News & Reviews:   Huawei Nexus 6P

The Huawei Mate 8 is the company's latest flagship and surprisingly, the official price tag for the device is only RM2099. Even if you go for the premium version (Mate 8 Premium); the price only increases up by RM300. Featuring beautiful design (we got the Moonlight Silver version), very "beast-like" hardware performance according to our videographer and the aforementioned affordable pricing, just how good is the Mate 8? Read below to find out.

Huawei has been on a roll recently, hitting all the right notes, resulting in a net profit of 36.9 billion CNY. While there were profits from the carrier and enterprise business groups, what should be noted was a 73% rise year on year from the consumer business group (they're the ones making the Huawei Mate 8, Huawei Nexus 6P, honor 7 Enhanced, honor 7, honor 5X, Huawei MateBook and just announced Huawei P9 and Huawei P9 Plus).

Huawei Malaysia have just announced that they have brought in both variants of the Huawei Mate 8 with the 3GB RAM Huawei Mate 8 and 4GB RAM Huawei Mate 8 Premium for value busting prices of RM2099 and RM2399 respectively. They also announced the Huawei Nexus 6P Gold Edition, Huawei MediaPad M2 10.0 and Huawei Watch Jewel and Elegant for Malaysia. The Mate 8 smartphones will be available from 11 March 2016 at VMALL.my and Lazada, but sales will start today on 8 March 2016. Telco partners for the Mate 8 include Celcom, Digi, Maxis and RedOne for now.

• Huawei Mate 8 Standard (available in Moonlight Silver and Space Grey) ~ RM2099
• Huawei Mate 8 Premium (available in Champagne Gold and Mocha Brown) ~ RM2399
• Huawei Nexus 6P Gold Edition ~ RM2698
• Huawei MediaPad M2 10.0 ~ RM1299 to RM1999
• Huawei Watch Jewel and Elegant ~ RM2299 / RM1999

Huawei recently announced their MateBook hybrid 2-in-1 tablet at MWC but didn't really detail anything on their upcoming Huawei P9 flagship smartphone. Looks like we may see it sooner than you think as a teaser image of an invite for a Huawei event has appeared. While we're not sure what beer has to do with it, the P9 has been making the rounds in the rumour mill recently with leaks revealing tech specs like a dual rear camera estimated to be 12MP camera sensors much like the one in the Huawei Nexus 6P but perhaps with different lens like on the LG G5.

No other tech specs or features were revealed but we expect it to have the Kirin 950 (or 955) processor, 4GB / 6GB of RAM, 32GB storage and possibly a USB Type-C port. No Malaysia release dates or pricing details yet, but it is expected to come with the Huawei P9 Lite, Huawei P9 Enhanced Edition and Huawei P9 Max. Stay tuned for more details and as always with such rumours do take this with a pinch of salt.

The still unrevealed and unannounced Samsung Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 edge have been having quite a few rumours already, but a recent listing at India's Zauba have supposedly confirmed the sizes of the screen. Listed as for testing, the Galaxy S7 or SM-G390R4 will have a 5.1-inch display while the Galaxy S7 edge or SM-G935R4 will have a 5.5-inch display. According to previous rumours, both will feature a 12MP rear camera, perhaps following the excellent 12MP rear camera on the Huawei Nexus 6P.

Apart from the Huawei Mate 8 and other CES 2016 announcements, Huawei also revealed that they managed to ship 108 million smartphones for 2015, gaining the #3 position in the global smartphone market and the top smartphone position in China. Revenues were more than $20 billion for 2015, almost a 70 percent increase over 2014.

Huawei attributes this success to continuous collaborations made with other top brands such as Google (resulting in the Huawei Nexus 6P), Swarovski (resulting in new Huawei Watch designs)  and Harmon Kardon (resulting in the MediaPad M2 tablets). Here in Malaysia, Huawei not only rolled out the Nexus 6P, Mate S and Honor 7 but also started off their Smart City solution. According to Huawei, 2016 will involve more collaborations, building upon the momentum of their achievements in 2015.

Huawei recently announced the global launch of the Huawei Mate 8 globally at CES 2016. Featuring tech specs that include the latest Huawei HiSilicon Kirin 950 processor, the Mate 8 ups the ante from its previous devices (Huawei Nexus 6P and Huawei Mate S) by also including a 6-inch display, 16MP rear camera with OIS (optical image stabilization) and phase detection autofocus with a 4000 mAh battery. You can see the full tech spec comparison with our comparison tool but it looks like with the global launch the Mate 8 could soon be coming to Malaysia (further supported by a poster from Huawei Device APAC of the Mate 8).

No Malaysia release dates or pricing details but the Mate 8 is currently going from 599 euros (RM2831) for the 3GB RAM/32GB storage version and 699 euros (RM3303) for the 4GB RAM / 64GB storage version. At its initial launch the three variants costs were the 3GB + 32 GB model for CNY 2999 (RM1985.09), 4GB + 64GB for CNY 3699 (RM2448.43) and 4GB + 128GB for CNY 4399 (RM2911.78). 

I have to say that we're quite excited about the Huawei Nexus 6P as it is not only the best Nexus device to date, it is also the only Nexus device with official support from Google Malaysia since forever. As such we've taken a look at what else comes in the box with an unboxing video of the Huawei Nexus 6P. Priced at RM2698, you can now get a free cover and Huawei Earphone with it onVMALL.my and Lazada.com.my. 

Following in the footsteps of the HTC One A9, the HTC One X9 has been officially announced featuring a fairly similar rounded metal body but this time with a plastic band at the top on the back that looks a lot like the Huawei Nexus 6P (which HTC say copied them first) and BoomSound dual front speakers. In any case the HTC One X9 is priced from 2399 CNY (RM1590) which is actually cheaper than the One A9 (2799 CNY) but there are still no Malaysia release dates or pricing details. Check out the HTC One X9 tech specs below:

• Octa-core MediaTek Helio X10 processor
• 3GB RAM
• 32GB storage + microSD
• 5.5-inch display (FHD 1920 x 1080 pixel resolution)
• 13MP rear camera (OIS, LED Flash, 4K video recording) + 4MP UltraPixel front camera
• 153.9 x 75.9 x 7.99mm | 170g
• features 4G LTE, Bluetooth 4.1, WiFi a/b/g/n/ac, GPS, Dolby Audio + HTC BoomSound
• 3000 mAh battery

Having trouble what to get for your friends and family? Fret not, Huawei is here to help with a “Wei To Christmas Gift Guide” (you see what they did there?). The list below will assist you on which of the devices are suitable for your friends and family, so without further ado...