As it turns out Samsung had a special VR stunt planned for the Oscars ceremony a few days ago, which was cancelled just hours before the red carpet rolled.

Samsung’s idea was to get Casey Neistat loose at the Oscars with a Gear 360 VR camera. He was supposed to be skateboarding in the Dolby Theater and pass around Leonardo DiCaprio as he was walking towards the stage (to grab his overdue Oscar).

Samsung planned this stunt for a while, brought Neistat to Dolby Theater, and everything was rehearsed. But then Samsung cancelled the stunt, and the company’s presence was limited to just one TV spot.

Casey Neistat still shot a VR video that you can watch here, so it wasn’t all in vain. You can also check this vlog entry, where he talks about Samsung’s cancelled stunt.

Samsung is a major sponsor to the Oscars, so it’s natural it gets special treatment when it comes to advertising. You probably remember Ellen DeGeneres and her famous selfie with the Galaxy Note 3 in 2014.

The reason for the cancellation is unknown, but maybe it was for the best – it could have been awkward someone to be skating around during the actors’ most cherished…

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Xiaomi announced the Mi 5 flagship at the MWC a few days ago, and it quickly became one of the most anticipated smartphones this year. The Mi 5 will be available in three different editions, and China is the first market to get it.

The first flash sale in China sold 4 million units in no time – all Xiaomi has prepped for the occasion – and registered more than 17 million interest entries. The second flash sale is scheduled for March 8 (10 AM Beijing time) and is expected to sell at least as many phones.

As it turns out Xiaomi didn’t anticipate the huge demand, and it asked Foxconn and Inventec to increase the Mi 5 production.

Naturally, China is the first market to get the Mi 5, but Xiaomi plans to bring the flagship to other key markets shortly after. And it can expect similar high demand there, too.

We’ll keep you in the loop as the story develops, but if you live in China and want a Mi 5, you should act fast. And with the second batch to enter production only now, some of the pre-orders may ship in April, or even May, as a report suggests.

Source 1 | Source 2 |…

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Sony has begun rolling out the Android 6.0 Marshmallow update for the entire Xperia Z5 lineup in Japan – Xperia Z5, Xperia Z5 Compact, and Xperia Z5 Premium. The Marshmallow update for Sony Xperia Z5 has been already available in Turkey.

The new Marshmallow-based firmware improves on the battery manager, app permissions manager, notification area customizations, and it brings a new Xperia Home launcher as well as an updated Camera app.

Sony UK announced the Marshmallow rollout for the Xperia Z5 series, the Xperia Z4 Tablet, and Xperia Z3+ units will begin on March 7. Now that Sony is seeding Marshmallow updates in Turkey and Japan, we believe March 7 should be the date for the global release for those updates.

Thank you, Chary, for the tip!

Source •…

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Microsoft has lots of useful apps for Android but Hyperlapse is definitely one of the top picks. The app allows you to shoot stabilized time-lapse videos, but until today it was limited to 720p output.

Microsoft pushed a new version to the Play Store, which adds support for shooting and saving hyperlapse videos at 1080p resolution. The 720p option is still set as default, so you should tweak the settings of the app after updating.

But there is more. In addition to the added 1080p video support, Microsoft Hyperlapse now allows you to save the video on your microSD card. Nice!

To use these new additions to the Hyperlapse app, your phone should be able to shoot 1080p videos, of course. Some launchers may not allow the app to save on the microSD card, so you should have that in mind, too.

The app is now available for download in the Play Store. It’s free so if you didn’t have the chance to use it, you may want to give it a try.

Play Store •…

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The Xiaomi Redmi 2 Pro name popped up last October as the US FCC cleared the device, but we never heard it since. That’s until today – the phone has been launched in Brazil.

The Redmi 2 Pro is identical to the Redmi 2 Prime – it’s the 16GB model of the Xiaomi Redmi 2 with 2GB RAM.

In case you need a refresh – the Redmi 2 Prime, also known as Redmi 2 Pro in Brazil, packs a 4.7″ 720p IPS display and runs on the Snapdragon 410 chipset with a quad-core Cortex-A53 CPU, Adreno 306 GPU, and 2GB of RAM.

The rest of the specs include an 8MP rear camera, a 2MP front snapper, 16GB expandable storage, LTE connectivity, dual-SIM support, and a 2,200 mAh battery. The Redmi 2 Pro comes with MIUI 6.0 on board.

