Pay Less, Get More.. 2018 is Messed Up - Honor 8X Showcase
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2019-05-06
·
1,948 words · ~9 min read
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Still a lot to celebrate.
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This is a lot of phone for the money
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and I'm gonna tell you all about it.
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This video is sponsored by Honor.
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So really, Honor's deal has kind of been the same
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ever since the brand launched
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and it's all about sort of more phone for your dollar,
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which isn't to say that you like get more phones,
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although, I mean, if it's, you know,
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a quarter to a third of the price of a flagship,
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I guess you could actually get more phones for your dollar,
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but most people probably wouldn't do that.
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They would just buy one.
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And anyway, I don't know the exact price of this yet.
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So I do know the price of the 8X Max, maybe in the yen,
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but how well that translates into US dollars
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is yet to be known.
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So it's probably somewhere in the 250 to 350 US dollars
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range and what you get for your money is looking pretty good
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because especially if you're into the whole phone
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as a fashion statement thing,
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with the Honor 10 and with the 8X,
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they have put a lot of work
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into making their devices really stand out,
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which is kind of funny
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because you think about how upset Apple was
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all those years ago about,
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oh, everyone's ripping off
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the plain black rectangle visual design of the iPhone.
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And then now, you know, whether it's red or blue or,
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you know, kind of iridescent colors or whatever it is,
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phone manufacturers are going out of their way
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to not look like a plain black rectangle.
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But viewers of this channel are probably less concerned
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with what it looks like
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on the outside and more concerned
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with what's going on on the inside.
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First, though, I should probably mention
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the AI camera from the Honor 10 is back.
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So even though this uses a lower spec Kirin processor,
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the AI functionality,
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which is to say the intelligent battery saving
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and object recognition,
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so whether it's a landscape or an animal, person, food,
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whatever the case may be, that is back.
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So they'll be trying to optimize the image based on that.
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We've got a rear fingerprint sensor.
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Then back around to the front.
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So what's kind of cool about this particular processor,
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so this is the Kirin 710,
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is that it actually uses almost the same CPU cores
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as the 970.
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So it's still got an octa-core processor
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with four stronger ones and four weaker ones,
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but it does have a downgraded GPU.
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So how much that translates to actual performance, though,
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I mean, hey.
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What's better than just firing up an actual game
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and seeing how it runs?
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So I'm gonna whip up PUBG here and see how that goes.
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The way that I see it,
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your player should always be naked
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because it is the mark of how well you're doing in the match,
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how much good gear you can steal from other people.
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I'm actually so glad that the trend to,
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if you have to have bottom firing speakers,
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instead of having it on this side,
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where you're much more likely to be cupping it
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with your palm,
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I'm glad that the trend is to put
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them on this side now.
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Oh, speaking of which,
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there's a headphone jack,
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if you're into that sort of thing.
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It uses micro USB for charging,
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and then there's a bottom-mounted speaker there.
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Oh, I think there's someone to fight up here.
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Oh, this sucks.
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So I'm in the red zone.
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Oh, is someone shooting at me?
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Oh, dang it.
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Where's this loser?
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Why not kill me?
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Did I get him?
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I wanna run this guy down.
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Where he at?
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It's actually pretty loud.
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Oh, I was heavily injured by bombs.
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Oh, I'm still...
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Why do I...
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Whoa, why is it all that green gas
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that comes out when I die?
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So while gaming isn't necessarily a focus for this device,
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it didn't get crazy warm,
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and it was playable,
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even if not the smoothest frame rates.
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So not a bad showing for something
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that's really more about beefy CPU,
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and less about GPU.
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Also, expansion options are a nice touch here.
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Check this out.
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So we've got micro SD expansion,
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which Honor says is good
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for up to 400 gigs and two SIMs.
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And unlike some other devices out there,
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none of them are combo slots.
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So you can install all of those things at the same time.
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So I'm going to throw my SIM
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and my 512 gig micro SD in here.
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512 gigs, it's only rated to 400,
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but yeah, we'll see what happens.
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Oh, I was worried there.
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It said unsupported SD card on the notification.
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Check that out.
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But then you just have to format it.
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Hopefully there's nothing important on it.
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So even though the official support is only 400 gigs,
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once again, our 512 gig card is supported.
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Dang, so you can change the default location,
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internal storage is currently blah, blah, blah, et cetera.
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All requires a restart,
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but you can actually change the default storage location
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to your SD card.
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That's pretty cool.
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Probably not necessary,
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since it comes in either 64 gigs or 128 gigs,
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but it's nice to have the option
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if you're a total data hoarder.
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So now the next thing I wanna see
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is their face unlock uses AI now, apparently,
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to adapt for changing conditions, to lighting,
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changes to kind of the face you're making.
