Honor 7X & V10 Western Launch Event: A Live Blog (2:30pm UTC)
by Ian Cutress on December 5, 2017 8:30 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Snapdragon
- Qualcomm
- honor
- Live Blog
- Honor 7X
09:05AM EST - Today Honor is announcing a new smartphone coming to EMEA and the Americas: the Honor 7X. The 7X has actually already been announced for the Asia-Pacific market, however Honor is emphasizing its message for western markets with its launch today in London.
09:07AM EST - Going to start in about 20 minutes here
09:23AM EST - Under than 10 minutes. Showing all the Honor PR videos on the screen while everyone is sitting down
09:25AM EST - This is my third Honor launch if I remember correctly, after the Honor 8 and 6X. The Honor 8 had Brooklyn Beckham as their 'celebrity' on stage.
09:26AM EST - Honor likes to promote itself as a young person, 'on-line' brand
09:26AM EST - Technically it is a sub-brand of Huawei, but with different design, advertising and sales departments
09:27AM EST - But Huawei reps know next to nothing on Honor, and somewhat vice versa
09:27AM EST - The Honor 7X is the launch product today. It has been plastered all over the marketing materials
09:27AM EST - This event is called the 'global launch', but technically it has already been launched in China / parts of Asia
09:29AM EST - We're expecting this launch variant (the 'global' launch variant?) to be pretty much identical in design, but perhaps with slightly different LTE band configurations for Europe, Africa, and the Americas
09:30AM EST - Of course, the press event we're covering today allows Honor to go through all of their new features and hardware
09:31AM EST - The Twitter tag for the event is #MaxYourView, alluding to the 'full-screen-like interface' of the display
09:34AM EST - 3 minute warning
09:37AM EST - Opening video, emphasizing the dual camera with the IOOI styling
09:38AM EST - BMX style riders on the stage. A brand for young people, you know
09:39AM EST - They're just going round in circles
09:40AM EST - They're trying to get a room full of press to clap
09:40AM EST - Still going
09:41AM EST - Second intro video time
09:41AM EST - It said V10 ?
09:42AM EST - Icy crystals floating in space and shattering? Particle waveforms? I'm not getting the message here
09:43AM EST - Neurons? AI?
09:43AM EST - This is an odd video
09:44AM EST - Now the Senior Product Manager hits the stage, Neils someone?
09:44AM EST - George Zhao, President of Honor, to the stage
09:44AM EST - Honor 7 launched 2 years ago in London
09:45AM EST - 'London is always a good idea'
09:45AM EST - Honor was set up in 2013, and is now the number 1 smartphone 'e-brand' in China
09:45AM EST - (Jan to Sep 2017)
09:46AM EST - China Singles Day: Sold $609M of smartphones. 90% increase over 2016
09:46AM EST - In the past two years we started to develop into the global market
09:46AM EST - We have achieved some success
09:47AM EST - Number 3 market share in Russia, No 1 market share in Finland
09:47AM EST - Success during Black Friday: 6X best seller in unlocked phones on Amazon in US
09:47AM EST - 'Our phone works in the global market'
09:48AM EST - 'We define our global strategy'
09:48AM EST - Most important thing for Honor is the product
09:48AM EST - Honor V, Honor N, Honor X and Honor Lite
09:48AM EST - Honor V: Top Tech and Perf
09:49AM EST - Honor N (e.g Honor 8): Aesthetics and Function
09:49AM EST - Honor X: Flagship features with mainstream price
09:49AM EST - Honor Lite: 'Accessible Aesthetics with unbeatable value'
09:50AM EST - Honor Magic: first Honor AI phone. Not launched widely due to the ecosystem
09:50AM EST - This year launched the Honor 9
09:51AM EST - Second most popular color at retail, after the blue, was the glassy green
09:51AM EST - 'We design our smartphones for young people (or young at heart)'
09:52AM EST - 'we grow together with young people and young people sports, music, and e-games'
09:53AM EST - Our store style is unique - a place for young people to join together to enjoy technology and make friends
09:53AM EST - We want to be friends of young people
09:53AM EST - 'Low date of stock'
09:53AM EST - Only spend 2.5% spent on marketing
09:54AM EST - Leverage channel partner and retail partner for direct communications
09:54AM EST - Less-to-no risk, so can accept low margin to sell Honor products
09:55AM EST - Honor is very confident about the brand, the business model, and the spirit
09:55AM EST - Honor wants to redefine the global smartphone map with a global expansion strategy\
09:55AM EST - Expanding in Europe, US. Then Russia, Turkey, India, Middle East and Africa
09:56AM EST - Honor wants to become the top brand
09:56AM EST - We want to improve our global market
09:56AM EST - Honor wants to be Top 5 in 3 years, Top 3 in five years
09:57AM EST - Currently, 15% of revenue is overseas, 85% is overseas. Aiming for 50/50 in 2020, and 60/40 in 2022
09:58AM EST - So 60% overseas revenue in 2022, 'to make honor a truly global brand'
09:58AM EST - co-create the future with partners: media, retail, distribution
09:59AM EST - Now for another video
09:59AM EST - IOOI means dual camera and maximising the screen size
10:00AM EST - The X-series is defined by its price range. Taking flagship features down to that price
10:00AM EST - For 7X, the full screen display is the key feature
10:01AM EST - Already 2 million Honor 7X phones shipped in China already
10:01AM EST - 'Almost 100% positive reviews' ...
