It’s unclear if those four somewhat distant “models” will be four distinct phones or perhaps just two main devices, each available in a couple of configurations separated merely by their RAM and ROM attributes.
But these sometimes accurate, sometimes not insiders expect screen sizes to range from 5 to 5.7 inches, with either Full or Quad HD resolution in tow, panels supplied by LG, CTC and Innolux, and of course, FIH Mobile, aka Foxconn, a very important “production partner.”
As for the Nokia-branded, HMD-distributed D1C, current predictions paint an overall mid-range picture, 2 and 3GB RAM, 5 and 5.5-inch Full HD display, $150 and $200 prices forecasted for two MWC-headed variants. Interested or disappointed?
The LeEco Le Pro 3, the top-tier phone made public in the US a couple of months ago, now has an over-the-air update destined for it.
It’s not Android Nougat, but it takes users to EUI version 5.8.020S and most of the improvements have to do with cleaning and prettying up said user interface: adding iOS-esque badges to apps on the home screen for notifications; dropping superfluous empty subject banners on SMS; reducing Bluetooth scanning periods to save on device resources; camera improvements and; app permission tweaks, among others.
The Google Mobile Services app package has been updated, too, for “increased stability & stability.”
The roll-out will take its time. There’s been some, but less love for the mid-range Le S3.
It’s a beautiful dream. You’re heading to a gig tonight, so you nip out and buy a camera with a powerful zoom, and hot-swap it onto your phone. The next day, you’re editing a video, so you plug in a bit of extra RAM. Two months later, it’s upgrade time, but instead of getting a whole new phone, you just switch your old battery for a superpowered one. Nice.
Everything about modular phones makes sense - to the consumer, at least. It’s cheaper, it’s easier, it’s better for the environment. It works better with the pace of hardware development, too: instead of a whole new phone that makes yours obsolescent every six months, we could have a cool new component every few weeks.
So why aren’t we all using modular phones?
The first piece of the modular puzzle
The granddad of today’s modular phones was a tiny handset launched in 2008 at Mobile World Congress; not by a Samsung or an HTC, but a little-known Israeli startup called Modu Mobile.
Modu’s record-breaking mobile had basic functionality which could be added to by slipping it into one of the company’s proprietary exoskeletons, known as a ‘jacket.’ The jackets were specialised depending on what kind of phone you wanted - a keyboard, perhaps, or a sporty chassis, a camera or an MP3 player (it was 2008, remember).
A fully clothed Modu
The phone did reach the market in 2009, but despite a trailblazing concept and the expertise of founder Dov Moran - inventor of the USB memory stick - Modu shut down in 2011.
Moran’s efforts weren’t wasted, though: Google bought Modu’s patents for $4.9m, and its then-subsidiary Motorola Mobility turned them into a little thing called Project Ara.
Ara we doing this thing or not?
Project Ara is probably the best-known modular phone scheme, and had some very excited fans before it was abruptly cancelled in September.
Like Modu, Ara phones centred around a fixed structure (an ‘endo,’ short for endoskeleton) made by Google, and third-party modules of standard sizes could then be slotted in to make a phone.
The hardware equivalent of Windows Mobile’s UI
For the tech equivalent of an E-fit, Ara handsets looked surprisingly good. However, despite more than three years’ worth of development, the team couldn’t seem to make it work.
Ara’s cancellation was met with widespread disappointment, and Google’s explanation of “streamlining its hardware efforts” didn’t do much to sweeten the pill.
Rest in pieces
Ara and Modu are not the only names in the modular graveyard. ZTE showed off a prototype called Eco-Mobius at CES in 2014, but it never made it to market and they wouldn’t comment for this article, rather suggesting it’s dead and buried.
Later the same year came Vsenn, considered a major Ara competitor - until it too was cancelled in June 2015 due to “financial pressure.”
This was a month after budget modular handset Fonkraft was yanked from Indiegogo for “not meeting trust and safety standards.” Yikes.
There was more than one side to ZTE’s Eco-Mobius
But what about this year’s LG G5? That’s modular, right? Well, kind of. The bottom section can be swapped, but only for a very limited range of alternatives, and the rest of the phone is fixed.
LG explains to TechRadar, “By allowing the LG G5 to physically connect with other modules such as LG CAM Plus and LG Hi-Fi Plus, the Modular Type can transform the handset into a premium camera or audio device.
"We know that not every user demands high-fidelity audio or precision camera controls; but for those who are passionate about their music or taking photographs, the option to enhance the phone to suit their needs is there."
Taking the battery out may not be the only thing to kill the G5
That all sounds good, especially as a sort of market test for full modularity - but has it paid off?
