Apple’s iPod was once their hero product, now however, the story is completely different. Apple has ignored the iPod for two cycles of the iPhone. This time around the iPod gets an internal overhaul, with the new chipsets form the iPhone 6.
The new iPod also gets new colours along with some noticeable upgrades as well. The camera has been upgraded to a new 8 megapixel iSight camera. The new iPod Touch will also get an improved FaceTime HD camera, because who doesn’t want selfies on an iPod.
Apple’s A8 chip found in the iPhone 6 is used in the iPod Touch 2015, along with the old 4-inch Retina display. The new iPod touch starts at INR 18,900 for the 16GB model, INR 22,900 for 32GB and INR 26,900 for 64GB.
If you are in the US, 16GB edition will cost you back $199, you can get a 32GB option for $249, a 64GB variant priced at $299 and a first time 128GB model for $399.
Chinese smartphone manufacturer ZTE has unveiled its new phone, “Axon” in New York, which the company says is the “first phone made in the US, for the US”.
Lixin Cheng, chairman and CEO of ZTE USA, said: “We put consumers at the heart of everything we design, build and deliver, and our phones reflect what consumers want, value, and use. ZTE AXON is a product that devotes to meet all of consumer’s’ requirements.”
The phone runs on a 64-bit octa-core 2Ghz Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 processor with 4GB of RAM. Axon has 32GB of inbuilt storage which cannot be expanded. The 3000 mAh non-removable battery should deliver up to 12 hours of talk time and 240 hours of standby time on a single charge.
The device sports a 5.5 inch display and uses a “dual-lens” system for the rear camera. According to Xinhua, the combination of 13 MP and 2 MP rear camera will lead to sharper video capture. The dual-lens system will also allow users to focus before and after taking a shot.
Dubbed as “a Hi- Fi audio phone”, the features of the Axon include low-light and fast-image capture and high-quality audio. Priced at $449.98, it is available for order directly on ZTE, Amazon and Ebay starting Tuesday, with shipping beginning on July 27.
Barely one and a half years old, and OnePlus is already catching up in the department of suave marketing, which was once the exclusive domain of Apple. In 12 days, OnePlus will launch the OnePlus Two through a VR launch event, which might be the most unique launch since Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone in 2007.
Over the past few weeks, we have heard rumours, seen reports and official confirmations from the company about the OnePlus Two. Here’s what we know so far:
1. OnePlus Two Confirms its Screen Size
The phone will sport a display ranging between 5.5 and 5.7 inches and will have a black matte border, as leaked on Weibo.
2. OnePlus Reveals the Launch Date
OnePlus Two will launch on 27th July through a virtual reality event. Their live streaming of the event will take place in Virtual Reality, starting at 7 pm PDT. For this occasion, OnePlus has engineered their own ‘cardboard’ VR headgears that allow you to slip in your mobile handset inside the little box.
3. OnePlus Two Will Use USB Type-C
The company announced in a tweet that OnePlus Two will use a Type-C USB port and will become the first flagship phone from a mainstream company to use this USB port.
4. OnePlus Two will Run Second Gen Snapdragon 810
Pete Lau (CEO, OnePlus) has confirmed that the OnePlus 2 will come with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 v2.1 processor. Key reasons that this particular chipset was selected include the capability of streaming 4K Ultra HD video, impressive image processing and more.
5. OnePlus Two Pricing Will Not Cross More Than Rs 28,500
OnePlus posted on Twitter confirming that the device won’t cost higher than $450 (Rs 28,586).
6. OnePlus Two Is Confirmed To Arrive With a 4GB RAM
OnePlus has announced the upcoming smartphone will sport a 4GB RAM. It will sport the next-generation LPDDR4 memory chips, which are also packed with Samsung Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge only, for now. No other smartphone, apart from the Asus Zenfone, in the Indian market, comes with 4GB of RAM.
7. OnePlus Two Will Feature Fingerprint Scanning Technology
The company has revealed that the new handset will have a fingerprint sensor, and it is slated to be better than the Touch ID.
