HUAWEI has launched two new high-end phones in Australia: the workhorse Ascend P2 and the more designer-focused P6.
Both have their strengths. The P6 is extremely thin (6.18mm), has an HD display, removable micro-SD card slot, and a five-megapixel front-facing camera for "selfies" -- self-portraits.
But it's the P2 that seems destined for bigger exposure, even though it doesn't have a micro-SD card -- rather 32 gigabytes of storage, only a 720p 4.7-inch display, and a more conservative 1.3mp front-facing camera.
It's the first Huawei post-pay high-end phone that a local telco has taken on -- here Telstra. And for its price -- $504 outright -- it's a bargain alongside the Samsung Galaxy S4, which costs $889 outright, although you can get a 16GB version for $629.
The P2 doesn't have the bells and whistles of the S4 -- it doesn't, for example, monitor where your eyes are looking or magically erase extraneous people in the background of a snap -- but it's the kind of phone I could recommend to not-so-techy friends who get spooked by advanced features.
The P2 has some excellent features -- a fast, although not cutting-edge, 1.5 gigahertz quad core processor (Huawei says it is its fastest phone), and what is definitely cutting-edge: new 4G LTE category 4 technology that in theory delivers download speeds up to 150 megabits a second. The P2 is the first phone to market here that is offering this, in conjunction with Telstra.
There is a caveat here. Telstra needs to own around 20 megahertz of continuous spectrum across available 4G bandwidth for this to work, and they tell us this is the case in Adelaide, Perth and Brisbane.
In Sydney and Melbourne, where they have 15 MHz of bandwidth, the speeds can't theoretically be as fast. We achieved a respectable 50.5/17.2 Mbps download and upload speeds from News Corp's office in Surry Hills, Sydney.
The P2 isn't as slim as the P6 but at 8.4 mm it's thin. It has a large 2420 milliampere hour battery that drained just 7 per cent while watching 45 minutes video. It has a good 13 megapixel back facing camera that takes reasonable shots in low light, although on a full screen PC displayed there was noise at these levels.
The P2 operates using Android Honeycomb 4.1.2 and Huawei's Emotion UI. I did however ditch its home widget which loaded really slowly when rebooting the phone.
Huawei has ditched the apps drawer on Android phones generally, but in the case of the P2, has reinstated it, we're told, at Telstra's insistence.
The fact the phone lacks the bloatware of excessive manufacturer and telco apps means you get a more authentic Android experience using it. It is generally a snappy, fast, easy to use, and attractive phone, especially considering its price.
