works quickly. Works quickly after installing 30 programs (running in the background) and two months of use. Cool? Not that word. You know, Huawei doesn’t have to do it once in a while. Either there are some problems with the operation of applications, or with the operation of the interface. Everything is great here, starting from the stability of applications, the speed of the device, and the timeliness of notifications. Just a find. We can only compare it in speed to the Nexus 6p, but that one has long since turned into a pixelated pumpkin. It's amazing how this particular device turned out.
The smartphone failed the stress test. At the same time, it coped with all other synthetic tests without problems.
The smartphone interface is simple and clear. It's gloomy and creepy like Halloween. However, nothing new. The smartphone runs Android 6.0.1, with the proprietary EMUI 4.1 shell installed.
The automatic synchronization icon has disappeared from the shortcut bar. Now only 9 icons fit on that panel, the same number are hidden, fast access missing from them.
The Gallery is of particular interest. Convenient sorting and grouping of photos. Simple gestures (move up the photo) to transfer. Detailed viewing of photo information is available.
The video player has degraded a little. It is no longer possible to display thumbnails with active playback on top of other windows. There are almost no settings. There is only one audio effect (DTS), and it is only available in wired headphones.
The music player, following the video player, lost its functionality somewhere along the way. There are no detailed sound settings. Of course, everything is decided by installing additional software, but I’m not used to living like this and looking for complicated ways. I’d rather write a meaningless long text about applications of political parties than search in the Market good player. There is only one audio setting, it only works with headphones.
The sound quality in the headphones (not included) did not leave the most pleasant feeling. It feels like they forgot to add some kind of audio chip to this smartphone. But there is a Hi6402 audio chip, which is integrated at the processor level. The sound is slightly rough, of average quality. The volume reserve is not very large, at the Samsung level. Remembering the sound and comparing it with Mate 8, I start to get a little upset. I won't say that the sound here is terrible - you just need to listen to it, it is not so rich and bright. The ringing speaker is slightly above average in strength, and its sound is also quite ordinary. Compared with Honor 6. So, in terms of music, Honor 6 turned out to be not only more interesting, but also louder. The phablet’s audio capabilities don’t shine, but they can’t be called terrible or insufficient either. Average in this regard.
The pre-installed software is not particularly interesting. There are a dozen uninstallable brand utilities installed here and a dozen uninstallable Google services.
HiCare is an application for quick support. Of course, Russia is not on the list of countries with active and constant support, but Belarus is. Strange coincidence, don't you think?
You can adjust the audio volume for media, call, conversation and alarm at any time. What about notifications, comrades? By holding down the "volume down" key you can instantly start the silent vibration mode; with an additional button on the screen you can achieve absolute silence.
The incoming call menu looks inconspicuous. Unnoticeable until you put it on speakerphone. The microphone control feature will be useful if you communicate via speakerphone in the office or on the road. But will you communicate there using speakerphone? Only if the speaker fails?
The telephone book has not changed since the 18th CPC Congress. You can configure the display of calls for both SIM cards. HD Voice control is available if provided by your operator. You can generate QR codes in the phone book. Just what will you do with them later on another device if the information is not automatically transferred in the form of a contact to another device when scanned?
Instead of the standard keyboard, an adapted version of Swype is used. Looks a little old, but works well. I don't want to change the keyboard. In any case, I haven't changed it yet. By the way, emoticons without visual design can be used either by a person with a phenomenal memory or by a psychic. Of course, I remember all the MK Ultimate combinations from my first Sega game console, but I wouldn’t want to remember the digital/symbolic appearance of the emoji.
The smartphone can take long screenshots. How to make it? Take a regular screenshot, and when saving, the smartphone itself will offer to make a longer version of it. Great. After you have made a screenshot, it is very easy to crop and you can make notes on it. I often took notes on the Note 4 this way. Now about Galaxy Note You don’t have to remember (in every sense), Huawei has successfully implemented a similar functionality for notes on the screen.