10:02AM EST - Now for an intro video
10:02AM EST - > They're really pushing the bezels
10:03AM EST - Powered by Kirin... 659 I think
10:04AM EST - 5.93-inch Full View display
10:04AM EST - Two colors: Black and Blue
10:04AM EST - Also, now in Gold
10:05AM EST - 2.7mm narrower and 2.8mm shorter than iPhone 8 Plus
10:06AM EST - With new technology, the trend should be 5.5-inch phones to have 5.9-inch displays
10:06AM EST - 2160x1080 FHD+, with built in image enhancement
10:06AM EST - 18:9 screen
10:07AM EST - Now mentioning the benefit of 18:9 for games like FPS to see other people
10:08AM EST - one-key split screen
10:09AM EST - Daylight modeto sharpen the display, night time mode for 3 nits
10:09AM EST - Dual 16MP rear camera, 8MP front camera
10:09AM EST - Portrait mode for both front and rear camera
10:09AM EST - Gender beauty mode that can change modes depending if it detects a man or a woman
10:10AM EST - Gesture trigger for selfie
10:11AM EST - 3340 mAh battery. 22 days of standby, 12 hours of video, 91 hours of music, 12 hours of Internet, 21 Hours of Talking Time
10:11AM EST - Kirin 659 + 4GB DRAM
10:11AM EST - 64GB storage + Expandable 256GB MicroSD
10:12AM EST - 32 GB version as well
10:12AM EST - Phone design has a corner 'air bag design'
10:12AM EST - > President drops phone on stage twice to prove the point
10:13AM EST - Dual lens camera is 16 MP + 2 MP
10:13AM EST - 64GB + 4GB = 299 Euro / 269 GBP
10:14AM EST - Available from today in certain contries
10:14AM EST - Order on the website today from certain locations and get a 'special prize'
10:15AM EST - Now for another Honor product... ?
10:15AM EST - Honor View Series
10:16AM EST - It's Honor's salute to the ultimate technology
10:16AM EST - Last year was the Honor Magic, this year the View 10 will have AI
10:17AM EST - First member is the View 10
10:17AM EST - 5.99-inch screen, FHD+
10:17AM EST - Metal body
10:18AM EST - Pure blue and Pure black
10:18AM EST - Comparing sizes to other flagships
10:19AM EST - 6.97mm thick, 3750mAh
10:19AM EST - thinner than Note 8 and iPhone X, bigger battery than both
10:20AM EST - Fingerprint sensor in front
10:20AM EST - 3.5mm jack
10:20AM EST - embedded fingerprint sensor into glass
10:21AM EST - Now for a video with some sort of robot
10:21AM EST - Kirin 970
10:23AM EST - 'Design is futuristic and shows high status'
10:23AM EST - Colors: Navy Blue
10:23AM EST - Midnight Black
10:24AM EST - Full View display
10:24AM EST - Integrated AI function from Kirin 970
10:24AM EST - 'Better than any AI smartphone on the market'
10:25AM EST - > That's an odd claim. Mate 10 and Mate 10 Pro has the same chip
10:26AM EST - Recognizes 33 images per second. iPhone X does 16, Note8 does 2
10:27AM EST - >This would mean image recognition while recording video. Waiting for that feature to be enabled
10:27AM EST - Facial recognition unlock. Do not need to switch on screen to enable face detection
10:28AM EST - *feature will be provided by OTA update
10:28AM EST - He tried 10 times. It worked twice...
