Oppo has always had some interesting as well as some great looking smartphones in its portfolio but the company has struggled to sell most of them due to the higher pricing. However the recently announced the R7 Lite is an attempt by the company to offer a premium design in the mid-range segment. The handset has a sleek metal design along with a curved glass over the display giving it a great feel.The most attractive feature is its design, probably the best in its segment. It comes with a metal uni-body chassis at the back which gives the handset sturdiness and also offers a good grip. On the front, the display uses a 2.5D glass panel which is curved at the edges. This makes using the touchscreen a bit more natural to use. The hardware lock and volume keys are also solid and offer a good click feedback.In the software department, it runs on Android 5.1.1 Lollipop operating system along with Oppo’s Color OS layer on top. It is surprisingly lighter and much more responsive than its previous versions. Oppo has also tried its best to keep less pre-installed apps. The OS also offers some customization options where you can change the themes, home page, scrolling style, widgets and so on. Overall it runs smooth and didn’t show signs of struggling with apps. Since the smartphone is powered by Snapdragon 615 octa-core processor, it manages to handle 3D games pretty well and didn’t skip a beat while playing a full HD movie. Slim smartphones with a uni-body design usually don’t end up having a good battery life and also heat up a lot but that was not the case. There is a 2,320mAh battery on the inside which churns out about a day of backup on regular usage. Extensive usage doesn’t show heavy signs of heating but there is the occasional warming up. It also leaves you at half a day of battery backup, which has become a standard with smartphones today.Though the display size feels perfect at 5-inches, Oppo has used a 720p resolution which is not entirely bad, as it means less toll on the battery, but handsets priced lower than the R7 Lite offer a sharper and higher resolution 1080p full HD display. If you aren’t very finicky about screen resolutions, you will not be disappointed. It uses an AMOLED panel which offers a good amount of saturation and contrast, and also good viewing angles.The 13MP rear camera comes with an LED flash which takes pretty average pictures and struggles a bit when shooting in low light and even indoors. In daylight, it can capture good shots and focuses fairly fast thanks to the phase detection auto-focus system. The camera app has been highly inspired from the iPhone and offers some fun features like slow shutter where you can go as low as 16 seconds of exposure time, HDR, a GIF or animation mode, panorama and some filters. The app also comes with Oppo’s Ultra HD camera mode which can shoot a 25MP picture, which sadly takes forever to process and doesn’t offer anything in terms of quality. Overall the camera is not very impressive if you are looking for a great snapper, but for occasional shooting it isn’t all that bad.At its price it doesn’t sound like a bad deal, however it isn’t the best one either. You get a great looking design and a smooth software experience but there are a few compromises here and there. The R7 Lite is priced at Rs. 17,999 which puts it in a tough spot when compared to the likes of Moto X Play (Rs. 18,499) and the Xiaomi Mi 4 (Rs. 14,999). But if you care more about aesthetics than this is a good option. There is a larger version of the handset as well which comes with a fingerprint scanner called the R7 Plus priced close to Rs. 30,000, in case you want a bigger and better package.
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By Haider Ali Khan Microsoft Corporation will launch the Surface Pro 4, its latest mobile computing device, in Janurary. "We will bring the Surface Pro 4 and the Lumia 950 to India in January and December, respectively," Chief Executive Satya Nadella announced on Thursday (05 November). "At Microsoft, we strive to empower every citizen and every business and government organisation to achieve more. With the newly launched Microsoft Cloud and with Surface Pro 4, our customers have the digital technology they need to seize incredible new growth and opportunity on a global scale." The Hyderabad-born Microsoft chief said that the Surface Pro 4 will be priced at Rs 75,000 and above. Nadella said, “The core sense of purpose and responsibility at Microsoft is to enable every individual to leverage its technology offerings and expertise to help them transform and optimise productivity.” The company will come out with the Lumia 950 and 950 XL in December. "Cloud and mobile technologies are already galvanising the industry here... That innovation is as much what you do with technology as the invention of the technology itself," said, Bhaskar Pramanik, chairman of Microsoft India. The operating platform of both the devices will be Windows10; the Surface Pro 4 will turn into a fully-powered laptop from a tablet while running all desktop software and will have a 12.3-inch PixelSense display weighing around 766 grams. It will come with 6th generation Intel processors and to have a 9-hour battery life, claims Microsoft. The storage options will start at 64 GB and expandable to 128 GB, 256 GB and 500 GB.
