Rumors have been heating up that BlackBerry is all set to introduce smartphones that run on the Android operating system instead of the company’s BlackBerry 10 OS. Latest updates suggest that the BlackBerry Prague might be the first of such handsets. Continue reading “BlackBerry Prague to be a low cost Android running handset, expected in August”
The Microsoft Band, launched in October, is gradually becoming quite a comprehensive fitness tracking platform. The company’s first effort in the fitness wearable space, the Band stood out for the sheer number of sensors on offer. Redmond has stood behind their product and has regularly added compelling features to the Band making it a fairly compelling offering. Continue reading “Microsoft Band gets automated golf tracking through partnership with TaylorMade”
Amidst a media blitz in Delhi, Micromax launched a brand new product that it claims to be the world’s slimmest handset. Called the Micromax Canvas Sliver 5, the phone measures a svelte 5.1mm and has specifications that should be good enough but aren’t really competitive. We spent some time with the handset to see what really sets it apart and here are our first impressions. Continue reading “Micromax Canvas Sliver 5 Hands On Impressions”
The emoji icons spotted on your phone’s keyboard are all part of an international standard that ensures that the icons are visible across devices and platforms. As part of Unicode 8, the Consortium has added 41 new emoji which cover a wide range of uses and emotions including a face with rolling eyes, a hugging face, taco, cheese and even a unicorn. Continue reading “Popcorn, Cricket and Robot Emoji headed to your phone as part of Unicode 8”
In a major organization reshuffle, Microsoft has announced the departure of two key executives. Stephen Elop, ex CEO of Nokia, had helmed the sale of the erstwhile smartphone giant to Microsoft. Jo Harlow, a high ranking member of the Nokia leadership, is also departing from the company. Harlow reported directly to Stephen Elop and was instrumental in the decision to kill future feature phones and also the Android powered X series of phones. Continue reading “Stephen Elop & Jo Harlow quit Microsoft as part of organization reshuffle”
Sharp, one of the most highly regarded manufacturers of smartphone displays, has announced that it has begun wide scale manufacturing of its new in-cell type touch displays. These displays are thinner and lighter and provide more flexibility to smartphone manufacturers to add more features within the space constraints of modern phones. Continue reading “Sharp announces mass production of in-cell type touch panels to facilitate thinner phones”
OnePlus has been relatively coy about the upcoming successor to their first handset, the OnePlus One. The sophomore release of the phone is being revealed piecemeal with the release date still unknown. On that note, the company took to its forums to reveal that the handset will be powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 810 chipset.
In particular, the company has chosen to go with v2.1 of the processor. The Snapdragon 810 is an Octa Core chipset and is 64bit compatible. In terms of capabilities, the chipset will let users steam 4K video as well as record ultra HD video. The capabilities of the Snapdragon 810 chip are well known but OnePlus claims to have integrated a newer, version 2.1, of the chipset into the handset which goes a long way in fixing the problems associated with overheating. The Snapdragon 810 chipset has been widely panned for overheating and the likes of LG too haven’t been able to resolve this issue.Indeed the solution so far has been thermal throttling of the chipset which results in decreased performance. The problem is documented well enough to have forced LG to opt for a slightly lower end hexa core 808 chipset that delivers similar real world performance with none of the heating issues.
In addition to the work done on reducing heating issues in collaboration with Qualcomm on a chipset level, OnePlus is also employing layers of thermal gel and graphite to dissipate heat evenly. While practically all multicore phones actively delegate tasks to individual processors based on computing requirements, OnePlus claims to have deviced a proprietary solution that ensures that such tasks aren’t assigned to adjoining processor cores as far as possible.
It certainly seems like OnePlus is working hard to mitigate any overheating issues that have plagued the Snapdragon 810 chipset as they go ahead with integrating the SoC into their upcoming flagship. We’ve seen mixed results from the efforts made by larger smartphone manufacturers so we do feel a bit skeptical about the company’s ability to achieve these results. The OnePlus 2 will be out later this year and we can’t wait to find out if the company delivers on its promise when it comes to a high end, yet cool computing experience.
[Via – OnePlus]
The Chinese invasion of the Indian smartphone market was helmed early on by the likes of Gionee. Somewhere between the price wars and the somewhat lackluster high end products, the brand never managed to gain the favor of high end smartphone buyers. Sure, the company has done exceedingly well in the mid to low end segment with record breaking turnovers that the enigmatic head of Gionee’s Indian business is proud to trumpet but the higher end has remained elusive. While the company has regularly produced ultra slim devices, with the Elife S7, Gionee hasn’t broken any world records and this very well might be for good reason. All said and done, we went over the handset with a fine toothed comb to ascertain whether the company has learnt from its mistakes and has finally created a high end product that can be wholeheartedly recommended. Did it succeed? Read on to find out. Continue reading “Gionee Elife S7 Review”
Locating a USB cable every time you need to transfer a file to your smartphone can become quite irritating. The developers behind Pushbullet, the app that easily lets you send across links, SMS messages and notifications across your computer and phone, have seemingly launched a new app to solve that very problem. Continue reading “Pushbullet Portal allows easy file transfers between PC and Android devices”
HTC has one of the better custom interfaces out there when it comes to Android skins. Ever since Sense UI 5, the company has introduced a special feature called BlinkFeed that can essentially be considered an endless feed of your social life, content based on your interests and if the Taiwanese company’s trial succeeds, then promotional adverts as well. Continue reading “HTC begins test pilot of promotions in BlinkFeed app”
Modular phones and the use of ecologically friendly materials has increasingly been in focus with Project Ara being one of the first serious attempts at making modular phones a reality. But if Dutch company, Fairphone, has its way, they might just beat Google’s project to the market. With the Fairphone 2, the company has a product that not only uses ethically sourced materials but is also easily repairable due to the modular nature of the construction. Continue reading “Fairphone 2 uses ethically sourced materials, brings easy repairs via modular design”
Eyefi has long been the go-to solution for users wanting to add wireless capabilities to their cameras but it has required users to purchase one of their own WiFi enabled SD cards. With more and more cameras shipping with WiFi built into them, Eyefi has announced that you’ll now be able to interface with GoPro and Olympus cameras to transfer images from them via the Eyefi application. Continue reading “Eyefi adds wireless transfer support for GoPro and Olympus cameras”
Cash rewards for fixing security bugs have always been a lucrative revenue stream for researchers and has resulted in more secure browsers and operating systems. Now, Google is bringing a similar reward scheme for users of Android phones. Continue reading “Android Security Rewards Program launched by Google to promote bug reporting”
Search encryption has been available as an option for Bing users and has been the default standard for Google and Yahoo users for quite some time now. Starting this summer, all your search queries through Bing will be encrypted by default and will bring increased security. Continue reading “Microsoft to encrypt Bing search by default”
Adobe, the maker of apps that are the de-facto standard in the creative world, has just launched a fresh range of Android applications. From Photoshop Mix to Shape CC, Brush CC, Color CC; we have applications that cover the whole spectrum of users from the hobbyist to creative professionals. Continue reading “Adobe releases a slew of Android apps including Photoshop Mix”