“While we're confident in the technology, there needs to be a robust audience for it," explains LG. "Some technologies are ahead of their time and it can take time to attract a significant user base. Whether modular smartphones are the next big thing is still up in the air, so we'll continue to listen to our customers and monitor usage trends for the time being.”
That monitoring doesn’t appear to be going well, sadly.
The consumer benefits of a Lego-style phone are obvious. Dave Hakkens, founder of Phonebloks - the modular smartphone movement that influenced Project Ara’s design - notes: “You can upgrade, repair and customise it. It will last longer and you can adapt it to your needs.”
Pretty compelling, so why aren’t consumers biting?
“I’d say phones like the LG G5 aren’t really selling because it’s not really modular, more of a first step to break the phone apart and customise it. But it won’t last much longer, yet. It’ll take some time before the perfect modular phone is developed.”
Dov Moran, founder of Modu, agrees that current phones haven’t nailed it. “On the technical side the issue of easy connection and disconnection of the modules is not resolved yet.” (Google were originally using electropermanent magnets for this, but changed the design after jokingly saying they “failed the drop test.”) It’s a serious point, though: when you’ve put your phone together piece-by-piece, you need the whole to be strong enough to withstand drops and back pockets. Yes, it’s easier to repair a modular phone, but is it also easier to break one?
Moran continues, “Phone lifespans are relatively short, and inexpensive. When we talk about replacing modules, the price goes down so fast on ingredients like the screen, memory, camera, that what is the high end of today would become the low end of tomorrow. The hassle of buying modules - which one, shipment etc - is large compared to ‘give me a new phone’ where all the ingredients are upgraded.”
Some people prefer ready meals to recipes
Modular phones are touted as being better for the environment, but Moran points out that they could actually lead to more waste: “When you upgrade your phone, you do not throw away the old one. You keep it as a backup or give it to someone else. While you upgrade a module, you have nothing to do with the low-end part.”
It’s likely a secondary market would spring up, but given how fast entire phones depreciate, how much could you realistically expect to get for last year’s camera module on eBay?
Roadblocks
To fulfil the promise of modular phones, we’d need to carry a plethora of easily-lost bits around with us - as Moran puts it, “A minimal configuration when I am doing sports and a large one when I use it as a phablet in a meeting requires having all the parts handy, and it dilutes the theoretically nice (but not so practical) concept.”
Hakkens agrees. “For the current phone manufacturers, there’s not much of a benefit. However, there would be for other companies like camera, speaker or battery manufacturers that currently can’t contribute to the mobile phone market: they could with a modular phone.”
“Could you leave out the bit that lets people call me?”
In other words, if a manufacturer can make a popular enough base phone, we could end up with an App Store-style selection of components to choose from.
That sounds like a good thing, but consider all the junk apps on iOS and Android: do we really want the hardware equivalent of that? Is it worth it, when most of us just download the same 20 apps as everyone else anyway?
Building the future
There’s still hope for the modular dream. Despite having fatefully relinquished Project Ara to Google, Motorola haven’t given up on the piecemeal phone, launching the modular-ish Moto Z earlier this year. Not everything on the Moto Z (and its variants Force and Play) can be swapped, but there’s a good range of magnetised accessories including a wireless charging battery pack, speakers, a projector and even a 10x optical zoom.
Meanwhile, ethical, repairable smartphone Fairphone 2 has been well-received and is available for preorder now, while the similar Puzzlephone has been postponed to 2017 due to delayed EU funding, but is apparently still happening.
For now, though, it looks like modular accessories are as mainstream as we’re going to get: things like Mophie’s battery cases, and Olloclip’s clip-on lenses.
The best example is probably Otterbox’s uniVERSE, a modular iPhone case that allows you to swap in modules including extra storage, power, and even a credit card reader, but it’s a long way from a whole phone.
iven all the projects that have fallen by the wayside, can we still look forward to a modular future? Dave Hakkens says yes: “I would imagine all tech to be modular [in the future], especially considering the Internet of Things where all our devices are connected to the internet and become little computers. What if a tiny processor component of your fridge or washing machine breaks? Do you throw everything away? I’d say swap in a new block!”
Dave Hakkens presents his vision to, er, a bridge
Dov Moran sees an even more radical pathway for modular tech: modular humans. “I do believe that at some time a [modular smartphone] solution will evolve, but it is competing with the other solution of having parts of the phone installed in our bodies while connecting with external peripherals. I know it sounds like sci-fi but this will happen. I am not sure this is so far away.”
