LG G2 Review

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It really is a testament to Moore’s law and the hyper-accelerated development of the mobile space that two year can lead to such immense differences between flagship devices in just 2 years. The Galaxy Nexus, announced in late 2011 was one of the first devices to feature a 720p display at a positively gigantic, (for the time) 4.65 inch display. It ticked every box in the spec sheet at the time, 1GB of RAM, the newest dual-core CPU clocked at 1.2GHz and a competitive GPU for the time courtesy of the OMAP 4460 platform.

Video Review

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkZkgZlH-nM

Now, just two years later, LG G2 is in almost every conceivable way twice the device the Galaxy Nexus was in a footprint barely 3mm larger in either width or length. Over twice the pixels in the form of a 5.2 inch 1080p display, twice the CPU cores at almost twice the clock speed courtesy of the Snapdragon 800 processor resting in the belly of this svelte beast. The camera is similarly improved, over twice the megapixels (13 Megapixels), more than twice the video recording capabilities (1080p 60) and almost twice the battery capacity (3000 mAh) to power all of these internals. It really is impressive and astounding how far the mobile market has moved in such a short time.

 

All in all, on the specifications side of things, the G2 is pretty representative of the top of line in 2013. So how does it stand out in what is already a crowded marketplace. In most cases, OEM’s attempt to differentiate in two major ways, industrial design and software additions,. So let’s took a look at the hardware shall we? Continue reading “LG G2 Review”

Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 T211 Review

Samsung announced the Galaxy Tab 3 T211 in April and it has been available since July. The Galaxy Tab 3 T211 is a 7inch mid-range Android tablet from Samsung that was launched keeping in mind the mid-range tablet buyers. Galaxy Tab 3 T211 is the one with the calling abilities while the Galaxy Tab 3 T210 is the WiFi version.

galaxy-tab-3-t211-review-18 Continue reading “Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 T211 Review”

Ground Miles app launched by Bupa, makes fitness tracking social

Fitness enthusiasts now have yet another option to track their daily walks and runs. Ground Miles is a new app developed by Bupa which is the company behind Max Bupa and is meant to encourage you to walk a bit more. Makes sense coming from a health insurance brand! The app was launched in association with the World Health Federation and is a ‘personalized and motivational’ walking app. The application uses GPS to keep a track of the distance you’ve walked and even helps you locate walking routes.

Bupa-Pedometer

What sets it apart from the wide range of similar apps available out there is the social bent to the app. The app helps you find walking clubs, compare scores against family members and friends. There’s the usual stats like walking quotient, number of steps taken, distance walked and calories burnt. The Ground Miles app also has a gamification angle to it where it awards badges on the basis of goals crossed.  Continue reading “Ground Miles app launched by Bupa, makes fitness tracking social”

iPad Mini 2 housing spotted in Space Gray and Gold with Touch ID sensor


ipad-mini-2-gold

With the yearly iPad refresh right around the corner, we’re starting to see leaked images of the upcoming products. Spotted first on Weibo, we now have our first glimpse of the upcoming iPad Mini 2 housing. Expected to ship in all the same colors as the new iPhone 5s, the iPad Mini 2 was spotted in both space gray and gold. The three colors are expected to be silver, space grey and gold which are the same as that of the new iPhone 5s.  Continue reading “iPad Mini 2 housing spotted in Space Gray and Gold with Touch ID sensor”

HTC Desire 500 launching in India soon

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The HTC One mini appeared on the official India yesterday, now the Desire 500 is available for pre-order from online retailer Snapdeal. Online retailer Flipkart has also listed the smartphone as coming soon. The HTC Desire 500 was announced back in July and packs a 4.3-inch  (480 × 800 pixels) display, powered by a 1.2 GHz quad-core Snapdragon 200 processor and runs on Android 4.1.2 (Jelly Bean) with Sense 5. It has a 8-megapixel auto focus rear camera with LED Flash and BSI sensor and a 1.6-megapixel front-facing camera with BSI sensor. Continue reading “HTC Desire 500 launching in India soon”

Modern Combat 4: Zero Hour for Android, iPhone and iPad now at $0.99 for a limited period

Modern Combat 4 offer

Gameloft has started their weekend sale. This time they are offering Modern Combat 4: Zero Hour at a discounted price of $0.99 / Rs. 55 rather than the usual price of $6.99 / Rs. 390. The game was released for Android, iPhone and iPad back in December last year. Since there is no exact release date for Modern Combat 5, you can start this game and get familiar with the game play before the new game releases. The Modern Combat 4: Zero Hour, the latest First Person Shooter (FPS) in the franchise has better graphics, more life-like animations and improved sound and voice acting. Continue reading “Modern Combat 4: Zero Hour for Android, iPhone and iPad now at $0.99 for a limited period”

Archos 10.1 XS2 + Keyboard Dock Hands On

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During IFA 2013, alongside additions to its smartphone and other tablet ranges, Archos introduced the Archos 10.1 XS2 tablet that comes with a very cool ultrathin magnetic keyboard. The keyboard is a pleasure to use and slips away out of sight beneath the tablet (which can also be removed from the keyboard and carried around on its own).