8. OnePlus Two May Sport a New Metal Body
According to a tease by OnePlus’ CEO on Weibo, OnePlus Two will supposedly don a metal frame, instead of a polycarbonate body, the current one sports. By ditching the polycarbonate, OnePlus Two may go for a premium look, like an iPhone. Moreover, given that the Two will cost more than the One, it may be possible that the phone will arrive with a metal body or may be a mix of both polycarbonate and metal.
9. OnePlus Two will sport a bigger battery
A few days back, OnePlus executives revealed in a Reddit AMA session that the OnePlus Two will sport a bigger battery. The 3,100 mAh battery has been upgraded to a 3,300 mAh battery.
The Xiaomi Mi 5 and Mi 5 plus have already been the talk of the town, in recent times. While everyone anticipates its release into the market, the China based firm has let out yet another secret that will come as an exciting new upgrade to its devices.
Apart from the phones releasing tomorrow, which is good news enough, the Mi 5 and Mi 5 plus are likely to have wireless charging as the company revealed an image on social media sites, asking its fans to ‘take guesses’ on what is going to be unveiled tomorrow.
While it is clear that the Mi 5 and Mi 5 plus will be reasonably priced (not more than 30,000 thousand rupees), this new speculated feature will surely add a competitive edge to the devices as we saw Samsung playing its wireless charging card earlier, this year.
The Mi 5 and Mi 5 plus are touted as the most anticipated phones of the year as there have been many rumours and leaks regarding their specs as well as the release date. Xiaomi released the Mi 4i, this May and sold a staggering 40,000 units within 15 seconds due to its raging popularity.
Hence, we are presumably excited about the launch of the Mi 5 and Mi 5 plus. Let’s see how Xiaomi fares with the coming of these devices.
From today, The Terminator will not be the only property revived from the 80s this year. Commodore, a North American company that holds the Guinness World Record for the best-selling single computer model of all time, has unveiled its new project – a smartphone named PET. So why should you care? The company became bankrupt almost 20 years ago, which is why no one was expecting it to make a comeback. In fact most of us (including the author) haven’t even heard of Commodore.
Source: Wired
Nostalgically named after the company’s 1977 PET computer, the smartphone runs on a 1.7 GHz Mediatek 64-bit octa-core processor with ARM Mali T760 GPU for graphics. PET is powered by a 3000mAh battery. According to Wired, the phone’s main camera uses a 13-megapixel Sony sensor with a bright f/2.0 aperture and can capture full HD, 1080p videos. The front camera is an 8MP camera, with an 80 degree wide angle lens.
Commodore PET is a dual-SIM phone and supports 4G connectivity. The phone runs on a customised Android Lollipop 5.0. The phone is available in two variants – 16GB storage/2GB RAM and 32GB/3GB RAM. The former costs around $300 while the latter will cost $65 more.The phone will be available in a variety of colours, such as white, black and classic biscuit-beige.
Commodore will release PET in Italy, France, Germany, and Poland later this week. The company is planning on expanding to international markets soon.
Barely six months after Samsung launched Galaxy A7, the company has already unveiled its successor, Galaxy A8. Samsung’s latest offering proves how the company is trying to win back the market it once dominated. The phone is the slimmest in Samsung’s lineup, with a 5.9 mm width.
Galaxy A8 offers a bigger display than its predecessor, which is a 5.7-inch full-HD (1080×1920 pixels) resolution Super AMOLED display. The phone sports 64-bit Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 processor with Adreno 405 GPU for graphics, and 2GB of RAM. The A8 will run on Android 5.1.1.
In the camera department, the Galaxy A8 uses a 16 MP autofocus rear camera with OIS, a f/1.9 aperture,a wide-angle lens and LED flash. The phone also has a 5MP front camera. The camera can be accessed by pressing the home button twice.
Samsung has upgraded the battery for the A8, from 2,600mAh to 3,050 mAh. A dual-SIM phone, the A8 supports 4G LTE and 3G on both slots. It’s surprising though, that Samsung chose to release two variants of the phone based on storage – 16GB/32GB, which is expandable upto 128 GB. The A8 will also feature a fingerprint scanner.
The Galaxy A8 is now available in China through pre-orders. The company hasn’t revealed its plan to launch it in other countries.