There are no problems with connection quality. Microphones work great, volume levels conversational dynamics Enough, the volume reserve is literally one or two divisions. A “smart” smartphone fulfills the capabilities and responsibilities of a simple phone to the fullest, which is good news. It seems to me that this smartphone will work in all ranges in which smartphones on the planet can only operate. Here it is, a traveler's dream. Works great with our networks. Communication is maintained everywhere confidently.
Deeper, deeper in the settings, interesting features of the device are hidden. Turn off the network connection speed (a very useful informer in the status bar) and remove the second SIM card. Take screenshots of the top of the screen and send them to your friends. Everyone now thinks you have an iPhone.
You can create profiles. This means that you can register twice with What's App. Maybe this information will be useful to you. In any case, such small “nifties” (I don’t like this word, but I try to keep up with the times) make using a smartphone more versatile and convenient .
The fingerprint sensor is a different story. First of all, it's fast. Very fast in recognizing any one of the five registered fingers. Secondly, it is integrated in the interface and performs various functions. For example, I no longer reach for the top panel, but open the shortcut panel with a swipe of my finger across the scanner. Thirdly, the sensor does not work in the cold. Literally one minute outside in the cold season, and that’s it - the sensor stops responding. As soon as the smartphone body warms up in the room or by placing your hand in your pocket, the fingerprint sensor begins to work. It’s just an amazing situation that I’m seeing for the first time. Yes, it also stops responding to wet fingers in hot conditions. It was quite hot in September; in the warmth he did not recognize the print very well.
The smartphone perfectly recognizes keystrokes when wearing gloves. Tested. The thinner the glove, the less accurate the responses. Yes Yes exactly. He responds to the touch of thick mittens without any problems. Gestures and movements are typical.
For some reason the mini-window does not appear in the screenshots. Its size can be changed. Automatic data synchronization (enabling and disabling it) is available only in the settings.
Built-in memory 32 GB. Approximately 24 GB of built-in NAND flash memory is available to the user. Instead of a second SIM card, you can try to install a memory card. By the way, after changing the memory card or SIM card, the smartphone does not need to be rebooted, everything starts working instantly. How did they learn this? Let them teach engineers and developers of Korean brands.
There's not much that's interesting about accessibility features. Unfortunately, there is no Huawei Pay yet.
As for wireless interfaces and sensors, the smartphone has everything you need to completely satisfy a geek: NFC, 802.11a\b\g\n\ac, Wi-Fi Direct, Bluetooth 4.2, OTA, DLNA, OTG, VoLTE and more dozens of other protocols. MHL is not supported, unfortunately. I shouldn’t have bought cables on Ali at one time, which everyone abandoned with the advent of fast chargers. The age of cloud technologies, what can I say. But in the age of cloud technologies, Huawei found a place under the device’s body for an FM antenna. There is support for FM radio. By the way, in many countries the number of radio listeners is not decreasing rapidly, so in vain many manufacturers are trying to abandon radio and replace it with Internet broadcasting.
You can launch dual-window mode by swiping across the display or by holding down the task button. The screen is divided into two fields with a choice of shortcuts. Screens can be swapped and their size can be changed. Comfortable. When using the dual-window mode for a long time, there is a slight throttling of the processor (once I worked like this for half a day with mail and office), the device itself heats up slightly.
Smartphone Huawei Mate 8 - review
Second desktop with applications. By default, several applications with a Chinese interface are installed here (search engine, browser, social media , navigation), which, however, can be easily removed. Instead of a store Google Play
The HiApp store is installed here, which is better not allowed to install and update any recommended applications, because they will all be in Chinese.
Regarding the installation of Google services. Google Play Store is easily found by searching in HiApp and installed. And then the services you need are installed from the Google Play Store.
The only service that I somehow couldn't install from the Google Play Store is Google contacts synchronization. But this application was easily installed via GApps Installer (Google services installer). Quick switch icons.
They are easy to edit.
In the list of running tasks there is a "Clear" button (unload programs from memory).
The themes for the design of the shell and icons, as usual with Huawei, can be changed within very wide limits. Here, for example, is one of these topics - in a completely different style.
The shell supports two-window mode.
