Asus ZenFone Max (M2) Android Pie update rollout expands

Earlier last month, Asus rolled out the Android Pie update for the Zenfone Max (M2) in India, sporting the model number ZB632KL. Now, the company has expanded the rollout of the latest version of Android globally for the 2018 smartphone for all units, bearing the ZB633KL moniker. The firmware carries version number 16.2018.1905.42 and bumps up the Android security patch level on the smartphone to May 2019. Asus ZenFone Max (M2) Asus says the update is rolled out in batches, and it may take "some days" before you get an update prompt on your smartphone. If you can't wait for...

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OnePlus 7 Pro software features coming to OnePlus 5/5T/6/6T

The OnePlus 7 and 7 Pro brought two new features to Oxygen OS - these are the baked-in Screen Recorder and Zen Mode features. Owners of older-generation OnePlus devices wanted these features so much that, in fact, some users side-loaded them to their devices and found that they were half-broken. For instance, the Screen Recorder wasn't recording sound and notifications still came through when Zen Mode was activated. We have received some feedback from users who have installed the Screen Recorder and Zen Mode on the OnePlus 5/5T/6/6T. The results turn out to be that when you are using...

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Nokia 3.2 officially lands in India, sales start on May 23

Nokia today officially brought the Nokia 3.2 to India. The phone is priced at INR 8,990 for the 2/16GB model and INR 10,790 for the 3/32GB variant. The phone will go on sale starting May 23 across retail outlets. The Nokia 3.2 is a budget smartphone. The main feature of the phone is the large 6.26-inch display although it comes with the lowish 720p resolution. The other key feature is the promised 2-day battery life, courtesy of a 4,000mAh battery. While the battery may not seem all that big, the phone runs on the modest Qualcomm Snapdragon 429 so there's not much there to drain...

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Xiaomi will open a Mi Store in Portugal on June 1

After Romania, Xiaomi is to expanding its European fleet of Mi Stores to Portugal. The company announced it's planning to open its first official store in the Iberian country on June 1. Xiaomi really putting a strong focus on expanding its European presence and it's no wonder - yesterady it announced a 115% growth in shipments for the region and is now among the top four manufacturers in Western Europe. Despite slow growth in its home market of China, Xiaomi is looking strong in Europe and plans to reach 150 stores in the Old Continent before the end of the year. For now, we don't...

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Samsung pushes first software update for the Galaxy A70

The Samsung Galaxy A70 is one of the best all-around devices in the manufacturer's lineup. It offers a large 6.7-inch Super AMOLED screen with the capable Snapdragon 675 chipset and a large 4,500 mAh battery. The phone is on sale already and now it's treated to its first official OTA update. The A705GMDDU1ASE4 update comes in at 376MB and brings camera, fingerprint and stability improvements. Additionally, the Galaxy A70 is also treated to the May security patch. The camera now features an added Beauty Video mode and overall quality improvements. The fingerprint sensor has been...

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Canalys: China dominates smart speaker market in Q1

The smart speaker business is booming in China with a 500% year-on-year growth in the first quarter of 2019. During the first four months, 10.6 million units were shipped helping China secure a 51% share of the global market. The US, on the other hand, saw only 5 million smart speaker sales for the same period with a 24% market share. Baidu captured the top spot in the Chinese market due in large to an exclusive deal with the China Central Television (CCTV) channel. This, in turn, gave the brand exposure to a larger audience during the Chinese New Year holiday season. Alibaba, Xiaomi...

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Oppo K3 price, hands-on photos and battery capacity leak

Oppo K3 is arriving on May 23, packing the back design of Oppo Reno, but featuring a more traditional pop-up camera, like the Realme X. Hands-on photos of the device leaked on Twitter, while, in the meantime, the company posted some more specs on its official Weibo page. The device will support VOOC 3.0 fast-charging for the 3,765 mAh battery. Oppo K3 hands-on photos The images pretty much confirm what we already know - OLED panel with Always-On Display support, Blue-Violet back that can be Gorilla Glass, but is more likely a transparent polycarbonate panel. The main...

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Lenovo Z6 Youth Edition launching on May 22, key specs revealed

Lenovo announced the Z6 Pro flagship smartphone last month with Snapdragon 855 SoC and four cameras. And now, the company is all set to launch a toned down variant of this smartphone called the Lenovo Z6 Youth Edition on May 22. The Lenovo Z6 Youth Edition is already available for pre-order on the company's official website, and its listing confirms features like triple rear cameras, waterdrop-notch display, and a dual-frequency GPS. Furthermore, the smartphone will come with a gradient design, a rear-mounted fingerprint scanner, as well as HDR10 and Dolby Atmos support. It will ship...

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Samsung is ready with its own 5x optical zoom smartphone camera

The Huawei P30 Pro brought the periscope camera trend followed by the Oppo Reno 10x zoom and it seems Samsung wants to join the long optical zoom party. Samsung Electro-Mechanics (SEM) has begun mass production of its new 5x optical module and according to rumors we can expect to see it in Samsung's upcoming Note series phones. The sensor won't protrude from the back thanks to its slim 5mm profile compared to the 6mm thickness on previous Samsung modules. Inside, the new 5x sensor uses a light refracting prism similar to the P30 Pro but with a rectangular lens instead of a circular...