Can’t play Candy Crush Saga on Firefox? In light of recent security flaws found in Adobe Flash, Mozilla has disabled Flash by default. For the past few days, Flash has been scrutinised for having security flaws, which was revealed when a leak of files of size 400GB happened during a hack on the Hacking Team, a spyware company.
In a tweet by Mark Schmidt, the head of the Firefox support team at Mozilla, the browser has disabled Flash version 18.0.0.203, meaning that Flash-based content will not work unless Adobe issues a patch to fix the security flaws. Users can of-course, enable it manually in the Settings menu.
Adobe has now released a new version for Flash, 18.0.0.209, in which the security flaws have been fixed.
The dislike for Flash isn’t new. Just yesterday, Facebook’s new chief security officer asked Adobe to announce a “kill date” for Flash. In a tweet he said, “It is time for Adobe to announce the end-of-life date for Flash and to ask the browsers to set killbits on the same day. Even if it is 18 months from now, one set date is the only way to disentangle the dependencies and upgrade the whole ecosystem at once.”
Late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs was also known to dislike Flash. In an open letter published in 2010, Jobs asked for the discontinuance of Flash, citing performance and security issues with the platform. He also named it the number one reason for a crash in various Mac systems.
A few months back, Google announced an updated version of its Chrome browser that would intelligently pause Flash. YouTube, which has supported it for a long time, dropped it in January in favour of HTML5.
It is only a matter of time before Adobe decides to drop Flash, considering that it already stopped the development of the mobile version back in 2011.
While some may call it a bold move, others term it as cautious; Samsung has advanced the launch date for its upcoming Galaxy Note 5 from September to August. According to Asia One, Samsung’s decision to release the phone earlier has to do with struggling smartphone sales.
In April, a new report showed that Samsung’s market share dropped from 31 percent worldwide to 24 percent. The company said last week, that it was expecting profits to decline this quarter. In the past year alone, we have witnessed the rise of companies like OnePlus and Xiaomi, which are giving quality products at a lesser price than rivals Samsung and HTC. To cut down costs, Samsung is trying to cut down its lineup, like it did in November last year, when it slashed a third of its smartphone lineup.
By advancing the launch date, Samsung may have secured the sales for Galaxy Note 5 from massive competition. Apple is reported to launch iPhone 6S in September, which has already gained momentum months earlier.
The Samsung Galaxy Note 5 is likely to feature a 5.4-inch or 5.5-inch Super AMOLED display with curves on both the edges. The display is likely to also feature a 4K resolution. According to reports, the Note 5 will feature 3GB LPDDR3 DRAM, 32GB of eMMC (embedded multimedia card) along with a controller. The phone may also feature a 16MP rear camera, 8MP secondary shooter, 4GB RAM and 16GB internal storage.
HTC has had a tough year, tough decisions and a lot of devices. The company has had the slowest quarter yet and the stock prices have dropped to an all time low. The company also reported a net loss of $258 Million, which points to the fact that the company is not doing well.
However that has not stopped HTC from making new handsets, and in countries like India, the HTC market share is growing considerably.
The HTC One ME, adds fuel to the HTC fire in India, a handset that brings the best of the flagship world at a relatively lower cost.
Overview
The HTC One ME is a good mix of things from HTC. Priced at Rs. 40000 or US $ 630 (outright) the phone makes a lot of sense to people. However the use of mediate is slightly bothersome to the tech crowd, especially at such high prices.
Hardware
The HTC One ME has almost everything from the HTC One M9+ including most of the hardware. What differs is the chipset. The One ME uses the new MediaTek Helio X10 and is also the first phone with the said chipset. This enables devices to utilise full octal-cores at 2.2 GHz in 64 bit and also shoots high quality videos at upto 480 frames/sec. It allows a 120 Hz video display rate too.
Apart from that you will get 3 GB of RAM, a brilliant 2k display with 5.2 inch size, a 2560×1440 px resolution and 565 ppi.
The same camera as the One M9, a 20 MP f2.2 lens equipped sensor, and an HTC ultra pixel sensor for the front.
