Nokia phone is all set for revival

May 18, 2016: The pioneer of  Mobile phone, "Nokia" is known to come back after years of handling of the brand by Microsoft following the acquisition of Nokia brand and their handset business. The deal then entailed Microsoft to use Nokia brand in feature phones for 10 years and High end phones for 18 months. Microsoft later opted Lumia brand over Nokia to use for the medium range and high end windows phones. With the ending of the rights of Nokia brand from Microsoft, the Nokia brand is all set for revival with Android phones. Microsoft is also known to sold the feature phone business to a subsidiary of Foxconn whereas Nokia has planned to provide the license to a startup company named HMD Global. So HMD global will be using the license to manufacture and sell Nokia branded phones (possibly mid range and High end) and tablets. They have also announced the phones and tablets be build on Android platform. In case of Operating system, Nokia has come from a long way: the all popular Symbian to Asha to Windows to a very lil of Android too. World's no. 1 phone makers went all the way down gradually after the surge of Android and Apple phones. The Finnish handset maker even could not revive with the adoption of Android and the Windows Operating system. The handling of the brand by Microsoft as Nokia Lumia phones also did not catch up the long lag behind. During that time, Nokia had launched WiFi only N1 tablet, partnering with Foxconn. 

It is in the news that Microsoft is planning to launch Surface phones and put Lumia phones to shelves. As it is known that the new company HMD global is being run by Ex-Nokia employees, the likes and popularity of Nokia brand will be augmented by the great design and quality. So I say its gonna be a revival of Nokia with the Android. Do you agree?

Xiaomi launches Mi Max and MIUI 8

May 10, 2016: Xiaomi, the Chinese phone&accessories company and one of the worlds rapidly growing handset maker has launched a new phablet (size 6.44 inch) called Mi Max along with latest offering of its Android Skin MIUI 8. The biggest smartphone from Xiaomi is all metal with 7.5 mm body that fits in a pocket as already teased in a picture before. The phone features fingerprint scanner at the back like Redmi Note 3. There will be three variants of the phone: 3 GB RAM, 32 GB ROM version powered by Snapdragon 650 costs 1500 RMB, 3 GB RAM, 64 GB ROM powered by Snapdragon 652 costs 1700 RMB whereas 4 GB with 128 GB Storage also powered by Snapdragon 652 costs 2000 RMB. The phone is backed up by a whopping 4850 mAh battery as bigger screen need bigger batteries. The phone sports 16 MP PDAF rear snapper and 5 MP 85 degree front snapper. The full HD display phone comes in silver, gold and dark grey color and weighs 203 gm. Its a dual 4G LTE handset, with the availability of IR sensor. 

Along side the device, Xiaomi also announced MIUI 8 with all new exciting colors and styles. It features wallpaper Carousel to provide daily lock screens from 12 categories. All new Gallery app includes filters change, quick share, doddle, stickers and video editing. MIUI 8 changes its color according to the weather change. 

Other features include the new Notes app (requring password), power saving mode (freezes background activity), Multi window management and detecting fraud & scam messages.The developer ROM of MIUI 8 will be available from June 17 and the supported devices will be Mi 2/ 2S, Mi3, Mi4/4C/4S, Mi5, Mi Max and all Redmi, Note series.

Xiaomi Mi5 camera photos samples

May 08, 2016: It has been nearly a month that I have used the Xiaomi's latest flagship device Mi5 smartphone. The all metal phone powered by the latest snapdragon 820 processor, is insanely fast and lives up to the performance as expected. The thin bezel and the looks makes it more deserving. Other than the camera (which I will be writing in brief) I loved the amazing sound from the phone. Having said all good, the phone gets heated while using cellular data, some apps and even camera. Some applications (like Youtube, Xender) is getting crashed regularly with the latest MIUI (7.3.2 China Stable) update. May the new Global stable MIUI solve both the heating issue and the apps crash problem. 

Lets come to the camera specifications, which is Sony IMX 298 16 MP rear camera with 4 axis OIS and PDAF. The phone is very fast to capture sharp and steady pictures. Its camera is one of the reason for me to get the Mi5 phone especially due to the manual mode (with 30s shutter) which also has the ISO selection from 100 to 3200. Other features in the camera include panorama, audio trigger shutter, Straighten, HHT and fish eye mode. The photo comes steady even while zooming up to 2X. I have tried with the slow shutter of 1s & more to get the trail of the vehicle lights at night but without a stand the photo results blurry. If its with a stand, the phone definitely misses ISO 50 (which is there in Samsung Galaxy S7). After using the phone for sometime, the best part is I have stopped carrying point and shoot camera to capture photos promptly for some events on the way.

Compared to that of rear camera, front 4 MP snapper is not that exciting for a super phone like Mi5.

Here are some of the photo samples (without editing and watermarks) taken from Mi5.

All photos are copyrighted... click to enlarge.

Manual Mode photo flowers

Manual Mode

Low light photography: KTM CTY brand Thamel

With additional macro lens.

NAC office from a moving vehicle.

Slow shutter photo sample at Kingsway Kathmandu

Low light photo sample: Sizzler

Taxi meter: low light photo sample