Great design is one thing but does the Archos 10.1 XS2 have the specs list to back up Archos’ bold claims that this isn’t your average 10 inch tablet? Continue reading “Archos 10.1 XS2 + Keyboard Dock Hands On”

Nokia Coloud Headsets Photo Gallery

Nokia Coloud Boom 01

Back in July, Nokia had announced a trio of affordable headsets in collaboration with Coloud – namely Boom, Knock and Pop. These headsets are meant to be affordable while providing good design, sound and build quality.
Continue reading “Nokia Coloud Headsets Photo Gallery”

Samsung Galaxy Note 3 Camera Samples

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The Samsung Galaxy Note 3 has a leather-like texture on the back which is interesting, but what sits on top of it is even more interesting. Continuing the tradition of using the same camera units as the Galaxy S series for the Notes, Samsung has included the similar 13 megapixel camera for the Note 3, the exact same one that you find on the Galaxy S4. The 13 Megapixel sensor is Sony-made and is the 1/3.06″ Stacked EXMOR RS CMOS sensor that you find on various other devices like the very recent Oppo N1 and the Lenovo K900, but what differentiates Samsung devices from them is the Fujitsu-developed ISPs that are custom made for Samsung. With a bundle of great algorithms + ISP hardware and a highly sensitive camera sensor, the Note 3 strives to be as good as the Galaxy S4, or may be even better? Take a look at the camera samples below and find out for yourself!

Continue reading “Samsung Galaxy Note 3 Camera Samples”

Samsung Galaxy Note 3 Snapdragon 800 vs Exynos 5 Octa Benchmarks

Samsung Galaxy Note 3 Snapdragon 800 vs Exynos 5 Octa

We did a comparison between the Snapdragon 600 and the Exynos 5 Octa 5410 for the Galaxy S4 back in May, here we have the Note 3 to compare the benchmarks of the Snapdragon 800 and the Exynos 5 Octa 5420, the latest high-end chips from both Qualcomm and Samsung. The Snapdragon 800 processor is clocked at 2.3 GHz. The Exynos version uses Samsung’s ARM big.LITTLE architecture with fours Cortex A15 chips clocked at 1.9 GHz and four Cortex A7 chips running at 1.3 GHz. The Exnos 5 Octa chip has a ARM Mail T628 GPU instead of PowerVR SGX544MP3 GPU present in the Exynos 5410. The Snapdragon 600 chip has a Adreno 330 GPU, faster than the Adreno 320 present in the S4. Let’s see how these two phones perform in various benchmark tests.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wY1Fkss-Xtg
Continue reading “Samsung Galaxy Note 3 Snapdragon 800 vs Exynos 5 Octa Benchmarks”

Apple iPhone 5c vs iPhone 5, a side by side comparison of what’s new

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The Apple iPhone 5c(Check out the 360) in all its bluish glory landed in our labs for a quick unboxing and a photo gallery that we did earlier. While we covered a quick look at how it compares with the older and the very similar 5 in our unboxing video, lot of people were still asking for a deeper look at the comparison between them and here we are, with another video, detailing the same, now with all the details you need to know –

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUQj-yaTkJo

Continue reading “Apple iPhone 5c vs iPhone 5, a side by side comparison of what’s new”

Broadcom, Samsung and others partner to form MobileBench to improve mobile benchmarking

Broadcom, Huawei, OPPO, Samsung Electronics and Spreadtrum has partnered to form MobileBench, a new consortium for effective benchmarking of mobile devices. This consortium surprisingly doesn’t include Qualcomm, one of the top SoC manufacturers, NVDIA, popular for its Tegra processors or MediaTek which is based in China. Samsung is one of the founding member Continue reading “Broadcom, Samsung and others partner to form MobileBench to improve mobile benchmarking”

Google Nexus 7 gets a price cut, 16GB WiFi only version now available for Rs. 9,999

Google Nexus 7 was launched in India quite late and went for sale at Rs. 15,999 for the 16GB WiFi version. Around a couple of months back, Google announced their second version of Nexus 7 as the Google Nexus 7 2013 with an upgraded processor and a much better display. Earlier in July, just after the announcement of new Nexus 7, Amazon had slashed the price of Nexus 7 to Rs. 11,999 for the 16GB version.Now, Amazon and Flipkart, two popular giants of India’s eCommerce market slashed the price of original Nexus 7 to just Rs. 9,999 for the 16GB version.

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Gionee Elife E5 Review

Gionee E5 Elife-1

Gionee, popular Chinese mobile device design company entered into the Indian market back in March with the Dream D1. Now the company has launched several Android smartphones. The latest flagship smartphone is the Elife E5, that was launched back in July. The Elife E5 is the second phone in the Elife series. We reviewed the Elife E3 recently and the Elife E6 that was announced last month is coming to India next week. Even this phone lies in the 20k price range, similar to most of the latest phones from Indian companies. Let’s jump into the review to find out if it’s worth the price. Continue reading “Gionee Elife E5 Review”

Beats buys back $265 million of shares and bids good bye to HTC

HTC has been struggling in the smartphone market despite some encouraging HTC One sales. HTC held a 25 percent stake in the popular audio company Beats and that is one of the reasons most of the HTC handsets came with Beats audio. HTC had purchased 50.1 percent of Beats’ shares in 2011 for $300 million. Last year, the music company Beats got back half of that for $150 million and now they have totally got rid of HTC by buying their entire shares back for $265 million.

HTC-One-HTC-One-X-HTC-Butterfly-2 Continue reading “Beats buys back $265 million of shares and bids good bye to HTC”