Specifications
HTC One ME
Display
5.2-inch Super LCD3
Resolution
WQHD 1440×2560 pixels : 565 ppi pixel density
Chipset
MediaTek Helio X10
Processor
Octa-Cora 2.2 GHz
GPU
PowerVR G6200
RAM
3 GB
Storage
32 GB
MicroSD Support
Yes, Upto 2TB
Rear Camera
20MP, f2.2, BSI Sensor, 4K Video Recording
Front Camera
HTC Ultrapixel, f2.0
Battery
2,840mAh
Operating System
Android Lollipop 5.0.2 with HTC Sense 7.0
Misc
Boom Sound Speakers / Fingerprint Scanner
Price
Rs. 40,500
Display, Multimedia and Camera
The display on the new ME is the same as the M9+, excellent colours, deep blacks and great outdoor visibility. The touch is highly sensitive and even works when there is water on the display or if your fingers are wet. You will also get features like double tap to turn on. The display is great for all sorts of usage like watching movies, playing games or even browsing the internet. The high resolution makes content optimized for this look, great and the strain on the eyes is reduced considerably.
Boomsound speakers have always had this ability to be better than the remaining devices in the price segment and that continues with the new One ME. Sound is excellent in the headphones, out speakers or via bluetooth. Volumes are kept high and bass levels deep, almost as if the profile is the same as the old ones when HTC handsets would ship with “Beats Audio,” however, only better.
The camera lens and sensor are relatively large, hence a lot of light passes through to get a really high detail image. The images have excellent contrast and sharpness, shallow depth of field on close ups and a large zoom ratio thanks to the large 20.1 MP size of the rear camera.
4k video can be captured in 5 minute bursts, which gets annoying for those looking for a seamless solution. There are alternatives, devices which do not have said limits including the one we chose for our project here. Video is jitter free and captured at 30fps and it looks good, as the colour is deep and light is aptly adjusted.
Camera App
The Camera App is in-depth and features a lot of the capabilities of HTC devices seen in the past, galleries and Zoe are now independent apps with independent cloud storages. This complicates things for first time users, but in the longer run, makes sense. You also get the usual filters and effects along with post capture edits, which were all a part of HTC’s Sense.
Rear Camera Bokeh Effect
Rear Camera Indoor
Wide Front Camera
Front Ultrapixel Camera
Performance and Gaming
The handset scores roughly 46-48k on Antutu 64 Bit benchmark, which is impressive taking into consideration, the price. However, most of the performance which may not appear on benchmarks can been seen in real time usage.
The handset will almost never lag. In the 2 weeks of usage, the handset has not slowed down and transitions remain smooth, despite consuming large parts of the storage and or RAM.
Gaming remains impressive, the 120 Hz refresh rate of the display helps tremendously. Boom sound adds to the experience and so does the impressive touch screen. The good thing is that the device does not heat up despite increased usage, or high periods of gaming.
Phone Networks and Battery
The HTC One ME accepts dual LTE sim cards, both of which need to be nano sim cards. Network strength is great and so is the audio on both sides. Both sim cards can run LTE data packs and can be switched, depending on your convenience or usage scenarios.
Battery life was impressive due to high levels of optimizations and range point locks. Despite several rumours of poor battery life, we did not face any such issues with the handset. On our handset, the battery life was rather impressive. We got an average of One day plus use. Another thing to brag about is the quick charge capability of the handset. The One ME reaches a full charge in just over an hour, 50% recharge can be achieved in about 15 minutes of time.
Type of Usage
Battery Life Expectancy
Phone Calls
5 Hours
Standby
3 Days
Gaming
3.5 Hours
Music Playback
11 Hours
Internet
7.5 Hours
Fingerprint, Blinkfeed and New Sense 7
The new style fingerprint scanner utilised by HTC is better by leaps and bounds. Versus the previous ten scanners, which required you to slide your finger across, the new “Apple Touch ID” style scanners are efficient and very usable. This makes your phone private and safe. You can easily unlock your device in the presence of others, without revealing your passwords or unlock patterns.
