Samsung Galaxy S7 and S7 edge review: Next-level low-light photography and so much more

We can't decide if the Galaxy S7 and S7 edge are incredibly easy or incredibly hard to review. They get so many things right that it's easy to sing their praises, but because they're so good and polished, lacking the kinds of gimmicks that used to define Samsung phones, they almost make for a boring review (after all, problems and conflict are the root of all storytelling). We'll do our best to keep things interesting, despite the lack of drama in these two near-perfect flagships.

    Display quality, build quality, performance and camera quality ... the Galaxy S7 and S7 edge are so good in these respects that there isn't much to say about them (okay, we will say something about them in a minute, but you get the gist). Expect the very best among today's smartphones in all of these categories.

     The phones are a lot like Samsung's 2015 flagships, only with some subtle external and not quite as subtle internal tweaks. You get the same general glass back with aluminum-framebuild – our pick for the best-looking smartphone design to date – only now with a curved glass back that makes them slide more naturally into your palm (that is, if you aren't just going to slap a bulky plastic case onto it). And of course the S7 edge also has that curved glass on its front.

One of the biggest differences between these two and Samsung's early 2015 phones is that the standard flagship (S7) and curved flagship (S7 edge) are no longer the same size. The Edge is now a phablet – not quite as big as Samsung's end-of-year 5.7-inch phablets, but still standing tall with a 5.5-inch screen. The smaller S7 has a 5.1-incher, just like last year's S6.

Samsung may be taking a cue here from Apple, releasing standard- and phablet-sized flagships at the same time, but it's a good idea no matter where it came from. Regular-sized flagships early in the year and big flagships late in the year doesn't make much sense, but regular and large side-by-side gives customers a wider and better variety of the very latest tech.

There are two key features onboard that aren't exactly new per se, but that we didn't see in last year's Samsung flagships. Samsung wisely brought water resistance (rated IP68, or "continuous immersion") and expandable storage, both last seen in the Galaxy S5, back from the dead. Both help to further differentiate the Galaxies from Apple's latest iPhones, which have neither.

This is the first time Samsung has married water resistance to a premium build. If you remember the GS5, it was plastic all around, with a port flap that you needed to close to protect its microUSB port. This time Samsung made the water resistance internal so you get the best of both worlds.

Storage has become a major perk for Galaxy buyers over the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus, which each start at 16 GB with no way to expand that once you bring it home. For similar prices, these Galaxies start at double that (32 GB internal) along with those microSD slots. As app, photo and video file sizes have grown, Samsung's approach is better adapted to today's digital world – not to mention friendlier to customers' wallets.

Display quality is incredible – Samsung has been a leader in this category for the last few years. The smaller S7 has the slightly higher pixel density, but both look terrific. And, for the first time, they now have always-on displays, so you can leave your phone sitting on your desk and see this white on black view, showing you the time, date, battery life and number of recent messages.

Both phones are incredibly fast, with both benchmarks and real-world performance that are as good as any phones we've tested.

The Galaxy S7 and S7 edge have awesome cameras with amazing low-light photography. You hear that kind of hyperbole too often among today's sycophantic tech news, but in this case there's no better way to describe them.

Just look at this extremely low-lit shot taken with the iPhone 6s:

... and now the exact same shot taken seconds later with the Galaxy S7 edge:

That isn't a minor difference. The iPhone 6s and 6s Plus had one of the best smartphone cameras of 2015, but Samsung's 2016 flagships beat them here by a wide margin. This is outstanding low-light photography that raises the bar for all smartphone cameras (and yes, Samsung's handsets are tops in less extreme settings as well).

... and with the microSD slot, you can pop in a card and shoot to your heart's content, with no worries about running out of internal storage.

Battery life is also outstanding. In our test, streaming video over Wi-Fi with an absolute brightness measured at 25 lux in a dark room (the same level we set for all phones we battery-test), it only dropped 9 percent per hour. For some perspective, the iPhone 6s, iPhone 6s Plus, Galaxy Note 5 and Galaxy S6 edge+ (our top scores from 2015) all dropped 13 percent per hour under the exact same conditions. Extending that hourly average out, that's more than four extra hours of video streaming for the S7.

