Huawei sub-brand Honor has recently launched two popular smartphones in the Indian market, the budget-oriented Honor 7X and the affordable flagship, Honor View10. The company is now gearing up to launch another budget smartphone with four cameras, similar to the Honor 9i which was launched a few months ago in India. Honor has dropped another hint that the device in question here could very well be the Honor 9 Lite.
The Honor 9 Lite was launched in China in late-December and has a camera setup similar to the Honor 9i, which retails for Rs. 17999 in India. The company, in a press release, has conceded that the upcoming device will have a glass unibody, exactly like the Honor 9 Lite:
Ensuring its consumers to stay connected while in style, the new smartphone will be equipped with a sleek looking glass unibody with mirror effect rear glass, similar to what has been seen in premium smartphones like Honor 8 and Honor 9, and other smartphones like Apple iPhone X.
Teaser image shared by the company
The Honor 9 Lite shares a lot of similarities with the other two Honor devices in the sub-20K price categories, the Honor 7X and Honor 9i. The Honor 9 Lite has the same Kirin 659 chipset as the other two phones, a quad-camera setup like the Honor 9i and thin bezel-less design. THe differentiating factor here will be the build quality and most importantly, the price.
It has a 5.65-inch IPS LCD display with a 2160 x 1080 px resolution which translates into an 18:9 aspect ratio.
Under the hood, the Honor 9 Lite has the HiSilicon Kirin 659 chipset, an octa-core processor, the Mali-T830 MP2 GPU, 3GB or 4GB of RAM and storage options of 32GB and 64GB. It is worth noting that the onboard storage will be expandable up to 256GB via a microSD card. The fingerprint sensor is placed at the back and the bottom bezel on the front houses the Honor branding.
Powering the device is a 3000 mAh battery which also supports the Super Charge technology.
The Honor 9 Lite has four cameras. To the front and back, it has a 13MP + 2MP setup and both the setups record 1080P videos at 30fps.
The company has not hinted any date for the launch as of now and the price for the Indian market as well, is being kept under the wraps.
Huawei is riding high on the success of its Mate 10 Pro lineup along with the increasing popularity of sub-brand Honor’s Honor 7Xand View10. While the company has reiterated that it believes AI and machine learning is the future of smartphones, the upcoming Huawei flagship is poised to be the first of its kind smartphone in the camera department as well.
New renders of the Huawei P20 reveal a triple-camera setup at the back which will be unprecedented for a smartphone if the renders turn out to be true. Along with the astonishing triple-camera setup on the back, the renders reveal extremely thin bezels and a front-facing fingerprint sensor. Honor did that with the Honor View10 as well, fitting a front-facing fingerprint sensor on bezels almost as thin (or thick) as the OnePlus 5T.
There are almost negligible bezels on either side of the display with extremely thin forehead and chin. The smartphone will have a glass build and hopefully this time around, the company will introduce wireless charging as well.
Recently, a few leaked advertisement designs revealed that an upcoming Huawei device, presumed to be the P11 at that time, will launch with a triple-camera setup on the back. According to the advertisement, the smartphone will have a triple lens rear-facing 40MP camera, 5X hybrid zooming (which uses a digital and optical zoom for better capturing far away objects) and a 24MP front-facing camera. The camera will also be co-engineered by Leica, the same company that co-engineered the cameras for the Huawei P10 and Huawei Mate 10.
Considering the HiSilicon Kirin 970 is the best chipset by Huawei available right now, the Huawei P20 will, in all likelihood, will be powered by this chip. The Chinese smartphone maker talked up the AI capabilities of the Kirin 970 chipset and its own facial recognition technology while launching the Mate 10 Pro. While we have seen glimpses of the technology in the Honor View10, the Huawei P20 might be the first device to feature the facial recognition technology in all its glory.
If the company does go ahead with this alleged design, the addition of facial recognition will add more than just convenience. It will add an extra layer of security since the company has claimed that its technology is secure enough for data storage and bank transactions as well, similar to the iPhone X and its Face ID.
