You’ll most certainly by no means use a Tecno telephone. Until this week, I’d by no means heard of the Chinese emblem or its Camon line of handsets. Now, it’s not going I’ll overlook them.
The corporate just lately held a swanky New York City release for its new Tecno Camon Series 19 Pro Android 12 telephones even if the goods gained’t be on the market in the USA (or the United Kingdom, for that topic). I in truth questioned what they had been doing there and, extra importantly, why I used to be there.
Tecno insisted on describing the handsets as being “designed for fashionistas.” I may just now not inform you what that implies, however I admit to being intrigued through the design, specifications, and, particularly, the cost.
Key specifications come with:
- 6.8-inch FHD+ nearly edge-to-edge 120 Hz show
- Drill-hole front-facing 32MP digicam
- 64 MP and 50 MP cameras at the again
- 2X optical zoom
- Optical Image Stabilization
- 5,000 mAh battery
- Fingerprint reader
- Face unlocking
- Some nifty AI-infused photograph tips
- a three.5mm headphone jack (!)
- An influence brick, cable, and earbuds (!!)
It’s additionally a shockingly sexy telephone. There’s a fingerprint-rejecting diamond-coated again that appears and feels beautiful. The twin circle digicam array (which properties 3 cameras – there’s a 2MP bokeh-assisting lens), is huge however sublime, its top class seems to be assisted through its crystal glass overlaying. The chassis is most effective quite thicker than an iPhone 13 Pro Max, however the telephone feels significantly lighter.
The Camon 19 Pro comes will all this (and extra) for $280. That’s a telephone it’s good to repay within the area of 5 – 6 months (in case you pay round $50 a month). The Camon Series 19 Pro 5G begins at simply $320. That’s, on each telephones, with 128 GB of garage and 8GB of RAM.
To put that during point of view, the most cost effective iPhone you’ll be able to purchase is the $429 Apple iPhone SE, which has simply 64 GB of garage.
There’s a catch
There are, after all, massive caveats, the largest one being international availability. These Tecno telephones are to be had in Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and Southern Asia, however now not, as I famous previous, in the USA or Europe. Pricing may also range and the $280 and $320 Tecno presented continues to be simply an “estimate” for my marketplace.
There are a lot of limits frequently related to price range telephones like no under-the-screen fingerprint reader. Instead, the ability/wake button doubles as an efficient fingerprint reader. The display screen continues to be LCD and now not OLED. There’s no reported IP ranking (possibly stay it clear of deep puddles). It doesn’t be offering wi-fi charging.
Then there’s the cellular CPU, a MediaTek Helio G96, which is most certainly an identical to a Qualcomm Snapdragon 765G. Its benchmark numbers aren’t even in the similar community as, say, an Apple A15 Bionic or a Snapdragon 8 Gen 1.
So, after I all of a sudden walked out of the development with a evaluate unit in hand and made up our minds to spend an afternoon or so with it, I attempted to level-set my expectancies.
For probably the most section, regardless that, this price range tool exceeded them.
Not dangerous in any respect
As I discussed it’s a fantastic big-screen telephone with a colourful show that, naturally, seems to be very good indoors. Outside is a distinct topic. It struggled in brilliant gentle, however I may just nonetheless see neatly sufficient to make use of its digicam and moderately wealthy settings to take various photographs. Everything from same old to 2x telephoto, and from Portrait to sluggish movement appeared moderately just right. Even low-light and evening photographs had been respectable (not anything would qualify as exceptional). There’s no wide-angle lens, let by myself ultra-wide however the integrated lenses captured sharp, colourful, and correct photographs.
Portrait mode from the rear digicam is just right (the entrance digicam had extra artifacts), regardless that you’ll be able to’t regulate the extent of bokeh earlier than or after the shot (what number of people do that on their iPhone 13 or Samsung Galaxy, anyway?). There is an modifying software that permits you to upload and regulate a bokeh impact on any symbol, nevertheless it’s indirectly tied to Portrait Mode images, which is more or less foolish.
The AI-powered digicam and its efforts to spot items in a scene had been entertaining. At one level, I pointed the telephone at my hand, and it got here up with “Pet.”
There are such a lot of symbol manipulation choices that you can by no means in finding or use all of them. The set for frame manipulation is, at easiest, problematic. It provides to narrow the waistline, head, shoulder, narrow and extend legs, “plump butt,” together with different beauty alterations. Perhaps that is what Techno supposed through a telephone for “fashionistas.”
It used to be, to be honest, exhausting to seek out the ones options and the telephone indubitably doesn’t push them. Still, it’s bizarre that they’re there.
Punching above its weight
For a sub-$300 telephone, the Tecno Camon 19 Pro is moderately the performer. It performed taxing video games like Asphalt 9: Legends with out lacking a beat. I feel it will’ve been shedding a body or two, and the audio might be richer, nevertheless it used to be nonetheless an stress-free enjoy.
It’s an efficient productiveness platform for surfing and report control, and I do love the alphabetically ordered app checklist (Apple, Samsung, please do that).
That 5,000 mAh battery is, through the way in which, an all-day champ.
Basically, that is an above-average telephone at a ridiculously just right value.
Will it ever arrive in the USA and UK? I don’t know and Tecno presented no steerage. I’m now not positive it issues. What the Tecno Camon 19 Pro demonstrates for me is that each one telephone producers can do higher at the affordability entrance. We’re paying up to $999 for robust big-screen telephones that most certainly do way over we’ll ever want them to (no less than for many folks).
The Camon 19 Pro units a pleasing instance for the chances of price range. I feel it’s time Apple, Samsung, and others solution in sort.