You can immediately call the camera from the lock window. Also, by swiping upward, the proprietary action and application bar appears.
Incoming call. "Reminder" - reject the call and schedule a message to call back.
Talk. There is a recording mode.
Testing the channel speed for 4G showed the expected speed. The same applied to the speed of Wi-Fi - it was at the maximum. Quality telephone communication - good, the caller could be heard very well. The noise reduction system worked quite effectively. Audio
Full-size Plantronics BackBeat Pro headphones in wired mode are not particularly good: the sound is more or less spacious, but slightly dull, decent bass, which lacks fullness, and not at all outstanding highs.
The tanks produced 58 FPS. 
Settings The settings, as usual with Huawei, are very advanced and varied. 
Settings for two SIM cards.
One of them is 2G/3G/4G, the second is just 2G. However, 4G/3G can be assigned to any card. Switching mode between Wi-Fi and
mobile communications
. By the way, a useful thing: when it is turned on, the smartphone does not cling to the dying Wi-Fi until the last moment, but switches to the mobile Internet.
The home screen can be switched to a simple mode with large icons and simple settings.
Display settings. You can change color temperature, viewing modes, typeface and font size.
Setting up notifications.
Notifications for each application.
Fingerprint control. With it, you can also take photos and videos, answer a call, turn off the alarm, and open the notification panel. By the way, the scanner works well and recognizes normally. (But, as usual, there are problems with recognizing a wet hand.)
Setting up on-screen buttons.
Control.
Application Rights Manager.
Setting energy consumption.
Memory.
The smartphone saw a 128 GB memory card in exFAT without any problems.
Memory cleaning functions.
Camera
Camera interface.
Shooting modes. 
Settings. 
Examples of pictures. (All are clickable.) At home in normal lighting. 
Bright sunny day. 
In room. 
Sunny day. 
Mainly cloudy. 
Cloudy. 
Night. 
Indoors in poor lighting. 
Evening.
I must say that the camera has been significantly improved. Now it shoots more or less at the level of other flagships. It is somewhat inferior in performance and quality, especially the Galaxy S6 edge+ and LG G4, but not too much. In general, the camera is quite decent, you can and should use it. Discomfort, as I experienced with the Mate 7 (although the camera there was also not terrible at all), is not observed here. The pictures are bright, saturated, the white balance is almost never wrong, the exposure is wrong within reason (and it’s easy to correct). It focuses well, but does not focus very quickly (compared to the S6 and LG G4). By the way, here the camera can still be called up (and immediately removed, if specified) from sleep mode by double-pressing the volume rocker. System data and performance
CPU-Z data.
AnTuTu test. The highest index. First place in the table.
Geekbench tests.
Well, a PCMark test. By the way, the Galaxy S6 edge+ has 5260. It looks like this really is the fastest smartphone on the market right now. Well, it’s practically clear that the device is very fast: everything turns and starts smoothly and without jerks, there are practically no lags. Using a smartphone is very comfortable. Battery life I remember Mate 7 showed very good time battery life. What happened here. Internet. The display brightness is set to a comfortable 50% without auto-adjustment. All wireless communications are enabled and the browser page refreshes every 30 seconds. Almost exactly 12 hours - almost the same as the Mate 7 (and that platform is not as productive). Video. The screen is set to the comfortable 10th brightness level of the player (maximum 15th), the “Airplane” mode is turned on, and a television series with hardware decoding is playing in a loop in MX Player. 10 hours 10 minutes is good, but the Mate 7 lived noticeably longer. Reading. The screen is set to a comfortable 30% brightness without automatic backlighting, the page is automatically flipped in AllReader, and the “Airplane” mode is turned on. 18 hours 24 minutes. Synthetic test.
