Gionee has launched the new Elife S7 in the Indian market. The phone is priced at Rs. 24,999 ($404) and is available in black, white, and blue.

The Elife S7 has a 5.2-inch, 1920×1080 resolution Super AMOLED display, MediaTek SoC with 1.7GHz octa-core CPU, 2GB RAM, 16GB internal memory, 13 megapixel rear camera, 8 megapixel front camera, dual SIM support with 4G support on both SIM slots, and 2,700mAh battery. The phone runs on the latest Amigo 3.0 OS based on Android 5.0 Lollipop. And it packs all of this in a super slim 5.5mm body with Gorilla Glass on the front and back and magnesium alloy frame on the side.

We had a quick hands-on with the phone at the launch event. Like the S5.5 and the S5.1, the S7 is exceedingly thin and light. The display is vibrant and crisp with good viewing angles. The new Amigo OS 3.0 is similar in appearance to previous versions but thanks to Android Lollipop is super smooth and fast throughout the interface. There are also couple of extra features such as ultra power saving mode and a theme feature that takes color from your background using the camera and uses it for the UI. Gionee has promised two days of battery life with this device.

The phone is expected to go on sale shortly through offline…

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Alleged images of the yet to be announced Oppo Find 9 made the rounds online. The previously leaked successor of Oppo Find 7 is expected to debut at some point in the near future.

Overall, it appears that the upcoming Find 9 has mostly retained the design language of its predecessor. However, the newcomer has added dual camera unit and a fingerprint sensor to its specs.

There is no word on the functionality of the Oppo Find 9’s fancy camera setup. The fingerprint sensor on the other hand, looks similar to the solution found in the Oppo N3.

Finally, the leaked images reveal that users will be able to spec the back of the smartphone in seriously gaudy colors. Thankfully, a black version will also be available.

Rumored specs of Oppo Find 9 include Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 chipset, 4GB of RAM, and 5.5″ display. Android Lollipop will be the OS out of the box….

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Another week and another trending devices list. Looking at the top 10 most-interesting devices in our database, there are some quite expected results, but major curveballs are also present.

The Top 10 trending phones chart is a recap list of the devices that gathered the most hits throughout the week. In other words, the chart represents the interests of the majority of you, our visitors, and is an indication of what currently interests you.

The very top of the list is mostly unchanged with Samsung's latest flagship device – the Galaxy S6 still firmly in the lead and the affordable Galaxy Grand Prime following close by. The third place is a new and exciting entrance by the S6 edge. The double-curved smartphone finally managed to make an appearance in the list and all the recent news attention has procured it an instant third place in our list.

Interestingly enough, the iPhone 6 has skyrocketed all the way to the fourth place, which is a major leap forward, considering, that only last week, it was in danger of dropping out of the race altogether. It is also the only device, standing in the way of an impressive Samsung chain, because straight after it we find the Galaxy A7, A5, the Galaxy E7, as well as the Korean giant's former flagship – the Galaxy S5.

Asus and Lenovo have managed to hold on and are still in the race with the Zenfone 5. Dropping two spots and now at 8th place and the Lenovo A600 at the very bottom of the chart. The week has been rough for HTC though, as it's One M9 flagship, formerly number 9 in our list, is nowhere to be found. Perhaps it will climb back into the race next week, but we will just have to wait and see for that.

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Samsung Galaxy S6
RANK: 1WAS: 1

specs review

Samsung Galaxy Grand Prime
RANK: 2WAS: 2

specs review

Samsung Galaxy S6 edge
RANK: 3NEW IN

specs review

Apple iPhone 6
RANK: 4WAS: 10

specs…

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Each weekend we trawl our news archives for interesting events over the past several years around this time of the year – late April/early March for today's edition of Counterclockwise. We see the jump between the Nokia N8, one of its earlier camera phone legends, and the Lumia 930, Nokia's last. We also look at mini versions of phones and check out a particularly busy three-day period in 2009 that saw the birth of three app stores.

Nokia camera phones

In March 2010 Nokia was preparing to launch one of its iconic camera phones, the N8. A Symbian^3 smartphone with a 12MP camera capable of capturing 720p videos it can then output to a TV over HDMI. It had a 3.5" AMOLED screen with 360 x 640px resolution and multi-touch capabilities, which at the time was impressive since we marked it with an exclamation mark.

The Nokia N8 reigned as the best mobile camera with its large (1/1.83") sensor, ND filter, Carl Zeiss optics and xenon flash. It was a beautiful phone too, with an anodized aluminum unibody and a design that carried over to the first Lumia devices.

By the time the Lumia 930 came around, in April 2014, the design has changed but many things stayed the same – the phone still featured an aluminum build (though with a polycarbonate back), it had a 5" AMOLED display (with nine times the pixels) and a killer camera.

