Nexus 6P Review

Google is back with its most awaited, feature rich new-generation Smartphone Nexus 6P. Nexus 6P is not like its predecessors - it's far too better.Google has stated that the 'P' in the device name stands for Premium.

The last Nexus device which was really popular was the LG made Nexus 5X which was launched at 2013. even though Google couldn't make a big impact last year, with the launch of Nexus 6P they had made their comeback with a blast. The device was announced and launched this September and the reviews seems to be much satisfactory.

This is Google's first partnership with Huawei. Coming to the design aspect, the device had come with metal body instead of plastic and is made of anodised aluminium with diamond-cut chamfered edges. With a thickness of 7.3 mm and weight of 178 grams, Nexus 6P is not the lightest of the phones available.

The device has a 5.7 inch 2K AMOLED huge display which is the best currently available and with rich range of colours and wide viewing angles. It also has Corning Gorilla Glass 4 protection. 

It works on Android v 6.0 Marshmallow OS and is powered by a quad-core 2 GHz Qualcomm MSM 8894 Snapdragon 810 processor with 3 GB LPDDR4 RAM. IT comes in 3 variants 16 GB/ 32 GB/ 64 GB internal storage space and there is no option for increasing the Storage memory as there is no external memory card slot.

Nexus 6P has a rear camera of 12.3 MP f/2.0 with laser autofocus and dual-LED flash. The rear camera is placed inside a corning Gorilla Glass 4 enclosure and hence the camera has pop out to a small extend at the top. It also has an 8 MP front facing camera with FULL-HD video recording. Other camera features include HDR+ mode, Panorama mode, Timer mode, lens blur, geo-tagging, face detection and Photo Sphere.The rear camera is capable of shooting 4K videos at 30 fps.

The Nexus 6P also houses a non-removable Li-Po 3,450 mAh battery. The 3,450 mAh battery along with the Android Marshmallow battery new saving feature like doze will provide a long lasting battery life.Nexus 6P has a stand-by time of up to 440 hours and a talk-time of 23 hours on 3G mode.The device also supports USB-C charging port and hence faster charging can be attained in minimum time.

Nexus 6P supports a single nano-SIM slot which supports a 4G LTE SIM card as well. Other connectivity options of this device include Wi-Fi 802.11, Bluetooth v 4.2, DLNA, Wi-Fi hotspot, GPS, A-GPS, GLONASS, NFC and so on. It also Packs sensors such as fingerprint, gyro,accelerometer, proximity, compass and barometer.

Priced at Rs 39,999 for the 32 GB model and 42,999 for the 64 GB model, Nexus 6P is available in Aluminium Graphite and Frost colours. Being a Google device, Nexus 6P will also be the first device to get any ne Android OS updates in the future. 

Android 6.0 Marshmallow Features

Android v 6.0 Marshmallow is somewhat visually similar to its predecessor but Marshmallow have come out with many new stunning features. 

Memory Manager

One of the most heard disadvantage of Lollipop was its looting memory for apps. Android 6.0 marshmallow has come with a new inbuilt feature which allows you to check out the memory usage of newly installed apps without the help of any third party app.

You can browse through the RAM usage over the last 3, 6, 12 or 24 hours and identify when RAM looting have occured without much concern from user's side.

Type 3 USB

Marshmallow supports the new Standard Type C USB. which is associated with the USB 3.1 . The new feature supports faster charging . Type C charging cables and adaptors are currently available for a few hand picked number of devices. Type C cables support faster charging, faster data transfer and advanced multi tasking.

Marshmallow devices will also be having reverse charging feature which allows it to reverse charge other devices using Type C cable.

Google Now on Tap

Google Now on tap is the most highlighted feature of Marshmallow update. With this feature, you can go to Google Now with just a long press of the Home button. You can activate this even without leaving the current app you are using. 

while using an app, Tap will create a new Google Now overlay with your running app as the background. Now on Tap scans the current page, and provides relevant details regarding what now seen on the app. In case of music may show links to Youtube, saavn, and if it is a place then it will provide you with its directions on Google Map.

Fingerprint Scan

Google introduces System Level Fingerprint support for the Android Marshmallow. We have seen enormous number of third party finger print sensors in the hardware, but this is the first time fingerprint sensors are supported by the core itself. 

