I’m what you need: review of smartphone Huawei P10

Give me this day
Give me this night Give me one chance
And you will understand - I that is necessary. 

Although Huawei is the third largest in the world (after Samsung and Apple) a manufacturer of smartphones, the flagship device of the company was not particularly noticeable up to last year’s P9. Furthermore, Huawei has shown that it can produce a beautiful and powerful smartphones, if you look at the Nexus 6P. Now, using the experience gained, P10 Huawei wants to finally firmly establish itself in the segment flagships. On paper he’s a wonderful camera from Leica, a fast processor, metal body. But what is P10 in real life?

What is it?

Huawei P10 is the flagship smartphone Huawei 2017, which has two cameras with a resolution of 12 and 20 megapixels, and a 5.1-inch 1080p screen, made by technology IPS-NEO. In P10 is an 8-core processor HiSilicon Kirin 960 with a maximum frequency of 2.3 GHz and 4 GB of RAM. The volume of the built-in memory is 32 or 64 GB depending on version. Also smartphone, you can put 2 cards nanoSIM. The volume of the battery is 3200 mAh.

Than it is interesting?

The main feature of the P10 is a dual chamber, made in collaboration with Leica. During this 20-megapixel sensor takes the monochrome image and makes all the necessary measurements for unloading the main 13-megapixel sensor. Also interesting the use of multi-touch button as a fingerprint scanner and the new processor of its own design Huawei. P10 is very thin (7 mm), lightweight (145 grams) and mostly made of metal.

How it is made?

Design P10 is at the same time is a variation on the theme of the latest iPhone and the evolution of appearance of last year’s flagship P9. From the first smartphone got rounded corners, a beveled edge of the screen and the line of the antenna on the rear panel and the other unusual module dual camera says “Leica” and the excellent location of controls.

Almost the entire front panel is a small to date, a 5.1-inch screen with a standard resolution of 1920×1080 pixels. Apparently, oleophobic coating is not here, P10 very often have to wipe. The minimum horizontal and vertical is very high because of the location of functional elements in style smartphones from Cupertino. Earpiece, front camera and various sensors are installed on the top panel, and multifunction button with integrated fingerprint sensor on the bottom.

The rear portion of the P10 almost fully metal, if not to take into account the camera modules along with two flashes and a plastic line antennas. Tested in our review of the dark gray version of the smartphone has a very smooth, and brand coverage. Not only that, metal is a very good collects fingerprints – if you try to put P10 on some surface at an angle, in most cases it will slide off. However, the apparatus is excellent in the hand, primarily due to its small size.

On the top edge there is only the noise canceling microphone on the bottom – one for talking together with speaker, USB-C and thankfully, a 3.5 mm minijack.

On the right is a volume rocker and a very unusual patterned button switch/lock with a red border. Although at first glance it is a trifle in real life such a decision only adds to the smartphone’s appeal. On the left is a slot for two nano-SIM cards. In one of the places for SIM you can put a microSD memory card.

Overall, despite the similarity of the phone with Apple devices, P10 is not felt by something secondary, and attracts the attention of people around. Primarily due to the neatness of appearance, yet the unusual configuration of the camera and red button to lock/activate.

How good is the screen?

For a smartphone in 2017 IPS screen P10 standard is about 5 inches with Full HD resolution. But nothing wrong with that – the display is perfectly readable even under very bright sun and juicy and shows a clear picture. Needless to say, the viewing angles are maximal. Maximum brightness is 600 nits and a contrast ratio comparable with the best IPS screens and is 1423:1.

Also in the settings you can change the color temperature, and include the increasingly popular mode of protection of sight of the color blue in the evening.

The only obvious disadvantage is the overly aggressive brightness sensor – sometimes in the room it makes the screen too dark.

And the camera what?

For the second year in a row, Huawei has partnered with the legendary manufacturer Leica cameras. It is unknown how really is the Leica camera was engaged in P10, but this led to a very unusual configuration of the camera modules. In addition to the standard 12-megapixel sensor, there is one with a resolution of 20 megapixels, which shoots only in black and white. Both cameras have lenses with an aperture of f/2.2. As they say both black-and-white sensor has a much wider dynamic range and takes some of the load on the various measurements of the color module, which in theory leads to better photos.

One thing, just moved to P10 c cameras Leica is the design of the camera interface. He almost completely repeats itself in the legendary dalemark M series and different from the rest of the smartphone interface – a proprietary shell EMUI. There is a huge number of different modes – in addition to standard photo and video features black-and-white photography, HDR, two similar style of shots with a long exposure under the names “Light” and “Night snapshot”, the creation of panoramas and time lapses, slow motion, and a strange mode of “Beautiful food”, which by and large is a filter placed in a separate menu item. Also incredibly pleased with the ability to manually adjust ISO, shutter speed and aperture of the cameras in the “PRO”.

Maximum photo resolution – 20 megapixels, but the default P10 shoots 12-megapixel images. Yourself the camera settings are very extensive and allow, among other things, include different types of grids to better frame construction, a mode of fast shooting by double-clicking unlock and adjust the color gamut of the resulting photos for saturation, contrast and brightness. Yet forced to smile the ability to install Leica watermark on each photo taken exclusively for advertising smartphone.

Photo quality is very good. The unusual configuration of the cameras allows you to get great shots in almost any conditions. In daylight questions for no quality, and the additional module with the ability to manually change aperture allows you to create beautiful bokeh when shooting portraits or objects from a close distance.

Black and white camera is also good in itself. Monochrome photos are very beautiful and contrast. But, unfortunately, not so many people are addicted to black and white photography.

Night or low light image quality expected falls, but remains at a normal level. Mode “Night mode” allows you to take beautiful pictures with a long exposure, but we need a tough stand, tripod or very stable hands at the slightest wince picture strongly smeared.