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Acer India stepped into the growing smartphone market with the launch of its latest range of two internationally acclaimed smartphone models under the Acer Liquid Z Series - the Liquid Z630s and the Liquid Z530. The Smartphones will be available exclusively through Flipkart.com at price of Rs 10,999 and Rs 6,999, respectively.With the launch of these smartphones, Acer joins the ‘Make-in-India’ club with both smartphones set to be manufactured at their new facility in Pondicherry. Acer India also announced a strategic tie-up with Flipkart.com, one of India’s largest online marketplaces. As part of the tie-up, Flipkart.com will exclusively retail these two smartphone models in India.Liquid Z630s is powered by the 64-bit, octa-core 1.3GHz MediaTek MT6735 processor the 5.5-inch Liquid Z630s (measuring 156.3 x 77.5 8.9 mm) Android 5.1 handset is ideal for those looking to create, share and enjoy digital content on the go, enabled by 3GB RAM and a standard 32GB of internal memory. It packs a 4000 mAh battery ensuring lasting performance from every charge. A HD Zero Air Gap screen with IPS technology extends to house the 8MP wide view angle front lens (capable of 1080p video recording) as well as the 8MP auto-focus rear camera (capable of 1080p video). Connectivity comes through its Cat4 LTE, WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, and Bluetooth 4.0 with LE connectivity.The Liquid Z630s is also equipped with AcerEXTEND which connects wirelessly to a compatible laptop or PC and lets you view the phone’s home screen in a phone-shaped emulator box on the computer. Enabling functions like webpage and document sharing, full screening, drag and drop organization, messaging, typing and simplifies managing files and switching from personal to professional mode using the same device.Liquid Z530: The Android 5.1 handset features a HD IPS screen with Zero Air Gap to ensure bright rendering of color. Photo enhancements presented by Gourmet Mode for food photographers automatically adjusts color temperature and style for pictures of dishes; Touch to capture for focusing and capturing photos with just one touch; Smile Shutter to capture smiles as they happen and much more. Also featuring the Acer Liquid UI, the handset is designed for anyone looking to explore the real benefits of carrying a camera with them wherever they go.(BW Online Bureau)
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Exuberant Support For Data Services (ESDS), a cloud services provider, on Thursday (05 November) announced that it has received cloud computing patent (no. 9176788) for its eNlight Cloud from United States Patent and Trademark Office(USPTO).eNlight Cloud is a cloud hosting solution with a builtin ability to automatically scale CPU and RAM on-demand.Piyush Somani, Managing Director & CEO of ESDS said “90 per cent of the IT infrastructure investments go unutilized and organizations under tremendousfinancial stress need to quickly realize this dire state of the actual consumption Vs. the dollar spent. With our strong legacy in managing thousands of virtual machines, ESDS is committed to deliver innovative Cloud technology that is scalable and affordable. Additionally, this patent is a testimony of our commitment to deliver on Government's ‘Digital India’ vision by making IT compute accessible and affordable to all businesses.”As per a recent Gartner report, the present average global compute consumption by any organization is extremely low at 8% while it is just 5% among Indian organizations. Unlike the present Pay-Per-Use Cloud model, ESDS’ eNlight Cloud deliver of an in-built intelligence to constantly monitor consumption of virtual machines and accordingly assign computing resource in real-time. Large enterprises to SMEs are set to significantly benefit from the on-demand availability for maximum computing load and make IT investments based on their actual requirement and not on financial strength.(BW Online Bureau)
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When Micromax entered the smartphone market, it shook some of the established players and went on to become one of the biggest manufacturers in the country. It also set a new standard by creating a new category of affordable flagship smartphones. While they weren’t what someone would call premium, they always remained below the Rs. 25,000 price mark The company announced yet another ‘flagship’ smartphone in its Canvas series called the Canvas 5.The Canvas 5 comes with a 5.2-inch full-HD (1920x1080) IPS display with Gorilla Glass 3 for extra strength on a 2.5D curved touch panel which is slightly curved on the edges to offer a more natural feel when you swipe on the display. On the inside there is a 1.3GHz octa-core MediaTek processor with 3GB of