OPPO RX17 PRO review - camera phone with flagship performance and NFC

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

One of the first smartphones on Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 got a unique night mode, cool design and can fully charge in 40 minutes.

The Chinese company OPPO has brought another smartphone to Russia - RX17 PRO. Someone may call him another average peasant, but this is not so. As a base, the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 processor is chosen, which is designed to erase the line between expensive flagships and mass middlings. For the sake of bright and night photos, OPPO has built in variable aperture optics. The amount of artificial intelligence is such that you just need to press the shutter button and get the perfect photo. In the end, an NFC chip is added, which is not typical for OPPO.

Design and construction

OPPO RX17 PRO is built on the same metal chassis as the flagship Find X. The location of the buttons and SIM card tray, as well as the crescent-shaped design of the ends are identical. There is no 3.5 mm audio jack, there is no certified protection against dust and moisture penetration.

The highlight is in the rear panel. It is made of frosted 3D glass and therefore does not collect prints. Additional coverage creates a hazy gradient effect. The panel is painted in three colors, and one flows into another, and depending on the angle of incidence of light, the tone and nature of the transition changes. The very case when it is better to see once.

The manufacturer used Gorilla Glass 6, so the smartphone is not afraid to drop. OPPO claims that the gadget will survive a series of 15 falls from a height of one meter.

The front is a solid screen without bends at the edges, the thinnest bezels and a "droplet" with a front camera at the top. It looks concise and pleasant.

The OPPO RX17 PRO comes with a soft silicone case and headphones with a USB Type-C connector. There is no adapter for 3.5 mm.

Display

OPPO RX17 PRO received a 6.4-inch AMOLED screen with an aspect ratio of 19, 5: 9. The resolution is 2,340 × 1,080 pixels. Compared to the display of the flagship Find X, it is slightly cooler, but the brightness and contrast levels are similar. A protective film is glued to the screen, you don't have to change it.

Performance

OPPO RX17 PRO became one of the first smartphones on the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 chipset. This solution is especially so because it brings the mass mid-price segment and the top-end one closer together, offering flagship chips for little money. The chipset has eight cores, but if we usually had four productive cores and four energy efficient ones, this time we got a pair of powerful Cortex-A75 with a maximum frequency of up to 2.2 GHz and six energy efficient Cortex-A55 with 1.7 GHz.

The GPU Adreno 616 is responsible for the graphics, the Spectra 250 image processor is responsible for the camera, photo and video processing, the Hexagon 685 neuroprocessor for the artificial intelligence functions. It is noteworthy that the flagship Snapdragon 845 includes the same neuroprocessor and almost the same image processor.

With a 10nm process technology and custom Kryo 360 core architecture, the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 outperforms the previous 600th generation. Qualcomm itself compares the 710 to the 660, which crowns the 600 series. So, with an overall increase in productivity of 20%, the increase in energy efficiency of the 710th compared to the 660th reached 40%.

Okay, these are all numbers, but how is it really? OPPO RX17 PRO proved to be powerful enough to play the reference PUBG Mobile at high graphics settings - gadgets on Qualcomm Snapdragon 660 could only be mastered by average ones. In AnTuTu testing, the OPPO RX17 PRO smartphone scores 167 thousand points, in PCMark - 8, 7 thousand. This is the level of flagships from two years ago on Snapdragon 821.

As a result, the picture turns out as follows: although in terms of numbers in the tests, the OPPO RX17 PRO lags behind the hellishly expensive flagships, in real life, including in graphically loaded games, it allows all the same.

The amount of RAM OPPO RX17 PRO is typical for the mid-price segment and is 6 GB. The built-in memory is 128 GB, and this is so much that the manufacturer decided to abandon the microSD card slot.

Cameras

There are a lot of innovations in the RX17 PRO cameras, which is why the smartphone shoots perfectly in any conditions, be it a sunny day, a backlight or a dark night. Actually, night shooting is the strong point of RX17 PRO: the gadget is optimized for this task.

The parameters of the main camera are as follows: 12-megapixel Sony IMX362 sensor with a pixel size of 1, 12 microns, aperture f / 1, 5 and f / 2, 4, two-pixel autofocus, three-axis optical image stabilization.

Probably the most unique feature is the smart aperture of the main camera. The optics aperture will physically change! Yes, there is no blade diaphragm and only two positions are possible - f / 1, 5 and f / 2, 4, but this is already a breakthrough. The aperture takes f / 1, 5 in night shooting and low light conditions, for everything else there is f / 2, 4.

Other features of the camera are already related to software. These are intelligent scenario recognition, color matching that reconstructs colors for natural tones, and Ultra Night. Let us dwell on the latter in more detail.

With a wide aperture of f / 1.5, optical image stabilization and intelligent image processing algorithms, the RX17 PRO is capable of capturing bright, clear, detailed night shots at fast shutter speeds.

However, OPPO went further and developed a special Ultra Clear mode - a kind of night HDR. The smartphone takes several frames with a shutter speed of 1 second, processes them and gives the final picture. It turns out beautifully, especially if you shoot the lights of the city at night. Note that neon signs are sharp and easy to read. No soft highlights or white spots.

In all other conditions, the shooting results of the RX17 PRO are also at their best: it correctly detects scenes, competently fulfills the automatic RAW HDR mode, which expands the dynamic range, and gently blurs the background when shooting a portrait without harming the model's outline.