Brazil is getting the Redmi 2 Pro in dark gray only, and it costs BRL 699 or $183. The regular Redmi 2 (8GB storage, 1GB RAM) has been available in Brazil for a while already.

Just a quick reminder – the Redmi 2 has won the award for the best affordable smartphone at the MWC in February, so we might be getting it release on more markets soon.

Thank you, Harsh, for the…

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Chinese regulatory authority TENAA has sure had a busy day today. Having already released its certifications for the Oppo R9 and R9 Plus as well as the Samsung Galaxy A9 Pro, TENAA is now gracing us with the full details of the upcoming Galaxy J5 (2016) and Galaxy J7 (2016).

The successors to the original J5 and J7 from last year are due for a release soon. In the meantime they’ve kept on leaking, and now they’ve been put through the paces of TENAA, which has revealed that they could be sporting metal frames.

The Galaxy J5 (2016) can be seen above. It’s got a 5.2-inch 720p Super AMOLED touchscreen, a 13 MP rear camera with LED flash and laser autofocus, a 5 MP selfie snapper, a 1.2 GHz quad-core processor, 2GB of RAM, 16GB of expandable storage, and 4G on board. It runs Android 5.1.1 Lollipop. Its dimensions are 145.7 x 72.3 x 7.9 mm, and it weighs 155.4g. It will be offered in white, gold, and pink gold. This particular model, the SM-J5108, is headed to China Mobile.

TENAA has certified not one but two iterations of the Galaxy J7 (2016), the SM-J7108 for China Mobile and the SM-J7109 for China Telecom. You can see the former above this paragraph and the latter underneath.

They share most of the specs as you’d expect, with one difference being in the processor’s clock speed. Whereas the J7108 has a 1.6 GHz octa-core CPU, the J7109 has to make do with a 1.5 GHz octa-core chip. This may mean they’re actually employing different SoCs, but there’s no way of knowing for sure right now.

Otherwise they’re the same, each featuring a 5.5-inch 1080p Super AMOLED display, a 13 MP rear camera with LED flash and laser autofocus, a 5 MP selfie shooter, 3GB of RAM, 16GB of expandable storage, and running Android 5.1.1 Lollipop. The J7108 will be available in gold and white, while the J7109 will be offered in black and gold. Their measurements are almost identical, but not quite so. The J7108’s dimensions are 151.7 x 75.9 x 7.6 mm, and it weighs 165g. On the other hand, the J7109 measures 151.7 x 76 x 7.6 mm, and it weighs 166g.

Source 1 (in Chinese) • Source 2 (in Chinese) • Source 3 (in Chinese) |…

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Micromax, which is the number two smartphone player in India, saw a massive erosion of its market share in Q4, 2015. According to market research firm Canalys (which tracks phone shipments in the country), the company’s share plummeted to 13.2% last quarter from 21.7% the quarter prior.

On the other hand Samsung, which sits at the top, further consolidated its position – its share of the market increased from 22% to 26.1% last quarter. The third spot was claimed by China’s Lenovo with 11% market share.

Meanwhile, in a related development, Micromax’s CEO Vineet Taneja has resigned. He was on the job for the past two years. Officially, the company said Taneja left “to pursue other interests,” adding that “the co-founders and senior leadership are very well entrenched in to the operations and the business is as…

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Ever since January the upcoming Samsung Galaxy A9 Pro has been in the rumors, supposedly arriving soon in China. We’ve already seen it in the databases of both GFXBench and AnTuTu, on which occasions we’ve found out most of its specs.

And now the A9 Pro has been certified for sale in China by TENAA. The regulatory authority has thus outed the first images of the device, along with a pretty comprehensive list of its specs – like it always does.

The Galaxy A9 Pro will have a 6-inch 1080p Super AMOLED touchscreen, a 16 MP rear camera with LED flash, an 8 MP selfie cam, a 1.8 GHz octa-core processor, 4GB of RAM, 32GB of expandable storage, dual-SIM functionality and LTE. It runs Android 6.0 Marshmallow. Its dimensions are 161.7 x 80.9 x 7.9 mm, and it weighs 210g.

