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IIT Delhi Wants To Solve the Irrigation Problem For Indian Farmers

India being an agrarian economy, is largely dependent on farmers, the seasonal monsoon and a reliable irrigation system. In a country where power cuts are in abundance and money is scarce, being able to get a proper irrigation system going is a real challenge. Taking the present scenario in account, the farmers face multiple challenges to simply irrigate the fields. Apart from the endless power cuts and the cost of fuel, other factors like the safety, sustainability and durability of the irrigation system are extremely questionable.

Farmers currently resort to a device called “Jugaad pump” for irrigating the fields.This irrigation system is powered by a functional motor bike and is used for extracting water from open channels and ponds to deliver water for irrigation. While this “Juggad” works for some time, the bike run pump is not the ultimate and long term solution. A team of researchers from IIT Delhi has decided to build a solution which is sustainable and durable.

IIT Delhi researchers are designing solar pumps and invertors that are cost effective and energy saving. The project which is in partnership with industry partner Shakti Pumps Limited, will boost the productivity of the farmers and has received a massive funding of Rs 1.12 crore. The IIT Delhi research team includes Prof. Bhim Singh (Principal Investigator) and research scholars Utkarsh Sharma, Aryadip Sen, Md Kashif, Rashmi Rai, Hina Parveen, Yalavarthi Amarnath.

The research is carried out as a part of the project titled – Design and Development of Solar PV Based Super Efficient Agricultural Pumps and Hybrid Multidimensional Inverters- and falls under the Uchhatar Avishkar Yojana of the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD).

The project is based on decreasing the irrigation cost, or the cost of the energy (electricity or diesel) to drive the water pumps in remote areas where electricity is not yet available. The current irrigation cost in remote areas is upto 30% of the total input cost incurred by a farmer. This cost can be drastically reduced by solar powered water pumps.

The solar pumps will incur one time installation cost and expected battery maintenance cost approximately every two years. The pump will convert solar energy into electricity and employ Direct Current (DC) as opposed to the Alternating Current (AC) which is being currently used by most farmers. A DC powered battery is more efficient and durable and will keep the solar powered pump working for a longer period.

Project investigator Prof Bhim Singh says, “Besides development of super-efficient pumps we aim to design solar water pump with suitable motor considerations and variable frequency operation. We will subsequently be designing and developing the on grid/off grid hybrid inverter,”

Professor further states that the project is aimed at design and development of the industrial products under three verticals. The team will also develop cost efficient inverters running on solar power which can be used to light up the household and feed the electrical grid. The final deliverables would include new technology in electrical drives fed from solar power, novel motor and pump design along with the hybrid inverter design.

This project can help improve the lives of millions by making solar powered technology available at an affordable cost. But the maintenance cost after approximately every two years may make the farmers stick to their traditional method. A one time installation of the solar pump is expected to be expensive as well which may dissuade farmers not willing to incur the installation and the additional maintenance cost.

July 28, 2017
Meizu Pro 7 and Pro 7 Plus Launched With A Secondary Display

Meizu’s new Pro 7 and Pro 7 Plus dual screen rumours caught our attention a while back, thanks to the super AMOLED touchscreen on the back. Proving that the rumours were true, Meizu recently sent invites for the announcement of its Pro 7 lineup on 26th of July.

Meizu announced the Pro 7 and Pro 7 Plus in a tweet on Wednesday. The Pro 7 and Pro 7 Plus were launched with an interesting feature – dual super AMOLED display for the front as well as the back of the handsets. Designed by the design studio “Frog,” the 1.9-inch screen lights up when flipped over and can be used to display notifications, weather, time, playing music or maybe for a quick selfie session using the rear camera. Unlike LG and HTC’s “Second Screen” iterations, Meizu Pro 7 phones may be more practical and cooler versions of the dual screen setup. Priced at $430 and $530, the Pro 7 and Pro 7 Plus are expected to go on sale from 5 August 2017 in China.

