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Asus released a page from Xiaomi's book offering powerful, affordable hardware when he launched the ZenFone Max Pro M1 (Review) on the market earlier this year. We were impressed by the device when we looked at it because it offered Android stock and a powerful processor, and it even managed to reduce the Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 Pro (Review) in terms of price, which makes it an excellent value for money. With the ZenFone 5Z, Asus seems to be on the lookout again, this time at a higher price and against a very powerful smartphone, the OnePlus 6 (Review).
The all-new Asus ZenFone 5Z sports a Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processors and two cameras at the back, and starts at a surprisingly low price in India. With the ZenFone 5Z, Asus not only creates competition for the OnePlus 6, it also promises more features and benefits at a lower price. But does the ZenFone 5Z have what it takes to be our new flagship budget choice? We are about to find out.
Asus ZenFone 5Z Design
The Asus ZenFone 5Z is available in Meteor Silver and Midnight Blue colors. The phone has a 2.5D glbad in the front and back, while the frame between these layers is aerospace aluminum. Pick it up and you will feel the premium materials used in its construction. Glbad and metal get cold to the touch in an air-conditioned room. While the ZenFone 5Z has a glbad bottom, it does not get the most out of it since it lacks wireless charging. In addition, there is no mention of any kind of waterproofing, so you will have to protect this phone from the elements.
Asus opted for a 6.2-inch screen with a 19: 9 aspect ratio, which makes this phone big and narrow. It has a notch at the top that houses the selfie camera, the earpiece, and a couple of sensors. The ZenFone 5Z has a dual camera configuration stacked vertically at the back, placed over a single LED flash. The flash unit houses a color temperature sensor like the one on the Huawei P20 Pro (Review). The fingerprint reader is well positioned and allows you to quickly unlock the phone.
The positioning of the power button is perfect. Hold the phone in your right hand, and your thumb should support it naturally. The volume rocker is positioned higher, forcing you to mix the phone in your hand to reach it. The SIM card tray is positioned on the left, with one of the three anti-noise microphones of this smartphone. At the bottom of the ZenFone 5Z you'll find a Type C USB port, a speaker grille, the main microphone and a 3.5mm headphone jack. You can spot the antenna lines that cross the frame, and the third microphone is on top
[19659002] Asus ships the ZenFone 5Z with a case and 18W charger in the box. You also get a USB type A to type C cable and a pair of Hi-Res certified in-ear headphones. These headphones sound really good, and you can adjust the sound using the built-in Audio Wizard software on the phone.
Asus ZenFone 5Z Features, Software and Features
Just like the OnePlus 6, the ZenFone 5Z is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 SoC. It is a flagship octa-core processor clocked at 2.8 GHz. The ZenFone 5Z is available in three variants: 6GB of RAM with 64GB of storage, 6GB of RAM with 128GB of storage and 8GB of RAM with 256GB of storage. Our examination unit had 6GB of RAM and 64GB of storage on board.
Storage is expandable using the dual SIM hybrid slot, and the 5Z can support cards up to 2TB. The ZenFone 5Z is a dual SIM device and supports 4G and VoLTE on both slots. The connectivity options on the smartphone include Bluetooth 5.0, WiFi 802.11ac dual band, NFC, GPS, GLONASS and BDS. The ZenFone 5Z supports FM radio, but it does not have an application icon. Instead, Asus has put a shortcut in the notification drawer that is easy to miss.
The front of this camera is dominated by a 6.2-inch Full HD screen that uses Corning Gorilla Glbad 3 for protection. It has good viewing angles and the display becomes bright enough to be usable on the outside. Asus uses the camera's color temperature sensor to adjust the screen automatically based on current ambient lighting, a feature that has worked as expected. You have the option to turn it off and adjust the color temperature manually.
The display on the ZenFone 5Z supports the DCI-P3 color gamut and you can switch between this range and a standard range, or go ahead and change according to your preference. There is also the smart screen function that holds the display when you look at it
[19659002] Asus sends the ZenFone 5Z with Android 8.0 Oreo and ZenUI on top. Asus has not set a schedule for updates, which many companies are currently doing. The ability to hide the notch with a black band is integrated.
