Flipkart-exclusive Xiaomi’s ‘Desh ka smartphone’ to launch on Nov 30

The smartphone, a Flipkart-exclusive, is touted to be a battery-centric budget offering with smart multitasking capabilities.

Business News Today :  India’s leading smartphone maker Xiaomi is gearing up to launch on November 30 a new smartphone designed for the masses. The smartphone, a Flipkart-exclusive, is touted to be a battery-centric budget offering with smart multitasking capabilities.

The information around the upcoming smartphone is limited. But going by the tagline ‘Desh ka smartphone’, it seems the upcoming device is from the Redmi lineage.

Recently, the company launched Redmi 5A in China, a successor of trhe entry-level Redmi 4A, and houses a 3,000 mAh battery. The smartphone, the company claims, offers eight days of battery life. We believe the upcoming smartphone would be called the Redmi 5A.

The Redmi 5A would be a minor upgrade over predecessor Redmi 4A. It sports a 5-inch HD (1280×720) screen with three capacitive buttons below it. It is powered by a Snapdragon 425 SoC clocked at 1.4GHz, coupled with 16 GB of internal storage and a 2 GB RAM.

There is a microSD slot that can accommodate a chip of up to 128 GB storage to expand the device storage. The phone runs Android Nougat covered under Xiaomi’s proprietary MIUI 9 theme on the top.

The handset sports a 13-megapixel rear camera with f/2.2 aperture and a 5MP front facing selfie camera with f/2.0 aperture. Among other features, the primary camera supports burst mode, panorama mode and HDR mode.

Click to Know → Redmi 5A Features

Google Pixel 2 review: A compact smartphone challenging bigger flagships

Priced at Rs 61,000 for the base model with 64 GB storage and 4 GB RAM, the phone competes with the iPhone 8, iPhone 7, Samsung Galaxy S8 and HTC U11

 

Technology News : The Pixel 2, global technology major Google’s latest smartphone offering, is no masterpiece when it comes to design. But the smaller sibling of the duo in Pixel’s next-generation series exceeds expectations in terms of performance and imaging capabilities.

A powerful device with a compact body form, the Pixel 2 feels solid in hand and premium in aesthetics. The smartphone also boasts some clever algorithms from Google that learn the user’s usage pattern and improve the camera performance to match the results, or even exceed in some cases, of smartphones with dual cameras.

When compared with the Pixel 2 XL, this smartphone looks small and lets go of the 18:9 aspect ratio screen for a tradition 16:9 screen with fullHD resolution of 1920 x 1080. There are huge bezels on top and bottom – something reminiscent of HTC smartphones – that house powerful front-facing stereo speakers.

Just like the Pixel 2 XL, the back side of the Pixel 2 is also bland, with a higher top covered with glossy plastic and housing a 12-megapixel primary camera and LED flash. The rest of the area is covered with matte aluminium sheet which gives a premium feel.

The camera in the Pixel 2 is a delight to use. It is one the smartest cameras we have seen in a smartphone. Though a single unit, the camera takes clear pictures irrespective of lighting conditions.

The phone camera also features a portrait mode, something that so far was restricted only to dual-camera smartphones. This mode uses machine learning and artificial intelligence to create blurring effects (Bokeh) while keeping the subject in focus crisp and sharp. The addition of a live photo feature adds more substance to compete with the likes of the iPhone camera features.

Click to Know → Google Pixel 2 Price India

OnePlus 5T review: 18:9 screen adds 1+ to capable mid-range flagship device

Priced at Rs 37,999 for premium variant, the OnePlus 5T is a mixed bag of worthy and unnecessary upgrades

 

Technology News : China-based smartphone manufacturer OnePlus, after coming up with a few affordable flagship devices, has now set a new benchmark by launching two flagships in a year. The company recently launched the OnePlus 5T, a flagship smartphone that breaks away from OnePlus’ 5.5-inch display culture in favour of an ultra-wide 6-inch 18:9 aspect ratio screen.

In a way, OnePlus has indeed repeated itself in its upgrade experiement – the company had last year launched the upgraded flagship OnePlus 3T soon after coming up with the OnePlus 3. This time, the OnePlus 5T has come within five months of the OnePlus 5 launch.

But how worthy was the OnePlus 5 for an upgrade? And is the OnePlus 5T even a worthy upgrade of the predecessor? Business Standard reviewed the OnePlus 5T and compared its features with the OnePlus 5 to assess the upgrade quotient. Here are our observations:

OnePlus’ choice of the future-ready ultra-wide 18:9 aspect ratio screen in the OnePlus 5T is a welcome move. However, continuing with a fullHD resolution seems to limit the otherwise perfect display. Competitors have long been offering quadHD screens in their flagships. With the new ultra-wide format screen in the OnePlus 5T, the quadHD screen resolution might have been a real upgrade.

The OnePlus 5T display offers good sunlight legibility, contrast ratio and saturation. It covers almost the entire front with minimal top and bottom bezels. Also, the screen is no more prone to ‘Jelly effect’, which had been seen in some OnePlus 5 units.

Click to Know → Oneplus 5T Features