Front camera, unlike basic, very simple – the resolution of the sensor is 8 megapixels and aperture f/1.9. However, selfies are good, not least thanks to a special regime of elimination of defects of skin and “blurry” background.

Video is recorded in 4K at 30 frames per second and 1080p at 60 frames per second. The quality of material is good in the daytime, at night you can have problems with the autofocus. Noise reduction in most cases works correctly.

Sample video in daylight:

Video sample at night:

Also no problems with the regime of “Slow”, which at the output produces a nice slow-mo with the sound.

In General, the camera P10 pleased, especially monochrome and portrait modes. The partnership with Huawei has enabled Leica to do not only with unusual engineering solution with additional monochrome module, but also very convenient and detailed interface that will satisfy even advanced users cameras.

How quickly and how long it works?

Kirin 960 with four gigabytes of RAM P10 output at the same level of performance from any other smartphone. Any game or app will work on it without any problems. In the benchmark Antutu P10 scored a huge 149771 points above it in a real rating only Galaxy S8 or iPhone 7. But with all this there is one huge disadvantage – the phone is noticeably hot even when watching videos in 1080p, and after a long game in Need for Speed Mortal Kombat or speed due to overheating falling by about a third.

With autonomy, all very good. The smartphone stably withstand 1.5 days of active service due to the relatively large battery volume of 3200 mAh and the screen is not very high resolution. Also very helpful built-in utility to clean the memory from unnecessary applications and two different modes of extending your battery life – quite a common restriction background service and “Ultra”, when you turn on P10 which actually turns into a “dialer” with access to a few selected applications. You can still save battery by lowering the display resolution.

Approach instead of the player?

Huawei has made for the smartphone is very beautiful music player with support for animation effects and uploading words to the various songs. If you go to settings, you can configure the time during which it will play music, and smooth transition between tracks.

But the sound quality is a little disappointing. The main speaker is not particularly loud, and the songs from it sound very strange, seem to pass through a filter. The situation is similar with headphones, but it is exacerbated by a lack of equalizer, there is only the DTS mode. It adds a bit of volume and bass. Most likely the culprit of obscure problems is the incorrect operation of digital-to-analog Converter.

What firmware?

P10 running Android 7.0 Nougat. But it is almost invisible under EMUI – proprietary shell Huawei. Besides the above mentioned tools to improve the autonomy and beautiful music player there is a huge amount of change. They start from the main screen – by default it operates a La iPhone but in the settings you can enable basic for Android total apps menu. If you were to draw on the desktop with your finger down to open the global search for contacts, memory contents of the smartphone and apps.

Significantly customized lock screen. If a bit of pulling its bottom edge to open quick launch shortcuts built-in tools and buttons to adjust image special regime “Journal”. It dynamically loads different beautiful pictures for your screen saver. It is strange that the Journal is not available for the main desktop. Also on the lock screen, you can display the data with the built-in pedometer.

The standard set of tools – have a flashlight with adjustable brightness, calculator, notes, calendar, recorder, different types of timers and compass, combined with a position sensor. Nothing unusual in them is, everything looks neat and works correctly.

The list of built-in applications complement file Manager, data backup on servers Huawei and beautiful display of the weather. Very strange is the “Mirror” – it works using the front camera, but if you blow into one of the microphones, the screen shows the effect of perspiration. Surprised by the presence of additional on-screen control menu mobile – a P10 it is hardly useful to someone. Also there is a fitness app where you can set yourself different goals, but in fact it’s just a pedometer.

We should also recall the navigation button, which is also a fingerprint sensor. Fingerprints are read instantly, but for a smartphone with this button, there are big issues. In theory, a small touch surface can replace three normal buttons, but in fact its sensitivity is disgusting. When pressing it is not clear where it will clicks on the desktop or on one menu back. It is very good that you can turn it off, then on the screen appears normal navigatsionnaya Android toolbar that you can customize yourself.

A curious addition to Android are launching various functions with gestures. For example, if you tap with two fingers on the screen, then the screenshot will be removed, and if the incoming call hold P10 to your ear, the call will be automatically accepted. Also, you can record video with your smartphone display.

EMUI close acquaintance proved to be a very nice sheath. Additions to Android from Huawei is very organically fit into the operating system, pleased with the number of available settings. The only problematic part is the ill-fated touch button.

Competing with what P10?

The main competitors of the smartphone are the recently released LG G6 and the Samsung Galaxy S8. Despite a much lower price, P10 can confidently compete, and in some cases even surpass the latest flagships of other companies – same G6 has a much weaker Snapdragon processor 821. The only explicit (compared to other flagship smartphones) P10 drawback is the screen, which is smaller and has a small today, the Full HD resolution. But also this is a couple of benefits P10 – it is more compact and in theory last longer in the competition due to the small screen diagonal.

The bottom line

P10 was a great follower of the traditions of last year’s P9 – became a much nicer design, performance and even the camera. The novelty is a little bit not up to the other flagships, but it is much cheaper. The main problem is strange, some software P10. Huawei has already promised that in the next batch P10 with soft it will be much better and resolved the issue with the oleophobic coating. Then with improved firmware P10 will be a great offer for those who want a flagship smartphone, but not willing to pay a significant amount for the same Galaxy S8 or iPhone 7.

4 reasons to buy the Huawei P10:

• elegant and easy to use camera from Leica
• very fast processor, which is second only to the Galaxy S8 or iPhone 7
• much lower compared to other flagships price
• need a compact flagship smartphone

2 reasons not to buy Huawei P10:

• camera still loses Galaxy S8
• uncomfortable touch button, which requires you to use the on-screen alternative

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