While all of this might seem far-fetched, Huawei might surprise us all and give us a glimpse of this smartphone at the ongoing CES 2018 in Las Vegas. Stay tuned for further updates.
Vivo teased the official unveiling of the first-ever smartphone with an in-display fingerprint sensor on the 10th of January at CES 2018. Now, a day before the smartphone’s launch, Vivo has showcased the technology that will be responsible for putting a fingerprint sensory inside the display.
The in-display fingerprint sensor will sit between the mainboard and the OLED panel where it will illuminate the finger and then process the beams of light. Alex Feng, Senior VP at Vivo, said in a press release that this technology is the solution to the industry’s challenge of providing a more convenient authentication experience. The smartphone is ready for mass production and should be announced in “early 2018”.
Early reports of the Vivo smartphone with an in-display fingerprint sensor have been positive. Analyst Patrick Moorhead detailed his experience with a pre-production Vivo phone equipped with the in-display fingerprint sensor technology. Synaptics, the manufacturer of the fingerprint sensor had also claimed that this technology is three times more accurate and faster than Apple’s Face ID. This claim, however, will be thoroughly tested once the device is made available to consumers.
Apart from Vivo, Doogee, another Chinese smartphone maker is also working on a smartphone with an in-display fingerprint sensor. The name of the device will be Doogee V and according to the leaks, the smartphone’s design is heavily inspired by that of the iPhone X and Galaxy S9+ Leaks.
The launch of the Vivo smartphone will usher in a new technology trend which will allow OEMs to provide a front-facing fingerprint sensor all the while decreasing the bezels around the display as well. However, a lot will depend on the responsiveness and reliability of the device from Vivo as this will set precedence for upcoming devices from other OEMs and how the consumers will respond to this technology as well.
Smartphones of 2018 are expected to have better facial recognition technology along with a fingerprint sensor. Even though facial recognition has been a part of Android phones for a long time now, it has received mainstream attention ever since the iPhone X launched with Face ID. Smartphones like the OnePlus 5T was launched with features like Face Unlock, which the company claims is more for convenience rather than security.
Honor boasted about its facial recognition software during its London launch event back in December. The company has now announced that the Honor 7X, the budget-oriented bezel-less smartphone will soon receive a software update which enables Face Unlock. In India, the Honor 7X is priced at Rs. 12999 and apart from the LG Q6, the Honor 7X will have a proper Face Unlock feature that the OEM will enable.
Apart from the Face Unlock feature, there have been reports that Honor will launch the Honor 7X red colour variant in India, close to Valentines Day.
The Honor 7X has a 5.9 inch LTPS IPS LCD display with a 2160 x 1080 px display which translates into an 18:9 aspect ratio.
Under the hood, the Honor 7X has the HiSilicon Kirin 659 chipset, Mali-T830 MP2, 4GB of RAM and two storage options of 32GB, and 64GB. The onboard storage is expandable up to 256GB via microSD card. The device is powered by a 3340 mAh battery which charges via a micro USB slot. Since the device has thin bezels, the fingerprint sensor is placed at the back of the below the dual-camera setup.
The Honor 7X runs Android 7.0 Nougat with EMUI 6.0 on top which gives a user more options for customising their phones.
The smartphone has a dual camera setup at the back. One of the cameras is equipped with a 16MP sensor while the other one is a 2MP depth sensor. The camera setup at the back has PDAF and records 1080P videos at 30fps. On the front is an 8MP camera which also records 1080P videos.
Xiaomi and Oculus have launched two new standalone VR headsets at CES 2018 taking place in Las Vegas, USA. A lot of brands take to stage during CES and unveil new and exciting products. Xiaomi, along with Oculus has decided to unveil the Oculus and Xiaomi Mi VR Standalone. The Oculus Go will be manufactured by Xiaomi and sold in the western market where Xiaomi is trying to set a foothold in. While the Xiaomi VR Standalone is a rebranded Oculus Go meant for the Chinese market. This makes sense since Xiaomi has much stronger brand value in China than Oculus does.
