[REVIEW] Huawei P9 – The Magical Monochrome Marvel

Performance
The local variant of the Huawei P9, designated as the EVA-L19 comes with an in-house 64-bit Huawei Kirin 955 octacore processor that pairs up a quartet of 2.5GHz A72 processors to handle the heavy lifting and a quartet of 1.7GHz A53 processors for standard grunt work running the latest Android Marshmallow 6.0.1.

This is overlaid with Huawei’s own EMUI 4.1 user interface. The 5.2-inch display on the P9 is a Full HD model with a crisp 423ppi. The reasoning on paper on retaining a full HD LCD display on the P9 is that it retains optimum viewability without compromising on battery life.

Paired with this is 3GB RAM and 32GB of expandable storage that supports up to 128GB microSD cards via a hybrid SIM card slot. The phone also sports Wi-Fi a/b/g/n/ac, Bluetooth 4.2 and has a rear fingerprint sensor that allows for swifter phone unlocking. That’s not all as the fingerprint sensor on the P9 has additional functionality, acting as a shortcut to let you take calls, cancel alarms and take photos based on which digit you use. It’s an extremely handy way to access shortcuts and makes marvellous use of the fingerprint sensor beyond simply unlocking the phone.

The latest incarnation of Huawei’s user interface sports less bloatware than its predecessor with a cleaner, neater interface that makes it relatively easier to get where you want to go. There’s still some bloatware but it’s relatively minor with EyeEm to edit your photos, Shazam to recognise songs played nearby and WPS Office to handle your word processing needs. The addition of shortcuts to the camera via the fingerprint sensor are a welcome addition along with a Health tracking app that integrates calorie tracking and distance traversed along with a selection of fitness goals. The phone proved to be highly responsive with nary a hint of lag. Freeblade ran along at maximum settings at a nippy clip with nary a pause and browsing was suitably swift. Audio on the built-in speaker was pleasantly loud and relatively detailed too as was music played on the provided earbuds.

The display didn’t disappoint either with good colour accuracy and excellent detail with pin-sharp text and rich, superb hues along with good legibility even under direct sunlight. If the colour rendition onscreen doesn’t quite agree with you, you can opt to tweak the colour temperature via colour wheel to make it warmer or cooler as you so desire.

Camera
Rather than upgunning for a megapixel war, the P9 walks a different path with a dual 12-MP camera setup designed in cooperation with Leica. One camera takes snaps in colour while the other captures images in mono. Combined, both help to create exceptionally detailed images. Images captured in mono offered richer details compared to just slapping on a conventional mono filter onto snaps and colour shots were exceptionally crisp with good colours even under challenging light conditions.


Huawei’s interesting camera modes that include a Light Painting mode that lets you capture car tail lights, star tracks and smooth water effects first seen on the P8 are present and correct here along with a time lapse and slow-mo mode. Video is unfortunately capped at 1080p though it proved delightfully smooth.

[pullquote align=”left” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=”15″] What really impressed though was a live bokeh mode accessed by a shutter icon on the camera UI that lets you select the area of focus and dial the aperture from F/0.95 to F/16.[/pullquote]

The P9 also offered a comprehensive manual mode accessed by sliding a small arrow on the side to access ISO, shutter speed, exposure value, autofocus and white balance. What really impressed though was a live bokeh mode accessed by a shutter icon on the camera UI that lets you select the area of focus and dial the aperture from F/0.95 to F/16.

It’s an impressive feature and lets you serve up some exceptional shots without undue effort, more so for the fact that the P9 has a competent auto mode that lets you snag some good snaps without having to muck about with settings and missing the money shot.

Discerning auteurs will also appreciate the fact that the P9 is also able to capture images in RAW format which comes in handy when you have the need to tweak images in post.

On its merits purely as a camphone, this is the finest offering that Huawei has created from their foundries and is a very competent shooter that will hold you in good stead under most usage scenarios. Those who know their way around a proper camera will be able to edge out and derive much better performance from the P9.