Have a look at the red Meizu PRO 7. pic.twitter.com/rxdJwB8ce0

— Ard Boudeling (@ArdCB) July 26, 2017

Pro 7

The 5.2-inch Pro 7 features a 1920 x 1080 pixel Super AMOLED display and is powered by Helio P25 chip. 4 GB RAM and 64 GB onboard storage brings the phone to par with 2017 flagships. The Pro 7 has a 3000mAh internal battery and support for ‘mCharge 4.0’for faster charging. Meizu claims that mCharge 4.o technology will provide upto 67 percent battery charge in 30 minutes.

A high edition version is also available for the Pro 7 with an extended 128 GB memory and the Helio P30 chip which has a 10-core processor made by 10 nm manufacturing process, making it the first smartphone to use the technology. The higher version of Pro 7 also has IMG PowerVR 7XTP GPU.

Pro 7 Plus

For an extra $100, the Pro 7 plus boosts almost all those specs in the Pro 7 variant. A slightly larger variant of the Pro 7, the Pro 7 Plus offers a 5.7-inch QHD display, 6GB of RAM, a Helio P30 processor, and a choice of 64GB or 128GB of storage. Unlike the Pro 7, the Pro 7 Plus offers a slightly larger 3500mAh battery and offers support for ‘mCharge 3.0’. The phone also has a 10nm chipset including 10 cores made up of three clusters — two Cortex A73 cores that go up to 2.6GHz, four Cortex A53 cores clocked at 2.2GHz, and four energy-efficient Cortex A35 cores at 1.9GHz and a IMG PowerVR 7XTP GPU.

Both the smartphones have M touch fingerprint sensors, run Android Nougat 7.0 based Flyme skin and have Hi-Fi audio. The phones are decked with Sony’s IMX386 imaging sensors and 12 MP dual-camera setup – a primary RGB sensor and a secondary monochrome sensor with f/2.0 aperture for improved low-light performance, as well as a 16MP front-facing camera.

Though the phones are set to be up for sale on 5th August in China, no information about the release in other countries have been disclosed yet. Implying that the wait may be a bit longer than we expected. Meizu also announced the ‘Meizu Flow headphones’ along with the unveiling of the smartphones indicating that unlike Apple, the phones has decided keep the 3.5mm headphone jack.

July 27, 2017
Moto Launches Moto Z2 Force With Shattershield Display

Lenovo-owned Motorola has launched its flagship for the year, the Moto Z2 Force with a shatterproof display technology. With a lot of high-end specifications, the 2nd-gen Moto Z phone will be the flag-bearer for Moto this year. It goes on sale in the USA on August 10th and is already available for pre-orders.

Moto Z2 Force has got the hardware to compete with any flagship device this year with 4 GB of RAM, 64 GB of storage and a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 chipset. It has Android Nougat out-of-the-box with a promised update to Android. Let’s just say, pretty standard stuff for an expensive 2017 flagship device. The USP of Moto Z2 Force is three-fold. It has a shatterproof display that won’t crumble after a few regular drops thanks to a shatter-resistant coating on the display. Next up are the Moto Mods, which is why the design and the feel of the phone have been retained, except that it’s much thinner now thanks to a 2,730 mAh battery. The previous gen Moto Z had a 3,500 mAh battery, so to ship a new phone with that big a slump in battery size, just to make it thinner seems like a tricky decision. What’s also missing is our beloved 3.5mm headphone jack, so if you’re still living in the good ol’ days of wired headphones then you need to either make a shift to the wireless universe or live the dongle life, a USB C dongle is included in the box. Another significant change is the camera setup. It now has a dual-lens camera setup with dual 12MP sensors with an f/2.0 aperture. One camera shoots in monochrome, and the other shoots in colour, similar to what we saw on Huawei devices and recent Nubia M2. The Z2 Force also has laser AF, phase detection but no mention of optical image stabilisation. Similar to Apple’s portrait mode, the dual-lends setup has allowed Moto to implement a depth-of-field effect on the Moto Z2 Force.

The Moto Z2 Force doesn’t have the edge-to-edge display from the Galaxy S8 or a huge / relatively large battery one would expect, but with a price tag of $720 (roughly INR47,000), it competes with the big boys of the current flagship market aka the Samsung Galaxy s8 and its bigger sibling the S8+, Apple’s iPhone 7 and 7 plus. The release date in India has not been specified and it is likely that the phone may not launch in India at all as the company stayed away from the Force variant last year.

