As part of its Mobile World Congress announcements this week, Acer today announced the Acer Liquid Jade 2, the latest in the company’s lineup of flagship Liquid Jade branded smartphones.
When it comes to Android smartphones running manufacturer skins on top, the wait for the latest software updates can be excruciating, especially if you have a carrier-locked version. This year, LG’s seeking to change that it seems. The Android OEM announced via press release this morning that customers with the LG G4 will start seeing Android Marshmallow updates land from next week…
One of the most hotly-anticipated handsets of this year was finally made official recently, although little was said about its internal specs. All we know (officially) is that the BlackBerry PRIV will be an Android smartphone, and it will be a portrait slider with a physical QWERTY keyboard with “flagship specs”. Apart from a couple of official press renders, and a bungled hands-on demo by the chief, BlackBerry hasn’t been keen too share all the details with us yet.
A new leak from N4BB suggests strongly that early rumors of a focus on camera performance are accurate. The 18MP camera on the back purportedly features Schneider-Kreuznach optics and can record in 4K resolution at 30fps. It can also film 1080p at 720p at both 30fps and 60fps.
Although we don’t know exactly what processor is inside the PRIV, the leak suggests that it will be a 64-bit processor. There have been rumors previously stating that it will be the Snapdragon 808 hexa-core chip, the same processor found in the LG G4, Moto X Pure and LG Nexus 5X. BlackBerry then seemingly among the many manufacturers keen to avoid the overheating Snapdragon 810.
Previous leaks showed that the software would be a customized version of Android, keeping many stock elements but adding some of BlackBerry’s own popular tools and features like the notification Hub. Another piece of software being installed is a program called BlackBerry Safeguard which shows you how secure your BlackBerry PRIV is. In it, users can manage what information apps have access to and how they’re using it, and gives you warnings if there are settings you can change to make your device more secure.
We’ve heard before that PRIV = Privacy and Privilege. Security is a big focus for BlackBerry and its enterprise services are among some of the most-trusted on the planet. In the past, BlackBerry’s chief did state that they’d only release an Android phone if they could make it secure. It seems then that it has, and that BlackBerry Safeguard is just one of the ways which the company will secure the Google-powered device.
Last night, LG sent out a press release detailing its next flagship smartphone and teased its 2nd-generation Urbane watch. Today, at an event in New York, LG gave a more detailed first look to a select group of press folk. In so many ways, I can’t help but feel the LG V10 is the phone the LG G4 could have been. With so many flagship phones being equipped with fingerprint sensors and durable metal frames, the G4 has been a little out of place.
Now that the V10 has been outed, we can take a look at how its spec sheet compares to its little brother…
A few weeks ago, an unreleased and unnamed LG device passed through TENAA, China’s version of the FCC. The images showed what seemed to be an unremarkable device albeit one with the unusual design choice of having the front-facing camera built into the display. Later on it was revealed by Evan Blass (@evleaks) that there would be a secondary ticker display running along the top of the primary display.
Today, the well-known leaker is back with what looks like an official press render of that device, confirming that speculation…
Xiaomi has a growing reputation for releasing smartphones with impressive spec lists and features for very affordable prices. Its latest “flagship” was unveiled just a short while ago and features some flagship matching specs, but with a price that’s far below what you’d expect it to be…
As promised, Best Buy has started selling the new Moto X Pure online. The consumer electronics retail giant began selling it today, with white, black and bamboo models available in both 16GB and 32GB storage options.
As with Motorola’s Moto Maker, the prices start at $399 and go up to $475 depending on which memory and finish model you decide on.
There have been a number of LG handset leaks making the rounds in recent weeks and months. Whether it’s the LG Nexus or the mysterious ‘V10’, the company’s been unable to keep its upcoming devices from making appearances online. The latest device has seemingly been teased by the company itself on an invite promising ‘Something New’ on September 21. While the device name isn’t revealed, serial leaker Steve Hemmerstoffer believes it to be a mid-range phablet named the ‘LG Class’…
Motorola, this morning, opened up pre-orders for its newest flagship, the Moto X Style in the UK. While the device has been available to order in the US for a couple of weeks already, pre-sales only began today across the pond in Britain. Pricing starts at £399 and increases based on materials used on the back, or which storage option you go for.
When the Nexus 6 was announced with a super speedy Quick Charge 2.0 feature last year, I didn’t think it would almost be standard gear in the Android flagship world less than a year later. But here we are and pretty much every new high end phone announced in 2015 with Qualcomm hardware on board has it. In hindsight however, it’s not hard to see why.
