Nubia Red Magic 7 Pro Review
Introduction and specs
Just like last year, the new Red Magic 7 series from nubia comes in two flavors – standard and Pro. We already reviewed the vanilla model, so we know what to expect from the higher tier. After all, the two phones are fairly similar, with only a couple of marginal differences. Or maybe not so marginal?
Perhaps one of the most notable advantages of the 7 Pro over its non-Pro sibling is the battery. The 7 Pro adds an extra 500 mAh over the 4,500 mAh but still uses a 65W PD 3.0 charger. That applies to the Global market. The Chinese counterpart gets a speedier 135W-capable brick.
Then we have the UD selfie camera, which has helped a bigger screen-to-body ratio, and it’s a novelty only a few smartphones on the market have. ZTE has a history with this type of approach, releasing the world’s first commercially available UD camera. However, the screen diagonal has remained 6.8,” and the refresh rate has gone down from 165Hz to 120Hz. Arguably, this wouldn’t be an issue as there are hardly any games that can take advantage of
ZTE nubia Red Magic 7 Pro specs at a glance:
- Body: 166.3×77.1×10.0mm, 235g; Glass front (Gorilla Glass 5), glass back, aluminum frame; Pressure sensitive zones (500Hz touch-sensing), Built-in cooling fan, Aviation aluminum middle frame.
- Display: 6.80″ AMOLED, 1B colors, 120Hz, 600 nits, 1080x2400px resolution, 20:9 aspect ratio, 387ppi.
- Chipset: Qualcomm SM8450 Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 (4 nm): Octa-core (1×3.00 GHz Cortex-X2 & 3×2.50 GHz Cortex-A710 & 4×1.80 GHz Cortex-A510); Adreno 730.
- Memory: 128GB 8GB RAM, 128GB 12GB RAM, 256GB 12GB RAM, 256GB 16GB RAM, 512GB 16GB RAM, 512GB 18GB RAM, 1TB 16GB RAM; UFS 3.1.
- OS/Software: Android 12, Redmagic 5.0.
- Rear camera: Wide (main): 64 MP, f/1.8, 26mm, 1/1.97″, 0.7µm, PDAF; Ultra wide angle: 8 MP, f/2.2, 120˚, 13mm, 1/4.0″, 1.12µm; Macro: 2 MP, f/2.4.
- Front camera: 16 MP, f/2.0, 26mm (wide), 1/2.8″, 1.22µm, under display.
- Video capture: Rear camera: 8K@30fps, 4K@30/60fps, 1080p@30/60/120/240fps; Front camera: 1080p@30/60fps.
- Battery: 5000mAh; Fast charging 65W – Global, Fast charging 135W, 100% in 15 min (advertised) – China, Power Delivery 3.0.
- Misc: Fingerprint reader (under display, optical); NFC; 3.5mm jack.
Of course, the chassis is slightly different, but the design language is familiar, and so is the rest of the hardware. All of the iconic Red Magic features that make the series stand out are here as well. That includes the built-in cooling fan, which, although it may sound gimmicky at first, it’s pretty helpful for sustained performance. An important aspect of every gaming phone.
If you are wondering whether the vanilla option is more sensible at about €630 starting price compared to the €799 Red Magic 7 Pro, continue reading as we try to answer that question in the following pages. Either way, the Pro option is still pretty competitive for the feature set.
Unboxing the ZTE nubia Red Magic 7 Pro
The box is identical to the one holding the standard version and contains the same things – user manuals, the 65W Power Delivery 3.0 charger and a corresponding USB-C to USB-C cable.
The transparent silicone case is also at hand, which is nice because it won’t fully conceal the design.
Design and ergonomics
The Red Magic 7 Pro has much of the same design with just a few key differences. For instance, the display is officially confirmed to be protected by Gorilla Glass 5, and the camera island on the back has a different shape. Oh, and the front has a slimmer top bezel because of the UD camera, but more on that later.