Rumors about the iPhone 7S (or is it the iPhone 8?) continue to come thick and fast and the latest scrap of information to make it down the Apple grapevine concerns a third model of iPhone that's going to be added to the range next year.
There have already been hints from trusted sources that a 5-inch model would be joining the 4.7-inch iPhone and the 5.5-inch iPhone Plus in 2017, but Japanese blog Macotakara is now saying that the 5-inch device will sport a different, vertical dual-lens camera.
Various configurations and specifications are still "under consideration" apparently, but this vertical camera design would help the third iPhone stand out from the other two. At the moment, screen size, camera configuration and battery size are the key differences between the twoiPhones.
Photo calls
Macotakara has a reasonably good reputation for getting insider information from the Asian supply chain, and has already been tipping the world off to a new red color coming to Apple's iPhone line-up next year.
However we don't know any more about how this vertical dual-lens camera would work or what extra features it might bring to the table. Last month there was a leak that said 3D camera technology would be included in next year's iPhones, so this could be related.
People claiming to be in the know aren't holding back when it comes to revealing the secrets of the iPhone 7S or iPhone 8 or whatever Apple calls it: curved, AMOLED screens, glass displays and backings, and wireless charging are all apparently on the table.
Along with the announcement of the M2017, Gionee is also taking the time to promote that it can play nice and fair with Qualcomm in order to play with one of its latest chips.
The Chinese manufacturer and the San Diego-based chipmaker have signed a patent licensing agreement that allows the former to use the latter’s technologies for 3G and LTE technologies in devices intended for the Chinese market. Royalties were defined in a rectification plan Qualcomm submitted to China’s National Development and Reform Commission.
The semiconductor company has been able to ink deals with the top ten Chinese OEMs. It has also engaged in a global legal feud with Meizu over a lack of such a deal, claiming infringement on its patents.
Gionee is a Shenzhen-based smartphone manufacturer primarily known for releasing affordable Android models with either huge batteries or remarkably slender profiles. And while the company’s latest domestic flagship product certainly falls in the former category, it’s also special for targeting business users with a premium design… and fitting price tag.
The M2017 is by no means cheap, especially by Chinese standards, although compared to many so-called luxury gadgets available in the Western hemisphere, it’s quite the bargain. Starting at RMB 7,000 ($1,007) on January 6 in a 128GB internal storage configuration, this 5.7-inch beast equally stands out with its classy use of extravagant build materials and a mind-blowing 7,000mAh battery.
Technically, that’s two 3,500mAh cells thrown together inside a not-so-bulky 238 grams package measuring under 11mm in thickness and, of course, lasting a record-breaking 32 hours of uninterrupted talk time between charges.
Thanks to an otherwise mediocre Snapdragon 653 processor, the Gionee M2017 also supports Qualcomm’s Quick Charge 3.0 standard for hyper-fast power-up activity. And no, there aren’t any other compromises made to keep the pricing bar relatively low.
You get a plentiful 6GB RAM, Quad HD screen resolution, curved edges, dual 13 + 12MP rear cameras, an 8MP selfie shooter, strong China Telecom cellular encryption, as well as fast and secure fingerprint recognition. No headphone jack or microSD card slot, unfortunately, and no Android Nougat (yet), with a 256GB Gionee M2017 top-shelf variant available in a killer Italian custom alligator leather finish at 17,000 Yuan, or $2,445. Okay, that one’s a little extreme.
Wileyfox is one of two prominent manufacturer partners to Android ROM vendor Cyanogen. And, at least for the next few days, it still is.
But beyond December 31, the UK startup will have to figure out how to bring fresh updates to the deprecated software on its six devices out in the market.
Luckily for its customers, the company looks committed to the challenge and is addressing the issue in a statement through its live chat support staff:
Hi, Our OS Strategy and Software plan moving forward will be complete soon. We have agreed a smooth transition where we will continue deliver constant and consistent software and OS updates. Our plan is to bring our entire Wileyfox portfolio onto Android N, the latest version of Google Android’s OS, in a timely manner – while still continuing to protect the range with Google software security updates. We will share our full and final plan in due time.
The message received by Redditor /u/BurkusCat (linked in our Source spot) also added that Wileyfox does not represent Cyanogen in its comments and that it is confident that the “software will continue to evolve and stay pure to Android, enhanced to maximise our consumers’ user experience.”
While there are some stray manufacturers with the odd Cyanogen phone or two (like ZUK and bq) Micromax sub-brand Yu is the only other company with a Cyanogen-dependent product portfolio that will either need weaning off or reworking altogether. We shall see how these companies evolve.