The Oculus GO was announced back in October 2017 at the Oculus Connect 4 developer conference. The Oculus GO is priced at US $199 and powered by the Snapdragon 821 chipset and sports an LCD display with a resolution of 2,560 x 1,440 pixels. It also features integrated speakers and has a 3.5 mm headphone jack on board. As it’s a standalone headset, it will also work without a PC or a smartphone.
Immersive visual experience provided by standalone VR headsets seem to be the future of VR and AR. As more apps become VR and AR friendly, the VR content is expected to increase. Headsets like the Oculus Go provide a relatively inexpensive as at a price of US $199, a user doesn’t need a high-end smartphone to experience VR. To put things into perspective, the Samsung VR headset is priced at US $139 and is rendered useless without a high-end Samsung Galaxy device like Galaxy S8 or Note8.
There are no details about the VR headsets launching in the Asian markets like India as of yet. But, Xiomi is known to launch a few of its China-exclusive products in India and the Xiaomi Mi VR Standalone might be launched in India.
For months now, there have been rumours that Samsung will be launching a foldable smartphone in 2018. Till now, a lot of the information was gathered through Samsung patents but, a new report has claimed that Samsung will launch a 7.3-inch foldable smartphone in December of 2018.
The report was published earlier today, which provided a few interesting details about the upcoming foldable smartphone. According to the report, the phone would feature a 7.3-inch, flexible OLED display (built by Samsung Display) which would fold open like a book. The report further speculates that Samsung may even be showing off display prototypes for industry partners behind closed doors at CES in Las Vegas, USA.
Currently, Samsung’s engineers are tasked with ensuring that the display leaves no trace of having been folded once it is opened into a flat position. The price of the devices is expected to be “ultra-premium.” Samsung is not a stranger to exorbitantly priced smartphones as its ‘W’ flip smartphones are priced higher than usual smartphones in South Korea.
December sounds a bit too far since there are rumours of other OEMs like LG and Lenovo are also working on smartphones with a flexible display. However, it is fair to assume that a foldable phone from Samsung will definitely grab the headlines, regardless of the time its launched at.
Samsung has been known to experiment with smartphone displays in the past and has become a pioneer in curved displays with its Galaxy S7 Edge, S8 and the Galaxy Note series.
A report from the South Korea Herald suggested that the production of the Galaxy X would be on 100,000 orders, making it an extremely limited edition device. If this happens, the Galaxy X would be the most difficult Galaxy phone to get your hands on. Irrespective of the timeline of the foldable smartphone, it is expected to stir up the smartphone industry while more OEMs follow suit and launch their own iterations of a foldable Android phone.
Samsung Galaxy On7 Prime will soon launch in India. Amazon India has made a dedicated product page live on its website, listing various details about the device without revealing the price or release date. However, a previous report had claimed that the device could be priced at around Rs. 15000 in India which would be highly competitive.
According to the Amazon listing, Samsung Galaxy On7 Prime has a 5.5-inch display with a 1920 x 1080 px resolution.
Under the hood, the Galaxy On7 Prime will have the Exynos 7870 chipset, a 1.6GHz processor, and Mali-T830 MP1 GPU. The smartphone will be available in two variants, one with 3GB RAM and 32GB of onboard storage and the other with 4GB RAM and 64GB of onboard storage which will be expandable up to 256GB via a microSD card. There is no confirmation on whether the smartphone will have a dedicated microSD card slot or not.
According to Samsung UAE website, the Galaxy On7 Prime will be powered by a 3300 mAh battery. The physical home button on the front will, in most likelihood, house the fingerprint sensor as well.
The Galaxy On7 Prime will have a 13MP with an f/1.9 aperture on the front and back along with rear-facing LED flash.
Interested users can register for the device by clicking here.
There is no denying the fact that the Android smartphone space is extremely fragmented. That leads to more and more smartphones getting left behind in the software game. Even today, in 2018, Samsung recently launched a budget tablet running Android 5.1 Lollipop which was launched back in 2015. Such decisions should not be acceptable for consumers regardless of the price point of the smartphone/tablet in question.