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Our Motorola One Vision video review is up

The One Vision is the first smartphone from Motorola with a radically different design - one that departs from the circular camera bump around the back. The One Vision is also the first to use a hole-punch camera instead of a notch at the top of the display. The display itself isn't terribly color accurate, but maximum brightness is pretty good, and the contrast is automatically adjusted for viewing in direct sunlight. This is a 6.3-inch IPS LCD with a super-tall 21:9 aspect ratio which makes it a little harder to watch the standardized 16:9 video format. The phone itself is...

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Redmi Note 7S to replace the Redmi Note 7 in India

Xiaomi's sub-brand Redmi launched the Redmi Note 7 in India back in February. And yesterday, the company announced the Redmi Note 7S in the country which is actually a re-branded version of the Chinese Note 7. Now, Redmi has confirmed that the Note 7 will be replaced by the Note 7S in India, effectively aligning its offerings with the Chinese market. It's hardly a shock as the two smartphones are priced similarly and come with an identical hardware, except for the dual camera setup at the back. The Note 7 sports 12MP and 2MP modules on its rear, while the Note 7S comes with 48MP and...

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Honor 20 Lite hands-on

If you got your eyes on the Huawei and Honor phones but didn't want to dig deep into your pockets for a full-fledged flagships like the Huawei P-series or the recently announced Honor 20-series, the Chinese vendor is offering the Honor 20 Lite - an even more affordable alternative to the P30 Lite. The phone was launched about a month ago in Russia but this is the first time we get to see it in person, and it will finally reach the rest of the European market. It's a fashionable smartphone with a cool-looking back with gradient colors - Phantom Blue, Phantom Red, and Magic Night...

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Huawei Mate 20 Pro pulled from the Android 10 Q beta program

The Huawei Mate 20 Pro joined the Android 10 Q beta program two weeks ago, but it has now been removed from the list. This is likely because Google suspended Huawei's Android license. This move was delayed by 90 days, though it seems this means little for Huawei's long-term plans. This delay should be enough to allow the maker to queue up security updates for Huawei and Honor phones, but major OS upgrades are not happening. We'll keep an eye on the official Android Q Beta page (Source link) to see if the Mate 20 Pro reappears, but we're not holding our breath. Huawei and Honor...

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Cardinal Red versions of Samsung Galaxy S10 and S10+ surface online

Red versions of the Samsung Galaxy S10 and Galaxy S10+ have leaked again. Back before the official announcement, we saw a Cinnabar Red paint job that never came to fruition. Now a different red hue has leaked. Samsung Galaxy S10+ in Cardinal Red It's called Cardinal Red and like the other colors, it covers the back and sides (the screen still has a black bezel). There's now yellowish tint here like the Cinnabar color. Samsung Galaxy S10 in Cardinal Red The new red Galaxys are "coming soon", says leakster @rquandt. Back in the S9 days, a Burgundy Red color was...

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European prices for Honor 20 lite (aka Honor 10i) unveiled

The Honor 20 lite will soon make its debut in Europe. The phone previously launched as the "Honor 10i" and was initially available in Russia. The 20 lite will cost €300 in Europe. In the UK the price is £250 and will be available at Carphone Warehouse, Amazon, Argos, John Lewis and Very. The other two Honor 20 models cost €500 and €600 for the vanilla and Pro models, respectively. The lite model has a similarly-sized screen - 6.21" LCD with 1080p+ resolution - and a notch rather than a punch hole for the 32MP selfie camera. Rather than the Kirin 980 chipset, the phone is powered by...

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Honor 20 and Honor 20 Pro go official with quad cams, flagship Kirin 980 chipset

Huawei has established a name for itself in mobile photography, now sub-brand Honor wants to make its mark. The Honor 20 duo brings a unique dedicated macro camera and the main camera on the Pro model has the brightest aperture on a phone ever. Honor 20 Pro The Honor 20 Pro main camera has the fastest aperture of any phone ever - f/1.4. It guides 60% more light than an f/1.8 aperture towards the 48MP Sony IMX586 sensor (1/2", 0.8µm pixels). This camera has both optical and electronic image stabilization. The Pro has an 8MP telephoto camera with 3x optical and 5x hybrid zoom...

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Honor 20 and 20 Pro hands-on review

For the first time, Honor departs from its usual flagship releasing scheme by launching not one but two devices at once. And as per tradition in the Android world, it's a Pro and non-Pro version. In this hands-on review, we will be looking at the both and unlike most OEMs, Honor decided to make the size of both handsets identical, with the Pro taking an edge over the vanilla Honor 20 with better under-the-hood features.

