iPhone X vs iPhone 8 Plus

For once the ‘Plus’ model isn’t Apple’s biggest screen iPhone of the year. Nor is it the most expensive or most feature-packed, because this year we got the iPhone X.

Apple’s new flagship is the biggest change to the iPhone design in years, though we still got another ‘Plus’ model launched alongside it, in the form of the iPhone 8 Plus.

But just how different are these two big screen phones? The short answer is: very. For the long answer read on below, as we compare them across all the key points.

iPhone X vs iPhone 8 Plus design

Viewed front-on these are immediately very different phones, as while the iPhone 8 Plus has a very conventional look, with large bezels above and below the screen and Apple’s near iconic circular home button, the iPhone X gets rid of the bezels almost entirely, with just a small notch jutting out of the top.

It also ditches the home button, and by getting rid of that arguably wasted space Apple has managed to keep the dimensions down to 143.6 x 70.9 x 7.7mm, while the iPhone 8 Plus is 158.4 x 78.1 x 7.5mm.

That’s a big deal, as it means the iPhone X is actually a significantly smaller phone overall than the iPhone 8 Plus, despite having a bigger screen. As you might expect based on that, the iPhone 8 Plus is also heavier than the 174g iPhone X at 202g.

The iPhone 8 Plus has a very familiar design - though the back has changed from metal to glass

That said, not everything about the designs is completely different. They both have a glass back and a metal frame, and both have a dual-lens camera on the back, though the iPhone X’s is vertically aligned, while the iPhone 8 Plus’s is horizontal.

Both phones are also IP67 certified dust and water resistant, so they can be submerged up to 1 meter deep in water for up to 30 minutes, and they’re available in similar colors. The iPhone X comes in Space Grey or Silver, while the iPhone 8 Plus is sold in Space Grey, Silver and Gold.

iPhone X vs iPhone 8 Plus display

Both of these phones have big screens, especially compared to the 4.7-inch iPhone 8, but the iPhone X has the larger display at 5.8 inches. It has a 1,125 x 2,436 resolution, giving it a pixel density of 458 pixels per inch.

The iPhone 8 Plus on the other hand has a 5.5-inch 1,080 x 1,920 screen with a pixel density of 401 pixels per inch, so the iPhone X’s is higher resolution and sharper.

They also use different display technologies. The iPhone X uses AMOLED, which allows for blacker blacks than the LCD iPhone 8 Plus, as the pixels are lit up individually, meaning they can also be completely turned off, resulting in deeper blacks.

The iPhone X's bezel-free screen is likely the first thing people will notice about it

As such contrast should be better on the iPhone X, and colors are generally richer. And the iPhone X is the first iPhone to display HDR video content.

Not everything is different though, as both the iPhone X and the iPhone 8 Plus benefit from True Tone screens. That’s a technology inherited from the iPad Pro range, which automatically adjusts the white balance of your display based on your environment.

iPhone X vs iPhone 8 Plus biometric security

While Apple’s on-stage Face ID fumbles might not have been the introduction to the company’s facial recognition technology it had been hoping for, the tech still holds a lot of promise and is one of the biggest differences between the iPhone X and the iPhone 8 Plus.

Because while the iPhone X has Face ID, letting you unlock your phone just by looking at it, the iPhone 8 Plus doesn’t, instead relying on a Touch ID fingerprint scanner.

But in the process of removing the bezel from the iPhone X Apple also removed Touch ID, so you can have one biometric option or the other, but not both.

OS and power

The iPhone X and iPhone 8 Plus run the same operating system

Both the iPhone X and the iPhone 8 Plus run iOS 11, with the only substantial difference there being that in the absence of a home button on the iPhone X you can return to the home screen with a swipe up from the bottom edge of the screen.

Both phones also have a hexa-core A11 Bionic chipset and both are believed to have 3GB of RAM, so this is one area where they’re more or less identical.

iPhone X vs iPhone 8 Plus camera and battery

The iPhone X and iPhone 8 Plus both have 12MP dual-lens cameras on the back, allowing them to optically zoom and use depth of field effects in photography, but there are some subtle differences between them.