RAM and 16GB of inbuilt storage, which can be expandable via a microSD card (up to 64GB). It has two SIM card slots one of which is 4G LTE enabled. The battery backup is said to offer 275 hours of standby time out of a 2900mAh battery. At the back there is a 13MP camera and a 5MP snapper on the front which can click panoramic selfies. The handset has a faux-leather removable back panel under which you can access the two SIM card slots and the microSD card slot. The battery however is sealed and non-user removable. It will be coming in two colours, Space Grey and Tan Brown.The surprising part however is that the Canvas 5 is priced at Rs. 11,999 which is much lower than what Micromax used to define as flagship. The company’s last major flagship product, the Sliver 5, was priced at Rs. 17,999 and focused more on the slim 5.1mm design but came with inferior hardware. With the Canvas 5, Micromax wants to aim for consumers who want a better hardware experience rather than the design itself. Sadly it isn’t a very exciting handset as there are a number of other smartphones offering a similar features. Which is what Micromax is actually aiming for, catching up with other player. The overall quality of the handset is definitely not premium, but justifies the price. Even the software experience is very standard and doesn't offer anything unique, although it will be getting the new Android 6.0 Marshmallow update in the coming future. The Canvas 5 will be available in retail stores as well as all major online stores in India from today. Micromax also announced that has tied with Bajaj Finance to run a 12 month EMI scheme where consumers and a door-step service policy which assures repair or replacement in 7-days.
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By Mala Bhargava It’s barely the size of an ant, but it’s kicked off a loud protest. Twitter has sneaked in a little change taking users off-guard as it banished the little star that meant a tweet was a favourite and replaced it with a red heart which one supposes means you love what the poster said.None of the two icons really fit the conversations on Twitter. The star was mostly used when users couldn’t think of anything in particular to say but roughly agreed with a tweet, or even when they wanted to signal having read the tweet. Now and then, of course, the star also meant wholehearted approval.Now the heart actually goes beyond favouriting a tweet and even beyond pressing the Like button on Facebook because it seems to only mean you really like what has been tweeted.The differences here may be subtle, but Twitter users reacted with outrage over the change. Perhaps it is just the fact of the change – in today’s age of social media, a company barely owns its own logo or other visual symbols. This was brought home quite forcefully very early in the use of social media in 2010 when the clothing brand GAP suddenly sprouted a new logo and splashed it about online. It was supposed to be a modernized logo and far more trendy than was being used all that while. But oh the backlash. The online world all but went berserk protesting against the new logo. The situation was made far worse by a bit of arrogance on the part of GAP’s social media team who tried to deliver a sound rap on the knuckles to the company’s fans, telling them they had every right to change their logo. That only enraged the crowd even more and very soon GAP logo generating games apps went up on websites rudely called “CRAP logo generator” and the backlash got fairly viscous. Eventually, GAP rolled back its logo and was duly humbled by the whole experience. The lesson from this fiasco was quite clear: No, a company does not own its logo any longer. Customers do.When it comes to Twitter, the micro-blogging site has actually grown up more in the hands of its users than in the company’s own. There was no clear vision when it was launched and it was almost a serendipitous product. Users went ahead and took it where they wanted, giving it a language, rules, and even its now-famous hashtag. Most of the initial users are still very much on Twitter and have always reacted with indignation when changes have been made to the site or app. By and large, everyone understands the need for Twitter to get in revenue, so many of the direct measures made towards that end are tolerated without more than a weak protest. But the star was a “user thing” and didn’t seem directly related to ad revenue. It also seemed to be like a mimicking of Facebook’s Like. That annoyed users even more and all day a #TwitterHeart hashtag trended with users making unkind jokes about the whole business.Heart or star, neither will eventually be the tipping point for Twitter in its struggle to get more users and keep its investors happy against a backdrop of falling stock price.
