Bharadwaj Chandramouli | Fone Arena

Nokia Lumia 1020: What we know till now

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The long wait is finally coming to an end, with today’s launch of the much expected and awaited camera flagship from Nokia. Ever since the Nokia 808 launched in February 2012, the device has been unanimously praised as the world’s best camera on a phone, and it has stayed true even now. Efforts to dethrone the 808 have been unsuccessful till now, even with Nokia’s other PureView’s cameras, but that was not really their notion anyway. The Nokia 808 PureView phase I, it was called, once the Nokia Lumia 920 released with other capabilities, which was denoted as PureView phase II. Reported claims of specifications, images, hardware shots, accessories have all leaked out to the internet way before the device has even officially launched. So, what do we know about it till now? Find out all the details below.

UPDATE: AT&T just outed 3 promo videos –

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRV2KTcGz50

Looks like the camera UI is much better than what we had imagined, anyway read on for more videos below.

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How to book a Indian Railways train ticket from your mobile phone with just two SMSes

IRCTC copy

Indian Railways ticketing has always been cumbersome. While the online booking system indeed solved some of the issues, the IRCTC website always makes us nostalgic of the long waiting queues at stations and be the pinnacle of utter disappointment at times. While the website offers infinite control over your ticket booking, there are a lot of times when you just want it done, with minimal effort. Till now, it hasn’t been possible but worry not, a new and easy way of booking train tickets for Indian Railways is here, and it takes just two steps to book a ticket for upto six passengers! Read on to find out how.

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HERE Drive, HERE Transit and HERE Drive+ announced for all Windows Phone 8 devices

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HERE, the location asset that Nokia is proud of, has just been announced for all Windows Phone 8 devices, not just a Nokia Lumia. This is a significant step towards Nokia’s contribution to the Windows Phone ecosystem, even though Nokia owns a majority of the market share. Devices like the HTC 8X will now be graced with HERE navigation and location apps that you get for free on Nokia Lumia smartphones. The apps include HERE Maps, HERE Transit and HERE Drive(with Drive+ for Global navigation). The picture above tells you the availability and the pricing of the new HERE apps that will be released for all Windows Phone 8 smartphones this week, with an update for all the Nokia Lumia devices.

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Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom Camera Review

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You have seen the camera samples, a comparison with the Nokia 808 PureView and the unboxing, and we felt that’s not enough to let you know about the camera on the Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom. So, here is a camera review with all the details you’d expect of the camera part of the S4 Zoom. What you will read is a deep dive into the technical details of the camera with a walkthrough of the UI, the camera samples and a short conclusion, leading up to our full review later. We have documented that on video first, do watch it here and go past the break for the text.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=atxKwigyYgk

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Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom vs Nokia 808 PureView Camera Comparison

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The Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom and the Nokia 808 PureView are somewhat similar products, with both the devices aimed at cameraphone enthusiasts looking at packing the best camera on a phone. While the approach taken by the two companies are largely different, the intention remains the same. One has added phone features to a point and shoot camera, while the other has added a point and shoot level camera on a phone. But in terms of camera, for a novice user who doesn’t dabble with too many settings, how do these devices fare? Lets find out.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AiipogKXoxk

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Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom Camera Samples

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The Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom was officially unveiled and launched recently at an event in London. We had went hands on with the device earlier and even unboxed it to show you the first glimpse of what this hybrid device is all about. And yes, as you guessed right, the device is all about the camera. We took it for a spin and shot a lot of camera samples. How did it fare in every situation possible? Read on to find out.

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Nokia Lumia 925: What’s New in the Amber Update?

Nokia Lumia 925

We have been playing around with the Nokia Lumia 925 for a while, and had unboxed it to provide a first look of the device, but there is a lot more to talk about. While the 4.5 inch AMOLED screen, the six element lens and the new design and build are the major hardware changes from the 920, the software here is the star, called as the Nokia Amber update. The Amber update, is actually additive to the Windows Phone GDR2 release that brings some minor improvements to all Windows Phone devices. The Amber update though, brings a lot of usable improvements exclusively to Nokia Lumia devices. Lets go through every one of them.