With this feature, you can use fingerprint lock to unlock your device,make payments in Android Pay or log in to various apps and services as seen on iPhone. 

Doze

This feature helps to improve the battery life of the device. This feature senses whether your device is in rest and put your device somewhere close to Airplane mode when not in use and thus adds more life to the battery. It simply cuts down the background processes . 

Cut and Paste

After you had highlighted a text, options for cut/copy/paste will float over the highlighted text rather than at the top of the screen. This feature is seen on iOS devices.

Moto X Play Specifications and review

Moto X Play has the features in between Moto G and Moto X. Moto X Play is one of the 3 Moto X devices in 2015. other devices being Moto X Style and Moto X force.

Coming to the design , Moto X Play is solid , neat and good looking with just speaker grills and front camera sensor at the front side. With a thickness of just 8.9 mm at its thinnest point and curving out to a maximum of 10.9 mm thickness, the handset is pretty much comfortable in hands with its rubberised robust rear panel. It also has a customisable rear back cover.

Moto X Play comes with a giant 5.5 inch full HD  IPS display with Gorilla Glass 3.0 protection and with a pixel density of 403 ppi. Instead of AMOLED display, this device features an LCD panel. 

The smartphone runs on quad-core 1.7 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 chipset  and with 2 GB of RAM. It is powered by Android 5.1.1 Lollipop with Android 6.0 Marshmallow update . Moto X play has two variants available based on its internal storage either 16 GB or 32 GB.  The 16 GB variant is priced at Rs 18,499 while the 32 GB variant goes at Rs 19,999. It also has a micro-SD card slot with which Storage space can be expanded to up to 128 GB.

One of the most highlighted feature of Moto X Play is its huge 3630 mAh battery which will last for almost 2 days on a single charging. It also includes Motorola's Turbo charging facility which provides 8 hours of battery life in just 15 minutes of charging.

One of the disappointing feature of this phone is the lack of water resistant feature which was previously seen on Moto G 3rd Generation handset. 

Apart from its huge battery, another stand out feature of Moto X Play is its camera. It packs a 21 MP main camera with f/2.0 aperture, face detect autofocus, and with dual-tone LED flash. It also has a 5 MP front camera with f/2.0 aperture  for taking better selfies. Both the front and rear camera have a blue glass filter which would remove the infra red and thus the pictures look more natural.

The connectivity options of this device include Bluetooth v4.1, Wi-Fi, GPS, A-GPS ,GLONASS, FM radio with RDS, 4G LTE support, NFC. The Smartphone has customisable polycarbonate back plate and is available in 14 colours. 

The handset is available for purchase at Flipkart.

Xiaomi Mi 5 Specifications and review

Xiaomi has announced its latest smartphone Xiaomi Mi 5 this month. The release date of this phone is not yet confirmed, but is expected to come in the market at January 2016.

The phone will be having a 5.3 inch IPS LCD capacitive touch screen with a resolution of 1440 pixels by 2560 pixels and a pixel density of around 525 ppi. According to the reports by Xiaomi, Xiaomi Mi 5 smartphone is seemed to have an impressive bench mark score of  73,075.

The device is expected to run on Android v 5.1.1 Lollipop, powered by 2.2 GHz Adreno 530 Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 processor and with 4 GB of RAM.  It is also rumoured that , since many heating reports has been filed against Snapdragon 820 processor, Xiaomi Mi 5 might run on Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 SoC chipset.

Another highlighted feature of this device is its 16 MP primary camera with LED flash which would be a strong competitor for latest HTC, Samsung, and Sony Smartphones. It also features a 6 MP front camera with 1080P full HD video recording. The rear camera is expected to be a ' flip side camera ', suggesting that it would be hidden in the chassis by default and will prompt out when a picture is taken. 

The Xiaomi Mi 5 will include a 3D touch technology , which allows pressure sensitive interactions with the screen. with this feature, you can copy a text by light press on the screen and cut a text by touching hard at the screen.

The device is available as 2 variants, one with 16 GB internal Storage space and other with 32 GB internal Storage. Based on the informations received from various sources, it is expected that Xiaomi Mi 5 packs a Non-Removable Li- Po 3800 mAh battery. Faster charging can also be achieved through Quick Charge v 2.0. 