For one thing, while both of the iPhone X’s lenses have optical image stabilization only one of the iPhone 8 Plus’s does, so when using the telephoto lens on the iPhone 8 Plus your image won’t be stabilized.

Also, while both phones have an f/1.8 aperture wide-angle lens, the aperture of their telephoto lenses differs. The iPhone X has an f/2.4 aperture one, while the iPhone 8 Plus has an f/2.8 aperture one – meaning the opening on the 8 Plus is smaller, so less light can get in.

In our review, we noted how the 8 Plus is much noisier in low light using the zoom, so this should be significantly improved on the iPhone X.

There's a lot of tech packed into the iPhone X's dual-lens rear camera

As for the front-facing camera, the iPhone X has the edge there too, at least on paper, as while both phones have a 7MP f/2.2 snapper, the iPhone X can tap into its Face ID tech to allow for depth adjustments in photos, and for ‘Animoji’, which are emoji that mirror your expressions and even your mouth movements when you talk.

The iPhone X also probably has a bigger battery than the iPhone 8 Plus. While the X’s battery size hasn’t been officially confirmed yet, it’s reportedly 2,716mAh, while the iPhone 8 Plus has a 2,691mAh battery.

The difference is small then, though in some ways it’s surprising that the iPhone X’s is bigger at all, as while it has a larger screen the iPhone 8 Plus has a larger body, so you’d think there’d be room for a larger battery.

The iPhone 8 Plus may last marginally longer though, as Apple claims that it can survive through up to 14 hours of video or 13 hours of internet use, while the figures for the iPhone X are an hour less. Both phones support wireless charging.

iPhone X vs iPhone 8 Plus price

The iPhone X is $999 / £999 / AU$1,579 for the smallest (64GB) model and reaches $1,149 / £1,149 / AU$1,829 for a 256GB one. 

The iPhone 8 Plus is cheaper but still very expensive, at $799 / £799 / AU$1,229 for a 64GB handset and $949 / £949 / AU$1,479 for a 256GB one.

Takeaway

The iPhone X and iPhone 8 Plus are two of the most expensive phones on the planet. They’re also both pretty large and have a lot else in common, from their operating system to their power to the presence of dual-lens cameras.

But there are also plenty of differences here. The iPhone X has a larger screen and a smaller body, and is also undeniably higher end, with a sharper display, and facial recognition in place of a fingerprint scanner. It's also much nicer to hold in the hand.

The camera, while similar, is better on the iPhone X too (although we've not tested it for long), although in terms of battery life the iPhone X is tipped to last for a shorter time.

Ultimately though these are both high-end handsets and if you want a brand-new, big screen iPhone you've got more options than ever before.

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A measly $120 buys you a 16GB Moto G4 now, 32GB variants going for $130

The "regular" Motorola Moto G4 may never be able to officially run Android 8.0 Oreo, but it is powered by near-stock Nougat at just $120 and up.

The post A measly $120 buys you a 16GB Moto G4 now, 32GB variants going for $130 appeared first on Pocketnow.

HMD officials boldly promise Android Oreo for Nokia 3, 5 and 6 this year, Nokia 8 by the end of October

All four of HMD's Nokia-branded smartphones released in 2017 on Android Nougat should get Oreo updates by the end of the year.

The post HMD officials boldly promise Android Oreo for Nokia 3, 5 and 6 this year, Nokia 8 by the end of October appeared first on Pocketnow.

Back to square one: Samsung is again considering a fold-in smartphone design

Samsung's already mythical first foldable smartphone could still sport an inward-folding design after the fold-out concept has been abandoned.

The post Back to square one: Samsung is again considering a fold-in smartphone design appeared first on Pocketnow.