You also still get fast charging (now ubiquitous on Android flagships) and wireless charging.

Add all of this up and you have two smartphones that are as close to perfect as you can get today. The biggest remaining question, then, is who wouldn't we recommend these phones to over rivals like the iPhone 6s?

Well, Samsung's software can be a sticky point for some people. We don't have a problem at all with today's TouchWiz (Samsung's custom UI that sits on top of Android Marshmallow), as it's much more slimmed-down and closer to stock than the TouchWiz from a few years ago. Still, some people will prefer either stock Android (on devices like the Nexus 6P) or Apple's iOS. That's one condition under which another phone might be better.

Apart from that, these are easily the top two phones we'd recommend today. We haven't yet reviewed its biggest 2016 Android-based rivals, the LG G5 and HTC 10 (or whatever it's called), but they're going to have a tough act to follow. Right now this GS7 pair is sitting on the throne all by their lonesome.

The Galaxy S7 and S7 edge are available now, starting at (roughly) $670 full retail for the standard S7 and around $790 full retail for the S7 edge.

Xiaomi Mi 5 hands-on

The Beauty and Art of Glass

There's nothing quite as sleek and elegant as Xiaomi Mi5. The moment it's in your hands, you'll realize how incredibly thin it is. The premium feel of glass against skin, curved at the edges for a better grip, is substantial. It is smooth to the touch, even along the sides where glass seamlessly tapers into aluminum. It's the most beautiful phone we've ever designed.

Built For Performance

Xiaomi Mi5 was built to meet your ever increasing needs for power. It runs on a quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 2.15GHz processor and 4GB LPDDR4 RAM, which is a killer combination for multitasking, 3D games, HD movies, and running memory-intensive apps.

Stunning 5.15" Stunning Bright Screen

Go big with Xiaomi Mi5's gorgeous 5.15" Sharp/JDI full HD display. It offers a contrast ratio of 1400:1 as opposed to 1000:1 on standard displays, producing even richer colors and contrasts for a spectacular visual experience. It also features the latest Sunlight Display, which uses hardware-level algorithms to adjust contrast for each pixel in real time, dramatically improving readability in sunlight. 

Fast And Steady

Great photos are taken anytime, anywhere. That's why the 16MP Sony IMX298 CMOS sensor comes with Optical Image Stabilization (4-axis OIS) to compensate for handheld movements, giving you sharp images even in low lighting. The 4MP front shooter brightens up smiles too, with large 2μm pixels to let more light in. It's 66% larger than the 1.2μm pixels found in average sensors and comes with Beautify, which intelligently applies one of 36 smart filters for amazing selfies.

Quick Charge 3.0 Technology

Delivers true sound representation with a professional Hi-Fi system embedded in your phone. Xiaomi Mi5's audio module renders music in stunning detail for clearer vocals and deeper bass. Discover a level of music that you’ve never heard before with minimal-loss, studio-grade sound quality.

Best Partner: MIUI 7

 Enjoy a bigger MIUI experience on Mi Note. The 5.15" screen layout has been formatted to show 25% more content than on smaller 4.7" screens. Customize system font options from small to large, which adjusts even third-party apps. Best of all, one-handed mode resizes your screen to a smaller 3.5", 4.0" or 4.5" that gives you maximum one-handed accessibility. Simply swipe left or right on the bottom home button to activate.

Sachin Bansal Success Story

Biography

India is now shopping online like never before, and Flipkart is the hot destination of every internet shopaholic. The master mind behind the idea, one of the first people to establish an e-commerce website in India is Sachin Bansal, an IIT graduate and a business man who created something of a history in the great Indian internet shopping revolution.

Childhood

Born in Chandigarh, he went to the St.Anne’s convent school and was a grade A student right from his schooling days. His father was in business and his mother a homemaker. He graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi where he studies Computer Science Engineer. Bansal was a typical Indian geek.Continue reading

Flipkart’s Sachin Bansal vs Snapdeal CEO Kunal Bahl: Right guys stuck in a tough ecommerce battle

Three months into 2016 and the battle lines between India's top two ecommerce companies are being drawn deeper.

