Android Phone Fans
Android Phone Fans |
- What’s this about the Moto X+1 to coming equipped with 3D recognition and optical zoom?
- Samsung Galaxy Note 4′s new fingerprint scanning features detailed
- Is that a OnePlus One that exloded in your pants, or are you just happy to see me?
- Droid RAZR M to be rebranded as ‘Motorola Luge’ for Verizon prepaid 4G LTE
- New Motorola Skip outed in FCC filing with Bluetooth proximity unlock
- Official: Amazon (not Google) acquires Twitch for $970 milllion [UPDATE]
- Rumor: Samsung working on a circular smart watch
- HTC Desire 820 could come with a 64-bit octa-core Snapdragon 615
- Samsung reloads the hype train with another Note 4 teaser [VIDEO]
- T-Mobile gives 2GB of LTE data on Simple Starter plan for just $45 per month
- Sony accidentally leaks possible compact tablet and new smart watch
| What’s this about the Moto X+1 to coming equipped with 3D recognition and optical zoom? Posted: 25 Aug 2014 06:45 PM PDT To say we’re hyped over September 4th’s Motorola event would be an understatement. Where we already have a good idea of what is going to be announced in Chicago, when it comes to the Motorola Moto X+1, there’s still a few small details seemingly left uncovered. Today, the folks at HelloMotoHK happened upon a few new details regarding the upcoming smartphone as it relates to the display and camera capabilities of the device. According to the leaked screenshot shown below listing off a few of the phone’s upcoming features, the phone could come equipped with some kind of 3D recognition. While not much else was said, memories of the Amazon Fire Phone immediately come to mind. We’ve actually seen Motorola toy around with 3D recognition in the past with their Windy Day app. Whether this is merely more of that, or 4 cameras on the face of the phone is too early to say, but we’re intrigued. Also mentioned in the spec sheet is something about a “super camera” featuring an “optical zoom.” Although leaked images of the phone didn’t show anything particularly special about the Moto X+1′s camera, it did have an interested flash setup, with 2 LEDs outfitted on each side of the camera lens. But we wouldn’t get your hopes up too much about this alleged “super camera.” According to early reports from a user who’s played with the phone, the camera still leaves a lot to be desired. Of course, we’ll reserve judgement until we get our hands on the phone come Thursday of next week. |
| Samsung Galaxy Note 4′s new fingerprint scanning features detailed Posted: 25 Aug 2014 05:41 PM PDT Earlier today, we saw Samsung throwing more coal into the Galaxy Note 4 hype train with a new teaser video highlighting the innovation that was the original S Pen. And while we were expecting the usual bump in hardware specs (display resolution, RAM, battery), it seems Samsung could have another trick up its sleeve: a new and improved fingerprint scanning software. According to SamMobile, while the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 uses the same Synaptics Natural ID fingerprint technology as the Galaxy S5, the button will take advantage of new software features unique to the phablet (but will likely arrive on the S5 in a future update). Apparently, the home button will come with the added benefit of launching specific apps according to the finger being swiped to unlock the device. This means you users will set the phone app to launch with the index finger, messaging app with middle finger, or the Phandroid app with the thumb. Samsung is also taking the Note 4′s fingerprint scanning abilities to the next level by remembering credentials from the websites you visit online. Whether IGN, Android Forums, or anything in between — after visiting a website for the first time and logging in manually, the Note 4 will remember your info, entering in your credentials with the swipe of a finger. As useful as the fingerprint scanner sounded on paper, we were disappointed to find that not many apps supported the function, with the exception being the PayPal app. Hopefully this is only a sign of things to come and when Samsung officially unveils the Galaxy Note 4 come this September 3rd, we’ll hear about additional app support as well. Of course, Phandroid will be reporting live from the event bringing you the latest, so stay tuned. |
| Is that a OnePlus One that exloded in your pants, or are you just happy to see me? Posted: 25 Aug 2014 04:23 PM PDT Seems like almost every other week we hear about some manufacturer’s latest flagship spontaneously combusting in some part of the world. Today, the Grim Reaper has come to claim the soul of OnePlus One forum member MiYzu‘s One as he walked down the subway talking with his brother. Ironically enough, the owner claims he was praising the OnePlus One’s battery life when suddenly the device exploded while in his back pocket. The damage is pretty severe too. Looking over the pictures, you can see how the battery juices melted out of the OnePlus One’s back cover, burning a hole through the TPU case, jeans, and onto the user’s skin. It’s because of this MiYzu is urging other OnePlus One owners to take caution. Safety issues like this are no laughing matter and could have ended much differently if the phone was on a nightstand or laying on a bed. While full details haven’t been divulged just yet, it doesn’t appear any kind of physical damage lead to the explosion. Although, as one forum member points out, MiYzu previously opened up a thread discussing problems with his OnePlus One charger that caused his phone and charger to overheat. It’s possible that may have ended up damaging the battery in some way (or could have been the fault of a 3rd party replacement charger/USB cable he used while the original was being replaced). A OnePlus forum administrator was quick to respond to the issue, saying:
