Asus ZenFone 8 Review - The Mini Flagship I've always wanted! By The Tech Chap

As, my wife always tells me tom, it's not about the size, it's what you can do with it and I don't think that's ever described a phone as perfectly as the new before 8, and it's kind of like if ASUS have made a flagship version of the pixel, hey guys, I'm from the tech chap and ASUS have sent me both the before 8 and also its bigger brother, the before 8 flip. Now, to be honest at the start, I was more excited about the flip, because well it's got a flipping camera. It is a bit of a chunky monkey, but having all three rear cameras for selfies is awesome and there's not a whole punch cut out in sight. So we get this lovely full screen experience. So I really do like the flip, but it does only have a 90 hertz screen, and also we haven't had official confirmation of a release or even pricing for this in the UK, but regardless of that actually having played with these phones for a couple of weeks now, it's actually the standard, before 8 that I'm a lot more excited about. You guys know the drill.

Normally, what happens? Are we get a big flagship phone like the eight flip, the s21 ultra iPhone 12 Pro max or maybe OnePlus 9 pro and then usually a smaller cut down, cheaper non-pro ultra max flip version, but not this time? This is a 5.9 inch, proper flagship phone which takes the customization and game genie DNA from their dog. Gaming phones combines it with the before design and almost stock android renew software, and then it's given the best specs possible we're talking, snapdragon triple eight 120 hertz AMOLED screen up to a whopping, 16 gigs of ram and 256 storage, 5g, of course, gorilla, glass, Vitus, ip68, stereo speakers and a few extras. You don't normally see like this high-res three and a half mil headphone jack. A proper notification led. I haven't seen one of those in ages and also this nifty customizable power button.

So you can program what a double tap or a long press does. However, there are a few compromises. For example, there's no micro SD card support, so you can't expand the storage uh. We don't get any wireless charging, which is a bit disappointing, there's also no Wi-Fi 6e support, which I would have thought we'd have given the snapdragon triple a chip. Also, we get GUI glass vectors on the front uh, but on the back and the camera lens, it's just gorilla glass, three, but most significantly we do only get two camera lenses on the back uh, which both use last year's Sony sensors, although the main and ultrawide lenses double as a macro and telephoto, but this setup doesn't quite compete with the best camera phones out there by the way.

If you do enjoy this video and want to see more from me, perhaps then a cheeky little subscribe would be lovely now design wise. It's definitely got a Pixel 4a, slash, pixel, 5 kinds of vibe when you first pick this up, except this has an in-screen fingerprint reader and well proper high-end specs. Now, as you can see, it's not as small as the 5.4 inch iPhone 12 mini, but I actually find that to be a little too small and I kind of think the before's got it just right, the Goldilocks size, if you will but hilariously there is also a one-handed mode. If you just want to go crazy small. So at this stage, given everything I've told you how much do you think this is? How much do you think it costs? Well, I can tell you that in the UK this will start from 539 pounds or 599 euros in Europe.

Obviously, and that will get you six gigs of ram and 128 storage. You can pay an extra 60 quid if you want eight gigs of ram, but this tops out at 699 pounds so 700 quid, basically uh, which doubles the storage and doubles the ram up to a frankly ludicrous 16 gigabytes of the stuff, which really does just complete the napoleon complex that this phone has and for context. The same spec, before 8 is actually 30 pounds cheaper than the OnePlus 9, and also the cheapest pixel 5, and also the cheapest iPhone 12 mini uh costs the same as the most expensive, before 8 at 699. So actually, if you go for the cheapest model of this, which I probably would recommend you do, that's all you need really, then you'll actually save yourself 160 pounds. So in many ways ASUS is becoming the new OnePlus flagship, specs slick software decent, although not best in class cameras and fantastic value for money and actually like OnePlus.