The exchange of barbs between Flipkart's executive chairman Sachin Bansal and Snapdeal CEO Kunal Bahl on Twitter Friday evening wasn't merely a spillover of their rivalry but emblematic also of the significant pressure they are under with investors' becoming tightfisted. It portends more ugly confrontations.

"While in 2014 it looked like the game had consolidated  .. 

Read more at

Honor 5X hands-on review

There are so many good, cheap smartphone’s knocking around these days that they’re almost two a penny. Cough up around US$250 on a new blower and you’ll be able to choose between a new Moto G, or the excellent OnePlus X.
Naturally, the Honor 5X wants in on a piece of this cut price action. Having already launched pretty much everywhere around the world, it’s finally arrived in the Middle East for a thoroughly tempting US$245. Stump up that cash and you’ll get yourself a well-chiseled aluminium handset, a fingerprint scanner and an all-new Snapdragon 616 processor.

So is the new best smartphone for professional skinflints? We got hands-on with the Honor 5X to find out.

HEY LOW SPENDER

Honor phone’s specialise in looking a lot more pricey than you’d expect, and the 5X sticks to this alluring formula like chewing gum on a fresh pair of Converse. In a good way, though.

It’s got a 5.5-inch Full HD display, weighs a nimble 158g and, most importantly, has a fingerprint scanner slapped on its brushed metal backside. You don’t get that kind of premium feel from the Moto G or OnePlus X, although the Oppo F1 also riffs on this same aspirational aesthetic.

So where is the Honor 5X cutting around its corners? Well with 403 pixels pier inch, its display isn’t blessed with the greatest amount of detail. Comparatively speaking, the 5.5in LG G4 offers 538 pixels per inch. But hey, it costs almost twice the price of the 5X.

SOUPED UP PROCESSOR

In the US the Honor 5X launched last month with a Snapdragon 615 processor and 2GB of RAM, which will offer most people enough oomph for everyday usage. For some reason, the 5X has been treated to an update in the Middle East with the latest 1.5GHz Snapdragon 616 chip. Maybe Honor just felt bad about the delay.

Thanks to some new efficiencies, the upshot of this tweak is that you should be able to squeeze a little extra juice from the 5X’s 3000 mAh battery. Enough to last you through until closing time at the office, we suspect, but the impact won’t be massive. Still, as the Honor 5X’s price remains pretty much identical, this is essentially a free upgrade for us.

As for internal storage, the Honor 5X offers a slightly stingy 16GB. You can expand this by up to 128GB with a microSD card, so don’t go getting too upset.

SPOT THE SAVINGS

With a 13MP f/2.0 front-facing snapper, you should be able to take some reasonable photos with the Honor 5X, and that’s about it. You can expect the phone to come a tad undone when you’re stuck somewhere without a lot of light. But then again to be fair, its camera is perfectly serviceable for the price of entry.

What about selfies? The Honor 5X has a 5MP front-facing camera with a f/2.4 aperture but the same hesitance applies. Either way, it looks like you'll be getting what you pay for with this phone.

GET YOURSELF GOOGLE NOW

If there’s one major qualm we have about the Honor 5X, it’s the Emotion UI 3.1 operating system it runs on. This has been transplanted on top of Android Lollipop (that’s version 5.1.1, fact fans) and if our past experience with this modified OS is anything to go by, it doesn't offer much to shout about.

That’s mainly because, similarly to an iPhone 6s, it does away with the Android app launcher menu where you access all the downloads you don’t use that often. Instead you’re forced to lather your apps across various home screens.

Turned off by that thought? Then you can at least get round most of Emotion UI’s shortcomings by grabbing the Android Now launcher app.

HONOR 5X VERDICT

There’s plenty of value to be found in the Honor 5X, and that’s really all you can ask for from a budget-oriented smartphone. You want to feel like you’ve bagged yourself a bargain.

The 5X serves up some stern competition to both the OnePlus X and Moto G. Whether it seems like a steal after a week in your company is entirely up to the sort of smartphone experience you're looking for. If you're after the whizzbang of the latest bells and whistles then this isn't for you, but if you want a good looking phone that's totally serviceable with a few cool bonus features, then it's worth a look in.