Almost by the evening of the first day, with normal loading, the smartphone had about 70% charge left. And, in general, it lasted up to three days on one charge - in all-inclusive mode. If you optimize (turn off wireless communications and determination of coordinates when not needed, disable automatic synchronization), it can live up to five days. It also has well-optimized power consumption in standby mode: during the night it consumed only 2-3 percent of the charge. So with battery life here everything is very good. The smartphone supports fast charging in 9V/2A mode. At the same time, the smartphone is charged to 50% in literally 50 minutes, and a full charge from zero lasts about 2 hours 45 minutes. Observations during operation and conclusions During testing, I did not find any serious glitches, although occasionally it happened that the Play Market was switched off for some reason at startup. Noticeable heating back cover did not appear even when using heavy applications. There was only one serious glitch. I was unable to install the Epic Citadel game: when I tried to download it from Google Play, Google Play was cut off at the moment the download started. And nothing helped here: neither an attempt to download via 4G, and not via Wi-Fi (in some cases it helped), nor even full reset
- systems. I don’t know why things didn’t work out with this toy. All other games and applications installed without any problems. What conclusions can I draw here? The device turned out to be very decent. Powerful platform, excellent equipment, very high-quality display, excellent battery life, the camera is not top-end, but quite high quality. If this model is compared in price with the Galaxy S6 edge+, then in Russia Mate 8 starts from 35 thousand, and S6 edge+ - where- then from 42 thousand, that is, S6 edge+ is about 1.2 times more expensive. Moreover, compared to the S6 edge+, the Mate 8: there is support for a second SIM card or memory card; bigger display
The Chinese company Huawei is pushing forward with all its might to compete with brands such as Apple and Samsung, and ultimately become a trendsetter in the smartphone market. Until recently, it was impossible to even mention this, but today we are holding in our hands the premium metal phablet Huawei Mate 8, which is practically not inferior in price to the sacred iPhone 6s Plus and Samsung Galaxy S7 edge.
Huawei does not skimp on epithets when describing the advantages of the Mate 8’s exterior. There is an all-metal body, a 2.5D diamond-cut screen, and sandblasting of the surface - in general, everything is first-class. One cannot but agree with this - the device is truly of very high quality, truly beautiful, technologically advanced, and exudes the aura of an expensive business item. But let's be honest: its design is ordinary, there is no zest, no signature character.
It's too similar to last year's Huawei Ascend Mate7. Moreover, since Huawei is still a successful company, many others Chinese manufacturers they boldly borrow her ideas, and therefore there are a lot of smartphones similar to our hero today. They'll even have the same fingerprint scanners on the back. By the way, compared to last year’s model, the scanner depth has been reduced by 0.45 mm, notes Huawei in the hope that we will all immediately take crispy bills out of our pockets.
Huawei Mate 8 is a classic phablet with a classic large IPS screen with a diagonal of 6 inches. A little more and there would be a tablet! At the same time, the device itself is by no means gigantic - the screen occupies 85% of the front panel area, there are practically no frames.
The resolution is 1920x1080, the density is 368 ppi, and this is not as much as we would like, because we are dealing with a flagship phablet, and we would like Quad HD. Moreover, if you use Huawei Mate 8 with virtual reality glasses, you will see pixels. To be fair, we’ll say that the pixels are visible even at higher resolutions, but we repeat – we have a flagship phablet in our hands, and you naturally expect the highest possible numbers from it.
There are no comments about the picture quality. The color rendition is true, the brightness is enough so that even in sunny weather you can watch videos, and even more so surf websites, text with WhatsApp, walk on Google Maps and “swipe” girls on Tinder during your lunch break on a bench.
Performance
Huawei Mate 8 is built on the proprietary HiSilicon Kirin 950 processor. And this is complete stuffing! Octa-core chipset based on ARM Cortex-A72, made using a 16-nanometer FinFET Plus process based on transistors with a 3D structure, flavored GPU Mali-T880 GPU – sounds serious, doesn't it?
When the Huawei Mate 8 with 3 GB of RAM was just born, it received the laurels of the most powerful smartphone in the world, leaving behind all competitors on the Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 and Samsung Exynos 7420. Now, when 2016 processors rule the roost, Huawei Mate 8 is already slipping somewhat in the ranking, but still falls into the top 10 most productive AnTuTu smartphones, taking the last tenth place.