Asus also promotes many AI-driven features in the ZenFone 5Z, although the use of the term "AI" a stretch in some cases. AI Charge uses automatic learning to adjust the charging speed according to your established habits to avoid stressing the battery, which other OEMs like Sony have shipped for a while without marketing it as & # 39; 39; & # 39 ;. AI
For example, if you leave the ZenFone 5Z plugged during the night, there is no need for fast charging. The phone will charge itself up to 80%, then pause, then recharge to make it full when you wake up. Asus says that it's better for the health of the battery. Alternatively, the planned billing uses the hours you set manually instead of what the phone learns about your usage patterns. The AI charging mode needs more than a week to learn your charging habits, and so it has not been launched on our evaluation unit. The programmed charging option worked as expected
AI Ringtone uses the phone's microphones to determine the noise level around you and adjust the ringer volume accordingly. We observed that in quiet rooms, the phone rang at a lower volume and gradually increased, but it started loud if the environment was noisy. We found this feature useful.
Most of the custom software additions on the Asus ZenFone 5Z were listed in a submenu Advanced in the settings. Here you can find Twin Apps which allows you to create two instances of compatible applications such as WhatsApp. Game Genie gives you the ability to record gameplay parties or even stream them on YouTube or Twitch. You also see a toolbar Game in the navigation bar when you launch games, offering you options to lock the navigation bar, disable alerts, and clear RAM. A display scaling option allows you to force games to work in 19: 9 format. There is even a way to create macros to record and automate specific actions or gestures, which is unique and could be useful if a game you play requires the same repetitive input.
BeautyLive, a feature we saw for the first time on Asus ZenFone Live (Revue), allows you to use the embellishment when broadcasting a live video. ZeniMoji is the Asus version of Animoji, and allows an emoji to mimic your facial movements. Although it is not as good as Animoji on the iPhone X (Review), it is better than the implementation of Samsung on the Galaxy S9 (Review) and the Galaxy S9 + (Review) . ZenUI Safeguard is a slightly improved security feature that allows you to send an SOS with your current location to emergency services or specific contacts by quickly pressing the power button three times.
ZenMotion allows you to interact with the ZenFone 5Z. You can press twice to wake the phone or put it to sleep. You also have the option to reactivate the phone and launch applications directly by drawing alphabets when the screen is off. Just like with Google's Pixel smartphones, you can slide down on the fingerprint scanner to lower the color of notifications. You can disable an incoming call by returning the phone or answering it automatically when you bring it to the ear. The Advanced submenu also allows you to set the Kids mode and Easy mode, which simplifies the user interface.
Like the old Asus phones, the ZenFone 5Z is compatible with the themes. allows you to manage phone resources. You get a number of Google applications, as well as Facebook, Messenger, Instagram and Asus WebStorage. Although the WebStorage application can be uninstalled, all others can not be disabled. Face recognition is available. It was easy to set up, but it's a little slow to unlock the phone. The OnePlus 6 is faster and the Vivo X21 (Review) is even faster.
Asus ZenFone 5Z performance, autonomy and cameras
The Snapdragon 845 at the heart of the ZenFone 5Z virtually guarantees top-of-the-line performance The only other smartphone currently on the Indian market with this processor is the OnePlus 6, which makes this phone its direct competitor. We have not been confronted with any staggering or stuttering while using the ZenFone 5Z, and this SoC goes through applications and tasks like a hot knife through the butter. With 6 GB of RAM, our examination unit kept applications in the background, saving us time when reloading previously used applications.
Asus says that he uses "AI & # 39; to predict the applications you want to use in the application drawer. It also has an OptiFlex feature that speeds up launch times for your selected applications by allocating them the maximum amount of resources possible.
We performed tests on the ZenFone 5Z and found that it got 2,451 and 9,111 in the Geekbench 4 multicore tests respectively. In AnTuTu, the phone scored 271,861. The phone also handled 60fps in GFXBench T-Rex and 33fps in Car Chase. In 3DMark Extreme Slingshot Open GL, he recorded 4,681 points. The focus of Asus on AI appears when you run tests on the phone because it subtly drops a notification asking you to enable AI Boost mode. We also tried this feature and saw a bump in the benchmark scores.
The ZenFone 5Z is able to play most new game titles without breaking a lot of sweat. We played PUBG, Clash Royale and Asphalt 8, and they were all quick to load. The phone showed no signs of stress during their operation. Clash Royale, being the most basic of these slabs, had no problem running on the ZenFone 5Z. The asphalt 8 worked well even at the highest settings without any delay. PUBG was fast to load and was running with graphics set to HD and framerate set to High by default. The game went well and we did not notice stuttering while playing.
With our daily use of WhatsApp, an active e-mail account, and playing a few games, the phone lasted us one day with 20% to 23h. In our HD video loop test, the phone ran for 10 hours and 42 minutes, a little less than the OnePlus 6, which lasted nearly 11 hours. We have observed that playing games for long periods allows faster discharge of the battery.
