On July 23, the “jump-level innovation” product of the “Sharp Technology” strategy – the Honor 9X series smartphone was officially launched in Xi’an. This new product has achieved “nine breakthroughs”, making it the most competitive smartphone in its price range:
Today, CFan brings you the experience product, the “super flagship” Honor 9X PRO, let’s take a look below.
Almost Full Screen
The Honor 9X series is one of the smartphones with the highest screen-to-body ratio in the Honor family and is the first Honor phone to introduce a pop-up front camera solution.
Since the front camera can be hidden inside the body without cutting or drilling holes in the screen, combined with the ultra-narrow bezel achieved by COF packaging technology, the Honor 9X series provides an ultimate full-screen experience – almost full screen, enhancing immersion when playing games or watching videos, with a very strong visual effect.
What? Are you worried that the phone might accidentally fall and hit the camera while taking selfies?
Rest assured, the Honor 9X series has introduced an intelligent drop protection mechanism for the pop-up front camera, which will detect its status and automatically retract the front camera to protect it from damage when it accidentally slips.
The Honor 9X series smartphone does not adopt the popular combination of OLED screen + under-display fingerprint recognition technology, but instead uses an LTPS screen and side-mounted fingerprint recognition scheme. Compared to OLED, LTPS does not have the drawbacks of low-frequency PWM dimming and screen burn-in, and can also display screen content clearly in strong outdoor light.Moreover, the Honor 9X screen supports video enhancement technology and has passed the German Rhine certification, providing vivid colors and clear details when watching videos, while also featuring low blue light eye protection characteristics.
The side-mounted fingerprint recognition design of the Honor 9X series (integrating the power button and fingerprint module) takes into account the aesthetics and design unity of both the front and back, and the capacitive recognition scheme is also superior to the under-display fingerprint scheme in terms of speed and accuracy, allowing for unlocking at the moment of pressing the power button, making operations more convenient.
Select Unlocking Method: Press or Touch Power Button
The Honor 9X series offers four color options: Midnight Black, Phantom Purple, Mystic Blue, and Flame Red (PRO version limited to Midnight Black and Phantom Purple), with a unique dynamic diamond micro-pattern formed inside the 3D glass back cover through a complex multi-layer coating process, which creates a shimmering X-shaped dynamic diamond light grid under light, making it unforgettable with its cool brilliance.
CFan’s review unit is in Midnight Black, although it lacks the unique diamond texture, it appears more stable and profound, more suitable for users who prefer a low-key and restrained style.
Experience The Roar Of Kirin 810
All models in the Honor 9X series are equipped with the latest Kirin 810 processor. Simply put, the Kirin 810 is the fourth mobile SoC chip in the world to use a 7nm process, featuring a combination of ARM native Cortex-A76 (2 large cores, 2.27GHz) and Cortex-A55 (6 small cores, 1.88GHz), and integrates a Mali-G52MP6 GPU customized by ARM (the Mali-G52 originally could only support 4 compute cores, i.e., Mali-G52MP4).
At the same time, the Kirin 810 also introduces Kirin Gaming+ optimization technology and GPU Turbo 3.0 technology, the former allows more games to achieve 60FPS high frame rate and HD high quality, and intelligently predicts the load of each frame using AI frequency scheduling, accelerating performance in high-load situations and quickly reducing speed to save power in low-load situations. GPU Turbo 3.0 now supports graphics acceleration for more than 70 mainstream games, maintaining full frame or nearly full frame while reducing power consumption and achieving millisecond-level touch response for a better feel.
The integration of an independent NPU has become a symbol of flagship SoC identity; this time, the Kirin 810 not only integrates an NPU but also integrates Huawei’s self-developed Da Vinci architecture NPU. This module is based on the Da Vinci cube and integrates tensor computation units, forming an innovative architectural design. Without going into the underlying principles, just know that the Kirin 810, thanks to the Da Vinci architecture NPU, directly topped the authoritative AI-Benchmark leaderboard, stepping on the Snapdragon 855.
Now, other brand smartphones in the 2000 yuan price range favor Snapdragon 730 and Helio G90. Compared to them, the Kirin 810 has the most advanced process and the highest CPU main frequency, laying a solid foundation for its performance. It’s important to know that the heat and power consumption of the A76 at full speed is very high, and even if the frequency is controlled to around 2.0GHz, it is difficult for a 12nm process to suppress it, while 7nm has more redundancy.
From the theoretical performance comparison of common benchmarking apps, the Kirin 810 can outperform Snapdragon 730 and Helio G90 in all test items, making it the NO.1 among “mid-range flagship SoCs”.
In other words, currently, the only SoCs that can surpass it in benchmarking are Kirin 980, Snapdragon 855, and Snapdragon 845, both new and old flagship SoCs. Although the performance of the Kirin 810 is not the strongest, the 7nm process gives it lower heat and power consumption, and the strongest edge AI performance allows it to achieve more advantages in system prediction optimization, camera imaging algorithms, and stable game performance.