The speed of now: how the Sony XPERIA® XZ Premium embraces gigabit speeds

It’s impossible to look at a smartphone today and imagine what it would be like without a data connection. Without bytes streaming into our touchscreen pals, they’d be pointlessly powerful lumps of plastic, glass and metal, fit for nothing more than calling, texting and listening to the music we side-loaded from our computers.

Thankfully we have the power to slingshot reams of data into our phones, which began with the advent of 3G at the start of the century.

Remember those days? When whispered talk of video calling and internet browsing on a mobile phone became real in 2003, when the network 3 brought phones like the Motorola A830, NEC e606 and NEC e808 into our lives?

The Motorola A830... not quite in the same league as modern smartphones

Some of these phones relied so heavily on video calling a way of selling them over the reams of Nokia phones bandied about that they were even sold as ‘buy one, get one free’ - but let’s look at the tech specs to get a flavour of how bad it was back then.

We’re talking phones that have a resolution of 162 x 132 pixels, which is far less than most average smartwatches these days. And they could download files (including MP3s, if you could find them) at a maximum of 384Kbps - there was no streaming on offer then, as it would have been a stuttery mess, a few snatched chords every minute or so.

That’s not a speed you want to experience these days… let’s just say that Spotify wouldn’t have worked on these phones in any way, let alone a touch of Netflix.

Nok-ing at the door

But move forward a year or two and the bigger names got involved with the data revolution: the Nokia 6630 was the first from the Finnish then-powerhouse. It brought with it a ‘high-resolution’ 2.1-inch screen, with a huge 176 x 208 pixels packed inside.

The impressive 1.3MP camera meant that you could send picture messages in, er, stunning detail to fellow colour-screen owners, and there was even a memory card that could store - wait for it - 30-40 songs.

And that was pretty much how it continued for the next few years, with phones getting incrementally more powerful and slightly quicker at browsing the web… but there wasn’t such a thing as a mobile-optimised site back then, so you’d have to watch as you downloaded an entire website only to look at the football scores.

The big change happened when smartphones ‘properly’ arrived, coming with full touchscreens and dedicated operating systems. Android was growing in popularity by 2008, but that was the year that heralded the arrival of the iPhone 3G, the first phone from Apple to have a true ‘fast’ internet connection.

That trudged along at 1.4Mbps, allowing you to stream some grainy video if you found the right conditions near a cell tower. It wasn’t spectacular, but finally internet browsing on a smartphone didn’t make you want to rip your hair out.

That phone had a 2MP camera, a 3.5-inch screen and 8GB of memory for the base model, which would hardly be able to hold much more than a few apps and songs today.

The dawn of true speed

This was just a few years ago… and yet the advent of ever-increasing power, speed and design prowess has made the modern smartphone capable of things that would have made your slightly-younger self weep with awe.

If you want to see a phone that embodies the pinnacle of smartphone specs, it’s hard to look past the Sony XPERIA XZ Premium, powered at its heart by the new Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ 835 Mobile Platform.

That platform delivers unrivalled power and graphical grunt to the phone, but it’s in the connection that it truly excels… capable of Gigabit LTE speeds, you’re getting up to 1,000Mbps of data streaming into your handset.

To put that in perspective, it’s nearly three thousand times faster than the phones that began the data revolution. That means you can instantly stream ultra-high definition video to the XZ Premium… which is perfect, given it’s the only mainstream phone to pack a 4K screen.

These Gigabit LTE speeds, already becoming the gold standard in smartphones, will help wipe out the barrier between user and the connected world. 

In the time it would have taken the phone user of the mid-2000s to access a single web page, a Sony XPERIA XZ user would have been able to download multiple albums of content, streamed crystal-clear 360-degree video or instantly pocketed a huge game to take with them on the commute to work.

We’re finally living in the future, and we’re crossing a major milestone in connectivity with Gigabit LTE speeds at our fingertips - so get out there and get connected, perfectly, with capabilities you could not imagine with the devices that sat in your pocket just a few short years ago.