A new report by Google further solidifies the argument that Android smartphones rarely get updated to new software in their entire lifecycle. Even in 2018, Android versions Lollipop, Marshmallow and Nougat dominate the market share. Android 8 Oreo running smartphones stand at a measly 0.7% which is less than Android 4.1 Jellybean. To put things into perspective, Android 4.1 Jellybean was released 5 years ago and its latest iteration, 4.3.1 was released four years ago in October of 2013.
Android 8 Oreo On Pixel 2 XL
If you own a new 2017 smartphone that isn’t a Pixel or an Android One device, your smartphone would probably be running either Android 7 Nougat or Android 6 Marshmallow. Even though companies like OnePlus, Motorola have released Android 8 Oreo update for a few of its smartphones, the rollout happens in phases and hasn’t reached every device in the market.
In comparison iOS 11, despite its constant bugs and what seems like an unfinished software, has caught on really well in the market. iOS 11 is running in more than 52% of the iOS devices in the market right now. iOS 10 launched in 2016 is present in about 38% devices. iOS 11 might have the slowest adoption rate of all iOS versions so far, but, it is far more present in the market than its Android counterpart.
Many reasons can be attributed to such a dismal adoption rate for Android versions but, despite the reasons, Android appears to be losing this particular battle against iOS.
It is hard to gauge which trend will catch on in a certain industry. Over the years, we’ve seen smartphones move in a similar direction for a period of time until a new aspect catches people’s attention. After the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus dropped the headphone jack, we saw more smartphone makers following suite so much so that Samsung, LG and OnePlus appear to be the only flag bearers of the beloved 3.5mm headphone jack. 2018 is expected to be the year of AI and machine learning, and not just in smartphones.
Amazon and Google have been dominating the smart home, especially smart speakers industry for a while now. Thanks to the affordable Google Home Mini and Amazon Acho Dot, it has become easier to enter the smart home ecosystem. Lenovo and Google unveiled a new smart home product, a smart display with built-in Google Assistant. Similar to the Amazon Echo Show, this new smart display from Lenovo does everything a smart speaker can do, with a display.
Also, unlike the Echo Show, it can playback YouTube videos. This smart display doesn’t run on Android or ChromeOS instead, it is running Android Things, a variant of Android that’s custom-designed for IoT. Apart from Lenovo, JBL, LG, and Sony will also be making smart displays with built-in Google Assistant running the same software.
JBL Link View With Google Assitant
Google showcased a small video revealing the capabilities of these smart displays. Google Assistant on smart displays can do a lot of tasks that the Echo Show does as well, like show you photos and calendar, give directions, recipes, and do video conferencing. This will all be handy if you are a Google Services user and part of the whole Google/Android ecosystem.
While third-party app support is on the way, the Lenovo smart displays won’t be available right away. The 10-inch Lenovo Smart Display starts at US $249.99 and the 8-inch model starts at US $199.99, and both are expected to be available early this summer.
A few weeks ago, Synaptics released a statement in which it conceded that the company has started mass production of an in-display fingerprint sensor in association with “one of the top five smartphone makers” in the world. At the time, everyone speculated that the announcement fit the timeline of the launch of the Samsung Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+. However, to a lot of industry expert’s surprise, that OEM turned out to be Vivo.
CES 2018 kicked off on the 8th of January in Las Vegas and the tech show has been known to showcase some of the most innovative products of the tech world. It appears that the first-ever smartphone with an in-display fingerprint sensor will also be unveiled during CES 2018. Vivo has released a teaser hinting at the revealing of its device on the 10th of January at CES. This means that unlike last year, Vivo will showcase a finished product rather than a prototype.
Early reports of the Vivo smartphone with an in-display fingerprint sensor have been positive. Analyst Patrick Moorhead detailed his experience with a pre-production Vivo phone equipped with the in-display fingerprint sensor technology. Moorhead describes the sensor as “fast and simple,” and Synaptics has claimed that it is twice as fast as 3D facial recognition like Apple’s Face ID.
