Difference Between Huawei Ascend P1, P1 S and Samsung Galaxy S II

Huawei Ascend P1, P1 S vs Samsung Galaxy S II | Speed, Performance and Features Reviewed | Full Specs Compared
 

At events like International Consumer Electronic Show, we expect records to be broken, and new trends to be set. That is because it’s a summit where most of the innovative vendors take up the stage to introduce their newest products. Many of these products have been rumors for quite some time, but only validated at the event. When they are officially released, we start redefining what we know about smartphones and mobile devices and re-learn to be flexible to accept the changes. One such change we had to commit to our knowledgebase was to update the world’s thinnest smartphone. It used to be Motorola’s but now the crown is on Huawei’s head. With the introduction of Huawei Ascend P1 S, they have beaten the record of Motorola and produced the world’s slimmest smartphone according to the claim of Richard Yu, the chairman of Huawei Devices.

Been the slimmest phone wouldn’t land you with good performance. That’s where what’s inside comes into play. Fortunately, Huawei has gotten that balance just right to include the best hardware out there to Ascend P1 S. They have also released a version called Ascend P1 that is thicker than the P1 S, yet has a more powerful battery for long lasting device. This is indeed a good strategy serving the needs of the consumers without harming their perspectives on essentials. The beauty in that is, the one who wants the slimmest smartphone will get that and the one who wants the smartphone to come with more battery will buy the latter and at the end of the day, Huawei is the winner satisfying both personas. To make the comparison interesting, we decided to compare it with Samsung Galaxy S II initially for it has been the trend setter in the niche market segment Ascend is trying to address. Galaxy S II is a much matured and renowned product of the Galaxy family and has a valiant history. Without much introduction, let’s try to figure out the differences between these two handsets.

Huawei Ascend P1 S

The slimmest smartphone in the world scores a thickness of 6.7mm and has dimensions of 127.4 x 64.3mm and weighs 130g. It sure is incredibly thin, and Huawei has made sure to make it look elegant, yet small. It has square edges and comes in a Black flavor. We think it might get sometime before you get used to having it in your hands, even though, it certainly doesn’t make your hand hurt. Huawei has given Ascend a 4.3 inches Super AMOLED capacitive touchscreen featuring 960 x 540 pixels of resolution at 256ppi of pixel density. The screen is also reinforced with Corning Gorilla glass, to make it scratch-resistant.

The Huawei Ascend P1 S does indeed ascend with the 1.5GHz Cortex A9 dual core processor on top of TI OMAP 4460 chipset and PoweVR SGX540 GPU. It is backed up by 1GB of RAM, and the operating system is Android OS v4.0 IceCreamSandwich. This set up works very well in any given environment regardless of what you’re trying to do. May it be browsing, may it be a movie, and may it be gaming or May it be all of these at once, yet the processor would make the switches seamlessly and smoothly showing the power of the processor and operating system. Huawei has blessed Ascend P1 S with HSDPA connectivity and it also features Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n for continuous connectivity. We are content about the fact that Ascend can also act as a Wi-Fi hotspot and host some of your friends for a quick session of surfing.

The camera is an important part of a smartphone and Huawei Ascend comes with 8MP camera with autofocus and dual-LED flash with geo tagging enabled. Huawei also promises that we can use the camera for HDR images, which is fun. It can record 1080p HD videos at 30 frames per second. Since Ascend also has a front facing camera, it is ideal for video conferences bundled together with Bluetooth v3.0. We don’t have more information about the battery apart from the capacity that is to be 1670mAh, and we guess it’ll hold for around 6 hours.

Huawei Ascend P1

Ascend P1 also belongs to the same series as Ascend P1 S and has the same features, but slightly thicker with a measurement of 7.69mm and weighs only 110g . P1 also has a more powerful battery than P1 S, and which is 1800mAh.

Samsung Galaxy S II

Samsung is the leading smartphone vendor in the world, and they have actually gained much of their popularity though Galaxy family. It’s not just because Samsung Galaxy is superior in quality and uses cutting edge technology, but it’s because Samsung is also concerned about the usability aspect of the smartphone and make sure that has the due attention. Galaxy S II comes in either Black or White or Pink and has three buttons at the bottom. It also has the same curved smooth edges Samsung gives to Galaxy family with an expensive looking plastic cover. It is really light weighing 116g and thin too having a thickness of 8.5mm.

The renowned phone was released in April 2011 and came with a 1.2GHz ARM Cortex A9 dual core processor on top of Samsung Exynos chipset with Mali-400MP GPU. It also had 1GB of RAM. This was top notch configuration back in April, and even now only a few smartphones surpass the configurations. The operating system is Android OS v2.3 Gingerbread, and luckily Samsung promises an upgrade to V4.0 IceCreamSandwich soon. Galaxy S II has two storage options, 16 / 32 GB with the ability to expand the storage using a microSD card upto 32 GB more. It comes with 4.3 inches Super AMOLED Plus Capacitive touchscreen featuring a resolution of 480 x 800 pixels and a pixel density of 217ppi. While the panel is of superior quality, the pixel density could have been somewhat advanced, and it could have featured a better resolution. But nonetheless, this panel reproduces images in a great manner that would catch your eye. It has HSDPA connectivity, which is both fast and steady, along with Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n and it can also act as a Wi-Fi hotspot, which is really attractive. With the DLNA functionality, you can stream rich media directly to your TV wirelessly.

Samsung Galaxy S II comes with 8MP camera with autofocus and LED flash and some advanced functionalities. It can record 1080p HD videos at 30 frames per second and has Geo-tagging with the support of A-GPS. For the purpose of video conferences, it also features a 2MP camera on the front bundled with Bluetooth v3.0. Besides the normal sensor, Galaxy S II comes with a gyro sensor and the generic android applications. It features Samsung TouchWiz UI v4.0 which gives a good user experience. It comes with 1650mAh battery and Samsung promises a talk time of 18 hours in 2G networks, which is simply amazing.

Conclusion

When you read up to here, I won’t blame you if you have made up your mind on what’s really the best handset for you. Sometimes it’s rather easy to pick one out and make the other a loser. Sometimes when we don’t know the apparent need that calls for the purchasing decision, it’s really an excruciating process. But if we are to consider the duo factor by factor and determine which one excels, it’d be a fair objective comparison. As we’ve been saying, Huawei Ascend P1/P1 S has a better processor and more competitive edge for it already runs on ICS, while Galaxy S II will have to wait some more till it gets the update. Huawei Ascend also has a better screen although panel itself is better in Galaxy S II. Oh and Huawei Ascend is the slimmest smartphone in the world and that certainly is going to be a deal magnet. We reckon more than a simple majority of buyers will be attracted to buy the slimmest mobile phone of the world. Apart from these, there are no apparent differences and we think the difference in performance might be visible, but won’t affect the user experience at all under current circumstances. So sometimes, the slimmest smartphone might be your choice, or the matured Samsung Galaxy S II might be your choice, either way, final justification is up to you.