Honor 6X – Review – the new Swag in town
Honor 6x is a new mobile from Honor. We have seen Honor consistently improving their product line up over the years and the Honor 6X has got a mature design in all aspects. In this review let’s check out if the Honor 6X is worth the price.
Design
From the physical design perspective, the Honor 6x is a metal body phone with plastic at the top and bottom to house the antenna. It is a 5.5 inch device, but feels a lot smaller than that. The back side of the mobile is interesting with a dual camera set up and fingerprint sensor. I will talk about the dual camera setup soon. The speaker is at the bottom along with the micro usb cable. The 3.5 mm jack is on the top. The power and volume buttons are on the left while on the right you would find the sim tray.
Overall, I would say that the device has a solid construction and feels good in the hand. Though it may not give you that premium feel, it has good aesthetics and ergonomics on its side.
Display
The mobile has a 5.5 inch IPS LCD screen with Full HD resolution support. The display is bright. The text and images are crispy and sharp. But I find the colors a bit dull and washed out. The viewing angles are good. But I find the color gamut a bit misplaced. I am a hardcore photographer and if colors are not accurate, that worries me. Having said that, i also say that on a regular day usage, the display is perfect for browsing, playing games, watching a few videos, and just about anything you do with it.
Hardware and Performance
The Honor 6x is powered by a Kirin 655 processor and time and again, Honor has proved that the Kirin processor does a good job when compared to its Snapdragon or Mediatek equivalents. My review unit has 4 GB of RAM and there is also a 3 GB variant available. The 3 GB variant has 32 gigs if internal storage while the top end 4 Gb variant has 64 Gb internal storage. But I must admit that I am impressed with the performance of this mobile for a mid range mobile. The games are handled smoothly even at high graphics mode. I get about 30 fps on high graphics games and 60 fps for regular games. Yet the gameplay is smooth. The device also handles multi-tasking smoothly.The UI is handled with ease. Honor 6x stands tall when it comes to performance among the mid range devices.
The mobile has dual SIM, but a hybrid sim slot. You can either use a single sim and SD card or dual sim. There is no dedicated SD card slot and that is something I miss from the Honor 5X. The speaker at the bottom is average at its best. Fingerprint scanner at the back is blazing fast and accurate. It has many features apart from just unlocking the mobile. That has become a trademark for Honor devices and do check out my video on Fingerprint functions for Honor 5c in the card above.
Camera
The major highlight of this mobile is its camera. It has a dual camera setup at the back, which is again becoming a Honor trademark. This time the Honor 6x has 12 mp and 2 MP combination. The 2 Mp sensor gives you depth and contrast information which is combined with the RGB data from the 12mp sensor to give you a crisp image. The bokeh effect looks very artificial and I would not use it. But otherwise the output from the camera is impressive. It also performs well in low light situation. The color reproduction is on target, details come out well and the dynamic range is impressive. Dynamic range keeps the highlights in check and that results in a very pleasant image.
The camera UI is simple and easy to use. It has a lot of interesting modes and features and you would love exploring them. I personally love the manual and document scanning mode. The front camera also does a decent job. Overall, the Honor 6X impresses with its camera setup.
Software
The mobile is running on Android 6.0 with EMUI 4.1 on top. EMUI 5.0 with Android 7.0 is expected soon on this mobile. The user interface is highly functional, yet simple to use. Most user would not find it difficult to locate an app or a feature on this mobile. The UI is different from stock android experience. But it is smooth, snappy and functional. User experience, if not the best, is good I would say. If you really want a stock experience, go for a custom launcher from the play store like Nova and you will love the rest of the UI from the mobile.
Battery
The mobile is powered by 3340 mAh battery. The battery performance took me by surprise and I am totally impressed with the fact that the battery can last more than a day of intensive usage. It takes about 2 hours to charge from 0 to 100%.
Verdict
The Honor 5X is a great mobile in the mid range segment. The Honor 6X follows the 5X and it impresses me as well. It stands tall on every department. The Redmi Note 4 and Coolpad Cool 1 are 2 mobiles that compete closely with the Honor 6x. I have used the cool 1 briefly and the Note 4 extensively. The cool 1 has a fine design and feels much premium, but we got bored of the same design from LeEco mobiles and the boring UI. The Note 4 has got a average camera performance but its MIUI user experience is hard to compete with. Comparing these 3 mobile, I would slight lean towards Note 4. But if camera and battery is the priority, the Honor 6X excels here. Honor 6X has set new standards for the mid-range mobiles and it will be difficult to break for a while.
Availability and Pricing
Honor 6x is priced at Rs 12999 for the 3GB / 64 GB variant. The 4 GB / 64 GB variant will be priced at Rs 15999. It will be available exclusively on Amazon in India.
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