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So what I wanna do is see if we can throw it
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for a bit of a loop here.
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So under normal conditions,
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okay, that was pretty quick.
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You can tell from the lock at the top here.
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Okay, yep, cool.
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Now, why don't we do this?
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Why don't we like kill one of the lights
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or a couple of the lights, actually?
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Let's go ahead and boom, unlock.
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Okay, no problem.
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So you can see it.
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Oh, nevermind.
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I was gonna say it takes a little longer,
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but it didn't on that one.
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Okay, now it's time to start making some faces.
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Got it.
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Took it a little bit that time.
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Ah, got that one pretty easily.
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Not bad, actually.
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Now, of course, facial recognition is less secure
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than some other, I don't know,
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unlock methods, including a fingerprint scanner,
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but it does have one of those as well.
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Something I'd like to see, actually,
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if anyone from Honor's watching,
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is a combo one, like a multi-factor.
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So face scan and fingerprint scan,
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it would be harder to defeat
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if you had to pass both of them at the same time.
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So one of the other key features
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they're really touting for this thing is the AI camera.
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And one thing stood out to me,
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and that's that apparently they're using multiple shots
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and their artificial intelligence engine inside
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in order to sharpen,
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and stabilize low light shots.
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So as you guys can see,
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we're in a fairly dim area of the set.
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So we've got most of the lights off for the WAN Show.
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And you can see it's actually taking more shots.
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That's why that message comes up.
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It's taking more shots after you take your initial picture
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in order to try and sharpen it.
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Here's an interesting thing.
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So here's an iPhone XS Max for comparison.
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Of course, remember,
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this costs three to four times as much or whatever.
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But it does manage to retain more sharpness
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in the image overall.
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And I'd say the color is closer to true life than this.
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This goes for more of like a vibrant poppy look.
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But there's certain elements like that hive text,
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for example,
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that still managed to come through really well
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on this camera.
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So the Razer logo actually has more separation
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on the 8X than it does on the iPhone XS.
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See that?
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Object and scene recognition is back.
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So it identified that it's overcast
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and optimized the conditions for that.
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You can see the sky still has
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some blue in it.
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Maybe more than is actually there,
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but it all depends on what you're after.
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And then also that we're taking a picture of a car.
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And you know, I'm actually curious.
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Do you think it'll recognize my car as a car?
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Hold on, I'm gonna blank it out.
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And then let's see.
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Does it still know that that mess is a car?
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Oh, rip.
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Come on, baby.
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It's like, no, no, this is not a vehicle.
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Nobody should drive this.
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Ouch.
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Every, I was testing this before we turned on the camera.
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There's like other cars behind.
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So see, check this out.
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New car, car.
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Pella's car, also car.
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See, Pella's car, also car.
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Dennis's car.
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Hold on, let's blank it out.
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It's not a car.
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But that, that's a car.
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Drove that thing for years, okay?
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So one of the big things that honors touting with this phone
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is how close the 19 and a half by nine aspect ratio is
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to a cinematic 21 by nine aspect ratio.
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It's like, wow.
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So you do still end up with black bars,
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but not nearly as big as you'd otherwise be dealing with.
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And yes, I'm one of those freaks
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who watches with subtitles on, whatever.
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There's another really cool thing.
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I don't remember exactly how they're doing it,
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but you can see they're actually not that far off
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Apple's chin bar, even though they can't yet.
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I don't remember if it's a patent or an exclusive.
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They can't yet use the same tech
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that Apple's using in the 10 and the 10S.
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So you end up with very little bezel to speak of.
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And you're watching cinematic content.
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So really there's no surprises with the 8X,
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but that's not necessarily a terrible thing.
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So what you're getting is a whole lot of phone for the dollar.
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So it's got four gigs RAM, 3750 milliamp hour battery,
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which with their power optimization from my experience
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should give you a heck of a lot of battery life.
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And of course, strong CPU,
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even if it's kind of a middling GPU
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and all for a very reasonable price.
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Thanks to Honor for not only sponsoring this video,
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but also giving away two Honor phones to two lucky winners
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in the hashtag cheer for Honor 8X giveaway.
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So just post what you love about the Honor 8X
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to Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram
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using hashtag cheer for Honor 8X,
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and they'll select two lucky winners
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to get a brand new Honor phone.
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So that's pretty much it.
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Thank you to Honor for sponsoring this video
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on the Honor 8X.
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Guys, if you hated this video,
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you can go ahead and hit that dislike button.
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But if you liked it, hit like, get subscribed,
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or maybe consider checking out
10:45
where to buy the stuff we featured at the links below.
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Also down there is our merch store,
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which has cool shirts like this one
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and our community forum, which you should definitely join.