As the saying goes – we are flagship.
Honor 9X PRO Performance Overview
As the protagonist of this review, the Honor 9X PRO not only features the Kirin 810 but also comes standard with 8GB LPDDR4X memory and built-in UFS2.1 flash storage, which was previously only available in high-end smartphones, with continuous read speeds approaching 900MB/s, offering top-notch storage performance.
The Honor 9X PRO offers configurations of 8GB+128GB and 8GB+256GB, priced at 2199 yuan and 2399 yuan respectively. By the way, this product also adopts a three-in-two SIM card slot design, supporting storage cards with a maximum capacity of 512GB. Therefore, if you do not need to install dual SIM cards, choosing the combination of 8GB+128GB+storage card is actually the most cost-effective.
It is worth mentioning that the Honor 9X PRO is equipped with a liquid cooling heat dissipation module, which can significantly reduce heat during long gaming sessions, keeping the phone only warm to the touch, without any burning sensation.
In “Honor of Kings” and “Peace Elite”, the Honor 9X PRO can maintain average frame rates of 59FPS and 29FPS at the highest graphics settings, providing smooth operations and excellent handling.
Honor of Kings can enable ultra-high graphics, testing environment is Abyss Showdown
Game developers have not yet adapted for new models, so currently can only select HD graphics mode, testing environment is Island Map
In addition, the Honor 9X PRO also supports 9.1 channel sky surround sound effects (requires headphones), enabling sound positioning abilities in shooting games.This product is also equipped with a 4000mAh battery, supporting AI intelligent node power control technology, allowing for longer use whether gaming or watching videos.
USB Type-C charging port and headphone jack
Below are performance screenshots of the Honor 9X PRO in common benchmarking apps, for reference only.
After two days of experience, the main feeling that the Honor 9X PRO gives me is low heat, power-saving, and particularly good Wi-Fi signal. The router is placed in the living room, and even in the kitchen, separated by two walls, this phone can receive a very stable signal, with low latency while gaming. It is reported that the Honor 9X series smartphones support AI intelligent dual-card internet access, AI intelligent base station selection, and AI smart antenna functions, performing much better in terms of 4G and Wi-Fi signals compared to competitors.
AI Triple Camera Strength Exploration
The Honor 9X series is standard with a 16MP front camera, and the rear main camera is also a 48MP sensor with an f/1.8 large aperture. It is important to note that the standard version of the Honor 9X uses an AI dual-camera setup with a 48MP main camera + 2MP depth camera. The Honor 9X PRO, on the other hand, opts for an AI triple-camera setup with a 48MP main camera + 8MP ultra-wide camera + 2MP depth camera.
Honor 9X Standard Version
Honor 9X PRO
Some may ask, many devices now use a 48MP main camera, what special features does the Honor 9X series have?
The answer is certainly affirmative, thanks to the powerful NPU and edge AI computing performance of the Kirin 810, the Honor 9X series smartphones have upgraded to AI Photography 2.0 technology, which can automatically recognize over 60 scenes, speeding up image recognition and processing, and can automatically recommend shooting modes such as “portrait” and “night scene”, allowing users to easily take good photos.
Just a glimmer of light is enough to capture scenes in ultra-dark environments
Ultra-sensitive testing demonstration effect
Honor 9X PRO Ultra Dark Light Shooting Effect
Other 48MP camera phones produce nearly black images under the same lighting conditions, nothing is visible
In addition, the main camera of the Honor 9X series has an ISO sensitivity of up to 102400, whereas, for comparison, the ISO of the 48MP main camera of the Xiaomi 9 is only 25600, and the ISO of the OPPO Reno and vivo X27’s main cameras are only 16000 and 3000 respectively. Better sensitivity, combined with Honor’s “Owl” night shooting algorithm and AIS handheld super night scene 2.0 technology, allows the Honor 9X series smartphones to capture more details in ultra-dark environments, comparable to night vision devices.
Normal and ultra-wide shooting mode comparison
Next, let’s appreciate a set of sample photos taken with the Honor 9X PRO:
Normal Shooting Mode
Ultra-wide Shooting Mode
The Honor 9X series smartphones adopt the pop-up camera solution with the highest screen-to-body ratio, featuring a unique and cool dynamic diamond micro-pattern design, providing high recognition, and the side-mounted fingerprint recognition design also brings a better unlocking experience. With the support of the Kirin 810 and UFS2.1 flash storage, this phone can outperform competitors equipped with Snapdragon 7 series in terms of performance, and the higher ISO main camera and ultra-wide-angle lens provide a better photography experience.
Honor 9X PRO Family Photo
The starting price of the Honor 9X PRO is 2199 yuan, making it a “balanced” mid-range smartphone. The biggest regret is the absence of NFC and infrared remote control modules.If your budget is limited, the standard version of the Honor 9X starting at 1399 yuan is actually more lethal – the price of Snapdragon 710 phones far exceeds the performance experience of Snapdragon 730, so what are you waiting for?!
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