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Waiting for Pixel 2 XL? Sketchy leaked images point to ‘Ultra pixel’ phone

We’re just days away from the October 4 reveal of the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL, yet hints of a completely new phone, dubbed the ‘Ultra pixel’ have emerged.

YouTuber Mrwhosetheboss received images and video from an anonymous, unverified source who claimed to have seen Google’s upcoming phones. The shots and footage show what appears to be presentation slides or marketing material on a computer screen, referring to a phone called the ‘Ultra pixel’.

This isn’t a name we’ve come across before in relation to the Pixel 2, so we’re skeptical. And even if the images are authentic the name could be referring to the camera, given that Google is strongly rumored to be working with HTC on the phones, and HTC makes ‘UltraPixel’ cameras.

The actual images of the phone look somewhat like the leaked shots of the Pixel 2 XL we’ve seen, complete with minimal bezels around the screen, so there’s not much new there, and not much to suggest this is anything other than a Pixel 2 XL. But there are some interesting hints at ways you might interact with the phone.

One of the slides says “the future of Android is fluid”, which could mean a focus on gesture controls rather than buttons. That could make sense if Google wants to maximize the screen space, but it’s not something we’ve heard before, which as with other things in this leak we’d think we would have by now.

Could Google beat Apple to under-screen scanners?

There’s also a mention of a new type of fingerprint scanner, which the YouTuber reckons might mean an under-display one, which the likes of Apple and Samsung have supposedly been working on and so far failed to deliver.

If true that could be a big win for the Pixel 2, but it’s more likely referring to an improved version of the standard fingerprint scanner, especially as leaked shots of the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL show a scanner on the back.

In short, while there are multiple ways to interpret this information the most likely is that this is simply the Pixel 2 XL, and with nothing much new shown, other than hints of gesture controls.

It’s also very likely that this is fake though. Indeed, reputable leaker Evan Blass has said as much, quoting “someone who knows.” So we really wouldn’t read much into it. Either way, we’ll know the truth soon.

Via 9to5Google

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LG V30 warranty extension confirmed, Verizon release set for October 5

We now know exactly when to expect the LG V30 to start selling through Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile. And yes, you'll get a two-year warranty as standard.

The post LG V30 warranty extension confirmed, Verizon release set for October 5 appeared first on Pocketnow.

iPhone X might not be widely available until March

The iPhone X is the most hotly anticipated smartphone of the year, but you might have to wait until next year to actually get your hands on one.

That’s according to several analysts speaking to USA Today. The most optimistic of them is Gene Munster, a tech investor and analyst with Loup Ventures, but even he reckons the iPhone X won’t be in stock until January at the earliest.

Tim Bajarin of Creative Strategies said it will be “a good three-four months until the X is in wide supply,” and Jan Dawson, an analyst with Jackdaw Research, claims you’ll be able to find the iPhone X in stores “sometime in the first quarter” – a period which runs until the end of March.

While these are just guesses – albeit educated ones – there are plenty of reasons to think the iPhone X might be in very, very short supply.

Delays and demand

For one thing, we’ve heard numerous reports about production problems and delays, thanks primarily to the new OLED screen and Face ID scanner, and this is clearly a product that’s taking Apple more work than usual, given that it’s not even officially landing until November 3.

When the iPhone X does arrive, not only might it be in smaller numbers than usual, thanks to these problems, but also it’s likely to be in higher demand.

Despite the high price tag it’s clear that the bulk of the interest seems to be on the iPhone X rather than the iPhone 8 or iPhone 8 Plus, and it’s no wonder, given how much of an upgrade the X is, at least on paper.

In fact, analysts expect the iPhone X to sell out within an hour or two of pre-orders opening on October 27, followed by long lines in stores and Apple playing catch-up over the following few months.

So, while no-one knows for sure how the iPhone X launch will play out, or how many handsets Apple will have managed to build, it seems that if you want one you should get your order in the second it’s possible to, otherwise you might be waiting a long time.