Fingerprint Sensor
The new Blinkfeed is far more seamless and smooth. The UI is easy and very pleasing to the eye, HTC has improved the layout of the content and things like fonts and colours have been tweaked to appear easy to the eye. You can now simplify content and chose what feeds you want, within your Blinkfeed. You can also set up custom channels for the same, to allow you to reach directly to your favourite feeds.
Sense 7 is a mega improvement over previous Sense UIs, more because of the way pure android is available to the consumer. The UI is far more simplified and streamlined, less invasive and does not come loaded with bloatware. Essentials like the “Zoe” feature and the “One Gallery” are cloud-only apps that serve a simple purpose.
Customisation has been HTC’s forté and it remains so, in the new Sense 7 on the new HTC One ME. The UI is extensively modifiable, and if you don’t like the BlinkFeed on the left you can simply use a third party launcher and replace it all.
Conclusion
HTC may not have gotten a lot of things right this year, but their devices in the Indian market show that the company has chosen the right things at the right time.
The HTC One ME is one such example. With Snapdragon not performing well on their current lineup of chipsets, HTC went with MediaTek and their latest “premium” chipsets. This has made the devices a lot more stable. However, this has also made one handset considerably vary from another. Some report of lag and battery drain while others, like us, appreciate the long battery life on our handset.
MediaTek aside, the HTC One ME is the plastic equivalent of the all round phone. The impressive display, great camera, excellent battery and seamless performance on our handset, makes us want to like it a lot. Just like any other scenario alternates do exist and with the S6 becoming cheap, a fixed storage and single sim is something that may make you pick the HTC One ME with its Dual Sim and 2TB expandability. However the S6 performs better and looks damn good.
Apple revolutionized the music industry when the iPod was launched 15 years ago. However, over the years, it has suffered the same fate as the Discman and the Walkman – it got replaced by a better system. Though it never matched the storage system that iPod offered, users started storing music on their iPhones and in the later years, streaming services such as YouTube, Vevo and Spotify literally killed the need for an iPod. It seems Apple hasn’t forgotten the iPod, despite the fact that it just launched its own streaming service.
According to a report by iGen, a French website, Apple may launch a new range of iPods in colours such as gold, electric blue and fuchsia, plus classic black, pink and grey sidereal. The new range will include iPod Shuffle, iPod Touch and iPod Nano. While the smaller models will not receive any major upgrades, the iPod Touch will be upgraded to 64-bit from the 32-bit A5 processor that the current one uses.
As Tech 2 puts it, the speculation is based on the code spotted inside the latest iTunes version. Apple has not yet confirmed the launch date for the new iPods.
It will be interesting to see how Apple presents the new iPods, considering that Apple just launched its streaming service and more music lovers are lapping up its features.
Facebook has grown from being a website where people post last night’s party pictures to a site where anything can happen. You can advertise your business, you can check out various events happening nearby, read the latest news and now, Facebook is venturing into streaming too. To enhance your experience, Facebook is reportedly testing a new virtual assistant along the lines of Siri and Cortana, named ‘Moneypenny’.
Named after the famous assistant in James Bond series, the feature will be present in the Messenger App. According to Engadget, Moneypenny will assist you in shopping and research, which sounds rather useful. Facebook is known for its penchant for data collection, and if people are excited about a feature like Moneypenny, then it’s a goldmine for the company as well as advertisers.
No other details about Moneypenny have been revealed yet. It will be interesting to see how Facebook integrates this with its website and app, considering that the virtual assistants by Apple, Microsoft and Google are integrated into the OS as a whole.
We can’t wait to meet Bond’s Facebook’s new assistant, Moneypenny.
This week was loaded with new product releases and announcements from around the world. We have compiled a list of news that made the rounds.
Here are the top highlights of the week:
LG hints at Google Nexus Handset
According to rumors, Google has teamed up with LG to produce the next Google Nexus handset. The device will reportedly sport a 5.2-inch screen display, six-core Snapdragon 808 processor by Qualcomm, and 2700mAh battery pack. It seems Google wants to recreate the success of Nexus 5, which was manufactured by LG.
Instagram Now Allows 1080x1080p Squares
What’s the point of clicking photographs in HD if you can’t view it in Instagram? Instagram users can now rejoice as they can store images in HD resolution. The app has upgraded the resolution from 640 x 640 pixels to 1080×1080 pixels.