The debate of Face ID vs Fingerprint sensor might become as huge as iOS vs Android in the coming months especially if more smartphones with a similar fingerprint sensor technology are launched before Apple releases its next iteration of iPhones later in 2018. Apple has confirmed that Face ID is the future for iOS and possibly macOS devices and it won’t be going back to fingerprint sensors.
A couple of weeks ago, Synaptics also announced that it will be unveiling a smartphone with an in-display fingerprint sensor. Now, whether this is a different device with some other OEM or the same Vivo smartphone will be revealed on the 10th of January.
Huawei sub-brand Honor is set to launch a new smartphone in India with a dual-camera setup on the front of the device. The Devices expected to be launched is the Honor 9 Lite which was recently launched in China. There is no confirmation about the smartphone or its price in India but, Honor has already launched the Honor 9i with four cameras and the Honor 9 Lite could be the new entrant.
In China, it is priced at CNY 1199 (Rs. 11600 approx.) for the 3GB/32GB variant, CNY 1499 (Rs. 14500 approx.) for the 4GB/32GB variant and CNY 1799 (Rs. 17400 approx.) for the 4GB/64GB variant.
The Honor 9 Lite follows the same design language as the Honor 7X and the Honor View10. It has a 5.65-inch IPS LCD display with a 2160 x 1080 px resolution which translates into an 18:9 aspect ratio.
Under the hood, similar to the Honor 7X, the Honor 9 Lite has the HiSilicon Kirin 659 chipset, an octa-core processor, the Mali-T830 MP2 GPU, 3GB or 4GB of RAM and storage options of 32GB and 64GB. It is worth noting that the onboard storage will be expandable up to 256GB via a microSD card. The fingerprint sensor is placed at the back and the bottom bezel on the front houses the Honor branding.
Powering the device is a 3000 mAh battery which also supports the Super Charge technology.
The Honor 9 Lite has four cameras. To the front and back, it has a 13MP + 2MP setup and both the setups record 1080P videos at 30fps.
The Honor 9 Lite shares a lot of similarities with the Honor 7X and the price of the smartphone will be key to the success of the new device from Honor.
In March of 2017, Motorola launched two promising smartphones that entered the Indian market’s ever-growing sub-15K category. The Moto G5 and G5 Plus both received praise from critics and consumers alike for their build quality, software, and camera performance. The Moto G5 Plus especially was hailed as the best camera smartphone in that price bracket. Almost a year after its launch, the Moto G5 Plus’ camera holds up well against a lot of its competitors.
As we approach March of 2018, there is anticipation about the Moto G6 and Moto G6 Plus which will possibly be launched in March this year. Ever since the launch of the Moto G5 and G5 Plus, the budget smartphone category has seen the entrance of a lot of smartphones that brought flagship features to this price bracket. Devices like the Moto G5s Plus and Xiaomi Mi A1 had dual-camera setup at the back while the likes of LG Q6 and Honor 7X had a nearly bezel-less design.
Moto G5s Plus
The Moto G6 Plus might be a mix of both these elements as Motorola would want to start off 2018 with powerful devices. So, what can we expect from the Moto G6 and Moto G6 Play of 2018? Let’s find out:
Price
Every brand knows that India is an extremely price-sensitive market and a difference of thousand bucks can sway consumers from one phone to another. With that in mind, Motorola might launch the Moto G6 and G6 Plus with a bit more competitive price tag of about Rs. 13999 for the G6 Plus and Rs. 11999 for the Moto G6. A price of Rs. 13999 with stock OS and thin bezels would make the Moto G6 Plus an instant hit especially when compared to the Xiaomi Mi A1 which has a dated design and the Honor 7X which as EMUI which a lot of people don’t prefer.
The ‘G’ series is what brought Motorola back in the smartphone game after a few hit and misses. The original Moto G released at an extremely affordable price and unlike a lot of smartphones at that point in time, did not skim out on design and hardware features. Hence, over the years, the Moto G series has seen a gradual design shift from plastic builds to now solid aluminium builds in the G5 and the G5s smartphones.