The new year in Japan usually means 108 tolls of the bells at Buddhist monasteries and plenty of fukubukuro to go around? What are fukubukuro (福袋), you ask? Well, they’re bags that shops fill up with assorted goodies and then sell at random to consumers for a fixed price. Think of them as retailers giving out crackers in Britain or, to a lesser extent, hongbao in China.
Apple has done this a few times on January 2, sometimes landing customers with iPads, PowerBeats speakers, Macbooks and other such big ticket items for a relatively chump fee of ¥36,000 or $300.
This year, though, Apple Japan’s site makes no mentions of fukubukuro in its shop page teaser for a New Year’s sale. But the discounts are happening anyways on January 2.
The end of Galaxy S8 leaks? There’s not even a hiatus in sight, including during the holidays, with the latest semi-credible Weibo rumor on Samsung’s “next big thing” started on Christmas Day. A tireless tipster with a decent Chinese microblogging track record when it comes to uncovering future high-end smartphone upgrades foretells of a massive memory bump and an important internal storage increment as well.
This is not the first time we’re hearing of the possibility that the Galaxy S8 could pack a record-breaking 8GB RAM in the spring, but following encouraging early gossip, the inside consensus was the Note 7 redemption effort would ultimately “settle” for “only” 6 gigs of the good stuff.
Now we’re back to dreaming big, and expecting Samsung to double down, plus move up from the UFS 2.0 standard to 2.1 speeds. That means the Universal Flash Storage of the Galaxy S8, likely capping off at 256GB capacity, will be a lot faster than anything you’ve been dealing with so far.
If you’re wondering where all the good jobs will be if and when Foxconn decides to start building iPhones in the United States, they’ll be in Indonesia and China.
A report from Taiwan’s Economic Daily News and relayed through Digitimes says that Apple is looking to the company, also known as Hon Hai Precision Industry, for help of some sort.
Apple is building research and development centers in Indonesia and Shenzhen, China, which are expected to open in 2017. Foxconn has facilities in both locales.
There are eyes on the prize in Indonesia as the government will begin pushing citizens to switch from 2G devices to 4G ones, if they have not already. Apple and Foxconn may see this as an opportunity to close in early.
BlackBerry may get network carriage for what’s expected to be its third DTEK-branded phone to be manufactured by TCL.
Leaks man Roland Quandt tweeted that the device, so far as we know it to be codenamed “Mercury,” is indeed headed to the United States in an unlocked GSM form as well as a variant for Verizon bands. He also says that the “BBB100” is designed by BlackBerry, which accounts for CEO John Chen’s desire to put out at least one more device with a physical keyboard on it.
The Priv was BlackBerry’s last phone made in-house and to have widely spread among carriers, especially in the US. The newer DTEK50 and DTEK60 phones were mostly dealt from BlackBerry and its partner retailers.
Benchmarks have shown and Quandt can confirm that the phone’s display does have a resolution of 1080 x 1620 or 2:3 in the phone’s vertical orientation. Renders and leaks have portrayed the phone to have an intractible keyboard, so it’s expected that for dimensional considerations, the screen has to shrink in real estate.
The Mercury is expected to arrive at market as the DTEK70 and will likely be revealed at CES 2017.
While the LG G5 was launched at MWC this year in late February, it took about a month before units started getting to consumers.
But with Samsung potentially calling for an April reveal of the Galaxy S8, it seems that LG wants as much headroom as possible for its G6, according to word from The Electronic Times out of Korea.
The company is supposedly moving up its first ship dates closer to right around MWC time, which starts on February 27. The company has moved up its production schedule to align with this change, made in the hopes of amping up sales volume.
If the LG G5 and V20 has shown us anything, it’s that the chaebol really seems to like its dual-camera implementation. So much so, in fact, that it may carry on the phones’ design language for another season.
Shai Mizrachi, in partnership with Android Authority, has leaked out a generic design diagram showing off the X and Y dimensions of the phone, along with some feature call-outs.
The dual-camera module is similar to those seen in LG’s past two flagship phones with a fingerprint sensor placed below it and some side-mounted volume buttons to follow. There’s a circular port on one of the Y edges that’s likely a headphone jack, but we aren’t entirely sure what’s going on here.
Watch today’s Pocketnow Daily as we talk about some of the recent issues that have emerged for the Google Pixel and Nexus devices. Then we talk about Apple’s recent patent lawsuit with Nokia. HTC, Asus and Acer follow as we learn of their results in device shipments for the year. Apple then takes the stage again, now regarding its innovations in AI. We end today’s show talking Cyanogen and how it’s died in favor of Lineage OS.
