Huawei to hold an MWC 2018 event after all

Last month we learned that Huawei will not unveil its P11 flagship (or P20, the name is not yet confirmed) at MWC 2018. Today the company announced on its Weibo page that it will still hold an event in Barcelona and announce new products.

Huawei is one of the few companies that posted a two-digit growth in tablet market (the other big player being Amazon), so a new Mediapad might be on its way.

The company might also announce the official arrival of its payment system Huawei Pay in Europe or a new smartwatch, a successor of the last-year’s Watch 2.

Source (in Chinese) | Via

Apple ships the most tablets in the Holiday season, Samsung drops to third

Tablets are not selling as well as before – Q4 of 2017 saw 7.9% less tablets shipped compared to Q4 of 2016 while 2017 as a whole saw a decline of 6.5% over 2016.

And yet despite this turmoil Apple, Amazon and Huawei managed to see growth in slate shipments – both in the final quarter and in 2017 in general.

Apple shipped the most tablets in Q4 of 2017 and 0.6% more than the previous year while Amazon achieved a huge 50.3% jump over last year’s Holiday quarter thanks to some aggressive discounts.

Samsung dropped to third in Q4 of 2017 and saw a 13% decline of tablet shipments compared to the final months of 2016. However, Samsung retained its second place in total tablet shipments for 2017, despite losing some market share.

Despite lackluster efforts from Huawei it still achieved a quarterly growth of 11.9% and yearly improvement of 28%.

Source

Nougat finally becomes the most popular Android version just as Oreo passes 1% of the market

Google has published its monthly analysis of Android market share today, and we have some big news. For the first time in history, the most used version of the OS is now Nougat – which launched in August of 2016, almost 18 months ago.

It takes the crown from Marshmallow, in fact its predecessor. Nougat is now at 28.5% of the pie (up from 26.4%), while Marshmallow dropped to 28.1% (from 28.6% last month). Lollipop completes the podium, still commanding 24.6% of the market at this time.

While all the older versions of the OS lost market share, Oreo is still gaining. At the same incredibly slow pace as it has since its initial release last August, but still – it is going up. In fact, this month it has broken past the 1% milestone, now running on 1.1% of devices out there. Samsung’s imminent release of its Oreo updatefor the S8 duo should help drive those numbers even higher.

Source | Via

Huawei Mate 10 Pro goes on pre-order in the US with $150 gift card

Despite its much publicized failure to have it offered by carriers, Huawei is still launching the Mate 10 Pro in the US, albeit only in unlocked form. Starting today you can pre-order the handset from Amazon, Best Buy, Newegg, and B&H. It should also be available in Microsoft stores.

The Mate 10 Pro is priced at $799, but to sweeten the deal you will receive a $150 gift card which you can use at the retailer you chose to purchase the phone from. This offer is only available to those who pre-order. The device will start shipping on February 18, so to get that gift card you will need to pull the trigger on or before February 17.

You can pick between Midnight Blue and Titanium Grey color versions at the moment, with Mocha Brown supposedly coming soon.

On February 18, the Huawei Mate 10 Porsche Design will land in the US as well. This $1,255 smartphone will be sold by Amazon, Microsoft, Newegg, and B&H.

Source

Users report issues with answering incoming calls on the iPhone X

While far removed from its humble stationary origins, smartphones should still be able to make and take calls. Apple’s iPhone X seems to be making a mess of the latter as multiple people report they can’t answer a call for several seconds.

What happens is that the ringtone starts playing as soon as the phone is called, but the screen stays off for several seconds, preventing you from answering. Going by the “I have this question too” count on the support page, close to a thousand people are affected by this issue.

People have tried resetting their phones and installing the latest version of iOS, but that proved to be only a temporary fix. Apple is looking into the issue.

Source | Via (paywall)

Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 leaks with 18:9 display, dual cameras, and huge battery

Last month, we covered the possibility of a new Redmi Note 5 smartphone for global markets. Two Xiaomi devices have passed through China’s 3C earlier last month, which we suspected were two versions of the Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 (one with less RAM, Storage, and a slower CPU). Fast-forward to now, some alleged renders of the phone have leaked.

The renders show a device with very thin top and bottom bezels, akin to the Samsung Galaxy S8 and S9. There is also a vertically-placed dual-camera setup above a rear-mounted fingerprint scanner. We’ve seen mockups of this device from before, and these renders look similar but much more like a final product.

There is always a possibility that leaked renders are not the real thing or may not be accurate to the final product, so think of them as very detailed mockups for now.

The Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 is expected to feature an aluminum body and a 5.99-inch 18:9 IPS LCD display with FHD+ (1080 x 2160 px) resolution. Under the hood is a Snapdragon 636 CPU, an upgrade from the Snapdragon 625 that powered the Redmi Note 4, and 3 or 4GB of RAM. The dual camera setup is slated to be comprised of a 16MP sensor + a 5MP depth sensor.