Truecaller Launches Messaging App to Keep Your Inbox Spam Free
Truecaller has launched its messaging app, Truemessenger, which basically serves the same function as its parent app – filter out spam and messages from unknown numbers.
OnePlus Two Details
With just two weeks left for the OnePlus 2 launch, here are some of the key details that have been revealed about the upcoming phone –
The phone will not be priced more than Rs. 28,500, OnePlus confirmed on Twitter.
OnePlus 2 will arrive with a 4GB RAM and may sport a metal body.
LG G4 Review
Check out our review of the LG G4 and find out if it is worth a hole in your pocket.
LG launches two new G4 variants
LG has released two new variants in its G4 lineup, the LG G4 Stylus and the G4 Beat.
Xolo Launches Black
Xolo has launched “Black” through Flipkart priced at Rs. 12,999. The company hopes the phone will be able beat to rivals Motorola and Xiaomi.
iOS 9 beta released for public
Apple has released the beta version of iOS 9 for the public. The company has introduced some new features such as separate folder for selfies and screenshots and Apple News.
GoPro Is Back With the New Tinier GoPro Hero4 Session
GoPro, the company well known for making incredible cameras for adventure and sports terrain, has unleashed their newest and the smallest beast yet, the GoPro Hero4 Session. The new camera is the first significant redesign of the company’s omnipresent camera in nine years.
Back in April, Xiaomi unveiled its new smartphone, the Mi 4i, at a grand event in New Delhi. One lakh registrations went up, and 40,000 units were sold out within 15 seconds. Rumours had that the company would be launching two more devices in the lineup later between June and July. The two anticipated devices were the Mi5 and Mi5 Plus.
Today, it is unveiled that the Chinese tech giant Xiaomi on Saturday teased an event that is scheduled to be held on 16 July, a social networking site Weibo said. The device that may come in the market is speculated to Xiaomi Mi 5.
As we can see in the picture revealed online, it could be Mi 5 with a metal body that is looking thin with curved corners.
The claimed specs of the devices were leaked on the Chinese social media site, Weibo. The Mi 5 is lauded to have a 5.2-inch display with a resolution of 1440×2560 pixels. It is held it will be powered by the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 chipset with either 3GB or 4GB RAM and will be juiced by a 3,000mAh battery. Its camera specification includes a 16MP primary camera.The device will also be infused with fingerprint technology.
The leaks also suggested that the Mi5 will be priced at CNY 2,399 (approximately Rs. 24,500).
News and reports of its larger cousin, the Mi5 Plus is yet to be announced. Going by the specs, the Mi 5 Plus will feature a 6-inch screen with 4GB RAM, 32GB internal memory and a 16MP primary camera.
Meanwhile, another of Xiaomi’s smartphones expected to be launched in 2015 is the Redmi Note 2, the successor to the popular Redmi Note of 2014. Acknowledging the fact that the Redmi Note was launched in July 2014, there is a good chance that its successor could be unveiled during the 16 July event. But, let us wait till Thursday to find out.
A few days ago, we did a story on how HTC ultimately become one of the biggest mobile phone manufacturers known for its design, OEM branded devices and its trademarked user interface in the world, all thanks to Cher Mi Wang, H T Cho and Peter Chou, who collectively established the company.
HTC, which stands for High Tech Computer, has been making smartphones longer than almost anyone. Years ago, it HTC was known for creating Windows Mobile devices that were rebranded by AT&T, O2 and other companies. But thanks to its early embrace of Android with the T-Mobile G1 and Google Nexus One, HTC has risen to stardom, becoming a brand of its own and holding its own against mobile industry veterans like Motorola and Samsung.
It seems 2015 has not really been a good year for HTC. HTC says their financial figures for its second quarter of 2015 lost 24 cents (or pence) for every dollar (or pound) of revenue it took. After four quarters of thin profits, the business just fell rolling off a cliff. In March, the company had a market cap of $4.06 billion, and today—only a few months later—it is worth less than half of that. The trend is downwards — year over year, HTC’s monthly revenue was down 38% in April, 48% in May, and 60% in June.