10:29AM EST - Current face ID does not support payment security - so Honor keeps the fingerprint sensor
10:29AM EST - Closed-eye face unlock prevention: stop people unlocking phone while you sleep
10:30AM EST - Hidden notification support - if it sees your face, it will disable the privacy protection for notifications
10:30AM EST - AI will follow your face to keep rotation as you are laying down - will not rotate
10:31AM EST - again, OTA update
10:31AM EST - Intelligent Screen On when you're looking at the phone
10:32AM EST - 'Easy Talk' - whispering detection
10:32AM EST - Support with Microsoft for offline translation (like Mate 10)
10:36AM EST - Open AI ecosystem for app development
10:37AM EST - Partnership with DJI - fly a DJI Mavik drone with voice control
10:38AM EST - Uses AI to talk to the drone in busy environments
10:39AM EST - 6GB DRAM, 128GB Storage
10:39AM EST - 3750 mAh
10:40AM EST - Supports Supercharge: 5V 4.5A
10:40AM EST - 50% charge in 30 mins
10:40AM EST - Supports dual 4G and dual VoLTE
10:41AM EST - EMUI 8.0
10:41AM EST - Game Suite
10:42AM EST - AI can predict graphics to make games smoother
10:43AM EST - View 10 is the official smartphone for both games
10:44AM EST - 20MP + 16MP 2-in1 PDAF with Dual ISP and Wide Aperture
10:46AM EST - 'View 10 has an AI camera'
10:47AM EST - Real Time recognition with AI, like Mate 10/Pro
10:47AM EST - 13 scenes detected
10:49AM EST - 13MP front camera
10:50AM EST - post-processing bokeh
10:50AM EST - Portrait recognition in group selphies
10:51AM EST - Pull the person out of the photo and change the background
10:51AM EST - AI Motion Detection
10:52AM EST - AI Zoom to enhance details at zoom
10:53AM EST - Super-resolution imaging
10:54AM EST - helps improve quality of Facebook and Instagram photos and compensate for low resolution... apparently
10:54AM EST - *The feature needs app support
10:55AM EST - Facebook, Instagram and Line supported today
10:57AM EST - Price for 6GB / 128GB is 499 Euro / 449 GBP
10:57AM EST - Coming January 8th
10:58AM EST - One more thing...
10:58AM EST - New technologies
10:59AM EST - A 3D Facial recognition system similar to iPhone X ? Facial avatar
11:00AM EST - Point Cloud sensor, 1200x800
11:00AM EST - 400ms facial unlock, create your own 'honor' animoji
11:01AM EST - more detailed animoji than Apple
11:01AM EST - Also 3D small object reconstruction
11:01AM EST - sub-millimeter reconstruction
11:02AM EST - Also showcasing Sync Play
11:02AM EST - 'Create an orchestra with your friends'
11:03AM EST - (My phone is on 5% battery, refusing to upload photos - I didn't expect the press event to go on over 90 minutes. Only 60 minutes were scheduled)
11:04AM EST - That's a wrap. time for samples
11:04AM EST - .
19 Comments
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negusp - Tuesday, December 5, 2017 - link
No USB-C, late kernel sources, Kirin CPU? Hard pass.ads295 - Tuesday, December 5, 2017 - link
You'd actually not consider buying a phone due to no USB-C? Maybe we really are as dumb as the industry wants us to be...For what it's worth, Kirin is now on par with the big guys, in what seems like an impossibly short span of time.
syxbit - Tuesday, December 5, 2017 - link
You could reverse the logic."A company would really consider a new phone without USB-C? Maybe they really as dumb as the industry allows them to be.
ddriver - Tuesday, December 5, 2017 - link
No need to argue, everyone is dumb :) Some more than others.BramEPC - Tuesday, December 5, 2017 - link
Personally I will not buy anything unless it supports USB 3.1 power delivery (and supports being host while being charged at the same time). Since only USB-C can be USB 3.1 I need USB-C (though USB-C does not imply USB 3.1 unfortunately).UtilityMax - Wednesday, December 6, 2017 - link
I totally understand your requirements, but this is a sub-250 smartphone that tries to feel as premium as possible, and Huawei has succeeded, but they gotta cheat somewhere. Hence micro-usb connector, 2.4GHz only wifi, and camera won't shoot 4K video. But the phone feels great in most other aspects. I got the previous version, the 6X, and couldn't be happier. Most people looking for the phone in this price range would be served adequately with old USB.sonny73n - Wednesday, December 6, 2017 - link
There's nothing to consider. I'd definitely not buying an Android phone without USB-C, period.By the way, I'm not an Apple fan but Apple has the best connector ever (the lighting connector).
ads295 - Tuesday, December 5, 2017 - link
You'd actually not consider a phone due to lack of Type-C? Maybe we really are as dumb as the industry wants us to be...And for what it's worth, Kirin is playing with the big boys since they moved to FinFET. They've developed incredibly fast considering how long they've been around
risa2000 - Tuesday, December 5, 2017 - link
I thought they were supposed to announce Honor V10 for western markets today?happy medium - Tuesday, December 5, 2017 - link
Just bought a Honor 6X for my cousin for Christmas for $150 , a killer deal.