Xiaomi Note 3 Review

Xiaomi has started 2016 with the release of its Redmi Note 3, a phone that was launched in China last year. The major difference being that the Redmi Note 3 in India will be housing the Qualcomm Snapdragon 650 chipset whereas the one in China was launched with the MediaTek Helio X10 processor. Apart from being the first Xiaomi phone with a full metal body, this is also Xiaomi’s first foray into fingerprint scanner sporting handsets.

The phone was announced to a packed auditorium on 3 March, and Hugo Barra, Xiaomi’s vice president of international also announced that the Mi5, Xiaomi’s flagship phone that was announced at the Mobile World Congress, will be coming to India next month. So let us see if the Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 repeats the magic that its last generation phones were renowned for.

Build and Design: 7.5/10

The Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 sports an all metal body and has rounded edges along the sides. Turn around the phone and the resemblance to the rear side on the Meizu MX5 is uncanny. The round fingerprint scanner is located just below the 16MP camera on the rear side and they are aligned to be placed in the centre. The dual LED flash unit is located in between the camera and the fingerprint scanner. The base has the speaker section and there’s a slight protrusion chin just below to ensure there is a gap between speaker section and the flat surface its placed on.

Looking around the device, on the left hand edge you have the dual SIM card slots, at the base there is a microUSB charging and data transfer port, on the right hand edge you have the volume rocker and power standby buttons. The top edge has the 3.5mm audio jack and an infrared blaster for controlling IR home appliances. The front has a 5.5inch display which has a tendency to collect smudges.

Thanks to the sand blasted matte finish on the rear side, you get a good grip on the phone. One handed option is inconvenient.The in hand feel of the phone is good as there are no sharp edges around the phone. Everything is nicely rounded. There’s even a chrome strip running around the edges which is slightly raised, so that it helps the display from touching the table if it is placed face down. Now these are minor touches, but quite thoughtful. Even the volume rocker and power/standby buttons are metallic with chamfered edges and a good feedback.

At 8.7mm thickness and 164 grams in weight, it is not winning any prizes in the slimness and lightness departments, but it isn’t bad at all considering it houses a 4050mAh battery.

Features: 8/10

Xiaomi is one company which started the specs vs price battle when it had launched the Mi 3 two years ago. And that is a legacy it has carried forward with the Redmi Note 3 as well. For starters, the Redmi Note 3 comes with Qualcomm Snapdragon 650 SoC which houses a hexa core processor, with a dual core Cortex A72 processor clocked at 1.8GHz and a quad-core Cortex A53 processor clocked at 1.4GHz. This is paired with Adreno 510 GPU.

There are two variants on the Redmi Note 3 – one comes with 2GB RAM and 16GB ROM and the other comes with 3GB RAM and 32GB ROM. We got the latter for testing and Xiaomi has given you the option to add in a microSD card to expand the storage. Out of the 32GB storage, the user available space is around 26.28GB. It runs Android 5.1 OS with MIUI 7 skin atop it. We will discuss more about MIUI 7 in the software section.

On the camera front, you have a 16MP rear camera with an aperture of f/2.0 and a 5MP front facing camera. The Redmi Note 3 comes with a hybrid dual SIM Card slot and can take in two 4G SIM cards which are hot-swappable. It supports voice over LTE (VoLTE), Wi-fi 802.11 b/g/n/ac, Bluetooth 4.2 LE, FM radio, infrared port, GPS with AGPS and so on. The Redmi Note 3 is the first Xiaomi phone to sport a fingerprint scanner as well.

Display: 7/10

The Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 sports a 5.5inch fullHD IPS LCD display which gives it a pixel density of 401ppi. The colours look natural and it has a good viewing angles. But the display tends to collect smudges which though easily removable are still annoying to have. There is no Corning Gorilla Glass protection, but the display is scratch resistant.

Xiaomi has carried forward the Sunlight Display technology from its Mi4/Mi4i line onto the Redmi Note 3. For those not aware, the Sunlight Display makes adjustments to the display at a pixel level so that you see a balanced image in bright outdoors. This is on by default and works when you are out in bright sunlight and want to photograph, without having to shade your phone. Reading mode helps reduce the blue light being emitted to reduce the eye fatigue, by adding a yellow tinge to the display.