Psst, if you’re lazy to go through the text, here’s a video explaining every feature in the Amber update –

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACOEAbO9Em8

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Lenovo K900 Review

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Lenovo, a leader in the PC industry, has been widely known for its well built notebooks and other PC devices, but at the same time, has not been well known for its smartphones. In an effort to change that image, every company needs a hero device that is the flagship of its portfolio, to induce that halo effect on its other smartphones. Launched at the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this year, the Lenovo K900 is poised to be the flagship device that Lenovo hopes to lead its portfolio. The device landed in India just a few weeks back and we had already given our first impressions of it earlier. So, does it live up to the flagship status? Is it a worthy phone at a price of Rs. 32,999? Lets find out in the complete review below.

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Lenovo K900 Gaming Performance Overview

While we are busy writing our complete review of the Lenovo K900, we thought it would be right to show you the gaming performance overview, as a glimpse into the performance aspect of the Intel Z2580 system on a chip residing inside this flagship device. The 2 GHz dual core processor has a total of 4 threads thanks to Intel’s own Hyper Threading technology and giving company is the PowerVR SGX 544 MP2 for graphics. Impressively enough, the GPU is clocked at a high 533 MHz frequency, making it one of the fastest clock rates for the specific model. All said, lets move on to the gaming part of the device then!

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Google developing Android gaming console, new Nexus Q and more for the big refresh – WSJ

The Wall Street Journal is always a bit of a hit or miss when it comes to rumours and its sources, so take this with a pinch of slat. Google is reportedly developing its own Android based gaming console, inspired by the Ouya, says the publication according to “people familiar with the matter”. This doesn’t come as a surprise because a start up funded by Kickstarter has already pioneered this idea in the form of the Ouya, and just like what Google did after the Kindle Fire, we guess it will take the opportunity to follow through with the disruption.

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Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 powers the Samsung Galaxy S4 LTE-A with 150 Mbps data speeds

Qualcomm Snapdragon 800

While the rest of the world is just warming up to the idea of LTE, Samsung has gone ahead and announced the Samsung Galaxy S4 LTE-A for Korea with high data speeds upto 150 Mbps. And anything with LTE in it, is usually powered by one of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon chips and the Galaxy S4 LTE-A is no exception. Powering the high speed phone is the Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 SoC which blazed through benchmark tests that we ran recently. The flagship top tier chip is powering the Galaxy S4 and its LTE-A chip by providing the promised speeds of up to 150 Mbps.

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Nokia Asha 205 Review

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The Asha 205 is one of Nokia’s low end offerings that aims to help people with a lower budget experience a glimpse of the various services of the internet, and prepare them for the smartphone onslaught. It can also be a secondary back up device for Smartphone users for its battery life and basic internet connectivity. With a nice QWERTY keyboard aimed at the youth, and with a low price of Rs. 3,475 can it satisfy the budget user? Lets find out.

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Age of Empires to land on iOS and Android in 2013, more first party games later

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In a landmark change to the mobile gaming scenario, Microsoft has decided to bring some of its hugely popular first party titles to iOS and Android beginning with the Age of Empires in 2013. This is facilitated thanks to a license agreement by Microsoft with Klab, a mobile game developer in Japan which plans to port Age of Empires within this year to iOS and Android.

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Sony unveils the SmartWatch 2 for Android with one touch NFC

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Smartwatches have always been a niche at best. Recently spurred into prominence by crowd funded hardware innovators like Pebble, amidst rumours of Apple being interested in a similar device, the smart watch is suddenly cool again, and Sony wants in on the market enthusiasm. While they pioneered a bluetooth watch since 2007, Sony has unveiled its latest iteration of the same – the Sony SmartWatch 2. Made for Android devices running on v4.0 ICS or later, the watch sports NFC one touch pairing and promises several utilitarian functionality to grace your wrist. This has been launched in conjunction with the massive 6.4 inch Sony Xperia Z Ultra, check that out. Watch this official promo to get an idea of what it is –

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DoUzM7WYlP0

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Lenovo K900 Unboxing and First Impressions

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UPDATE – You can read the full review here.

The K900 is Lenovo’s massive flagship device that recently launched in India for Rs. 32,999. Boasting some impressive specs, it has landed in our labs for testing. The huge 5.5 inch 1080p IPS screen is coupled with powerful internals such as the 2 GHz dual core Intel CloverTrail processor and the 13 megapixel Sony Stacked CMOS sensor camera, making it a very impressive package. This got us excited for the unboxing and the initial walkthrough of the device, which we captured in a video here –

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnwXRcLlff4

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