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As mobile devices become more deeply woven into the fabric of our personal and work lives, cyber criminals are taking increasingly vicious and disturbingly personal shots at us, according to the 2015 State of Mobile Malware Report by Blue Coat Systems.Pornography returned as the number one threat vector after dropping to number two last year and the other three top types of malware in this year’s report are Ransomware, Potentially Unwanted Software (PUS), and Information Leakage. The mobile threat landscape is becoming more active.Cyber blackmail (mobile ransomware attacks) leads the way as a top malware type in 2015, along with the stealthy insertion of spyware on devices that allows attackers to profile behavior and online habits. The new Blue Coat report, describes the latest trends and vulnerabilities in mobile malware, provides advice for strengthening corporate defenses and educating mobile device users, and offers predictions about the future of mobile threats.“As we sleep, exercise, work and shop with our mobile devices, cyber criminals are waiting to take advantage of the data these devices collect, as evidenced by the types of malware and attacks we’re seeing,” said Dr Hugh Thompson, CTO and senior vice president, Blue Coat. “The implications of this nefarious activity certainly carry over to corporate IT as organizations rapidly adopt cloud-based, mobile versions of enterprise applications, opening up another avenue for attackers. A holistic and strategic approach to managing risk must extend the perimeter to mobile and cloud environments—based on a realistic, accurate look at the problem—and deploy advanced protections that can prioritize and remediate sophisticated, emerging and unknown threats.”With no signs of slowing down, the market for mobile devices is booming. Anticipating that millions more of these devices will hit the street in the coming years, Blue Coat makes the following observations and predictions about the future of this trend.(BW Online Bureau)
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GetVee Technologies launched Wedlock mobile application in India. Available on Android OS, Wedlock is targeted towards eligible, educated singles aged above 24 years looking for a life partner.Basis research, traditional matrimonial platforms are either controlled or operated by parents today. WedLock, a unique concept in India, provides ultimate control to individuals by giving them a highly personalised experience to connect to relevant matches by primarily leveraging their social profiles.Nitin Gupta, CEO & Founder, GetVee Technologies said, “India has a huge demographics dividend and the young population spends a considerable amount of time online, socializing on networks. Online Indian wedding eco space on next-generation platforms can play a more diverse role with multiple offerings. This led to the birth of Wedlock. We wanted to provide our Indian users with a secure and private connection where they could chat without the parental pressure. We aim to give a life-long match to at least 75 per cent of our users signing up within 1 month with a prime focus on Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities.”Wedlock has seen an overwhelming response with 10,500 active registered users. The application adoption is growing at 200 per cent week over week and has a break up of 60 per cent males and 40 per cent females active users. With a strong focus on commitment, Wedlock offers only 1 connection at a time to males and upto 3 connections to females. Individuals can engage in private chat and can break the connection any time if it doesn’t work out.With access to family background, common friend links, education/profession/community background, verified income information, one to one chat and other important information availability in a click, the app also comes with a host of women-friendly features including 100% verified profiles, control over who can see profile and pictures, and abuse report/ block. Wedlock has inbuilt safety features including mobile verification, anti-screenshot feature and ability to go invisible anytime – all this to ensure the users find only the right match for marriage.Currently available on Android OS, the application is free for download from Google Play store. The company is planning to launch iOS and Windows versions soon. GetVee Technologies also runs Vee - an innovative mobile-first hyper-local college social network platform primarily targeted towards college youth in the age group of 18-23.Founded in May 2014, Vee has grown substantially close to around 500,000 downloads and is heavily used across 100s of colleges across India.(BW Online Bureau)
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