You can choose between Performance, Normal, Power Saving, Super Saving and a custom battery saver mode that lets you choose exactly how long the battery lasts. The charger supplied with the Asus ZenFone 5Z is rated at 18W and it takes almost an hour and a half to fully charge the phone.
The dual camera installation on the ZenFone 5Z consists of a 12-megapixel primary camera and an 8-megapixel camera with a wide-angle lens. The main camera has an f / 1.8 aperture and a dual pixel technology for the PDAF, which allows for quick auto focus. The selfie camera has an 8 megapixel sensor. We took the ZenFone 5Z outdoors on a cool, rainy day in Mumbai, and observed condensation inside the camera lens. selfie after being returned to an air conditioned room. It disappeared after a few minutes, and Asus told Gadgets 360 that it was not normal. It could be an isolated problem with our examination unit, and society is studying the issue.
The application of the camera on the Asus ZenFone 5Z is quite simple and easy to use. You get a switch to switch between the two rear cameras, and several fast flip-flops at the top for the HDR, the depth effect, the timer and the flash. Dragging to the left of the main screen shows you all the available filters, while swiping right lets you switch to Pro, Super Resolution, Beauty, Slow Motion, GIF Animation or Time Lapse mode. You also have the option of pinning a mode, giving you quick access from the viewfinder.
AI is also integrated into the camera software on the ZenFone 5Z in the form of AI scene detection and AI Photo Learning. The detection of the AI scene is triggered when you frame a photo. The phone can recognize certain objects or scenes and configure the camera accordingly. During tests, we found that the phone could recognize animals, flowers and people before pressing the shutter button.
With the second feature, AI Photo Learning, the phone suggests editing a photo in the Gallery application. Asus says that if you choose to apply the suggested changes, the phone takes note of your preferences and can apply the same settings to future shots. As it is driven by AI, it can run out a week or two to collect enough samples for the phone to learn. During our review period, we did not see any suggestions appearing.
The photos taken with the ZenFone 5Z are pretty good, and we found that it was quick to focus and get exposure just during the day. It is also quick to evaluate the scene and activate the HDR automatically. The photos had good amounts of detail and the objects at a distance were still recognizable. Macro photos are easy to take and the phone manages a sharp image with a good separation between the subject and the background. We also appreciated the color accuracy of our macro samples
Click to see ZenFone 5Z camera samples ]
When shooting at night, the AI Scene function automatically switches to night vision mode, which reduces the shutter speed and activates the night HDR mode if necessary. The shots we took had a good amount of detail and the noise was kept under control. When shooting with the Depth effect on, you have the option to simulate different apertures. Face detection is enabled when shooting in this mode and we found that the detection of the outer contours was very good, but that the ZenFone 5Z had problems with the spaces between the fingers
front camera takes in HDR charge. In low light, you can use a screen flash that is not very bright but enough to brighten your face. Embellishment mode offers different settings to adjust, or you can set it to auto
The video recording reaches a maximum of 4K 60fps with the ZenFone 5Z's main camera. You can use the wide angle camera, but the footage will end at 1080p, just like with the selfie camera. There is EIS for all cameras, which allows to get a stable output. Shots in 4K have stabilized well, and there does not seem to be a time restriction, allowing us to record for more than 10 minutes. Keep in mind that the phone gets hot during video recording for a long time.
Asus ZenFone 5Z in pictures
Verdict
The Asus ZenFone 5Z is marketed from Rs. 29,999 for the variant with 6 GB of RAM and 64 GB of storage that we examined. The higher variants with 6 GB of RAM and 128 GB of internal storage and the other with 8 GB of RAM and 256 GB of storage are priced at Rs. 32,999 and Rs.39,999 respectively. Asus hit the ball right out of the park when it comes to pricing, considering that you have a top-of-the-line Snapdragon 845 processor, good cameras, lots of features, and improved AI software. AI enhancements are useful and improve the overall experience. The cameras work well under different lighting conditions. Asus has targeted the ZenFone 5Z directly on the OnePlus 6 (Review), and at Rs 29,999 it is drastically reducing this popular option.
Asus told Gadgets 360 that the ZenFone 5Z will be available over the counter, but it's the same thing about the ZenFone Max Pro M1, so availability could be a problem. If you are looking for a powerful machine on a budget but find the OnePlus 6 a bit out of reach, you can choose the ZenFone 5Z, and you will not feel like you are settling down.
Asus Zenfone 5Z strengthens OnePlus to reduce the price of OnePlus 6? We discussed it on Orbital, our weekly technology podcast, to which you can subscribe via Apple Podcasts or RSS, download the episode, or simply press the play button below.
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