Wow, what a difference changing the strap from plastic to metal. The Sony Smartwatch looks much better in this finish. You can see why Apple’s Watch will come with some many straps. It can make or break a product.
Click here to get more info at Amazon on the Sony Smartwatch 3
Bloomberg.com reports that Swatch plans to bring its answer to the Apple Watch to market in the next 90 days.
“The device will communicate via the Internet “without having to be charged,” Chief Executive Officer Nick Hayek said in an interview. The Swatch smartwatch will also let consumers make mobile payments and work with Windows and Android software, he said.”
The simple solution would be for Apple to buy Swatch and shut it down, or an Apple competitor buy and expand the program or potentially Swatch and other watch makers challenge Apple successfully. I’m really hoping we have tons of competition.
Samsung’s Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge has been leaked to CNET Korea. The publication mentioned that the leak came from a South Korean electronics distributor, with the image itself featuring a render of both the Galaxy S6 and a Note Edge-style variant of the device.
At the moment it looks like any other phone. But what do you think?
Source – CNET Korea
I have the Note 4 and Samsung Gear S. Both do exactly what they say on the tin.
Both link together really nicely with Samsung’s S Health app. But sadly Samsung’s S Health app at present does not reach out and sync with many other devices. This has not been an issue for me until the start of this week, when I went back to using the amazing myfitnesspal app.
None of my exercise or steps from the Note 4 or Gear S are getting synced into the myfitnesspal. Nor can I work out how to manually convert my amount of steps into MFP app. (If you have any ideas please let me know) And at present MFP have no plans to integrate their software with S Health.
So why am I somewhat annoyed over this situation. Well, my wife has the Fitbit Flex and it talks effortlessly to MFP on her iPhone and gains her bonus calorie points.
SO is the S Health solution the safe method. I wrote the above last night and just before I went to bed, Android Central (www.androidcentral.com) reported that Under Armour had bought Endomondo and MyFitnessPal for $85m and $475m respectively. This is something I always worry about. A company acquiring another competitor and either closing it down, changing it for the worse or enhancing it. Under Armour made a statement that these deals will supplement and expand upon the company’s own MapMyFitness and UA RECORD apps. How many apps or services have you seen purchased by another company that ended up dust!
Now if you recall HTC announced it had partnered with Under Armour. So is HTC going to be able to make some big strides into the fitness and wearable space at the expense of others?
Nobody is going to buy Samsung (it’s not impossible) so it could be safer to stick with them for longevity. But what will Under Armour decide going forward?
The fitness, health and wearable space is potentially big bucks. But who will come out ahead? Only time will tell but it could be interesting times ahead.
Before I get to the sound and audio quality, lets look at the lock screen shortcuts. Half pull up or full up to see all of the options.
So far I have covered off various aspects of the phone. Now lets look at the music app. If you wanted to use Google Play Music, this app is available naturally and installed along with all the other core Google apps.
The music app is fairly simple. It allows you to see your music split into various ways, as well as moods.
The music app also allows you to create playlists and has a few settings. Otherwise it’s a simple affair.
So how good is the inbuilt headphone amp. The sound through the headphones is good and better than I had expected. It is remarkable that the phone costs around £250. In the system sound settings there is a toggle for DTS. It is best to leave this on as it adds some extra oomph, bass and depth but without being overkill whatsoever. I tried the following headphones with the Honor 6. The V-Moda Crossfade M-100s were driven loudly and accurately. I then tried Sennheiser HD518. The Sennheisers needed more headphone amp volume so did not go to a loud level.
Next I connected my USB DAC (Sabre USB Android DAC and Cayin C5 headphone amp). I used an app called USB Audio Player PRO to control everything. This works brilliantly, so USB Audio is supported in this setup. I then connected via Bluetooth and used a pair of Plantronics BackBeat Pro cans. Apt-x bluetooth codec is present and makes a difference too as the sound coming from these was excellent.
Talking of wireless, Chromecast is supported along with cast screen. The Honor 6 has an infra red blaster that is not documented nor does it come with any software installed for it. Yet a quick search on XDA Developers revealed a bespoke app made by Huawei that works a treat. I had tried a few other Infra Red remote apps but none of them worked apart from Huawei’s own app.
The loudspeaker is average, and perhaps the weakest link of the whole package. A bit tiny and does not go that too loud. Acceptable.
Tomorrow I will pen my conclusion.
Next week will be the start of another smartphone review along with its matching wearable watch.
The mystery device is astonishingly light. I have weighed it and it tips the scales at 104 grams. It is also slim, and due to its design looks slimmer than it actually is.
As another clue, it is a dual sim phone or you can use SIM 2 slot for a micro sd card. The mystery phone has a 13mp camera with a f/1.8. Thats right f/1.8. In initial testing it has produced better low light shots than the Samsung Note 4.
And the only other clue is it is not from a brand of smartphone you see heavily sold in the UK.
More will be revealed on Sunday.
See below the revised screen shots following firmware update.
Welcome back to my next instalment of the Honor 6 review. Today, I am going to look at all the camera options.
Above is a screen shot of the various shooting modes included. Something for everyone! I will have an additional post with more camera samples using as many of the modes as possible. Panoramic shots can be vertical or horizontal. Smart mode decides which is the best mode to use based on what you are about to shoot. HDR is self explanatory but I have found it is best to keep it in Smart Mode as the Honor 6 really does know when to switch to HDR. Best shot takes 10 photos in an instant and selects for you the best photo. You can override this as necessary. Watermark adds 10 different watermarks over your snap. Some are cute, weather stamp, food stamp and editable too. I will have some sample photos in my other post today. Audio control uses your voice to take the photo and works well. Audio notes allows you to add a little message with each photo. All focus is a selective focus type mode and the others are all self explanatory. I would recommend always using smart mode. It did a superb job.
Various options for the picture sizes. Note bottom left George fast asleep 🙂
More still photo options from object tracking to smiles. Dependent on the shooting mode, you have control of ISO from 100 to 800, white balance, exposure, contrast, saturation and brightness.
Next up video file options. Note there is no 4k video. Other video options include beauty mode, object tracking, stabiliser and HDR video.
And finally some other random camera settings.
Selfie mode is clever as a box appears. Here you concentrate in getting your face correct. It will then appear correctly and not look odd once the selfie is snapped.
Another smart camera mode is with the device off, double press the volume down. This triggers Ultrasnap. A photo is taken within a second. So that means, phone turns on, camera app opens, shot is focused on and picture taken all in less than a second. And it works. Every time!
Tomorrow, I will write my final part covering off the audio options and more.
Below are a full range of photos taken with the Honor 6. I really like the camera on this phone and it does take some good photos.
Yesterday I mentioned Samsung had sent invites out for its 1st March 2015 Samsung Galaxy S6 launch.
Well Pocket-Lint deciphered the invite. In fact it was easy to solve. Just add a panel.
Unlike the Note Edge this should have 2 panels and should be available in 3 storage sizes.
I say should be available in 3 storage sizes but will the S6 be the first to start at 32gb storage with options for 64 and 128gb. Let’s hope so.
In addition, Samsung is looking to launch a new payment system, potentially try and slow down Apple Pay’s advancements.
Gavin's Gadgets & Photography 