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Samsung's Galaxy A90 5G delivers specs and super-fast connectivity
Being expensive, finicky and hard to find, 5G is still the ultimate early adopter tech. Now, Samsung has brought that incredible speed potential within reach by launching the Galaxy A90 5G. Unlike models including the Galaxy Note 10 Plus 5G or OnePlus 7 Pro 5G, it's one of the few non-flagship 5G phones available, so it might be actually hit a reasonable price point.
This gaming phone has a built-in cooling fan and can record 8K video
We've already seen the likes of ASUS and Black Shark offering external cooling fans for their gaming smartphones, but the folks over at Nubia reckon it's about time to stuff a fan inside a phone (I mean, what else would you expect from a company that brought back the wearable phone?). Today, the Chinese brand unveiled the Red Magic 3 which not only packs a "liquid cooling" copper heat pipe, but also an internal cooling fan. This small fan is said to run quietly but can spin up to 14,000 rpm, and it has an IP55 rating plus its own isolated chamber, so you won't have to worry about liquids and dust getting in. It's apparently good for over 30,000 hours of continuous use, though Nubia didn't specify the speed used for the test. Regardless, combining this fan with the heat pipe, the phone's heat transfer performance is apparently five times better than conventional passive cooling methods, thus ensuring a smooth gaming experience for a longer period.
A closer look at Vivo's all-glass, port-free concept 5G phone
Picture this: you're holding two glossy all-glass concept phones for a photo, then one slips off and shatters another unit on the table. The room goes quiet. Everyone looks on in awe. You are left red-faced not because you broke a phone, but because you broke one of the few rare units in existence. That was exactly what happened to me at yesterday's Vivo APEX event in Hong Kong.
Vivo's iQOO phones are tuned for hardcore mobile gamers
Vivo is no stranger when it comes to a list of "firsts" in the smartphone market, with notable achievements including the in-display fingerprint reader, the notch-less all-screen design, the pop-up front camera, the dual-display implementation and, most recently, the port-less all-glass device. Now, the Chinese company is flexing its mobile muscles by tapping into the gaming segment, and it's doing so by way of a new sub-brand dubbed iQOO, which awkwardly stands for "I Quest On and On." Naturally, its first namesake smartphone is also quite the powerhouse.
Vivo's all-glass phone has no ports and a full-screen fingerprint reader
2019 may be the year of flexible mobile devices, but judging by a couple of announcements from China this week, it appears that we may also be expecting the disappearance of holes and ports on smartphones. Following yesterday's Meizu Zero, today Vivo has announced its latest concept 5G device, the APEX 2019, which is yet another smartphone with almost no holes. I say "almost" because there's still a tiny microphone slit below the screen, but other than that, you won't find any USB port, speaker grill or SIM tray around this shiny slab of glass.
Lenovo built a slider phone with 12GB of RAM
While Lenovo continues to push the Motorola brand in the West, it's also been busy doing its own thing back in China. Just last month, the company brought us the Z5 Pro all-screen slider phone which, to our surprise, packed mid-tier specs to woo the budget-conscious consumers. That's all well and good, but surely such a special form factor deserves the best specs available, right? This is where the new Z5 Pro GT comes in. Announced at the Beijing event today, this new Android phone comes loaded with up to 12GB of RAM -- a new record for smartphones -- along with up to 512GB of storage. It's also the second smartphone confirmed to feature Qualcomm's latest Snapdragon 855 chipset, though unlike OnePlus' yet-to-be-named flagship device, Lenovo's slider won't be packing 5G radio.
On-stage mistake means OnePlus won't have the first Snapdragon 855 phone
OnePlus was thrust into the limelight earlier this week when CEO Pete Lau announced on-stage that one of its 2019 flagship phones would be the first device to launch with Qualcomm's Snapdragon 855 chipset. As it turns out, what seemed like a major coup for the upstart hardware maker was actually a huge mistake. Chinese versions of the slide deck Pete Lau used to make the announcement at Qualcomm's Tech Summit in Hawaii said that the phone in question would be "among the first" smartphones to use the 855 — the problem is, the slides used for the presentation in Hawaii definitively said it would be the first. Needless to say, that's a serious blunder for a company enjoying a moment under the spotlight, not to mention a disappointment to the many fans who took that slide at face value.
OnePlus's CEO is working to keep its 5G smartphone under $1,000
OnePlus built something of a minor smartphone empire by building cheap flagship phones, and that trend just might continue as it ventures into 5G territory. In an interview with Engadget, OnePlus CEO Pete Lau said he would do his best to make sure the company's first 5G phone available to customers for under $1,000. If true, that means OnePlus would be able to offer access to ultra-fast data speeds for less than the price of a standard, 2018 flagship smartphone.
The Snapdragon 855 is a 7nm CPU primed for 5G, AI and more
As we hurtle towards 2019, Qualcomm has been busy introducing the world to its latest products that are likely to drive next year's biggest trends. At the first keynote of its three-day Tech Summit in Hawaii yesterday, the company already previewed some of the features of its next premium mobile processor -- the Snapdragon 855. Today, we're getting a deeper dive into the nitty gritty details of the new chipset.
Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 855 chipset will power your next flagship phone
Next year's high-end Android smartphones will use (you guessed it) Qualcomm's new Snapdragon 855 chipset. Qualcomm SVP Alex Katouzian didn't dwell on the chipset for very long after announcing it at the company's Tech Summit in Hawaii — the big details will apparently drop tomorrow — but we now have a better sense of what the company wanted to focus on as we barrel into 2019.
Qualcomm's 7nm Snapdragon chip will be ready for 5G phones
Qualcomm is keeping up its habit of using bleeding edge manufacturing for its mobile processors. The chip designer has confirmed that its "upcoming flagship mobile platform" will include a system-on-a-chip (read: the next Snapdragon) built using a faster, more efficient 7-nanometer process. You won't hear details about the chip itself until the fourth quarter of the year, but it will play nicely with the Snapdragon X50 5G modem -- conveniently, just in time for the arrival of the first mobile 5G networks.