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Honor 20 Pro gets 111 score in DxOMark test, matches the OnePlus 7 Pro

The Honor 20 Pro may not have the prestigious Leica label next to its camera, but the DxOMark review shows that it's one of the best - with a score of 111, it matched the OnePlus 7 Pro. Only two phones with a higher total score are the Huawei P30 Pro and Samsung Galaxy S10 5G. The photo score of 117 is higher than most flagships out there. The review commends the camera for a great dynamic range - the best shadow and highlight preservation on a phone yet - as well as excellent exposure and noise levels. The rendering of fine detail is not quite perfect, which keeps this camera from...

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Meizu 16Xs launch event set for May 30

Meizu 16s arrived last week and now its time for the more affordable variant, called Meizu 16Xs. The new device already appeared on TENAA with images, later followed by specs, and now the company has started sending out invites for the official launch event. It will take place on May 30 in China. The invitation hints at a triple camera setup that we already know will have a 48 MP main shooter, coupled with 8 MP + 5 MP additional snappers. Other specs include a 2 GHz octa-core processor, likely as part of a Snapdragon 670 or Snapdragon 675 chipset. The phone with a model number...

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Watch the Honor 20 Series announcement live here

Honor's event for its 20 series phones is about to begin - we should be seeing the Honor 20 and Honor 20 Pro go official in a few minutes. The launch event will be held in London and the live stream starts at 1PM UTC. Thanks to the several leaks, we've seen both the regular and Pro versions in the flesh as well as camera samples and Geekbench tests so we know what to expect. The highlight of the Honor 20 Pro will be its 48MP f/1.4 main camera, which is bound to perform well in low-light environments. It will be paired with a 16MP f/2.2 ultra wide, 8MP f/2.4 telephoto and 2MP f/2.4...

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Sony details its mobile plans, lists countries it's pulling out of

Sony held its Corporate Strategy Meeting laying out its plans going forward. The mobile division, in particular, is long away from its glory days and was merged with the TV, audio and camera divisions two months ago in hopes to bring it back to profitability. The aim is to leverage the brand's recognition across sectors like gaming, music and TV's to bolster smartphone appeal and according to Sony, the Xperia 1 is the first example of this approach. Now the company announced its planning to cut operational costs by 50% and will pull out of several markets in order to focus on a...

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Asus releases bootloader unlock tool and kernel source code for ZenFone 6

Asus unveiled the ZenFone 6 last week, and today, this Taiwanese tech giant has released the bootloader unlock tool and kernel source code for its 2019 flagship. You can download both of these by heading over to the source link at the end of this article. The bootloader unlock tool weighs 753KB in size whereas the kernel source code weighs around 165MB. With these, you can install a custom ROM on your ZenFone 6, or can develop one yourself. But, do keep in mind that unlocking the bootloader will void the warranty of your smartphone and you also won't receive any OTAs from Asus. ...

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OnePlus 7 Pro initial stock sells out in China

After hitting markets around the world, the OnePlus 7 Pro finally made its way to China for pre-orders via online retailer JD.com and local fans did not waste their time. Just several minutes after the pre-orders began, the phone went out of stock. There were reportedly more than a million registrations, meaning some fans were left empty-handed. OnePlus 7 Pro sales in China will begin on May 23 in three configurations. The base 6/128GB model will start at CNY 3,999 ($579), the 8/256GB one will go for CNY 4,499 ($652) while the top of the line model with 12GB RAM and 512GB storage will...

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vivo Z5x to be launched on May 24

The vivo Z5x that we've been hearing about since the past weekend will go official on May 24 at an event in China which will start at 7.30 PM local time. vivo hasn't divulged any details about the Z5x yet and has only shared a poster which contains the letter 'Z'. That said, the Z5x is rumored to come with a 6.53-inch punch-hole display and pack a 5,000 mAh battery. The vivo Z5x is expected to ship with a Snapdragon 670 or 675 SoC, but it appears we'll have to wait until Friday to know for sure. Source (in Chinese) | Via

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OnePlus 7 and 7 Pro get Android Q Beta

Soon after releasing the kernel source code for the OnePlus 7 Pro, OnePlus has dropped the Android Q Beta for its 2019 flagship as well as the vanilla OnePlus 7. Both the OnePlus 7 and 7 Pro run Android Pie out-of-the-box, and we are still a few months away from the moment the stable build of Android Q hits these smartphones. Hence, if you want to get a taste of Android Q on your smartphone right now, you can head over to the source link below for full instructions. However, do note that this beta build comes with its fair share of known issues including but not limited to the...

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Honor 20 placeholder appears on Flipkart app

The Honor 20 series is going official later today, but if you head to the Flipkart app and tap on "Mobiles" - just under the search bar, you'll see a teaser for the Honor 20 already. The landing page on the app has an excerpt about what we can expect from the Honor 20 and there's a livestream window embedded so you can tune in right from the Flipkart app. Following more of the text is a teaser video with the tagline "you deserve better". At the very bottom of the page is a "Notify me" button where interested buyers can get more information about the upcoming Honor 20 once...

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