Connectivity options of this device include Wi-Fi 802.11 , Wi-Fi direct,Wi-fi Hotspot, Bluetooth v 4.1, GPS, A-GPS, GLONASS, BDS. It also feature sensors such as Fingerprint sensor, accelerometer, gyro sensor, proximity sensor, compass, barometer.

The price of this device is not yet known. Xiaomi Mi 5 will be available in White Colour. 

How to update Google Play Store on your Android Phone

Google Play Store is the No.1 trusted app market available for android devices. You could download apps from Google Play Store and install it in to your device. So, from where you will download Google Play Store.Here is how you can update your Google Play Store for your Android Phone.

You could get APK of latest version of Google Play Store from various websites, we don't prefer to use them, as they may contain malware which would be harmful to your device. You don't need to download APK file for Google Play Store from external sources. You can update your phone's Google Play Store from your device by following the below mentioned steps.

You would have any version of Google Play Store on your device inbuilt . Firstly open the Google Play Store and you will get a screen like this and you will see a hamburger (three line) icon on the top left corner. 

Tap on that icon and you will get a list of options.

Select the settings  option from the side menu and it will open another screen. Scroll down and find " build version " option. Tap on it and now you will get a pop-up window. 

If your Google Play Store is up to date the popup window will show a message " Google Play Store is up to date " and if you have a new version of Google Play Store available, then the message will be "A New version of Google Play Store will be downloaded and installed " tap OK and the Google Play Store will automatically be downloaded.

Galaxy S7 Specifications and release date

After the success of Samsung Galaxy S6 and Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge, Samsung is coming with a much more feature rich smartphone, "Samsung Galaxy S7 ". Galaxy S7 will have same build quality and design as that of Samsung Galaxy  S6 but it would come with more updated features.

The release date of this device is not yet confirmed by the authorities but is expected to launch by February 2016.The price for this device is not yet known but it might not cost greater than Galaxy S6 and S6 edge. 

Like its predecessors,  it would also be having curved pressure sensitive display.

Samsung Galaxy S7 comes with a 5.1 inch 4K AMOLED display. It is powered by an Octa-core Snapdragon 820/ Exynos 8890 processor with 4 GB of RAM. It would be available as 3 variants based on the storage capacity as 32GB/ 64GB/ 128GB. 

The device runs on Android v6.0 Marshmallow . It also packs a giant 23 MP rear camera with ensures better picture quality with BRITECELL sensors and an 8 MP front facing camera with dual video call facility.

The networking options of this device include Wi-Fi, 2G, 3G, 4G LTE, HSPA, Bluetooth v4.2, GPS, AGPS, GLONASS. It also packs sensors such as Fingerprint, Retina scanner, Gyro, Accelerometer, Barometer, Proximity and heart beat sensor.

The device will run on a 4000 mAh battery with USB Type-C charging port for faster charging.

Huawei Mate 8 review

The Chinese Telecommunications company Huawei, has launched its new generation smartphone Huawei Mate 8, this November. It comes with a giant 6.0 inch IPS-NEO LCD capacitive touch screen with a resolution of  1080 pixels by 1920 pixels. It supports Dual-SIM cards (nano SIM).

Mate 8 is packed with features. It runs on Android v6.0 Marshmallow .The device is Powered by 1.8 GHz Octa-Core HiSilicon Kirin 950 processor with 3GB /4GB RAM. The phone has 3 variants. One with 32GB internal storage space with 3 GB of RAM, second with 64 GB Internal storage space and 4 GB RAM and the third one with 128 GB internal memory and 4GB of RAM. The device also has a external memory card slot (one slot of SIM card) and memory can be expanded to up to 128GB using external micro-SD card.

The preceder of this device, Mate 7 featured one of the best batteries and also provided more battery life as compared with other similar smartphones. Huawei has stated that the new version Huawei Mate 8 will have 30% more battery life than the previous version.

The Phone packs a 16 MP primary camera with features like optical image stabilisation, phase detection autofocus with dual-LED flash. It also has an 8 MP front camera for taking better selfies. it also has features like face/smile detection, panorama mode and HDR.

The connectivity options of Huawei Mate 8 includes Wi-Fi 802.11, Wi-Fi hotspot, Bluetooth v4.2, GPS, AGPS, GLONASS, FM Radio, micro USB v2.0. It also packs sensors like Proximity sensor, Fingerprint, Accelerometer, Ambient light sensor, Barometer and Gyroscope.