July 26, 2017
Visit The International Space Station With Google Street View

Google street view now works in outer space. Google Street View partnered with the European Space Agency to create a walk-through of the International Space Station. Taking the street view a little outside the planet Earth, Google now lets you pay a virtual visit and explore the entire habitable portion of the ISS and the interiors of two commercial spacecraft, Orbital ATK’s Cygnus and SpaceX’s Dragon.

Earth From Space via Google Street View – ISS Edition

While the regular street view let us see places like the Mount Everest, London. etc. navigating the ISS street view image is a bit different from the typical setup. Google also added side notes or as they call them – annotations to the images describing the significance of what you are viewing with additional information on items around the space station, because well, not all of us are bestowed with astronauts like wisdom. Besides, who is not curious about where astronauts eat or sleep, among other things.

Looking at the images, Google and Nasa did an impressive job, considering they were clicked in space. That said, Google’s typical street view wasn’t practical for the space station’s zero gravity therefore Thomas Pesquet, the ESA astronaut (who worked with Google to capture the images), improvised using the DSLR cameras which were already onboard the Space Station. The images were then amalgamated together to create the 360-degree views we see now.

Pesquet said that they “did a lot of troubleshooting” before they could get the images right. “The ISS has technical equipment on all surfaces, with lots of cables and a complicated layout with modules shooting off in all directions—left, right, up, down, And it’s a busy place, with six crew members carrying out research and maintenance activities 12 hours a day.”

Google and the ESA also made a video about the process of creating the simulation.

July 22, 2017
Andy Rubin’s Essential Phone PH-1 Is Almost Ready For Sales

The Essential phone which was announced last month by Andy Rubin is almost ready to hit buyers. Emails went out from Andy Rubin to those who ordered the Essential phone, confirming that the devices will be shipping in a few weeks.

Hi Bharat,

I personally wanted to thank you for putting your name down for our first phone. We’ve been hard at work getting everything ready and the good news is that we’re now going through certification and testing with multiple US and international carriers.

You might be getting impatient to get your hands on your new Essential Phone (and I’m also impatient to get it to you!) but rest assured that you will have a device in your hands in a few weeks.

Andy

The essential phone has a full front 5.71 inch display with radiused corners, a 19:10 aspect ratio, 2560 x 1312 QHD resolution and a brightness of 500 nits. The back has 13 MP dual cameras with one RGB sensor and one Monochrome sensor and f/1.85 aperture lenses. The front has an 8 MP camera and both cameras are capable of shooting 4k video at 30fps. The Essential phone also has a 3040mAh battery and supports fast charging using USB, but also has a cordless dock that allows you to lay flat the phone while it charges.

The Essential phone costs $699 and has flagship specifications like a Qualcomm 835 processor, 4GB of RAM, and 128GB of storage.

July 22, 2017
iPhone 9’s L-Shaped Batteries To Be Made By LG

We already have enough of the iPhone 8 rumours and speculations, but that hasn’t stopped new reports from claiming that LG will be the exclusive battery supplier of the L-shaped batteries of next iPhone, dubbed ‘iPhone 9’. According to the report, Apple and LG have reached an agreement, making LG the sole vendor of the iPhone 9’s battery.

Apple is usually known to hire multiple providers for sourcing parts but apparently, LG’s huge investment in dedicated battery manufacturing facilities was a major reason why Apple sided with them. One of the other reasons could be the recent backing out of providers from the agreement causing an expected further delay in launch of the iPhone 8.

As per the recent speculations, Apple’s next-generation iPhone will use a battery module that is either “bent” or extended to one side at its bottom to form an “L” shape. The L-shaped battery feature is also expected in the iPhone 8. The feature will not only allow Appleto increase the battery size without increasing the phone size but will also boost the charging speed.

LG’s focus on the L-shaped design can also be another reason for Apple to get in with the agreement. Whereas other suppliers like Samsung, Motorola etc., choose to stick with the traditional design featured in the most smartphones.