Let's get a look. Having scored 91,665 points in AnTuTu, our hero was ahead of Samsung Galaxy Note 5, iPhone 6, Meizu Pro 5, Samsung Galaxy S6, i.e. the deadliest devices of 2015! However, today it is inferior to Meizu Pro 6, LG G5, iPhone SE, iPhone 6s and, of course, Samsung Galaxy S7 edge. Does this mean anything to the average user like you and me?
Absolutely nothing! The device simply flies and will continue to fly for a very, very long time. Absolutely all games run at maximum graphic settings - at least Modern Combat 5: Eclipse. What more could you want?
But let's look at the camera. Huawei Mate 8 became the first smartphone to receive a 16-megapixel Sony IMX298 photo module with f/2.0 aperture, phase detection autofocus and four-axis image stabilization. Matrix area 1/2.8 inches, pixel size 1.2 microns.
Indicators are worse than those of the iPhone 6s Plus! Yes, the pixel size is approximately the same, but the aperture is 0.2 larger. However, let's see how Huawei Mate 8 shoots.
In sunny weather, pictures are sharp, with a wide dynamic range and ideal exposure - without gaps in the shadows or white spots in the highlights.
At night, of course, there is noise. This is not to say that the camera produces any extraordinary results.
Macro photography demonstrates all the delights of high-aperture optics - Huawei Mate 8 can create beautiful bokeh. True, sharpness when shooting a moving object, be it a bee or a flower swaying in the wind, is not so easy.
An attempt to film the kittens playing in the room was unsuccessful. The miracle did not happen - the kittens were smeared, and nothing could be done about it.
Overall, the Huawei Mate 8 camera left a good impression. It's a pleasure to shoot with, it produces beautiful, sharp images. Macro photography is a particular pleasure, but only if there is a static object in the frame, otherwise you can get upset. The lack of flagship features is also a little frustrating: there is no laser autofocus and you cannot shoot 4K video.
Other features
Experts are sure that today there is a crisis of expensive things. People are in no hurry to buy expensive flagships because performance alone is not enough to convince them of the rationality of the purchase. Realizing this, manufacturers are trying to endow their devices with interesting little things.
Fingerprint's scanner. In Huawei Mate 8 it is located on the back side. It works at lightning speed, identifies the owner in just 0.5 seconds, and allows you to lock and unlock not only your smartphone, but also folders with personal content. If necessary, it will remember several fingerprints.
EMUI interface. Yes, Huawei Mate 8 runs on the Android platform, but the Chinese have covered it with a proprietary interface that makes communicating with the smartphone as simple as possible. Plus, there are some interesting things in it.
For example, control your smartphone with “knuckle movements.” We drew the letter “C” and launched the camera. Draw a line across the screen with your knuckle and turn on the two-window mode. By the way, note that this mode only works with some applications. For example, you can watch videos and photos at the same time, but you won’t be able to watch videos and surf in the Chrome browser.
The control button is another feature of the EMUI interface. It hangs on top of most of the screen, you can drag it back and forth and use it to open a menu with the buttons “Back”, “Work screen”, “Recent”, “Lock screen”, “Optimization”.
Supports two SIM cards. It seems that today this is no longer a novelty, but not so much flagship smartphones provide such luxury. Of the two SIM cards in Huawei Mate 8, only one can work in LTE Cat.6 networks, while the second can only work in 2G. It's sad that Huawei is sticking to the same tray design, which can accommodate either two SIM cards or one SIM card and a microSD memory card. But what if you need both a memory card and two SIM cards?
In general, there are a lot of such little things in Huawei Mate 8. However, we’ll leave the joy of discovering them to you, because the more you find them yourself, the more pleasant your communication with the phablet will be.
Working hours
So, we have a large screen and a powerful processor, and then a reasonable question: how long can this miracle go without recharging? Don't worry, this is all very well. The battery capacity is decent – 4000 mAh. There are energy saving modes. As a result, we have 2–2.5 days of battery life in mixed mode. At the same time, the smartphone takes only 45 minutes to charge 50%. Excellent performance!