The exact chipset employed isn’t named by TENAA, but from the benchmark runs that were leaked in the past we know it’s the Qualcomm Snapdragon 652. Compared to the non-Pro A9, you’re getting a higher-res main camera, 1 extra GB of RAM, as well as a newer version of Android from day one. And since it’s 10g heavier and 0.5 mm thicker than the A9, we assume the A9 Pro will also sport an even bigger battery than the 4,000 mAh cell inside the non-Pro version.

The Galaxy A9 Pro will be available in China in black, white, and gold, and it’s rumored to have NFC on board complete with support for Samsung Pay. Its estimated price is between CNY 3,300 and CNY 3,600 (that’s $504 to $550 or €462 to €504 at the current exchange rates).

Source (in Chinese) | Via 1 (in Chinese) • Via…

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Amazon’s Echo smart speaker that has a digital assistant built-in has been a surprising success for the retailer ever since its launch in 2014. So now Amazon is adding two other members to the newly-established Echo family. Meet the Amazon Tap and the Echo Dot.

The Amazon Tap is basically the portable version of the original Echo which was rumored back in January. It’s portable because it has a battery (so no need to keep it plugged in like the Echo) that will last for around 9 hours of use.

It connects to Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, and like the Echo it comes with the Alexa digital assistant built-in. However, since it’s battery-powered Alexa isn’t always listening for your commands like on the Echo – you have to tap the microphone button on the device before you talk to her (hence the name of the speaker). The Tap has 360-degree omni-directional audio with Dolby processing. It’s up for pre-order already for $129.99, and will be released on March 31.

The Echo Dot is very small, and it’s primarily meant to connect the intelligence of the Alexa digital assistant to your existing speakers. It has a 7-microphone array like the full-size Echo, but only a very small speaker. The idea is that you’ll use an audio cable or Bluetooth to pair it to your existing speakers. You can also use it as a smart alarm clock, for example, all on its own. This device costs $89.99, but oddly you can only get one through an Amazon Fire TV or Echo speaker, by asking Alexa to place the order. You have to be a member of Amazon Prime to receive it.

Source |…

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Over the past few weeks we’ve seen a lot of rumors popping up regarding the upcoming Oppo R9. Despite the fact that the previous two members of the R-series have been nothing more than mid-range in terms of specs, the R9 was supposedly going to be a true flagship, with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 chip powering it.

Well, that theory has now been debunked courtesy of TENAA. The Chinese equivalent to the US FCC has certified both the R9 and the R9 Plus for sale. As usual, this process has revealed both images of the two handsets, as well as a list of some of their specs.

Let’s start with the R9, pictured above. It has a metal build as you can see, and it comes with a 5.5-inch 1080p AMOLED touchscreen, a 1.95 GHz octa-core processor, 4GB of RAM, 32GB of expandable storage, 4G support, dual-SIM functionality, a 2,850 mAh battery, and two 16 MP cameras – one on the front, one on the back (which also has a LED flash). It runs Android 5.1 Lollipop. Its dimensions are 151.8 x 74.3 x 6.5 mm, and it weighs 145g.

While the SoC employed isn’t mentioned by name, it’s clearly not the Snapdragon 820, since that features a quad-core CPU, not octa-core. Based on the clock speed alone, we could see MediaTek’s Helio P10 inside the Oppo R9, but that’s just speculation.

Moving on to the R9 Plus (pictured above), once again the fully metallic construction is obvious. This handset sports a 6-inch 1080p AMOLED touchscreen, the same 16 MP cameras as its smaller sibling, a 1.8 GHz octa-core processor, 4GB of RAM, 64GB of expandable storage, a 4,120 mAh battery, dual-SIM support, and 4G LTE. Oddly, it seems to be running Android 5.0 Lollipop, which is a rather ancient version of the OS at this point. Its dimensions are 163 x 80.8 x 7.4 mm, and it weighs 185g.

Once again the Snapdragon 820 can’t be at the helm, yet in this case we get a different SoC than in the R9. If we were to speculate, we’d assume the R9 Plus has the Snapdragon 652 inside (only based on the CPU clock speed and number of cores).

So the R9 and R9 Plus certainly look like solid mid-rangers, but not the flagships they’ve been rumored to be. Perhaps Oppo will finally unveil the Find 9 this year then. And speaking of unveilings, the R9 duo will go official on March 17.

Source 1 (in Chinese) • Source 2 (in Chinese) | Via 1 • Via…

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