Having recently announced the Australian release date of its most important smartphone to date, Oppo’s new R9s handset is now officially available for purchase Down Under, and with it comes a great deal of expectation for the relative newcomer to the Aussie market. 

“It was a really interesting time when we launched, because before we came to Australia we did research on the market, and our teams came back and said there was definitely an opportunity for us to crack the market,” said Michael Tran, marketing director of Oppo Mobile Australia.

Since the company’s arrival on our shores in 2014, Oppo has quickly gained momentum by aggressively going after the mid-range phone market and steadily building its reputation as a maker of quality handsets that don’t cost an arm and a leg. Its secret? Offering devices that feel premium but cost roughly half as much as flagships from Apple, Samsung, LG and Sony. But is Australia the key focus for Oppo in the west?

“Yeah, at the moment, definitely,” says Tran. “The strategy has been to work with our retail partners – with JB Hi-Fi, we go into their stores and we make sure we have a display, and that it’s positioned right next to Apple and Samsung. 

“Consumers already know Apple and Samsung – they go in wanting an iPhone or wanting a Samsung device, but we want them to look at Oppo and go ‘there’s the alternative.’”

Smooth Oppo-rator 

Looking at the Oppo R9s in its naked form, it would be easy to mistake it for an iPhone 7 – its thin, rounded aluminium body, slightly-protruding camera bump, matte finish and similarly-placed buttons seem clearly modelled after the Apple flagship, as does its new iOS-inspired ColorOS 3.0 software. 

But what the phone may lack in design originality, it makes up for in sheer value. Though it has a retail price of $599, many of the hallmarks we’ve come to expect from a premium phone are present with the Oppo R9s. Its 16MP rear camera features a customised 1/2.8 inch Sony-developed IMX398 sensor with an extra-wide F1.7 aperture, created exclusively for the R9s. On the front, it’s got another 16MP camera for high quality selfies powered by Oppo’s Beautify 4.0 technology. Its 5.5-inch AMOLED display lets you view your photos with vibrance and clarity.

Its specs also go beyond what we’ve come to expect from mid-range phones, offering a whopping 4GB of RAM and a Octa-core 2.0 GHz Cortex-A53 processor on a Qualcomm MSM8953 Snapdragon 625 chipset. It’s also got 64GB of onboard storage, with a further 256GB available via the MicroSD card slot in its dual SIM tray.

Topping off the list of premium features at mid-range prices, the handset’s 3,010 mAh battery also supports Oppo’s VOOC Flash Charge technology, which will reportedly give you two hours of talk-time after a 5-minute charge, and 75 percent battery after a 30-minute charge. 

The Oppo R9s is available now from JB Hi-Fi, Optus and Woolworths Mobile, as well as Oppo’s new partners, Vodafone and Virgin Mobile.

• Best cheap phones in Australia for 2017

Last year Nextbit launched the innovative Robin Android smartphone. It has just been acquired by Razer and will continue to operate as an independent entity within the larger company.

Razer is known best for its colorful keyboards, performance gaming accessories, and high-powered laptops, but the company may soon venture into a new market: smartphones.

The gaming tech brand has just acquired Nextbit Systems Inc., the company behind the affordable (and unique-looking) Nextbit Robin smartphone. 

Financial details such as the buying price were not announced, but Razer did make sure to mention that the smartphone startup will still "operate as a standalone business unit under its own management".

Nextbit CEO Tom Moss confirmed in a statement that the company has now stopped selling the Robin and its accessories.

Nextbit will fulfill warranties for the next six months though, and the company "will continue to provide software updates and security patches through February 2018".

Cloud technology

This isn't the first not-quite-related-to-gaming acquisition for Razer, as the company bought George Lucas' own sound technology firm, THX, back in October of last year. 

Despite its latest additions, Razer still refers to itself as "the leading global lifestyle brand for gamers" in the press release announcing the purchase of Nextbit – suggesting the company isn't alienating its core demographic just yet to take on the wider smartphone market. 

That said, we won't be surprised if Razer is looking to further augment its growing list of electronics – which includes its own virtual reality headset and an Android TV box – with a new smartphone in the coming years.

• Our review of the Razer Blade Pro – Razer's latest in desktop-replacing laptops

Apple appears to have nixed its Activation Lock checker tool, which allowed folks to verify if a used iPhone or iPad they're about to purchase may have been potentially stolen.

Visiting the Check Activation Lock Status homepage now turns up a 404 error. Apple also no longer mentions the tool in a related support page, seemingly making it no accident on the tech giant's part, according to Mac Rumors.

Introduced as part of iOS 7 back in 2014, Activation Lock was added to iCloud's "Find My iPhone" feature, letting users lock down their device if it went missing and prevent it from being wiped - making it effectively useless in the hands of a shady reseller and noticeably lowering theft rates.

Activation Block

For clarification, the Activation Lock feature itself is still available for misplaced mobiles. 

What appears to be gone is the Check Activation Lock Status webpage, which allowed those interested in buying a used iOS device to plug in its serial number or IMEI number to ensure it wasn't using Activation Lock - preventing them from buying a lemon and often a red flag that the seller may have acquired their merchandise dubiously.

It's possible Apple removed the page following a recent initiative to make its devices more secure than ever, as the Check Activation Lock Status page had the potential to be exploited using stolen serial numbers, AppleInsider posits.

Apple didn't state why the iCloud feature was removed, but we have contacted a representative at the company to learn more and will update this story as new details emerge.

• How to beef up your Apple ID's security

We don't often think much about the internal components powering our mobile devices, but it turns out this is where the real innovation is taking place in the mobile space. Let's take a closer look at the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 835.