Exploding smartphone batteries are by no means commonplace, but still happen more times than any of us would like. With OnePlus One moving far less units than the Samsungs or LGs of the world, a single exploding smartphone could be seen by potential customers as one too many. We’re hoping this isn’t the beginning of a more widespread problem and if nothing else, just add it to the pile of bad press OnePlus has been carrying on their back. Be careful out there, folks. |
| Droid RAZR M to be rebranded as ‘Motorola Luge’ for Verizon prepaid 4G LTE Posted: 25 Aug 2014 02:51 PM PDT Last night, TKTechNews reportedly got wind of a few leaked specs from a mysterious device calling itself the “Motorola Luge.” Said the be headed to Verizon Wireless under their prepaid service plans, the phone reportedly showed some specs that seemed all too similar to 2012′s Motorola DROID RAZR M. In fact, the leaked images accompanying the specs showed just that — a Droid Razr M with a few updated icons. Of course, this raised more than a few eyebrows from skeptics but today, a freshly leaked image seems to confirm TK’s previous information. Brought to us by the boys at PhoneArena, it appears the upcoming Motorola Luge could, in fact, be nothing more than a rebranded Droid M headed to Verizon prepaid. Showcasing support for Verizon’s 4G LTE network, other specs include: Motorola Luge
Off-contract pricing for the Motorola Luge is said to be $150 via a special online promo kicking off Thursday, August 28th. We expect will learn more about the device then along with the possibility of more rebranded devices to come. It’s interesting to see Motorola pitting the device against the already inexpensive Motorola Moto G, which in some cases bests the Motorola Luge (at least on paper). Which would you choose? |
| New Motorola Skip outed in FCC filing with Bluetooth proximity unlock Posted: 25 Aug 2014 01:28 PM PDT Last year’s Motorola Skip may not have been the “must have” smartphone accessory of the year, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t pretty damn cool in theory. An NFC clip that allowed users to tap to unlock their smartphones, it was convenient enough that someone could find a use for it (but not enough that everyone would want one). Following up on last year’s design, Motorola is preparing to give it another go with a newly design model for 2014. Outed in an FCC filing, the newly designed Moto Skip actually comes equipped with Bluetooth, taking its convenience to another level. Not only can the new Skip be attached to keys and beep when misplaced (works the other way around too in case you misplace your phone), your Motorola smartphone can actually detect when it’s in close proximity to Skip, allowing you to bypass any sort of normal lockscreen security you may have on your phone. Here’s the full feature list according to the FCC docs followed by some screenshots of the user manual:
Keep in mind the proximity unlock functionality will only work with Motorola smartphones and because the new Skip is always-on, the device features a tiny battery that will need to be replaced regularly (about once a year with normal use). Of course, real world battery life remains to be seen. Also, the Skip is not water/dust proof, so you might want to leave it in the car if you plan on hitting the beach. We should learn more about the Skip come September 4th during Motorola’s event in Chicago. [FCC] |
| Official: Amazon (not Google) acquires Twitch for $970 milllion [UPDATE] Posted: 25 Aug 2014 12:24 PM PDT Early reports of Google and YouTube looking to buy video game streaming site Twitch may have cooled down in recent months. Today, sources from both The Wall Street Journal and The Information are now reporting that it could now be Amazon looking to court Twitch, coming in hot with a $1 billion check to sweeten the deal. Despite negative feedback from users that Twitch as a Google property would be “ruined” — despite Google already having some experience with YouTube — it was a deal that made a lot more sense. Rampant copyright claims have been plaguing popular YouTubers looking to stream game content on the site. Twitch seemed like the next logical place Google would hope to move its content creators, a promised land if you will. While an Amazon deal doesn’t make a lot of sense, we have seen the company’s new found interest in video gaming with their recent opening of the Amazon Game Studios. Exactly what, other than street cred, Amazon hopes to gain from the deal is anyone’s guess.