A report earlier this year said that Apple could also introduce two new OLED screen sizes with the iPhone 9, including 5.28-inches and 6.46-inches. Of-course nothing can be said for sure based on the far fetched speculations and considering the delays in the production of iPhone 8 we might want to get past the current launch season before taking a dive in the next one.

Meanwhile,

The “iPhone 8” is rumored to feature a full-front OLED screen, front-facing 3D-sensing camera, wireless charging and embedded Touch ID sensors. And is expected to be announced at Apple’s September event.

July 21, 2017
Samsung To Recover 157 Tons of Rare Earth Metals From Recalled Galaxy Note 7 Devices

Staying true to its promise made in March, Samsung will recycle parts from then recalled exploding Note 7 devices . Sales of the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 were suspended last year, due to the poorly manufactured batteries. As stated in the reports released in March, Samsung has recently released refurbished Galaxy Note 7 FE in Korea. Even with all the refurbished handsets for sale, Samsung will still be left with the heaps of devices to recycle.

Samsung will kick start its phone recycling process this month and is expected to recover 157 tonnes of rare metals like gold, cobalt and copper. Samsung also plans on utilising the existing parts like OLED display modules, memory chips, and camera modules from the unsold refurbished handsets as replacement parts for repairs. New reports have surfaced stating that Samsung might pair with local (in Korea) and international companies for the recycling initiative, though the names of the companies have not been disclosed.

Samsung’s Note 7’s failure cost the company a loss of US $5.4 billion. Though the rare materials like gold, cobalt and copper from salvaging the scraped Note 7 might not be enough to cover the losses, it will still offers some respite, to Samsung and to the environment. In a recent statement made by Samsung, the company has “actively lead the industry in terms of environmental protection and resource recycling.” and is working on discovering new ways to recycle materials from the products in an environmental friendly manner. Apple, amongst many others have followed the lead to recycle and reduce their impact on the planet by figuring out a way to use only renewable materials in its products. And while Apple’s Robot Liam helps them deal with the reduction of the company’s footprint, Samsung’s Note 7 recall has offset the company’s carbon footprint for the worse.

While Samsung’s Note 7 recycling efforts will be appreciated, it seems that the company has timed the announcement just around the soon to be launched Galaxy Note 8, being one of the crucial launches for the company. Good PR we’d say !

July 18, 2017
Vertu Is Dead

The luxury smartphone maker, catering to the elites, stars and the rich is dead. Established in 1998, Vertu, originally a part of Nokia, hit bankruptcy as a result of firm’s £128 million debt. The bankruptcy is reported to cost Vertu it’s UK’s manufacturing operation along with the 200 job cuts. The company changed hands before finally being acquired by the exiled businessman Murat Hakan Uzan in March. According to reports, Uzan plans to bring Vertu back from the dead.

The luxury smartphone provider manufactured phones which ran an older version of android and last year’s processors. But the precious metals, Sapphire Crystal Screens, fine hand-cut ostrich leather, precious metals, snake skin and jewels made up for the antiquated technology. The extravagant luxury smartphones were priced from $11,000 to excess of $30,000, offering a 24/7 concierge services as a freebie in the price. Given the hype created at its recent launches, it’s surprising that Vertu struggled to find a customer base for its high end luxury phones.

Even the launch of Vertu’s latest luxury device “The Constellation” in January 2017 couldn’t do much to save the company from hitting a dead end. Maybe the handmade exquisite anodized aluminium, wrapped in soft leather with a 5.5 inch Quad HD display and fingerprint reader wasn’t enough this time, and the high end world seems just happy with the iPhones and the edgeless Samsung Galaxy S8.

July 15, 2017
Samsung Galaxy Note 8 Is Set To Launch on 23rd August

Latest reports state that the Samsung might release the newest Note 8 on 23 August. And with the expected delay in Apple’s iPhone 8 launch, Samsung’s Note 8 might steal some of its thunder. Last year’s Samsung Galaxy Note 7, and the fact that it was recalled due to battery fires, makes the launch of the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 a crucial release for Samsung. So far a whole lot of rumors of the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 have been floating the rumor mill.