The Moto G6 and G6s Plus, however, need to have a design overhaul to compete with modern day mid-range devices like the Honor 7X. The Moto G6 Plus, at least, could have an 18:9 display with thin bezels. Motorola could retain the 16:9 aspect ratio on its slightly cheaper model, the Moto G6. But, historically, Motorola has maintained the same design language for its regular and Plus model. The company is expected to maintain the same metal build and hopefully retain the iconic Moto dimple.
Moto G5s Vs Xiaomi Mi A1 Vs Honor 7X
Display
If Motorola does go the 18:9 aspect ratio route, the Moto G6 Plus could have a display size close 6 inches, similar to the Honor 7X. The Moto G6 could maintain the 5.2-inch display size while both the devices are expected to have a FullHD resolution.
Hardware
The Moto G5s has the Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 and G5s Plus was powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 625 chipset. An incremental upgrade in terms of hardware is expected in the upcoming Moto G6 and G6 Plus. Qualcomm is expected to launch three mid-range chipsets in the coming weeks, the Snapdragon 670, 640 and 460. Motorola could use the 460 and 640 in its upcoming Moto G6 and G6 Plus or, it could decide to use the existing Snapdragon 630 for the G6 Play. The RAM of the devices is also expected to receive a bump while the storage options will more or less remain the same.
Moto G5s Plus
OS
One of the USPs of Moto smartphones has been the software experience. Apart from adding a few of its tweaks, Motorola brings out close to stock Android OS on all its phones. The Moto G6 and G6 Plus won’t be any different and unlike a few OEMs who are still launching devices running Android 7 Nougat, Motorola will, in all likelihood introduce Android 8.0 Oreo in the two smartphones.
The Moto G5 Plus and Moto G5s Plus both had marquee camera performances and the same can be expected from the Moto G6 Plus. Motorola would want to launch a modern-day mid-ranger and that means a dual-camera setup at the back. The Moto G6 could continue to have a lower price tag and subsequently, a single camera setup as well. For the Moto G6 Plus, Motorola is expected to retain the same 13MP dual-camera setup but, this time around might offer a wider aperture like f/1.8 or f/1.9.
Conclusion
Motorola G series of smartphones have been a great entrant in the budget segment and the Moto G6 and G6 Plus are expected to take the lineup a notch further. With more smartphones launching in a similar price bracket, the Moto G6 and G6 Plus would need to have a refreshed modern design and performance to compete with the likes of the Honor 7X.
While everyone thought that AI and machine learning will be the next big thing in the smartphone industry, the colour Red appears to be grabbing all the headlines. What started out as a one-off colour variant, is slowly becoming a fan-favourite colour and smartphone makers are taking note of it. After the likes of the iPhone 7, OnePlus 5T, and more, HTC U11+ might be the next smartphone to be launched in a red colour variant.
In a listing on AliExpress, the HTC U11+ Red colour variant is available for pre-orders which means that this may or may not turn out to be an actual variant of the HTC U11+. At the time of its launch, the HTC U11+ was unveiled in a few exciting colour, especially the Translucent colour variant which shows off the interiors of the smartphone.
HTC has upped its colour variants game in the recent past, with a Solar Red colour variant of the HTC U11 and recently, the HTC U11+ and its translucent colour. Adding a red colour variant of the HTC U11+ to its repertoire will certainly give the consumers more options to choose from before buying their next flagship smartphone.
Red Xiaomi Mi A1
The rise in popularity of the red colour in smartphones has seen a peak in the past few weeks. While companies have released red colour phones from time-to-time, with Apple being a great example, more OEMs are now resorting to this colour to attract more customers. OnePlus is gearing up to launch the Lava Red OnePlus 5T and dropped another hint on social media today.
Xiaomi recently launched the red colour variant of the Mi A1 in India and Honor is expected to launch the red coloured Honor 7X in India close to Valentines Day. HTC has not launched the U11+ in India and has not shown any interest in it either, so, a red colour variant might not excite Indian suitors of an HTC flagship but, this move just confirms that more and more red coloured devices will launch in 2018.