It had a 1/2.5" BSI sensor with 20MP resolution and optical image stabilization. It had moved up to 1080p video shooting but it traded the xenon flash for a dual-LED flash.

The biggest change, however, was the OS – Symbian was no more, Windows Phone ran the show. The Nokia Lumia 930 will be the last legendary Nokia cameraphone – the Lumia line moved under the Microsoft brand. The Finns may be looking to resurrect their phone building business though, we'll see what the future holds.

Big and small

The rise of touchscreen OSes pushed screen sizes higher and higher, which naturally led to a countermovement of mini phones. Sony Ericsson already had a couple of Xperia X10 minis and in early April 2011 we saw the first signs of the second generation.

What would become the Xperia mini pro featured a slide-out QWERTY keyboard for a superior typing experience, something that would have been problematic on its 3" screen. It ran the popular at the time Android 2.3 Gingerbread and was powered by a 1GHz processor.

The same year Dell retired one of the first phablets ever, the 5" Dell Streak, but a competing phablet brand was blowing up. The Samsung Galaxy Note shipped 5 million units by the end of March 2012, having launched in October the previous year.

That number would prove small in the long run as later generation Notes went into the tens of millions and are still one of the best-selling phablets around.

Around the same time in March 2012 Motorola launched the Defy Mini in the UK at £162. With a 3.2" screen it was similar in size the Xperia though it was touchscreen only.

The following year Samsung had a second generation mini in the works too. The Galaxy S4 mini was to have a 4.3" qHD Super AMOLED screen and a 8MP/1080p camera. There were speculations of an Exynos chipset though it ended up with a Snapdragon with a dual-core processor.

At the same time the company was working on the other end of the spectrum with the massive Mega phones. The Galaxy Mega would come in 5.8" and 6.3" displays. They were dual-SIMs too, a formula fit for the Asian market.

This leads us to March last year when HTC was prepping a second gen mini too. The HTC One mini 2 carried over the metal unibody and stereo speakers of its big bro, but no UltraPixel camera. It went with a 13MP shooter instead.

Sony's Xperia Z1 Compact was the best-loved mini of 2014, but rumors about its successor were already swirling. The Xperia Z2 Compact never materialized, but some of the rumors came true – like keeping the 20.7MP camera and increasing the screen diagonal. These eventually landed later in the year as the Xperia Z3 Compact.

FCC schematic for the Altair • photos of what could be Z2 Compact's back panel

Another day, another app store

While touchscreen OSes influenced phones' screen size, app stores were influencing the OSes. On April 1 2009 BlackBerry unveiled App World, a serious launch despite the date. Users can download it on BlackBerry OS 4.2+…

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Nearly half of the fans who attended Samsung's recent press conference in China were hired, according to a report from Shanghai-based news outlet The Paper. The event, which was held a couple of days ago to show off the Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge smartphones, was attended by around 1,000 people.

The report said that Samsung wanted recruiters to hire people under 30 who look like students, adding that those who spent more than an hour at the event were paid $4.80 per person, while recruiters were paid $3.20 for each person they recruited.

Those hired were told to tell reporters that they're Samsung's fans or are interested in the South Korean company's new phones. However, interestingly, majority of the people taking photos of the Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge were using iPhones, the report…

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Purported live photos of the unannounced Sony Xperia Z4 made the rounds online. The upcoming successor of Sony Xperia Z3 is expected to make its official debut at some point this summer.

The images fall right in line with the leaked press renders from last month. Sony Xperia Z4 will continue the OmniBalance design language, which was introduced with the Xperia Z back in 2013. When announced, the newcomer will be barely distinguishable from its predecessors.

One of the photos confirms that the yet to be announced smartphone will pack a Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 chipset with octa-core CPU. The image also confirms the E6553 model number of the device.

A recent benchmark entry revealed the specs of Sony Xperia Z4. They include the above mentioned chipset, 3GB of RAM, 32GB of expandable memory, and 5.1″ 1080p display. A 20.7MP main camera and 5MP front-facing unit complete the setup.

Source (in Greek) |…

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The Apple Watch is entering the home stretch and is getting close to its release date. In the US, preorders are set for April 10 and you should be able to get one as early as April 24, if you manage to time things right. This, however, might not be the case for Swiss users.

Apple is allegedly facing some intellectual property issues, which might force the Cupertino giant to postpone the release of the eagerly-anticipated smart wearable. A local broadcaster, going by the moniker RTS, says that the word "apple" can't appear on the new product in his home country, or be used to in other promotional materials, as long as a patent from 1985 stands.

The document in question belongs to William Longe, owner of the Leonard watch brand. Apparently his company currently holds the rights to market a watch bearing the name or model "apple", which is clearly a setback, for the namesake American company. As luck has it, though, the patent expires on December 5 this year.