The IPS LCD display is quite good with a good contrast ratio and decent black levels. Viewing angles are great, although the display can get very reflective at times.

Software: 7.5/10

MIUI 7 OS which was announced by Xiaomi in October last year comes loaded on the phone. While in terms of pure looks, there isn’t any drastic difference from the MIUI 6, but we do see some finesse on the OS. Xiaomi has added on a lot more Indian themes to the MIUI 7 for starters. It has an animated profile picture feature called ‘Showtime’ which lets other MIUI users see your animated selfies when you call them, instead of a profile picture.

In the messaging app, MIUI 7 divides messages from your contacts and services. An interesting touch is that if you are getting a one-time password (OTP) for some or the other credentials fulfillment online, you now get the option of copying the OTP from the notification itself rather than opening the message to search for. This is a good addition as you do not need to switch between screens. Same goes for calls – you get floating notifications at the top. 

Xiaomi has also bundled in two months of free Hungama digital streaming for Redmi Note 3 buyers. Apart from the 13 system apps you also get a additional apps such as Flesky, WPS Office, Facebook, SwiftKey which thankfully dosen’t seem like a lot. You also get the Mi Store app pre-installed in case you want to purchase anything from the Mi India store.  You can enter into the one handed mode in case you find the 5.5-inch screen size too much. You get the option to select between 3.5-inch, 4.0-inch and 4.5-inch screen sizes. You can also select photos from your gallery and add them to a hidden albums. 

Performance: 7.5/10

Call quality on the Redmi Note 3 is excellent and the earpiece speaker is sufficiently loud even outdoors. We didn’t face any issues with signal reception even inside elevators, that’s speaking a lot.

Qualcomm Snapdragon 650 chipset is quite impressive here. It is clearly performing at par with Qualcomm’s last generation hex-core Snapdragon 808. Phones around the Rs 20,000 price point house this processor. The Adreno 510GPU ensures a smooth performance while gaming as well – Asphalt 8: Airborne is playable at Extreme settings as well. All in all, the Redmi Note 3 excels in the performance department when compared with competition in this price range.

Despite the MIUI 7 skin atop the Android 5.1OS, we did not face any slowdown issues with the Redmi Note 3, which is interesting since the Mi4i did show a lot of lag in this department. The phone does take ages to reboot after a system update though, so beware in case you are in the middle of an important conversation, finish it off before you hit Reboot for the new system updates to take effect. Heat management is quite good and unlike the the Mi4 and Mi4i, the phone does not heat up noticeably while playing heavy games, despite having a metal body.

Fingerprint scanner works fine and is quick. We rarely had to keep adjusting the finger position for the scanner to unlock. You can also use the fingerprint scanner to click photographs or even lock apps, which is an interesting feature. Audio output isn’t that loud and you really have to cover the rear side to hear it clearly.

Camera: 6.5/10

Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 sports a 16MP rear camera and a 5MP front-facing camera. The rear camera comes with phase-detect auto-focus function which works great in well lit situations, but struggles in low light. Xiaomi has added on the timelapse and slow motion feature for video shooting as well along with a fullHD video recording support.

Image quality for daylight photographs is quite good. The HDR mode on the camera is similar to the one we had seen with the Mi4i, and is able to give a balanced output for regions in the shadow area. But we noticed that the highlights did get blown out on a lot of occasions. The Sunlight display feature which worked wonderfully when using the Mi4i, is quite slow on the Redmi Note 3. There were many instances when we had to literally wait a couple of seconds before the camera kicked in Sunlight display.

Low light photography is the Achilles heel of the Redmi Note 3. The camera just refuses to give sharp images. It takes time to lock on focus and if you are in the HDR mode, then unless you have rock steady hands, forget getting a remotely sharp image. The performance is quite reminiscent of the one we had seen with OnePlus X – good daylight photographs, but mediocre low light shots. The bump in the megapixel count clearly shows its shortcomings in the low light department.  