In addition to the main dual camera, there is a third 3D-TOF camera at the back, which is used to create 3D models.

The selfie camera, oddly enough, is simple (as in the OPPO F7): a 25-megapixel Sony IMX576 module with an aperture of f / 2, 0. Selfie processing is done by SelfieTune 2.1 algorithms based on artificial intelligence. The smartphone recognizes race, gender, age, evaluates a face by 296 points, compares it with a database of 8 million portraits, and only then makes adjustments.

Connection

RX17 PRO became the first OPPO smartphone in Russia to receive NFC (yes, there is no such chip even in the flagship OPPO Find X). This means that the RX17 Pro allows you to use the G Pay contactless payment system.

NFC is full-fledged, supports the MIFARE Classic specification. For example, you can not only check the balance of your Troika card, but also top up it in the My Travel Card application.

The rest of the set of wireless interfaces is common for a smartphone in 2018: dual-band Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5 with support for aptX HD and LDAC codecs, GPS / GLONASS satellite receiver, LTE Cat.15 support. Of course, two SIM cards.

Software

OPPO has installed the new Color OS 5.2 operating system in RX17 PRO based on Android 8.1 Oreo.

We talked about the main chips of ColorOS in the reviews of other OPPO smartphones, such as Find X and A5. Here we will restrict ourselves only to innovations.

A "Smart Panel" appeared - a pop-up multitasking menu through which you can call other applications, including in windowed mode, as well as start recording video from the screen, take a screenshot, send files. Unfortunately, there are not so many compatible programs: you can add instant messengers, YouTube and Facebook clients to the Smart Panel. And that's all. The list of compatible applications will continue to grow. How quickly depends not only on ORRO, but also on software developers.

Improved built-in video editor. Now, in addition to trimming the video and applying color filters, you can change the speed of video playback, and not only speed up but also slow down, add special effects and a soundtrack, apply a theme to make a beautiful video.

In addition, there are other important updates scattered around ColorOS 5.2. For example, the SOS function to notify selected subscribers about your location, calling the "Google Assistant" by long pressing the power button, the ability to listen to the sound from the video with the screen off.

Security

In addition to the traditional face recognition system for OPPO, fingerprint authentication has been added to the RX17 PRO. Interestingly, the scanner is located under the screen and is equipped with an optical sensor, and therefore reacts even to wet hands. The technology works accurately, but slightly slower than conventional scanners. Together with the aforementioned face recognition system, it creates a feeling of complete protection of the smartphone.

Since the front camera in RX17 PRO is ordinary and without any infrared projectors, the gadget will not recognize you in complete darkness. This is where the fingerprint comes in.

Battery life

Like the flagship OPPO Find X, the new RX17 PRO features SuperVOOC fast charging. Thanks to her, the gadget is fully charged in 40-50 minutes and as much as 40% in just 10 minutes.

The smartphone has two batteries of 1,850 mAh, which gives a total of 3,700 mAh. This is enough for a day and a half of mixed mode use. Testing the battery in PCMark showed that 80% of the charge is enough for the smartphone to work without interruption with the screen turned on in various modes for more than 11 hours. This is a good result.

Important: SuperVOOC only works with a proprietary power adapter and USB Type-C cable. These accessories are equipped with chips that are responsible for the safety of charging and current conversion. Without them, RX17 PRO charges in 2 hours.

Summary

OPPO RX17 Pro turned out to be one of the most interesting devices on the market, and here's why.

pros

1. Thanks to the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 processor, the smartphone copes with the same tasks as the flagship, although it itself represents the mid-price segment. This is exactly what the mainstream tech-savvy user on a budget was missing. However, this plus can be safely attributed to all subsequent devices based on the 710 processor.
2. Traditionally, for OPPO, we got a cool camera with which you can simply shoot any scenes and get beautiful photos.
3. SuperVOOC fast charging is really fast. You don't have to plug your smartphone into an outlet at night - just 10 minutes in the morning while you brush your teeth.
4. Finally, NFC has appeared - now you can use OPPO to pay for goods at the checkout. Anyway, RX17 PRO is the first OPPO smartphone that is perceived as a whole. After all, NFC is nowhere else, and that's why even the flagship Find X seemed "cut off", because for a lot of money you want to get at least a standard package.
5. Futuristic fingerprint scanner.

Minuses

1. There is no slot for a memory card. But it would hardly be needed: the user already has 128 GB.
2. The lack of an audio jack can be forgiven, but the lack of an adapter from Type-C to 3.5 mm is not. Or is it still possible? They put the headphones on.
3. The camera application is austere, the number of settings is minimal, and although the smartphone is capable of shooting in RAW, this can only be enabled in a third-party application.
4. "Smart panel" at this stage of development of the system does not expand the functionality of ColorOS too much, since it supports few applications.
5. Protection against dust and moisture according to the IPXX standard would not hurt, but so far Chinese manufacturers for some reason bypass it.

OPPO RX17 PRO is worth looking at for those who want a spectacular smartphone with a good camera and an innovative processor, with which you can feel like the owner of an expensive and powerful flagship.

OPPO RX17 PRO sales will start on November 16 in M. Video, Svyaznoy and OPPO stores. Price - 49,990 rubles.