Another reason I really do like this is the software we get android 11 with ASUS zenui8 on top, but it's near enough stock android. So there's no bloatware or heavily customized UI to slow things down, but we do get a few handy extras, including a few features from their ROG gaming phones. For example, they've lifted the animation speed settings from the usually hidden developer options. I've put everything to 0.5 times to speed up all the animations. Also like the origin phone 5, I recently reviewed.

We have these power options that you can switch between. I tend to just leave it on dynamic, and it will automatically go to high performance in games, but if you jump into advanced mode in particular, you can really get under the hood and start tinkering with the settings and then, when you are gaming, the ROG pedigree comes into play with the game genie. All this is missing is a couple of shoulder buttons and maybe a fan attachment, and it will be a proper gaming phone now. I was actually really curious how the battery would hold up, because in the big brother, the before 8 flip, we have a 5 000 million power cell versus 4 000 in the before 8, which obviously isn't as big, but then it's a lot smaller size so versus the 8 flip. After an hour of YouTube and half an hour of gaming, the 8 had 72 percent of its battery left versus 75 on the 8 flip.

Although bear in mind the flip does have a lower 90 hertz refresh, but then again they are both set to automatic modes. So the battery isn't quite as good as the 8 flip, but it'll still easily get you a full day, and we also get a fast 30 watt hyper charger in the box. It is just a bit of a shame that we don't have wireless charging, however, in what is otherwise a pretty exceptional phone, the cameras are a little less impressive. We have a 64 megapixel main lens with is, which uses last year's Sony mix 686 sensors, along with a 12 megapixel ultra-wide, using an IMAX 363. , so we're not getting the latest camera tech, but we do get two times: lossless zoom from the main lens, and also the ultra-wide doubles as a pretty decent macro, with a four centimeter focal range.

Now, obviously, there are constraints around the size of the phone, so we can't expect a crazy periscope, zoom lens or anything, but I think my bigger issue is the processing, particularly with faces. Somehow photos can look both too soft and over sharpened at the same time. Take this regular photo of me, for example, my skin has very little texture, yet the fine detail in my hair and my jacket looks a little too sharp and then switching to portrait mode. The lighting changes completely, and the colors are quite washed down, but then in other situations it does quite well and actually side by side with the galaxy s21 ultra that costs over twice as much it trades blows. Although in low light, the before's dynamic range can't quite keep up with less detail and darker areas and the bright highlights a little overexposed but again for the price.

It's pretty good. We can also shoot in up to 8k at 24fps. Although genuinely I stick with 4k30, and it's nice and smooth thanks to is and then up front, we have a 16, megapixel, selfie and ASUS claims that it's the first phone to use Sony's brand new imx663 sensor, which also offers much faster dual phase: detection autofocus, which all sounds lovely on paper, but even with the beauty modes turned off, I still think photos. Look quite artificial. Skin texture is too soft.

The colors are a bit washed out, and every shot makes me look even more pale than I actually am, and so on the whole, I'm not super impressed. Although to be fair, I have been testing this with pre-release software, so updates may be able to tweak things a little so great specs and performance, and almost stock android UI with a few extras, which is nice and also a really comfortable, one-handed design, which you just don't see very often, plus it undercuts the competition when it comes to the price so from just 540 quid. If you can make do with a good rather than great camera, and also don't mind missing out on wireless charging or micro SD card support, then I think the before 8 is definitely worth a look, and actually it's perfect to see some proper flagship competition in a phone this size. So you don't have to just go for a mid-range pixel or jump ship to uh an iPhone 12 mini. I do just wish ASUS would put a bit more of their efforts into the camera department.

But what do you reckon? Do you miss smaller phones, and would you be tempted to buy the before 8? Let me know in the comments below and also uh drop a link below. If you do want to check this out. Thank you so much for watching guys, don't forget to hit that subscribe button and ding that bell uh, so you'll be the first to see when I publish a new video, and I'll see you next time right here on the tech chat just watching.

Source : The Tech Chap