Battery Life: 8.5/10

The Redmi Note 3 comes with a 4050mAh non-removable Li-Polymer battery. It manages to retain the battery life really well. We were impressed with the battery life on the phone since we could easily go over a day and more, with a single charge, despite using the phone to watch videos, update social apps and listen to music for hours. If you want to still extend the battery life further, you get some Battery saver modes as well. 

Verdict and Price in India

Xiaomi has clearly delivered enough goods with the Redmi Note 3 for us to recommend it. While it comes in two variants – Rs 9,999 (for 2GB RAM/16GB ROM) and Rs 11,999 (for 3GB RAM/32GB ROM) – we would recommend the latter as it gives you more room to do multi-tasking. Of course, you need to keep in mind that this phone does not perform well in the low light photography department. So if all you are looking for is a great battery life and fast performance – the Redmi Note 3 has little competition.

One thing we would have really liked to see is a Marshmallow OS support, instead of the dated Android 5.1. But considering the Redmi Note 3 ships with the MIUI 7, we are not sure when and if the Redmi Note 3 will get an Android 6.0 facelift. Not that the current implementation is bad in any way, but with Android 6.0 features like Doze mode can be great value adds to the already good battery life on the Redmi Note 3.

The Xiaomi Redmi Note 3’s closest competition is the LeEco Le 1s which is selling for Rs 10,999 and houses MediaTek Helio X10 processor with 3GB RAM and 32GB storage. We had faced call quality issues with the Le 1s, which is non existent in the Redmi Note 3. Also in terms of pure performance, the Snapdragon 650 goes ahead of Helio X10 by a significant amount. Redmi Note 3 will surely ruin Le 1s’s party with its offering.

If you are still not convinced of either of these phones, then you may check out the trustedMoto G 3rd gen or the Huawei Honor 5X which are around the same price brackets as well. 

Letv Le 1S Review

Letv Le 1S Review

Letv Le 1S is the hottest phone of 2016 with stylish design and performance.It is the best  budget phone.If you’re looking for a stylish, high-performing smartphone that is economical, then the Le 1s is a worthy bet.The Letv Le 1S was launched at a price tag of Rs 10,999 in India and is exclusively available at Flipkart. The phone looks a lot more premium compared to what the price tag suggests.Here is the review of this smartphone.Le is the brand of LeTV, an interactive platform for entertainment that provides movies,animations,news and lifestyle etc.,Here is Letv Le 1S Review for you.

Performance

With an Octacore Helio X10 Turbo processor (64-bit) which clocks at 2.2 GHz and 3 GB of RAM, the Le 1S opens web pages in an instant, switches between apps within seconds and streams high-quality videos without any glitches. The PowerVR G6200 GPU of the device makes it perfect for hardcore gaming.

Display

Watch your favorite episode of Friends on the brilliant 13.97 cm (5.5) FHD display which boasts a PPI of 403. The In-Cell display reduces the screen thickness and delivers sharper pictures, giving you a visual treat.

Design

The Le 1s has been designed to perfection. It features a full-metal body made from aircraft-grade aluminium, a bezel-less ID and a screwless design. The device is 7.5 mm thin and weighs 169 grams.Le 1S 151.10 x 74.20 x 7.50 (height x width x thickness).

Camera Quality

This smartphone is accompanied by a high-definition 13 MP rear camera that features Samsung ISOCELL technology and a blue glass infrared filter. This camera has an F2.0 aperture and is capable of 0.09 seconds fast focus. It achieves 6x digital zoom and records 4K/1080p videos.Click a selfie every day with the 5 MP front camera of the Le 1s, share it on Facebook and let the compliments keep coming. The front camera features a wide-angle (85 degrees) lens with an F2.0 aperture.

Click a selfie every day with the 5 MP front camera of the Le 1s, share it on Facebook and let the compliments keep coming. The front camera features a wide-angle (85 degrees) lens with an F2.0 aperture.

Fingerprint Scanner

A perfect combination of aesthetics and functionality, the Le 1s boasts the world’s first mirror surfaced fingerprint scanner with 6H hardness. Apart from unlocking the screen, you can use this fingerprint scanner to take photos too.

Battery

This device comes with a high-density fast-charging battery and a Type-C 24-watt charger, so you’ll never run out of charge