TECH NEWS : QUALCOMM LTE, APPLE'S UPCOMING IPHONE DESIGN, ESSENTIAL OREO UPDATE

TECH NEWS

Essential Phone Android 8.1 Oreo Beta update

Essential which is a rather new name in the mobile manufacturing industry has rolled out Android 8.1 Oreo beta update. The company made an announcement last month that it will skip the Android 8.0 update and will roll out the Android 8.1 instead directly. Essential made this decision keeping the device's stability in mind.

Essential is rolling out the updates to the users who aready are using the Android 8.0 beta version. While for the other user's the update is made available for download at company's official website. The update is available in flash file and a user can update his device using the flash file manually.

As per some reports from Beebom the update weighs at around 500MB and also adds a bunch of new features. The latest beta update also includes Oreo specific features along with the February security patch.

The Essential PH-1 was launched back in July 2017. The Essential PH-1 sports a 5.71-inch display along with 2560 X 7312 pixels. The display has an aspect ratio of 19:10 which is somewhat unusual and is not commonly seen on the smartphones displays.

In the terms of processing the Essential makes use of Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 SoC which is paired with 4 GB RAM. The device comes with an internal storage of 128 GB, this combination of 4GB RAM and 128GB makes multitasking a bit easier. The other features on the Essential Phone PH-1 include a USB Type-C port along with a fast charging feature. The device is packed with a 3040 mAh battery and has enough juice to run the device for a day.

In recent events Essential has also rolled out the updates for its camera which adds High Dynamic Range (HDR) functionality to the camera.The Auto-HDR mode was missing since the launch of the device. The new update also included several general stability fixes. As the name suggests, the new feature will automatically recognize optimum conditions and users won't have to manually flip a toggle to take HDR photos.

Comio S1 Lite and C2 Lite budget smartphones launched

As expected, Chinese phone maker Comio has launched two new smartphones in India. Dubbed as and S1 Lite and C2 Lite, the smartphones are budget offerings from the company. As we reported earlier, these two phones are targeted at the young generation with more focus in the camera, battery and connectivity department.

'We are thrilled to bring to our customers our latest offerings; Comio S1 Lite & C2 Lite. They boast not only of an elegant design and camera but also superior battery life. The Lite series will prove to be an all-rounder,' said Mr. Sanjay Kumar Kalirona, CEO & Director, Comio Smartphones while commenting on the launch.

'Our new models are inspired by the Indian Republic which is 'For the People, Of the People and By the People,' added Mr. Sumit Sehgal, Chief Marketing Officer, Comio Smartphones.

Anyway, without further ado let's see what the S1 Lite and C2 Lite have to offer in terms of specs and features.

Comio S1 Lite

The Comio S1 Lite sports a unibody design with curved edges and is available in three color variants namely Ocean Blue, Royal Black and Sunrise Gold. The smartphone is fitted with a 5.0-inch HD IPS display. Under the hood, the S1 Lite is powered by a quad-core processor. There is 2GB of RAM and 32GB of expandable native storage space onboard.

On the optics front, the smartphone is equipped with a 13MP rear camera and an 8 MP front camera. Cameras come with numerous features such as Beauty, Bokeh, Panorama, Watermark, HDR, Filter and Smile Capture effects. The smartphone runs on Android 7.0 Nougat OS with Comio's custom UI on top.

The S1 Lite is backed by a 3,050mAh battery to keep the lights on. The smartphone is priced at Rs. 7,499.

Comio C2 Lite

The Comio C2 Lite comes with a 5-inch HD IPS Display and is available in color variants like Sunrise Gold, Royal Black and Metallic Grey. The smartphone sports an 8MP auto-focus rear camera with flash as well as a 5MP selfie camera with flash. It also runs Comio UI based on Stock Android 7.0 Nougat.

The smartphone is powered by a quad-core processor that is clubbed with 1.5GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage space. The storage space can be further expanded up to 128GB via a microSD card.

The Comio C2 Lite packs a 3,900mAh battery that is claimed to stay charged for upto 2 days with upto 27 hours talk time and an impressive standby time of 270 hrs. The smartphone is priced at Rs. 5,999.

Other features

The devices are also embedded with the Freezer Application. The Freezer app allows users to open as many applications as you wish without worrying about RAM constraints.

Interestingly, these two new Comio phones features Venus Browser. This offers a light weight web platform for smartphone users with advanced functionalities like browsing, app store and services.

Users can do many things with this app like shopping, playing games, browsing, listening to music and watching movies etc. The browser also supports 22 regional Indian languages.

The Comio S1 Lite and C2 Lite also comes with a special anti-theft feature called the 'intruder selfie'. In other words, when someone tries to unlock the device by trying to break the pattern or PIN, the device will automatically capture the image of the unauthorized person. Other options include the lock and unlock feature, shutdown blocker, data back up and SIM related functions.