Display

The Samsung Galaxy Note 8 is expected to have a larger 6.3-inch curved infinity display, similar to the one used on the Galaxy S8 and S8+. Samsung might switch to a 19.5:9 elongated ratio, which should feel narrow in your hand, despite the size of the screen. Rumors also suggest that the Samsung Galaxy Note 8 will be manufactured with a 4k display which is what is also expected to raise the price of the Samsung Galaxy Note 8.

Design

The Galaxy Note 8 is rumored to look a lot like the Samsung Galaxy S8 and Samsung Galaxy S8 Plus, albeit with its curves a little flattened out. Reports also suggest almost zero bezel on the sides, improved iris scanner, a horizontal dual lens rear-facing camera with the finger print scanner likely to be place next to it. The S-Pen may also get a new design with improved functionality, the pen will charge inside the Note 8’s shell.

Camera

The Samsung Galaxy Note 8 may also feature dual cameras, much like the iPhone 7 Plus, LG G6 and OnePlus 5. Each of these cameras are expected to be 12MP dual pixel sensors. While the earlier rumors stated that dual lens camera might be placed vertically but the latest leaks say that the lenses will be placed horizontally and away from the fingerprint scanner.

Hardware

The rumored Snapdragon 835 and a massive 6GB RAM will help with multitasking and the extra features of the Samsung Galaxy Note 8’s S Pen such as a built-in speaker. According to the reports, the 64GB on board storage and a microSD expansion will offer a major storage boost. Reports suggests that the Note 8 is expected to have a 3,300mAh battery pack, which is actually smaller than the Galaxy Note 7. But considerings last year’s battery performance issues, Samsung may want to play it extra safe.

Price

The Galaxy Note is said to cost over $1,000 or approximately Rs. 69,000. Majorly due to the 4k display and the edgeless design. This cost may not sit down well with the guys eager to get their hands on the Note 8.

While Samsung’s Galaxy Note 8 is expected to launch on August 23 with a 6GB RAM and 64 GB Storage, the company may launch a larger storage and RAM variant in certain markets for a slightly higher price.

July 13, 2017
Windows Phone is Officially Dead

A minute of silence as Microsoft pulls the plug on Windows Phone 8.1, for those of you who have been paying attention, the inevitable has happened. Effective today, Microsoft is ceasing support for Windows Phone 8.1. Though phones running the platform will not be bricked, but the company will not be pushing any future updates for Windows Phone 8.1. The Windows Phone operating system was Microsoft’s biggest efforts in countering Android and iOS. However, as 99.6% of the smartphones run Android or iOS Microsoft failed to capture the market with Windows Phone and it never truly got off the ground.

While a few good phones were launched in the early days by HTC and then by Microsoft in partnership with Nokia aka the Lumia handsets, but they failed to gain popularity unlike their competitors. Though Microsoft continues to support Windows 10 Mobile, it’s unclear how long and to what extent that support will be available.

Rumor has it that Microsoft has branched out its Windows Mobile development into a “feature2” division that will only maintain Windows 10 Mobile until 2018, while any support for Windows Phone 8.1 has been officially terminated. Over the past year , it has becoming quite clear that company is shifting back it’s focus from smartphones to PCs. Microsoft’s new mobile strategy now seems to involve creating apps and integrating iOS and Android with Windows.

July 12, 2017
Moto Launches the Moto E4 Plus in India

Motorola has launched the Moto E4 plus in India at a price of Rs. 9999 . The phone group of the E series falls in between the C and the G series from the brand completing their budget offering for the year with the Moto G5s slated for later this month or early August.

The Motorola Moto E4 Plus is powered by 1.4GHz quad-core MediaTek MTK6737M processor and has 3GB of RAM with 32GB of internal storage along with microSD card expansion. The Moto E4 plus has a 5.5 inch 1280 x 720px IPS LCD display along with Corning Gorilla Glass 3 and an oleophobic coating.

The phone also runs Android 7.1.1 out of the box and should be updated to the next generation Android by the company, as the UI is mostly stock with some Moto features including the Moto display, some gestures and One-Key Navigation. The front also has a fingerprint sensor along with notification led light.

