Specifications
- Screen: 5'', IPS, 294 ppi, 1280×720;
- Operating system: Android 5.1 (EMUI 3.1 Lite);
- Processor: MediaTek MT6735C, Cortex-A53, 4 x 1.3 GHz;
- GPU: ARM Mali-T720, frequency 600 MHz;
- RAM: 2 GB, LPDDR3;
- Built-in memory: 16 GB, microSDHC slot;
- Cameras: 13 MP (dual-tone flash, autofocus), 5 MP (flash);
- Battery: 2200 mAh, removable;
- Dimensions: 141x71x7.9 mm;
- Weight: 139 g;
- SIM slots: 2, nano-SIM (Dual SIM Dual Standby);
- Communication: GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900 MHz, DC-HSPA+ 850 / 900 / 1900 / 2100 MHz, FDD LTE: 1, 3, 7, 38, 39, 40, 41, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n (2.4 GHz), Bluetooth 4.0, GPS, (A-GPS), GLONASS, BDS;
- Sensors: light, proximity, accelerometer/gyroscope, magnetometer.
Appearance
At first glance, the new product strongly resembles the Honor 4C Pro. Continuity is noticeable in the contours of the case, the design of the main camera, the perforation of the speakers located on the bottom side next to Micro-USB, the nice texture of the back - familiar elements are everywhere. The body assembly remains of high quality. And yet, we are not dealing with a complete copy.
The arrangement of the front panel elements has changed; a front flash has appeared instead of an event indicator. A programmable Easy Key has been added to the left side of the device. Due to the disappearance of individual design elements (the silver speaker grille, the pattern on the front panel), the design has become simpler and less memorable, but this is a budget model. All these changes did not negatively affect the ergonomics of the case; moreover, the presence of a fourth mechanical key and the reduced thickness of the case make Honor 5A even more convenient to use than Honor 4C Pro.
⇡#Appearance and ergonomics
Unlike Huawei smartphones, the appearance of which designers have brought to a single, more or less recognizable standard, gadgets under the Honor brand do not yet have bright distinctive features. However, this is absolutely normal - Honor should not fascinate, the emphasis is placed on an interesting ratio of cost and technical characteristics, this is what should attract the buyer, and not its good looks. Although this is all quite good - showing 5A to your friends is at least not a shame.
Honor 5A – front panel
The device turned out to be quite compact - it easily fits into pockets, additional compartments of bags or a small lady's clutch. It is convenient to operate it with one hand - the thumb reaches all points of the display, there is no need to move the gadget in your hand. Not a “shovel” at all - only five inches!
Honor 5A – upper part of the front panel
Unlike its older brothers, the 5A is made of plastic. This is more than normal for the budget segment. There are no hardware keys on the front panel: navigation buttons for the operating system are built into the interface.
Honor 5A – side view
The thickness of the device’s body is considerable - 8.9 millimeters, however, Honor 5A does not look chubby at all. Externally, it is a fairly balanced and easy-to-use gadget.
| Honor 5A – side edges | ||
From an ergonomic point of view, this is, at first glance, a completely standard Android smartphone: the power and volume control buttons are located on the right side, the audio jack is on the top side, and the Micro-USB interface is on the bottom. But there is one feature - a programmable Easy Key on the left side. The user can assign a specific action to it (start audio recording, take a screenshot, etc.) or launch any of the installed applications. Moreover, it reacts differently to a single, double or long press - that is, you can assign up to three functions to it, which is very convenient.
| Honor 5A – setting up the Easy Key | ||||
The back panel of the smartphone is textured, it looks good, almost does not collect fingerprints or any other stains and does not slip in the hand.
Honor 5A – rear panel
The body of the device is collapsible. Under the cover there is a battery, as well as connectors for two nano-SIMs and a separate slot for a microSD memory card. A very nice detail - despite the very simple status of the model, it does not use a universal slot, so you don’t have to sacrifice memory or a second SIM card.
Honor 5A with the back cover removed
The device is assembled, at first glance, not bad. When used in normal mode, it does not play and does not respond to compression with creaking. However, if you press on the side edges of the case, you will notice a lack of rigidity in the design - it is better to handle the device carefully.
Display
The Honor 5A displays information on a 5-inch screen made using IPS technology and with a resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels. For such a diagonal, this is enough - individual pixels are “not striking”; moreover, a higher resolution would significantly increase the load on the hardware platform.
The touch layer recognizes up to 5 simultaneous clicks. Thanks to it, the smartphone responds to gestures when the screen is off (more on this below). The light/proximity sensor unit performs its functions without noticeable problems. There is no oleophobic coating.
For its price, the matrix demonstrates excellent brightness and uniformity of the white field. It is also characterized by slightly distorted color reproduction and low contrast, which drops even more when looking at the screen at sharp angles.
First start
And after unpacking the fitness bracelet, a black bracelet appears in front of you. If you pick it up and press the display and it lights up, then the first turn on was successful, but if not, then this is where our instructions will come in handy on how to properly turn on the Honor Band 5, because there is no physical button. How to use if Honor Band 5 does not turn on? Easily! Just connect the fitness bracelet to the charging unit and it will turn on itself; after turning on, we recommend charging the device to at least 20-30%.
