Tech Blog #221 | Huawei Pura 80 Ultra : Switchable Telephoto Lenses !!
#Huawei has been doing unique experiments in their flagship #smartphone lineup. Last year, they implemented a retractable lens on the main camera of the Ultra flagship. But the thing is, they experiment with new things, but they won't update them. It's just one time, and they'll move into something new. And they did this time, too.
The Huawei Pura 80 series was released recently with 4 smartphones: Huawei Pura 80, Huawei Pura 80 Pro, Pura 80 Pro+, and Pura 80 Ultra. And like always, the Ultra is the highlight. And this time, like always, they came up with a camera trick, and it sounds interesting. But before that, let's take a look at the whole picture.
The Huawei Pura 80 Ultra is made with a quality build with glass panels on the front and back, toughened by Kunlun Glass, and an aluminum frame. Just like other flagships, the Huawei Pura 80 Ultra is also IP 68/69 rated. Actually, all these things are common to all Pura 80 series.
The 6.8-inch display looks great with quad curves, but it's so subtle, barely curving, making it more practical and durable. It's an LTPO AMOLED display that can vary its refresh rate down to 1Hz. And its brightness could go up to 3000 nits.
Funny thing is, Huawei didn't reveal the processor that their Pura 80 series is going to be powered by. I think they were unable to make a huge difference in performance from last year's Kirin 9010. It's a big issue for Huawei. All other flagship processors are in a 3nm node build, but Huawei is stuck at 7nm. And this affects both performance and power efficiency.
The camera department is quite a charmer. A 1-inch type 50MP sensor as the main sensor seems nice with its automatic bokeh effect. The 40MP ultrawide camera with Autofocus literally acts as 2 cameras. And another sensor acts as 2 cameras. It's the massive 1/1.28-inch periscope telephoto sensor (50MP) attached to two lenses. You get 3.7x and 9.4x optical zoom with sensor-shift OIS. The sensor moves and gathers light through the right lens to create the images. It sounds crazy, but it doubts the practicality.
The battery department is always strong of Huawei. The Huawei Pura 80 Ultra is powered by a 5700mAh battery, but it doesn't use the newest Si/C technology. Still, it uses Li/Po technology, and it could be a reason for the 220g weight of the device. Regardless of that, it can be fast charged by 100W by the given charger or by an 80W wireless charger, which are crazy charging speeds.
When it comes to Huawei, we all know that there's an Elephant in the room: Google Support. The Huawei Pura 80 Ultra comes with HarmonyOS 5.1, which is surely based on Android. But it won't come with preinstalled Google Apps. But that doesn't mean that you can't install Google. You can but you'll have trouble installing some apps like banking apps.
The Huawei P50 Pro was the last Huawei flagship was released in Sri Lanka. So with practical issues I don't think this device may released in Sri Lanka. But you can see some smuggled P60, Pura 70 devices in the market. But I don't recommend going for it.