Launch offers

Exclusive to the Reliance Jio subscribers, cashback vouchers will be credited to the customer's account and will be visible under 'My Vouchers' in MyJio app which can be redeemed, one at a time, against recharges of Rs. 198/299 plans, via MyJio app.

Customer will also get Rs. 2200 cashback (44 vouchers worth Rs. 50) at the time of 1th successful recharge of Rs. 198/299 monthly plans, which can be redeemed from 2nd recharge onwards. Each voucher of Rs. 50 will be credited in MyJio app which can be redeemed, one at a time per recharge, against subsequent recharges of Jio plan of Rs.198/299.

'We have taken step further and are offering consumers unmatched data and cashback offers with Reliance Jio, keeping in mind today's era of high-internet usage in our day-to-day life,' Kalirona noted.

Apple's upcoming iPhones will carry the same design as iPhone X

Apple is reportedly gearing up to introduce three new iPhones in 2018. While we have been hearing a lot about this in the past few weeks, one of the upcoming iPhone will be more popular than the others, a top analyst with Taiwanese business group KGI Securities has said.

According to Ming-Chi Kuo, the most famous analyst with KGI Securities when it comes to Apple, the Cupertino-headquartered giant will aim to sell 100 million units of 'a 6.1-inch iPhone it's planning to release this year'.

'The 6.1-inch LCD iPhone will apparently resemble the iPhone X with a similar full-screen design, but at a more accessible price for customers.

The analyst expects this new iPhone to be priced to replace iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus, as cheap as $699,' 9to5Mac reported late on Wednesday.

'The replacement for iPhone X is believed to consist of a three-SKU 2018 iPhone lineup. A new iPhone X style device with improved internals, a larger 'iPhone X Plus' with a 6.5-inch OLED display and the 6.1-inch LCD model,' the report added.

All three devices are expected to feature 'Face ID' feature and lose the home button in favor of iPhone X's gestural navigation. The 6.1-inch iPhone device will not get a dual camera nor 3D Touch, according to a previous KGI report.

Interestingly, other features expected to come to the iPhones are Gigabit LTE connectivity and dual SIM standby. However, we are not sure if Apple will incorporate Intel's new modems that will facilitate with this functionality,

Meanwhile, Kuo also expects iPhone X to ship a total of 62 million units in its lifetime, adding the company will cease production of this particular model mid-year.

'We expect iPhone X will go to the end of life (EOL) around mid-2018 and that total life cycle shipments will be around 62 million units, lower than our previous forecast of 80 million units,' the analyst had stated earlier.

'iPhone X would hurt product brand value and lineup of 2H18 new models if it continues to sell at a lower price after 2018 new models launch,' Kuo added.

He has also stated that the Cupertino-based giant will not sell iPhone X at a lower price as it will hurt its other products in the lower-priced premium segment. Kuo has estimated that Apple will ship about 18 million iPhone X units in the January-March quarter in 2018.

Qualcomm unveils Snapdragon X24 2GBps LTE

Qualcomm which is a known name when it comes to Chipset manufacturing today announced its Qualcomm Snapdragon X24 LTE modem. The Snapdragon X24 LTE modem is world's first announced category 20 LTE modem which supports upto 2GBps (Gigabytes per second) and is the first announced chip bult on 7 Nanometer FinFET process.

The Qualcom Snapdragon X24 LTE modem is the company's eighth generation LTE multimode modem and third generation Gigabit LTE solutio. The chipset includes advanced cellular features compared to any commercially available 4G LTE modem to date. This strengthens the LTE foundation for future 5G multimode devices and networks.

Qualcomm has further confirmed that the Snapdragon X24 LTE modem would be demonstrated at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) tech show along with the Ericsson, Telstra and Netgear.

As per Qualcomm the Snapdragon X24 LTE modem provides a speed which is double than the company's first Generation Gigabit LTE modem. The Snapdragon X24 supports up to 7x carrier aggregation in the downlink. The chipset further expands the use of 4x4 MIMO on up to five carriers.

On Qualcomm's blog post company official commented that 'With the Snapdragon X24 LTE modem's fiber-like Internet speeds delivered wirelessly, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) can offer consumers incredible mobile experiences such as immersive 360-degree video, connected cloud computing, rich entertainment and instant apps. At the same time, operators can gain flexibility in using their spectrum assets to offer blazing fast speeds to consumers, while also improving their network capacity and maximizing spectral efficiency.

The X24 LTE modem allows smartphones to utilize all spectrum assets which are available from a mobile operator, whether in the licensed spectrum or with License Assisted Access (LAA). Some system capacity improvements are made possible with the support of Full Dimension Multi-Input Multi-Output (FD-MIMO), a Massive MIMO technology that that would be the foundation