We can see in the graph that the HTC One M8 was the last peak of the HTC growth rate before starting to dwindle. The HTC One inspired an emotional connection, unusual in a generic market. The mobile won lots of phone-of-the-year awards. It joined a striking design to the smartest and most polished of all the leading user-interface skins. Surely, you would think this would turn into sales? It did, but only up to a point.
In the past few years, HTC chose to concentrate on the high-margin end of a cut-throat market, and outsourced manufacture of cheaper models to cut costs. Without an active portfolio, it couldn’t capitalize on any “halo effect” from all the rave reviews of the M8.
Also, the trademark design of the flagship didn’t change to the plastic E8 while the One Mini 2 married the One’s high-quality body and design to an underpowered engine. Neither screamed “buy me.”
The last three years of HTC flagships: The One M7, M8, and M9.
Samsung “recovered” in 2015 because it had used years spending a vast amount of debt on marketing and advertising. HTC had underinvested in marketing and hardly made a few good advertisements. HTC never published sales numbers for the M9, but our guess is they were never good. Reports from the supply chain suggest that HTC could cut component orders for the M9 by 30 percent. One major US carrier even left out the M9 from its lineup due to “lackluster sales.” The M9 flagship is not the reason of all of HTC’s woes, but it’s a good indicator of the company’s problems. In its Q2 guidance revision, HTC accused its economic problems on “slower demand for high-end Android devices and weaker than forecast sales in China.” The only other high-profile device the company makes is the Nexus 9, which ended up being an overpriced tablet with inferior build quality.
So will HTC survive or manage a comeback? We will never know for sure, not up until something changes. However, things are not looking great for the Taiwanese brand at the moment.
The smartphone train keeps on moving forward as time passes by. With almost half of the year gone by, we’ve seen many new devices like Samsung Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge and HTC One M9. But the year is far from ending, and many companies have given out hints of their new unnamed devices. Let us check them out below
Apple iPhone 6s
The iPhone 6 and 6 Plus were released in September, and in the months leading up to that, the gossip mill went mental. Be ready for more of the same with the iPhone 6S, which will launch in September 2015 running iOS 9. As always, we’re presuming a faster processor and some upgraded specs, but little change to the design. According to rumours, the new devices will have a faster A9 processor, 2GB of RAM, a 12-megapixel camera, an additional microphone to enhance voice quality, and a new interior mechanical design to address some bending issues users experienced with the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus.
OnePlus Two
OnePlus One was one of the most successful Chinese electronic startup stories of 2014. This handset captured an enormous chunk of the mid-segment smartphone market. OnePlus announced a new device on June, which is expected to be the next OnePlus handset. According to OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei, the OnePlus 2 will surprise us, and is likely to focus on flagship-rivalling design rather than specs. The OnePlus 2 launches on 27 July, and will be the first product ever to do so in virtual reality. We already know it will feature OxygenOS, an upgraded Snapdragon 810 processor, USB Type-C and a fingerprint scanner; also expect 4GB of RAM, a 3300mAh battery and a 5.5in 2K screen.
Samsung Galaxy Note 5
Everyone always brags on about Samsung’s Galaxy S lineup, but it’s the Note series that really impresses. The Note 4 was unveiled at a Samsung Unpacked event prior to September’s IFA trade show (3 September 2014), and right now sits at the top of our fastest smartphone and best phablet charts. Traditionally Samsung’s Note launches are held at IFA in September, but rumours suggest we might see the Samsung Galaxy Note 5 as early as July to give it a headstart on the new iPhones.
Mi5 and Mi5 Plus
Reports from Gizmochina claim two more devices will be joining Xiaomi’s line-up later in June 2015. These devices are larger copies of the Mi 4, expected to be named Mi 5 and Mi 5 Plus. The claimed specs of the devices were leaked on the Chinese social media site, Weibo. The Mi 5 is touted to have a 5.2-inch display with a resolution of 1440×2560 pixels. It is believed to be powered by the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 chipset with either 3GB or 4GB RAM and will be juiced by a 3,000mAh battery. Its camera specification includes a 16MP primary camera.The device will also be infused with fingerprint technology. Its larger cousin, named as Mi 5 Plus, will feature a 6-inch screen with 4GB RAM, 32GB internal memory and a 16MP primary camera. While nothing has been mentioned about the price, some rumors claim that Mi5 is slated to be priced around Rs. 23,900. Should the rumor turn out to be true, Mi5 will become one of the strongest performing phones in the market. We hope Xiaomi announces Mi5 as early as possible.