For optics the front has a 5 MP camera with a front flash while the main camera is a 13 MP, f/2.0 with 720p video capture at 30fps. The battery on the E4 Plus is a massive 5000 mAh battery and owners will get dual-SIM capability with VOLTE.

The Moto E4 Plus goes on sale tonight 12 July at 11:59 on Flipkart here

Launch offers for the Moto E4 Plus include a discount on Moto Pulse 2 headphones, Free data with JIO and IDEA along with free 2 month subscription to Hotstar. You also can opt in for the exchange offers, while the phone will be launched with an assured buy back of Rs. 4000

July 12, 2017
Honor 8 Pro Launched in India For Rs. 29,999 6 GB RAM and 128 GB Storage | Unboxing

Honor 8 pro has officially been launched in India for a price of Rs. 29,999. The phone will be sold on Amazon on Prime Day for a limited sale model.

The Honor 8 Pro has a whopping 128 GB of storage along with 6GB of RAM. The Honor 8 Pro runs on the Kirin 960 chipset which is an octacore chip – four high-performance Cortex A73 cores clocked at 2.4GHz and four low-power Cortex A53 cores clocked at 1.8Ghz.

The Camera setup consists of two cameras, 12+12 MP shooters, where one is a monochrome camera while the other is RGB. The Honor 8 Pro can combine the aperture to deliver an extremely wide f/0.95. The Phone also shoot 4K video at 30fps. The front camera is an 8 MP shooter with an f/2.0 aperture and capable of 1920 x 1080p video.

The phone also has a large 4000 mAh battery and fast charge capabilities, with long battery modes built into Honor’s user interface.

The Honor 8 pro has Android Nougat out of the box along with EMUI 5.1 which has some interesting shortcuts and customizations. More importantly the Honor 8 pro has a 5.7 inch QHD display which beats the competition right our of the park.\

The box of the Honor 8 Pro doubles up as a VR headset, thanks to the included lenses and eye cutout. check out our Full Unboxing below:

July 6, 2017
The iPhone X May Not Have A Touch ID At All
The new design of the iPhone 8 has been doing rounds for more than a few months. However, till now the leaks mentioned a fingerprint scanner embedded in the display. But, KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo released a note to investors that mentions several details for the upcoming iPhone expected to launch in September. Here is a full list of expected changes mentioned in the note.
- Apple will roll out three iPhone models in 2017; the new iPhone 8 with an OLED display & revisions of the LCD models including 4.7” display & 5.5” display.
- OLED iPhone will adopt full-screen design, with the “highest screen-to-body ratio of any smartphone currently available worldwide”, the OLED model will also come with a virtual Home button, though the button will not support fingerprint recognition.
We predict the OLED model won’t support fingerprint recognition, reasons being: (1) the full-screen design doesn’t work with existing capacitive fingerprint recognition, and (2) the scan-through ability of the under-display fingerprint solution still has technical challenges, including: (i) requirement for a more complex panel pixel design; (ii) disappointing scan-through of OLED panel despite it being thinner than LCD panel; and (iii) weakened scan-through performance due to overlayered panel module. As the new OLED iPhone won’t support under-display fingerprint recognition, we now do not expect production ramp-up will be delayed again (we previously projected the ramp-up would be postponed to late October or later).
- OLED iPhone will support 3D sensing for facial recognition & improved selfie quality. This will be used to replace the TouchID and hence used to unlock phones and make payments.
- OLED iPhone & 5.5” LCD iPhone will both come with DRAM capacity of 3GB (for dual-camera setup), while 4.7” version will only use 2GB DRAM (for single camera).
- Three new models will all come with 64GB and 256GB storage options.
- All three new models will have a Lightning port but will have an embedded USB-C power delivery chip for higher charging speeds, which would be not possible through the existing charger. The charger shipping in the box will be a 5W charger, so fast charging hardware will be sold separately.
- Wireless charging on all new iPhones will require an optional accessory and will not be available out of the box.
- The output power of the receiver & speaker of OLED iPhone will be more consistent to create better stereo effects.
- The OLED version will offer fewer options for casing colors than LCD iPhone models, restricted in the early launch phase to special colors.
- October-November & August-September as production ramp-up schedules of OLED iPhone & LCD iPhone, respectively.
For optimized promotional effect, we think Apple may unveil the three models simultaneously in September, though the launch date of the OLED version may trail that of LCD models, and supply tightness may not improve before 1H18.
- All three new models for the 2017 launch will be 80-85 million units, with an equal split between OLED & LCD versions. As Apple expects higher demand for the OLED iPhone.
- iPhone 8 has an ‘Apple Neural Engine’ which handles both ProMotion and various “artificial intelligence tasks”
- All three iPhones will be unveiled simultaneously “For optimized promotional effect” However release dates will vary. September release for iPhone 7S and iPhone 7S Plus, October-November for the iPhone 8
July 5, 2017
Moto X4 Photos Leaked with Curved Screen and Dual Cameras