The company could, potentially, take legal actions and attempt to find a way out for the wearable, but this is surely a lengthy process and could very well stretch beyond December of this year. Another option is to work around the issue and not use the word "apple" for the device in Switzerland at all. While this is somewhat plausible and could be pulled off, it seems quite unlikely and too much of a hustle. The sad truth, for Swiss Apple fan's at least, is that the patent saga might postpone the Apple Watch launch by a few months.

Still, even if that was to happen we have no doubt that all eager fans will be able to import units from the rest of Europe. There is also always the possibility that the whole matter is blown out of proportions and no real threat of delay exists, but without an official statement, we can't really be…

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The Apple Watch is now inching toward its release date and excitement is at an all-time high. The Cupertino tech giant has set preorders for its smart wearable for April 10 and the first batch of units should be made available to eager consumers on April 24.

The aforementioned set of dates has been known for quite some time now, but there has been a lot of speculation regarding the way distributing the devices will be handled.

Today, some light has been shed on the issue and it turns out, customers will, in fact, be given the option to pick up their devices from a physical retail store on launch date, as well as, to have them delivered. This, however, does not remove the need for preorder, on the contrary. As we mentioned in a previous article, Apple is expecting a huge amount of interest, especially for the first wave of devices, and consequently, they won't be sold to walk-in customers at all, at least until things calm down.

Anyone who want to purchase one as soon as possible, after the April 24 launch date, that is, has to preorder online, or, at least register for a try-on session. Registering before going into the store on the said date seems to obligatory if you want to be among the first to own the gadget. The try-ons will be held at select stores and will start on April 10, but, if you sign up for one on April 24 you could theoretically buy the watch after you get to see it, but availability is still not guaranteed.

This is a little confusing and will surely lead to even bigger camping lines in front of store, than at usual Apple device launches and ordering your device online with free delivery really seems like the smarter way to go, at least on paper.

Bear in mind that if you have opted to spend an inordinate amount of money and get yourself a Watch Edition then your experience will most likely differ. One of the many perks premium Apple Watch shoppers will get is a one hour, private try-on session, as opposed to a 15 minute one at a booth. And we assume supplies won't shift so fast for a $10,000 unit, so you are quite safe.

As for the majority of users, who will opt for the slightly less-horribly overpriced steel and sport versions, you might have to show some patience. And if you are still struggling with the purchase decision, perhaps our editorial on the subject can help you make up your mind. We have also prepared a comprehensive overview of the pricing on the "affordable" models, as well as the elite ones.

Will you be standing in line for the Apple Watch come April 24 or do you have other plans? Tell us in the comment section…

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OnePlus One users can rejoice as the eagerly-anticipated Oxygen OS build is finally here. The official package can now be downloaded from the OnePlus website and flashed on to the legendary One handset.

The custom Android-based ROM had a long and bumpy journey, but one thing is for sure, it has come a long way thanks to the love and attention to detail of the sprawling OnePlus community. What originally started out as an escape plan from CyanogenMod, has been build up, despite numerous setbacks and delays, into what is now a functioning Android 5.0.2 Lollipop build, complete with an array of custom features, carefully selected by the community.

Oxygen OS is built around the ideal of open-source and offers an almost pure-stock Android experience, highly optimized for the OnePlus One hardware and complete with custom gestures, customization features and numerous tiny details, crafter with great attention.

The build was initially scheduled for March 27 and didn’t quite manage to meet the deadline, mostly because of problems with Google certification. Ever since then, the OnePlus team has been actively giving status updates to eager users and even gifting handsets to compensate for the wait. Today, the air has finally cleared an Oxygen OS is fully certified and will be easily updatable over the air in the future.

So if you happen to own a OnePlus One, be sure to head on over to the source link and enjoy the new Oxygen experience. Here is a video, courtesy of the OnePlus team, showcasing the top features, incorporated in the ROM.

Also, be sure to report back with your opinions and any interesting notes you have on your Oxygen OS experience.

A big thanks for all the tips goes out to: roshan rawat, akshay, Soumyadeep, Muhammed Rafeek, Vivek Goel, mads, Sachin, Khairuddin, Madhu Kashyap, shriram, Jamie Berlofsky

Source 1 | Source…

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Samsung’s latest devices, the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge, are already up for pre-order from US carrier Sprint, and now the latter has announced that it will start shipping the handsets on April 6.

"Samsung GS6 starts shipping Monday! Pre-order now to be among the first to get yours," the carrier said in a tweet. It's worth mentioning that both the handsets are set to officially release on April 10.

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Samsung GS6 starts shipping Monday! Pre-order now to be among the first to get yours. http://ift.tt/1DyffH9; Sprint (@sprint) April 3, 2015

As for the price, Sprint is offering the 32GB S6 for $200 on a regular two-year agreement and $648 sans contract, while the 32GB S6 Edge is priced at $300 on contract and $748 off contract. For more information on memory, colour, and payment options, click the Source 2 and Source 3 links below.
Source 1 | Source 2 | Source…

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