LG G5
Rumours say that LG is now working on the successor of the G4, and will be bringing iris recognition system into play. Reports from Korean publications state that LG has teamed up with local biometrics specialist Irience to implement this feature in its next smartphone. Reports also indicate that the phone will be released in the last quarter of 2015. For now, this is the only information we have found out.
Samsung Galaxy S6 Mini and Galaxy S6 Plus
Samsung Galaxy S6 Mini
It seems like Samsung is on the move to expand its range of Galaxy lineups. The Korean company is reportedly working on a smaller version and a larger version of the Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge, namely, Galaxy S6 Mini and Galaxy S6 Plus respectively. Both the rumours emerged this week.
According to GSMArena, the smaller version, Galaxy S6 Mini, or ‘SM-G9198′, the device will be an iPhone 6 competitor. It will have a 4.6-inch HD display and run on Snapdragon 808 chip with 2GB of RAM. It will be equipped with a 15MP primary camera and a 4.7MP front camera.
Galaxy S6 Plus
Meanwhile, Italy’s HDBlog revealed that the company is working on a bigger version, possibly a phablet, on the Galaxy S6 line. For now, the device has been codenamed as ‘Project Zero 2?. Interestingly, the S6 and S6 Edge were codenamed ‘Project Zero’. According to the rumours, the device will just be like the Galaxy S6, only bigger and with a more powerful battery.
Microsoft Lumia 940XL
Microsoft had launched the Lumia 930 almost a year ago, and now, the company is back with its newest smartphone, the Microsoft Lumia 940XL. According to NokiaPowerUser, the device is a larger version of the Lumia 940. The device is expected to have a bigger 5.7-inch display with a slim design and a metal frame. The processor will feature a Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 processor paired with 3GB of RAM and 32GB of internal storage, a microSD card slot for expandable storage, a 5MP front-facing camera, a 20MP main PureView camera for photos and videos, and will feature native pen support as well.Further, it will also support USB C-Type and an Iris Scanner too. The specs sound very exciting, but the company has not officially confirmed the existence of such a device.
Motorola Moto X (third-gen)
Motorola may launch the third generation of its flagship Moto X smartphones in the coming few months. According to STJS Gadgets, the third-generation Moto X is leaked by a Motorola insider, who claims to have a hold of details about the next Moto X. The upcoming smartphone on the Moto X series will sport a 5.2-inch QHD AMOLED display, used on the Droid Turbo. Under the hood will be a Snapdragon 808 chipset bundled with a massive 4GB RAM. The device will come pre-installed with Android 5.1.1 Lollipop.The front camera will be 5MP while the back will house a 16MP snapper with Clear Pixel Technology. The battery powering the device will also be mammoth at 3280mAh. The device will come in two storage variants – 32GB and 64GB.
Bonus
Nexus 5 2015
New reports have emerged that after months of speculation about with whom will Google team up with for its next Nexus device, it seems that LG could be the one to build the next, temporarily named, Nexus 5 2015. According to Android Pit, rather than basing the Nexus 5 2015 on the LG G4, LG will be creating the new handset from the scratch. The device would sport a 5.2-inch screen display, six-core Snapdragon 808 processor by Qualcomm, and 2,700 mAh battery pack, according to the rumours. It may also come in 64 GB and 128 GB variants and have a 16-megapixel rear camera and a five-megapixel wide-angle camera in front.
However, for now, neither Google nor LG has confirmed the news. Also, Google’s next mobile OS, Android M is set for an August release date. Hence, details regarding how many Nexus devices are going to be released and who would be building them will be out really soon.
Keep on checking iGyaan for more updates regarding these future devices!