Motorola’s next X series phone the Moto X4 has leaked in images with detailed specifications. Prolific leaker Evan Blass has leaked more information on the Moto X4 including images and branding.

The Moto X4 will bring IP68 certification to Motorola’s portfolio, with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 630 chipset with an Octa-Core CPU running at 2.2GHz, with a 5.2 inch full HD screen, and 4GB of RAM with a 64GB internal storage along with microSD storage.

The Moto X4 will have a 3,000mAh battery capacity along with TurboPower charging. The Moto X4 has two rear cameras, one of which is 8-megapixel and the other 12-megapixel. With the capability to include a “Portrait” mode much like that on the OnePlus 5 and iPhone 7 Plus.

The Moto X4 will also have a front fingerprint sensor which will also support gestures which allow users to remove the on screen buttons. The Moto X4 will run Nougat out of the box with Android 7.1 along with no customizations from Moto, except the Moto App features.

However, another leaker Andri has shown images of a phone with a Dual Camera setup, with the LED flash above the lenses not below. The second phone also appears to have a 3800 mAh battery, could this be the Moto X4 Plus?

July 5, 2017
The Samsung Galaxy Note 8 Is Expected to Cost US$ 1000 Or More

Samsung’s next big launch of the Galaxy Note 8 is around the corner. With the company prepping for the August launch, a whole bunch of leaks have surfaced for the mega flagship from the company. The Note series will continue on despite the recall of the Galaxy Note 7 last year. The company plans to launch some exciting new things with the Note 8 , which will not only excite consumers but make them lighter by about US $ 1000 or more.

The Galaxy Note 8 is expected to be based on the design and build of the Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8+, think of wider Galaxy S8+ but with an S-Pen. The company will launch the Galaxy Note 8 with a lot of firsts, it will be the first Samsung smartphone with a 4k display, a 6.3-inch Super AMOLED screen with an 18.5:9 aspect ratio, Exynos 8895 or Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processors. The phone is expected to feature a dual camera setup to directly compete with the iPhone Plus variant. News for this was just announced by Samsung, pointing to a dual 13 MP camera array with their IsoCell sensors. Both sensors feature 1.12 micron pixels and an f/2.0 aperture lens. However one is an RGB sensor and one a Monochrome sensor much like those seen on the Huawei phones.

The Samsung Galaxy Note 8 is set for launch on August 26th in New York , according to reports, but a Saturday launch seems unlikely for the company. The Samsung Galaxy Note 8 is also expected to feature 6 – 8 GB of RAM as the company has finally been seen pushing 6 RAM in their mid-high range phones.

The phone along with the infinity display design is expected to have some interesting S-Pen features including new modes with which the pen will interact with the handset. For markets like India the launch will happen first week of September with availability tied in with the global release of 9th September.

The pricing of the Note 8 is what Samsung seems to be struggling with, and the phone is expected to cost US $ 1000 for the 128 GB variant and more for the 256 GB variant which will be the two variant to go on sale. In India, however, this time around the Samsun Galaxy Note 8 will be cheaper than the $1000 price and is expected to sell at INR 64999 for the 128 GB variant.

Recent case leaks of the Galaxy Note 8 on mobilefun’s website show a dual rear camera with the fingerprint sensor next to it, in a Samsung Galaxy S8 type setup. However rumours point to a fingerprint sensor embedded in the display, where the physical button is intended to be.

July 1, 2017