Huawei made a great phablet. Comfortable, powerful, with a decent camera and excellent battery life. It’s not so easy to find fault with him, because everything here seems to be in the right mind. However, for that kind of money you want something more interesting - either in design, or in functions, or in everything at once. In the case of the iPhone 6s Plus, we understand what we are paying money for. After all, this is Apple. In the case of the Samsung Galaxy S7 edge, it’s even more clear - just look at the curved screen. What about Huawei Mate 8? This is where you need to look at the roots, because behind the strict design lies a powerful, long-playing phablet, which may not be as interesting as its competitors, but is nevertheless more practical.
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Rising to new heights with the successful launch of Google Nexus 6P, consumers around the world are becoming more aware of the company thanks to the value phone. Huawei's remarkable 2015 launch continues in the new year with the announcement of the latest smartphone in the Mate line, the Huawei Mate 8, at CES 2016.
It's been over a year since its predecessor was released, and the level has been raised by the Nexus 6P, so there are great expectations for the Mate 8. Like the recent Mate S, you might be a little skeptical about its value based on its starting price of €599 (~$650).
Package contains:
- Huawei Mate 8 smartphone
- 2A charger
- Micro USB cable
- SIM Removal Tool
- Headphones
- Protective case
- User guide
Huawei has created a beautiful all-metal phone.
There is no doubt about this at present. Huawei is able to play on par with established industry brands like HTC when it comes to delivering a quality all-metal design. The Mate 8 is a beautifully crafted all-metal design with fine edges that shares many of the design features seen in the Mate series. The 6-inch screen does not feel bulky; it is quite thin and light. In no case does this mean that the device can be controlled with one hand, but aesthetics make it possible to neutralize the importance of dimensions.
Many design details have been carefully thought out, such as the placement of the SIM slot, which combines microSD, nanoSIM and microSIM slots into a single unit.
There is a built-in fingerprint sensor on the back of the case, the same as the Nexus 6P. It's surprisingly accurate and responsive, plus it has good placement when we hold the phone.
Display
The same oversaturated colors, but with more powerful brightness.
The Mate 8 comes with a 6-inch IPS LCD display with 1080p resolution. The resulting pixel density of 367 ppi is certainly sufficient for reading small text from a normal distance.
Thankfully, the display's brightness has improved significantly over the Mate S. In particular, its peak brightness reaches 492 nits, which improves screen readability in direct sunlight. Color reproduction remains on par with the Mate S, unlike the more accurate panels on the Ascend Mate 7. So colors look oversaturated, which some people won't mind, but the resulting picture doesn't always look natural.
Interface and functionality
EMUI 4.0 resorts to a 'bigger is better' strategy, but it can appear disorganized.
Launched on Mate 8 new interface EMUI 4.0 on top of Android 6.0 Marshmallow. Availability of the latter Android builds is great news for fans, but the core UI still prides itself on being feature-rich. Whether this is good or bad depends on who you talk to. Huawei is making every effort, but EMUI 4.0 still lags a little behind Samsung and LG's interpretations.
Visually, the interface is present in all relevant areas, such as dialing and the calendar. Functionally, the shell has many features used by power users, such as one-handed mode, multitasking and gesture controls, but they are not as refined as we would like. For example, multitasking is limited to just a handful of native apps, a far cry from the more diverse support seen in TouchWiz.
While the core Android features are present, EMUI 4.0 is an attempt to have Android with a bunch of over-the-top specs, but the end result lacks cohesion and a clear direction.
Performance
Kirin-950 is a leader in test results.
Huawei promises to be a formidable force because of its unique 64-bit chip The in-house Kirin 950 delivers impressive results with the Mate 8. Our particular review unit has 3GB random access memory, but there is another model with 4 GB. In any case, the benchmark results are through the roof.
In reality, every action will be accompanied by a pleasant level of responsiveness, but performance is not as close to the Nexus 6P with pure Android. Still, the smartphone continues to amaze with its above-average graphics processing performance.
IN various tests Performance Huawei Mate 8 showed better results compared to Samsung Galaxy Note 5, LG V10 and Huawei Ascend Mate7.