There’s also a large 4,100 mAh battery and 64GB of internal storage with support for Quick Charge 4.0. The phone will carry a cost of CNY 1499 (around $237) and will supposedly arrive in three colors: gray black and blue.

We might be seeing these phones make a splash at the MWC later this month. It is possible that Xiaomi announce these at MWC since there isn’t going to be a major Mi 7 announcement.

Source | Via

Microsoft introduces cheaper Surface Laptop and Surface Book 2 variants

Microsoft has introduced new price points for each of its Surface Laptop and Surface Book 2 models. Both now start at a lower price, albeit with reduced specs.

Starting with the Surface Laptop, the new base model comes with an Intel Core m3 processor with Intel HD Graphics 615, 4GB RAM and 128GB storage and is priced at $799. Previously, the point of entry for this computer was $999, which has a more powerful Core i5.

Surface Book 2

Similarly, the Surface Book 2 now starts at $1199 for the 13.5-inch model, and has an Intel Core i5, 8GB RAM and 128GB storage. Previously, the cheapest variant was $1499 and had 256GB storage.

While positively rated, Microsoft’s Surface computers are often criticized for their high prices. These new variants are cheaper but they also lose out on critical specifications, so the value proposition remains the same. However, if you are on a tight budget and don’t mind a slightly slower processor or less storage, then these just might be within your reach now.

Source 1 • Source 2

Oreo for Honor 9 and Honor 8 Pro begins rolling

A couple of devices from Huawei’s sub-brand Honor are getting a new update. Specifically, the Honor 9 and Honor 8 Pro are getting the EMUI 8.0 update which brings along Android Oreo.

As for changes, all major Oreo goodies should be there, including picture-in-picture mode and notification dots. The update is currently hitting units in the UK, although we expect it will be available in other key markets sooner than later.

For the complete list of Honor devices that will get Oreo, head here.

Via

Apple sold fewer iPhones this holiday season, still made more revenue

Apple’s latest quarter report is out for the Holiday Season. This report includes initial iPhone 8 sales, as well as the first wave of iPhone X sales. Combined, the company shipped 77.3 million iPhones. This is just 1.15% below the same quarter from the previous year.

The higher cost of the iPhone X was just enough to offset the slight decline in total iPhone shipments, just enough, in fact, to bump Apple’s revenue for this quarter over the previous one: $88.3 billion vs $78.4 billion in revenue. The posted revenue was just above the predicted amount: between $84 to $87 billion.

iPhone X and the iPhone 8

During this quarter, Apple also sold 13.2 million iPads and 5.1 million Mac computers. The same quarter last year did fewer iPads (13 million), and slightly more Macs (5.4 million). Apple also highlighted that it has reached 1.3 billion active Apple devices around the world in January.

We’ve discussed this in the past: the smartphone industry is becoming very saturated and increasingly marginal updates year over year. A company even as big as Apple has had trouble keeping up with the slowly declining industry and analysts have even suggested that Apple may discontinue the iPhone X early.

What’s amazing is that Apple managed to market and sell a smartphone experience for $1000. What’s not amazing is that this may be prompting other smartphone makers to try the same thing. The first one on that list is Samsung with the Galaxy Note8, it was $950 when it launched and we might be able to expect that its successor will be sold for $1000.

In any case, we don’t see Apple slowing down any time soon. 2018 rumors have swirled about three new iPhones this year, all of which may have employ the same iPhone X notch-style display.

Source

YouTube Go expands to 130 countries

YouTube Go is one of the apps that’s part of Google’s effort to get the same information to people in developing countries while using a lot less data. There are other apps with the same concept: a lightweight version of an otherwise data-hungry app that offers the app’s core functionalities while keeping tabs on data usage.

The app is expanding to 130 countries around the world, so it’s quite a big deal. The app is arriving in the Play Store in many countries in Central and South America, Middle Eastern countries, and part of Africa. YouTube Go first launched as a Beta product in India before officially releasing in Indonesia.

Mobile internet is still considered a luxury in many parts of the world, so YouTube Go is meant to let people download YouTube videos to their internal storage where there’s good reception or a Wi-Fi network available. Users can then watch these videos whenever they want to, and YouTube Go even lets these users share videos with others without the need for an internet connection.

Similar to how Files Go sends files: if you wanted to send a video, you’d select it from the videos saved on the device and the person you’re sending the videos to would have to open the YouTube Go app and hit “receive”. This works sort of like airdrop in that the phones use Bluetooth to detect and handshake with another nearby device, then Wi-Fi direct takes over and transfers the videos.

In the past, you could only send one video at a time, but the YouTube Go app has been updated to be able to send multiple videos in one go. Of course, in order to play the video on a new device, YouTube Go needs to make a quick communication with its servers to download a decryption key. This is a precaution to keep developers from abusing the download feature.

YouTube Go on the Play Store