Via Phone Arena

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It’s a bit of a stretch, but a ‘high-quality’ Google Home Max could also debut on October 4

Even if legit, there's a much better chance the so-called Google Home Max, stereo speakers and all, will go official later on rather than next week.

The post It’s a bit of a stretch, but a ‘high-quality’ Google Home Max could also debut on October 4 appeared first on Pocketnow.

iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus on Flipkart: Assured buyback, cashbacks and exchange offers

Apple had launched the iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus in India recently and the devices are set to go on sale starting from tomorrow, September 29 from 12AM. Both the new iPhones went up for pre-order on September 22.

The iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus are priced starting at Rs. 64,000 and Rs. 73,000 respectively. Reliance Jio had earlier announced various discounts and cashback on the iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus, promising up to 70% cashback on the basic value of the phones. Now, Flipkart has come up with some attractive exchange and buyback offers on the iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus.

iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus – best exchange offers

Under the exchange offer on Flipkart, you will get the best discounts if you exchange devices such as the iPhone 7 Plus, iPhone 7, iPhone 6S, Moto Z and OnePlus 3T. If you exchange your iPhone 7 Plus, you can get the iPhone 8 64GB for as low as Rs. 3,000 after considering the exchange value, cashback, and guaranteed buyback value.

Citi Credit card and World Debit card offers on iPhone 8, 8 Plus

Customers who pay using Citi credit card and World debit card will get a cashback of Rs. 10,000 on buying the iPhone 8 or iPhone 8 Plus. However, to avail the Rs. 10,000 cashback, you will have to buy the new iPhones before 17:59 hours, 29th September. The cashback of Rs. 10,000 will be credited to your account by 30th December, 2017.

Buyback Guarantee up to Rs. 38,000

Coming to the Buyback Guarantee value, you can buy it for Rs. 99 and you will get an assured exchange value of up to Rs. 33,000 on the iPhone 8 and Rs. 38,000 on the iPhone 8 Plus.

Assuming you are exchanging an iPhone 7 Plus for the iPhone 8 64GB, using a Citi credit or World debit card, and return the iPhone 8 within 6-8 months, you can essentially use the iPhone 8 for free. This is, of course, subject to any additional buyback conditions applicable from Flipkart’s end.

If you upgrade to new smartphones often, it may be worth considering subscribing for Flipkart’s Buyback Guarantee. At worst, you lose only Rs. 99 at the end of the day even if you don’t use the offer.

Exchange offers on iPhones

If you exchange your existing Apple device such as the iPhone 7 Plus, you will get a discount of Rs. 23,000. In addition to that, you can get an additional cashback of Rs. 10,000 if you pay using the Citi credit card and World debit cards.

As for the Buyback Guarantee on the iPhone 8, you will get an assured value of Rs. 33,000 if you exchange it within 6 – 8 months of buying the device. Considering all these offers, the effective price of the iPhone 8 is Rs. -2,000, essentially making the iPhone 8 free subject to application of all these offers.

Similarly, you can get a discount of Rs. 17,000 and Rs. 11,000 on exchanging your iPhone 7 and iPhone 6S respectively. The Citi Credit card and Buyback Guarantee offers remain unchanged irrespective of the device you are exchanging.

Exchange offers on other smartphones

Apart from Apple devices, Flipkart has also mentioned Android devices such as the Motorola Moto Z and the OnePlus 3T on ‘Reasons to buy the iPhone 8 on Flipkart’ page. The Moto Z comes with an exchange value of Rs. 8,550 and the OnePlus 3T comes with an exchange value of Rs. 10,550.

To claim the Citi Credit card offer, you need to order the iPhone 8 or iPhone 8 Plus by 17:59 PM on September 29.

Apart from the discounts and cashbacks, Flipkart has listed some more reasons to buy the new Apple devices from Flipkart. The next listed reason is fastest delivery - Flipkart will deliver the iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus on the release date, i.e., September 29 in selected cities across the country.

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