Internal memory 32 GB, in another version - 64 GB, there is room for memory expansion - a microSD slot.
As usual, a wide variety of movements are supported.
You'll enjoy its many shooting and control modes, but the camera quality leaves a lot to be desired.
The love and care is evident in the abundance of camera hardware on the phone, which features a 16-megapixel 1/2.8” Sony IMX298 CMOS sensor along with an F/2.0 lens aperture, phase detection autofocus, three-axis optical image stabilization and dual-LED flash. The 8-megapixel front camera is more than enough for selfies. Even with the dreamy combination, the only chink in the armor is the fact that video recording doesn't exceed 1080p resolution.
In addition to a rich camera system, Huawei Mate 8 launches a variety of camera interfaces, largely repeating its EMUI shell. There's an extensive range of tools, shooting modes, and a manual mode to please advanced users, but for all its photo prowess, video recording is still largely automatic once the record button is pressed. Indeed, there is manual control over preset parameters, such as focus, but once recording starts, the parameters cannot be changed while shooting.
Image quality
The hardware sounds amazing on paper, but in reality, performance will be average at best. Scenes with plenty of light are handled beautifully by the camera, with a fair amount of detail and mostly neutral colors being stamped out. Walking indoors, the artificial light casts a noticeable greenish cast on our footage, while details become significantly washed out. And while noise levels are kept to a minimum, in low light the lack of detail in photos just makes everything look muted. Plus autofocus sometimes becomes unstable.
Video quality
You'd think that a smartphone of this caliber would be capable of 4K resolution when recording, but that's not the case. In general, its 1080p samples did not impress with the appearance of their calm tones - there simply is no significant presence of fine details. However, autofocus is fast and audio recording is mostly clear. The standard 30fps mode has stabilization, but the camera is very prone to a shaky, jelly-like effect when moving.
Multimedia
There's nothing to complain about.
If you can stomach the display's color inaccuracies (or at least partially correct it by setting the white balance better), you'll find that the 6-inch Mate 8 is well-suited for media playback, like most high-end phablets.
Both video and music players are fairly basic and offer little more than you'd expect from built-in solutions. The gallery is actually a very powerful photo editor, combining pixelation functions for selective parts of the image and numerous filters that would normally be found elsewhere.
Unfortunately, the built-in speaker is not enough; its maximum volume is 71.4 dB. It is sufficient for small spaces and produces a neutral sound tone. Using the DTS-enabled headphone jack allows you to enjoy rich, rich sound.
Call quality
Listening through the ear goes without any problems, mainly because voices are clear and deep in tone, and also because the optional "loud voice" mode provides more volume for voices. However, on the other hand, the microphones used to capture our voices seem to give off a robotic tone to our callers. Lastly, the speaker can be used in moderately noisy environments - it simply won't cope in extremely noisy environments.
Battery
Long battery life.
You won't believe the slim profile, but Huawei has somehow managed to cram a 4,000mAh battery inside the Mate 8. The battery will easily last longer than a day. By the end of the day, the phone's charge level is usually in the range of 40% - 50%. And while the charging time of 156 minutes isn't the fastest compared to flagships, we have to keep in mind that the smartphone has a significantly larger battery than many of its contemporaries. 
conclusions
Huawei's sudden rise is obvious, and there's no denying its dramatic changes in just one year. Huawei Mate 8 is another device in the portfolio that shows that the company is not backing down anytime soon. The device quickly established itself as a premium phablet with Marshmallow on board. To be fair, there are some great things: premium all-metal construction, long battery life, and exceptional performance, but high price makes it difficult to sell.
The device is already available abroad at a starting price of €599 ($643). We already have several reviews of smartphones that have better features and performance, plus a few that are lower in price.
PROS
- Elegant all-metal construction
- Thin and light for its size
- Above average battery life
- Tons of features with EMUI 4.0
MINUSES
- Disorganized user interface
- Weak built-in speaker
- Greenish tints in indoor shots
- Shaky effect when recording video
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