As CES 2018 goes underway in Las Vegas, USA, there will be a lot of smartphones that will be launched. Sony has wasted no time and launched three devices, the Xperia L2, Xperia XA2 and Xperia XA2 Ultra at CES 2018. All three of them are budget smartphones but, none of their pricing has been confirmed by the company yet.
Sony Xperia L2
Xperia L2
The Sony Xperia L2 branches out from the now defunct Xperia E series. The Xperia L2 will start shipping January and there is no word on the pricing yet.
The Xperia L2 has a 5.5-inch display with a 1280 x 720 px resolution.
Under the hood, the smartphone has the MediaTek MT6737T chipset, 3GB of RAM and 32GB of onboard storage which will be expandable via a microSD card. The fingerprint sensor has now been moved to the back of the phone and is placed centrally, right below the camera.
Powering the smartphone is a 3300 mAh battery but there is no word on fast-charging support yet. In a move similar to Samsung’s, the Xperia L2 will run Android 7.1 Nougat out of the box.
The Sony Xperia L2 has a 13MP camera on the back and an 8MP camera with a wide-angle lens on the front.
Sony Xperia XA2 and Xperia XA2 Ultra
Xperia XA2
The two mid-range offerings from Sony, the Xperia XA2 and Xperia XA2 Ultra will start shipping in February however, there is no word on which countries will be the first on its radar.
The Xperia XA2 has a 5.2-inch display while the XA2 Ultra has a 6-inch display but, both the devices have a 1920 x 1080 px resolution.
Under the hood, both the devices are powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 630 chipset and have the Adreno 508 GPU. The Xperia XA2 has 3GB of RAM and 32GB of storage, which is expandable via microSD (hybrid slot on the dual SIM XA2). The larger XA2 Ultra has 4GB of RAM and two storage options of 32GB and 64GB. Thanks to the big bezels and a massive footprint of the device, Sony has provided a dedicated SIM card slot for both the single SIM and dual SIM models.
The XA2 features a 3,300mAh battery as compared to the XA1’s 2,300mAh unit, while the XA2 Ultra is powered by a 3580mAh. Both of the devices will also support QuickCharge 3.0 via a USB Type-C port. Unlike a lot of Sony devices, the fingerprint sensor now sits on the back of the devices just below the camera module.
Xperia XA2 Ultra
Both the smartphones have a 23MP camera with an f/2.0 aperture. To the front of the Xperia XA2 is an 8MP camera with a wide-angle lens. The Xperia XA2 Ultra has a dual-camera setup on the front, as it has a 16MP camera with OIS along with the 8MP wide-angle lens.
With the Snapdragon 630 chipset in the mid-range devices, pricing in India will be key for Sony as the mid-range segment continues to get congested. The Xperia L2 will compete with the likes of the Xiaomi Redmi 5A and Nokia 2 in the India market.
The International Consumer Electronics Show, famously known as CES kicks off in the US on January 8th. Brands use CES as a global platform to launch or unveil its latest and greatest pieces of technology and DJI has done something similar this year. DJI has unveiled its new gimbal, called the DJI Ronin-S.
The Ronis-S is compatible with DSLRs and mirror-less cameras. According to DJI:
The Ronin-S combinesadvanced stabilization, precision control, and manual focus control capabilities in a compact, single-handed form factor.
Ideal for vloggers and content creators in general, a gimbal helps take smooth footage while in motion and adds an extra layer of stabilisation to the already stabilised footage from a high-end camera. Not just stabilisation, a gimbal, like the Ronin-S helps videographers take better shots since it increases handleability of a camera.
The Ronin-S’s framework elevates camera payload above the Roll Axis, which makes the camera’s built-in display in the line of the shooter’s sight and obstruction free. To give the user even more control over the smoothness of the gimbal, the Ronin-S has two customisable parameter groups to store your favourite settings. While recording, the user can switch between those two settings with a single click.
The Ronin-S will be available in the second quarter of 2018 from dji.com, DJI Flagship Stores, DJI Authorized Retail Stores, and DJI Resellers worldwide. Pricing will be announced prior to availability.