So you got a shiny new iPhone 7 or iPhone 7 Plus for Christmas. What’s the first thing you do with it? Check your email? Fire off a tweet? Start researching how much you’ll need to spend on adapters and dongles for the Lightning port?
How about you begin by downloading the 10 best iPhone games available? Our list ranges from classics to contemporaries to games that will just plain show off the impressive processing power and sleek resolution of your new iPhone.
And luckily, they’ll work on more than just the most recent models, so even if you’re rocking an iPhone 6S, iPhone 6S Plus, iPhone SE or other, you can still play these great games.
Simogo’s iPhone masterpiece is an interactive novella and text-based game that uses the iPhone’s strengths like no other. Words aren’t just words in Device 6 - they’re also puzzles, clues and your map to the game’s mysterious world.
If you haven’t played the stylish story of amnesiac Anna and the man in the bowler hat, make Device 6 the first game you download on your new iPhone.
The celebrated adventure game that debuted on more traditional platforms is just as great on iOS, and more importantly it will show you exactly what your new iPhone 7 is capable of graphically.
Guide the brothers Naia and Naiee as they quest for medicine to cure their dying father. And there’s a reason Brothers is regarded so highly among those who value good storytelling in games: In addition to being gorgeous, it’s an emotional rollercoaster.
Monument Valley is borderline iconic when it comes to iOS games. The simple fairy tale-like story of Princess Ida is part M.C. Escher, part Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds, and all fantastic.
And although it doesn’t have photorealistic graphics, the game’s absolutely gorgeous art will look all the better on the iPhone 7’s crisp display. Basically, any Monument Valley screenshot makes a perfect phone background.
Super Mario Run
Get it: Free for first few levels, then $9.99/£7.99/$14.99 on iTunes
The newest game on our list, Super Mario Run is essential for your iPhone, if only to compare scores with your legions of friends who are undoubtedly also frolicking around the mobile Mushroom Kingdom.
The story (rescue Peach) doesn’t matter. But the action - precision platforming across 24 intricate, replayable levels - does. Remember: although the price is steep for a phone game, it’s cheap for a Mario game.
What better way to take advantage of the iPhone 7’s improved battery life than by taking it out in the bright sunlight to catch some Pokémon?
Pokémon Go has felt more or less stagnant since its launch over the summer, but if you can get past the disappointments of missing features and infrequent updates it’s still a fun, family-friendly game and a good excuse to venture out into the real world. Meanwhile, it’s essential for dog-walkers everywhere.
Square Enix’s expanding series of “Go” games, begun with Hitman Go and continued with Lara Croft Go and Deus Ex Go, are near-perfect iOS puzzlers. Each one, like a miniature board game, is truly bite-sized, yet with multiple ways to complete every level, it’s easy to lose yourself in them.
Deus Ex Go, the latest, adds a number of features themed after the recent blockbuster game Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, such as hacking.
Downwell is nothing more or less than a perfect iOS action game. You hurtle down the well at breakneck speed, trouncing enemies and slowing your descent with high-powered jetpack gunboots.
It’s not endless; there’s a bottom to the well, although only the most skilled players will ever see it. Downwell feels incredibly precise to control, but its true genius is how it rewards you for even the briefest failed run, making it great for hour-long sessions or 10 seconds in line at the store.
Terry Cavanagh’s Super Hexagon is one of the simplest games ever created, and also one of the most addictive. You position the cursor to fit through gaps as the rotating, concentric hexagons shrink endlessly toward you, trying desperately (and usually failing) to just stay alive for another split second at a time.
The pounding music, hypnotic visuals and puritan design make Super Hexagon a perfect game for the mobile platform. Few godlike players will ever reach the end, but you could be one of them.
Based on Jules Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days (hence the title), this is a text-based, choose-your-own adventure that harks back to novels of yore but could only be possible on the modern mobile platform.
A quintessential iPhone adventure, 80 Days casts you as Passepartout, loyal valet to a man attempting the famous journey around the world. With a half-million word script and infinite variables, no two players’ stories are alike. And text-based though it may be, 80 Days features gorgeous art that your iPhone 7 screen will love.
Vlambeer’s Ridiculous Fishing takes the idea of the endless descent game and flips it on its head, then multiplies it. First you cast your line, taking care to avoid all creatures and obstacles so you can reach the bottom. Then you try to catch them all as your hook comes back up.
But it doesn’t end there: As the fish, monsters and treasure you snared flies up into the air above your boat, you whip out a pair of automatic shotguns and blast them out of the sky. How that results in profit for you as a fisherman is unclear, but how it results in one of the best iPhone games ever is obvious.
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