Fast charging is incredibly useful in the car, on the road and at work where you have minutes to add hours of charge. And Qualcomm chips are now nearly ubiquitous in flagship Android phones making it a perfect storm (full updated list of of Quick Charge 2.0 phones and tablets here).
Aukey, a value-priced, quality hardware manufacturer that sells mostly through Amazon sent me 4 Quick Charge 2.0 products to review. All of them work well but I found some nuances to consider…
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Update: Canadian mobile operator TELUS has just posted its pricing for the Moto X Play, and it will be $50 CAD on a 2-year plan or $420 CAD unlocked.
Are you a Canadian eagerly awaiting the day when you can finally get Motorola’s new Android-powered Moto X Play in your hands? Well, this weekend is going to be great for you, as Motorola Canada has just announced that will be available in retail stores starting this Friday.
[tweet https://twitter.com/Motorola_CA/status/633735528110649348 align=’center]
Earlier today we saw Motorola begin to accept orders for the Moto X Play online through its Moto Maker personalization tool for approximately $400 USD. Orders through that system have been displaying an estimated delivery date of the 26th and 27th for some of the 55 countries (Europe, Latin America, and Canada) that the new phone is being sold in. Motorola Canada’s website has yet to be updated with pricing information, and the company has traditionally only sold its phones through carriers in Canada — not unlocked. There’s no word on when the Moto X Play will make it to retailers in the other 54 countries.
The Moto X Play is quite similar to the Moto X Style, also unveiled at the same time, but compromises on internal specifications in favor of a water-repellent design and quoted 48 hours of battery life. Where the Moto X Style is more beastly than the X Play is in its display, processor clock-speed, and total RAM — the X Style has a 5.7-inch Quad HD display, a 1.8GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 808, and 3GB of RAM, whereas the X Play has a 5.5-inch Full HD display, a 1.7GHz Snapdragon 615, and 2GB of RAM. You still get the same 21 megapixel camera, 5-megapixel front-facing camera, and the battery capacity is 3630 mAh versus 3000 on the X Style.
As with all Motorola smartphones these days, expect a very light Android experience (Lollipop until Android Marshmallow comes out) with almost no Motorola-preinstalled software save for well-regarded features like Moto Assist. That is, after all, one of the main selling points of Motorola phones today aside from their reasonable prices off-contract.
Motorola Canada’s The United States was left out of this phone’s release, but Motorola says that it will be bringing more new offerings stateside sometime in the near future.
Android-powered flip-phones are all the rage now with Korean manufacturers. LG announced its ‘Wine Smart’ clamshell smartphone just a couple of weeks ago and today, Samsung has unveiled its latest dual screen flip phone, the G9198. It’s the follow up to its G9098 launched in China last year and if the spec sheet is anything to go by, this could be an impressive device, although it might not see release outside Asia.
Rumors that Samsung plans to launch a larger-screened version of the the Galaxy S6 edge kicked off at the beginning of the month, with the first alleged image appearing a day later. A later claimed image seemed to suggest a display size of around 5.5-inches, and dimensions and battery capacity reported today by SamMobile are in line with this kind of screen size.
It is around 151 mm tall and around 73 mm wide, which makes it 9 mm taller and 3 mm wider than the Galaxy S6 edge […] According to the insider information that we’ve received, the device will house a 3,000 mAh battery.
The phablet, which may be called the Samsung Galaxy S6 Plus or Samsung Galaxy S6 edge Plus, is said to go by the internal codename of Project Zero 2. Earlier rumors had suggested the device would have a hexa-core Snapdragon 808 processor, 32GB storage, 16MP rear camera and 5MP front camera.
While the rumored device is gaining in credibility, there’s no word yet on when it may launch.
Google’s existing Nexus 5 and Nexus 6 handsets
With Google reporting falling revenues from its Nexus devices, and having seemingly abandoned the original concept of an affordable vanilla device in favor of more expensive devices, the future of the product line was looking a little uncertain. But a new rumor says that Google will indeed be continuing the Nexus program – and not just with one new smartphone, but two.
Android Police cites a “reliable source” in suggesting that Google is partnering with two different manufacturers: with LG for a 5.2-inch smartphone code-named Angler, and with Huawei for a 5.7-inch phablet code-named Bullhead …
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