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| Rumor: Samsung working on a circular smart watch Posted: 25 Aug 2014 12:23 PM PDT After the overwhelmingly positive response Motorola received to the circular Moto 360 it seems competitors want to try their hand at it. This past weekend LG began teasing a circular wrist dweller of their own, and now another big name is rumored to be getting in on the fun. According to SamMobile, Samsung is working on a circular smart watch of their own. We’re almost certain it wouldn’t be ready in time for IFA Berlin, though with the Gear Live having just launched and the Gear Solo (a SIM-enabled Gear) rumored to be coming next week we’re not sure we’d fancy another option so soon. That’s all we know so far. There’s no indication on which OS Samsung will look to use (Tizen or Android Wear), though we’re personally keeping fingers and toes crossed for the latter. With the feint exception of the Samsung Gear Live, Samsung’s devices haven’t exactly been the prettiest on the market. We’re hoping a circular smart watch design would help inspire Samsung to come up with something fresh, sleek and slim just as they’ve started to do on the phones side of things. Let us know if you’d consider buying a circular Samsung smart watch in the comments below! |
| HTC Desire 820 could come with a 64-bit octa-core Snapdragon 615 Posted: 25 Aug 2014 10:00 AM PDT It looks like HTC could be the first Android OEM to get serious about 64-bit circuitry. The Taiwanese company has started teasing what seems to be the Desire 820 on their Weibo social account. The post is littered with mentions of it being the first 64-bit Android phone to make it to market, an honor that not even Samsung’s silicon team hasn’t been able to claim yet. We don’t know much about the device pictured above just yet, though it looks like it could come with a two-tone design. It also most certainly sports a front-facing camera, though that isn’t particularly surprising or exciting. Your guess is as good as ours when it comes to which exact chipset they’re going with, but we imagine they’ll look to continue their longstanding relationship with Qualcomm for this upcoming release. Qualcomm’s current roster of 64-bit chipsets include the Snapdragon 410 and the Snapdragon 615. The former is a Quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 configuration that hits up to 1.3GHz and sports Adreno 306 graphics, while the latter is actually an octa-core setup: 1.7GHz ARM Cortex A53 + a quad-core 1.0GHz A53 paired with an Adreno 4o5 GPU. Our bet is that HTC is looking to use the Snapdragon 615 as the 410 is meant for entry level handsets. We’re not yet sure what sort of performance we can expect out of that or if HTC’s handset would take proper advantage of the 64-bit architecture (Android isn’t currently built to handle 64-bit systems just yet), but we imagine HTC will answer those questions for us as we head into the latter portions of the year. The announcement is said to be coming at some point during IFA next week. [via GSMArena] |
| Samsung reloads the hype train with another Note 4 teaser [VIDEO] Posted: 25 Aug 2014 06:55 AM PDT Samsung wants you to get hyped about their upcoming September 3rd announcement where they’ll be unleashing the Samsung Galaxy Note 4, as well as possible new smart watch products. Last week we saw the South Korean company placing emphasis on the device’s S Pen and preaching the importance of handwriting. This week is a bit more of the same, except they focus on the importance of tools in human society. Samsung boldly exhalts their S Pen as the next big tool since, well, the regular pen. We’re not so sure that’s totally accurate, though we can say no other company has made a feasible stylus-equipped commercial smartphone that works as well as the Note line. Samsung’s pen-focused marketing seems to be hinting toward some new innovation on that front, though no rumors have given any indication that they will be introducing new features that aren’t already present on the Samsung Galaxy Note 3. Guess we’re going to have to wait until September 3rd to get the full picture drawn for us. Check out the teaser video in the YouTube embed above. |
| T-Mobile gives 2GB of LTE data on Simple Starter plan for just $45 per month Posted: 25 Aug 2014 06:11 AM PDT Folks on T-Mobile’s affordable $40 Simple Starter plan have likely been loving the unlimited talk and text, plus 500GB of LTE data for $40 per month, but what happens when they decide they’re no longer a light user? Thankfully T-Mobile’s introduced an inexpensive avenue for greatly increasing that pool of high speed data. The company has announced a new $5 upgrade option that will net you a full 2GB of data on their LTE network, effectively quadrupling your allowance without quadrupling your bill. Unfortunately the Simple Starter plan still kicks you off the data network as soon as you hit that limit, though getting four times the data for just another $5 should help make up for that. T-Mobile seems to have no shortage of moves to help bring competition back to the United States wireless sector. We’ve seen the other big 3 carriers begin to roll out more affordable plans as a result of T-Mobile’s aggressive strategy, and the Uncarrier still isn’t satisfied. It’s continuous beneficial changes like these that will keep netting them millions of customer additions each quarter, and as long as they can maintain momentum and a solid network it won’t be long before they’re no longer seen as the underdog. The new plan is available for both existing and new customers starting September 3rd. [via T-Mobile] |
| Sony accidentally leaks possible compact tablet and new smart watch Posted: 25 Aug 2014 05:51 AM PDT We’re not sure if Sony has some of the world’s most untrained interns or if they decided some of the best marketing they can do is to leak their own products, but yet another announcement may have been spoiled ahead of their IFA conference next week. In a “Street Smart Summer School” promotion they’re hosting on Facebook to educate folks on on the SmartBand, the company accidentally posted an image of what appears to be a small tablet, as well as a smart watch that may or may not be the rumored SmartWatch 3. The image has since been removed. The former device has been leaked in recent weeks as the Xperia Tablet Z3 Compact, with rumors telling us to expect a small form factor that was popularized by tablets such as the Nexus 7 and the LG G Pad 8.0. Highlights of its specs are said to be a Snapdragon 801 chipset, 3GB of RAM and an 8 megapixel Exmor R camera sensor. We’re not yet sure what else to expect from the device, though we imagine it’ll come in within that typical 7-8 inch range and sport HD resolution. On the side of the smart watch? We’re just as clueless, though we know it likely won’t be an Android Wear smart watch as Sony has said time and time again that they instead wish to focus on their own platform (which should still be based on Android at the very least). It won’t be long before we’re doused with all the goodness we’re waiting for, so circle back around August 3rd next week when all of this information is scheduled to spill out. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in!] |
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