Iron
For the second time, testing Honor smartphones, we are faced with oddities associated with the declared modification of the system on the chip. (Perhaps, in this way, the company is testing the professionalism of the testers themselves?) In this case, the press release refers to a certain modification of the MediaTek MT6735C. At the same time, neither using specialized software nor based on the results of synthetic tests, it is not possible to identify any differences between this processor and the standard MT6735. The user will not even notice the difference.
Four Cortex-A53 cores with a frequency of 1.3 GHz, Mali-T720 GPU, 2 GB of RAM and 16 GB of internal memory (about 10 free) - sounds familiar, doesn’t it? Almost every week a smartphone with a similar filling is tested. The configuration is quite good for comfortable everyday use. Android does not lag on it, casual games run well, and the frame rate in projects offering beautiful 3D graphics is kept at 25-30 frames per second at low and medium settings.
Performance
The hardware basis is the 8-core Kirin 950 chipset (four Cortex-A53 cores clocked at 2 GHz and four at 1.7 GHz). The Mali-T830 controller is responsible for image quality. The amount of RAM is 2 GB. This is enough for the device to function very quickly and stably, and unload applications from memory without any problems.
We tested the smartphone in AnTuTu, Geekbench and GFXBench OpenGL and got good results on par with the flagships of the year before.
Simple arcade games like Happy Jump start instantly and run smoothly, the accelerometer shows itself perfectly in action, reacting to the slightest tilt of the smartphone. The more advanced game Dead Trigger 2 also requires little loading time and does not slow down during the process. Running Godfire: Rise of Prometheus will require a little patience and some time, but there are no complaints about the functioning of the game itself.
The bottom of the rear panel becomes slightly warm during prolonged use.
Software
Like the 4C Pro, the main character of this review runs the Lite version of EMUI 3.1, which has lost a number of animations and some other beauties for the sake of performance. With the exception of design, this modification of the operating system is almost in no way inferior to the basic EMUI. Let's briefly list its features: support for themes, a simplified style of the home screen, black lists of subscribers and password protection of applications, advanced do not disturb options, control over application permissions and their operation in the background.
Even more interesting are the options presented in the “control” section. The “Easy Key” item allows you to assign the launch of any three applications to an additional key (short, long and double press).
The “motions” section allows you to turn off the sound by turning the smartphone over and assign the launch of four more applications to various gestures on the locked screen. In addition, the one-hand control mode, which temporarily reduces the image scale, and the floating control button have not gone away.
Connection
Honor 5A has two slots for nano-SIM cards and a separate slot for a memory card. In this case, there is only one radio module in the case, and at the same time it is connected to the Internet, for example via 4G; there can be only one of the cards. The second card remains in standby mode and is capable of receiving calls. There is no connection to the slot; the main card is selected through the menu. The design of the smartphone does not allow for hot-swapping of cards. USB OTG - does not work, but there is a separate microphone for noise reduction.
Single-band Wi-Fi (2.4 GHz), FM radio, Bluetooth 4.0, as well as all three global positioning systems are supported. Starting navigation takes time, but the location is determined with enviable accuracy.
Autonomy
The manufacturer promises that thanks to Doze Mode and Huawei Smart 3.0 technology, the battery charge will be enough for 1.34 days of battery life of the smartphone with intensive use. Under average load, the gadget can work for up to two days (with one SIM card and Wi-Fi always on). Overnight, the device discharges by about 4% with Wi-Fi turned off.
The downside is the lack of support for fast charging - because of this, the device takes about 2.5 hours to fully charge when turned off.
Battery
Under the plastic cover there is a removable 2200 mAh battery. EMUI 3.1 Lite, like the basic version of this operating system, has three operating modes. Energy saving mode disables most smartphone functions, leaving only the basic ones - calls and SMS messages. With it, Honor 5A can work for several days.
The performance and balanced modes function ineffectively in this case (let's hope that this omission will be corrected with OS updates). The difference in autonomy between them was about 10 minutes. In total, the smartphone lasted almost 7 hours in our proprietary test. It took just over two hours to fully charge the battery.
Camera
The photographic capabilities of the Honor 5A are provided by 13 MP main and 5 MP front sensors. Both smartphone cameras are equipped with flashes: a bright double flash for the main one, and a single-color flash for the front one.
The power of the latter is enough to snatch from complete darkness the face of a person taking a selfie, but the sensor still cannot cope with the lack of light and the image is covered with numerous multi-colored dots of artifacts. Thus, the front camera is still not suitable for night photography, but it can somewhat compensate for the lack of light at dusk.
Does the main camera take good pictures? Rather yes than no. The results greatly depend on the shooting conditions, but if we evaluate the Honor 5A relative to its competitors, it is not inferior to them. The only thing that spoils the impression is the somewhat “scattered” autofocus. It doesn't always work correctly.