The camera bump on the back takes a square-ish shape with the cameras, and the LED flash in a square formation for the sake of symmetry. The camera module sits on a brushed metal plate surrounded by a glass cover. We once again received the Supernova paint job, which is practically a semi-transparent back. You can see where the chipset, the memory chips are and, of course, the iconic fan-cooled system.
The cooling fan has an RGB LED lighting showing through the glass and drawing air from the back grille that cuts in the metal plate. The exhaust vent is placed right next to the fan itself. Interestingly enough, the vanilla Red Magic 7 had an extra grille on the left side of the frame. Now there’s only the gaming mode mechanical switch.
Speaking of, we have a flat anodized aluminum frame with the touch-sensitive shoulder trigger on the right side along with the power button and the volume rocker. The bottom accommodates the SIM card tray (no microSD slot), one of the speaker grilles and the USB-C connector. The top side of the frame has the 3.5mm audio jack and the second opening for the other loudspeaker.
Unlike the standard 7, the Pro has a dedicated grille for the other loudspeaker, supposedly because of the top bezel. Since there’s no need for a thick bezel to house a selfie camera, the top frame of the display has only the earpiece opening to hold. This leaves the bottom bezel a bit thicker-looking but goes well with the side ones.
This change might not be such a good idea because you want a bit thicker top and bottom bezels on a gaming smartphone to avoid any mistouches when holding the device in landscape orientation. Also, the side metal frame is now completely flat, and it’s hard to feel the shoulder triggers. The vanilla had deeper grooves helping with that.
The slightly curvy back is rather comfortable to hold, but still slippery. And the added weight and thickness over the proper 7, makes the Pro even more unwieldy. It’s a 6.8-inch smartphone tipping the scale at 235g while the profile measures exactly 10mm. It’s been a while since we’ve held a 10mm handset.
Game space and other gaming features
The new Game space has been vastly improved along with the in-game overlay. The latter can now display CPU and GPU frequency, and you can now monitor your real-time FPS as well. The better integration with some messaging apps, including Discord, is much appreciated. There’s quick access to the ones supported (WhatsApp, Facebook and Telegram are on the list) and opens up a small window, which you can move around, open in full-screen or resize.
The sidebar now seems more refined, and you can scroll the quick toggles. They were pretty limited last time we used Game Space.
Some additional Game Space features and settings can be found in the Game Space Center by tapping on the icon in the upper-right corner. A quick summary of how much and which games you’ve played recently is available, control network settings, customize barrage messages (a pretty neat feature to read your texts while in-game).
A new set of features that appear to be supported in almost all games can be found in the Power Base menu at the bottom of the Game Space’s home screen. A wide selection of plugins. One of them adds a customized crosshair in shooters and even zooms in on the crosshair. A handy countdown for your enemy’s cooldowns on certain spells and skills is also available. We can definitely see some of those features giving you some competitive advantage.
An under-the-hood gaming-related feature is the so-called Smart game that intelligently controls the phone’s temperature by ramping up the cooling fan when needed and also analyzes the game’s capabilities to match an adequate refresh rate. It doesn’t say that it’s doing a proper variable refresh rate. It just chooses between the standard 60, 90, 120 and 165Hz steps that the display offers.
This feature is still called Touch Choreographer, going by nubia’s press release, and it says it has been improved even further. The display’s refresh rate is adjusted dynamically and in real-time, but we are still not convinced that it can make incremental steps by 1 or 10Hz. It probably just chooses the most appropriate refresh rate from the existing HRR steps. All in all, nubia claims that the new Touch Choreographer should improve frame stability by up to 50%.
But by far, the best gaming feature would be the shoulder triggers. Even more responsive than before (the difference is rather negligible, though), they provide a really nice experience for racing and first-person shooter games. It’s so much better to have some physical keys for certain controls during gaming. The software lets you map certain controls to the triggers and adjust the pressure sensitivity to avoid mistouchessuch a fast refresh rate.
source:padihub