November 2015 – Page 2

iPad mini 4 review: why has Apple hidden this great tablet away?

What do you do when you’ve made a massive tablet that’s got tongues wagging? You slip out a well-made teeny one and don’t really tell anyone about it, apparently.

That’s what Apple’s done with the iPad mini 4. The iPad Pro is getting the bulk of the interest in the tablet world at the moment, but that’s a shame – there’s something really awesome here with this smaller model.

For £319 you’re getting a really decent tablet (the iPad Air 2) squished down into a smaller size – while that’s a year old, that doesn’t mean it’s less impressive. The iPad range struggles to find an equal from the competition, and at this lower cost the mini 4 is definitely worth thinking as a ‘big present’ to someone.

The design is as you’d expect with a tablet from Apple: it’s got a metal case, curved at the edged, but it’s done in such a way that it feels almost ceramic in the hand. The buttons – a little small, it has to be said – are now limited to just power and volume, with the silencing rocker switch now placed on screen in the Control Center.

Nexus 5X review: Google’s Nexus back at its best?

At 5.2 inches the Nexus 5X fits into the new average size of Android phones for 2015, but more importantly, its price and specs give it an above average value.

Google is selling its new flagship for £339 with 16GB of storage. Even at £379 for 32GB, the Nexus 5X is cheaper than its rivals, like the LG G4 and Samsung Galaxy S6 at launch.

It’s still able to keep up, for the most part, with specs like a Snapdragon 808 processor, 2GB of RAM and a fingerprint sensor. Its performance makes few compromises.

LG is behind this Google-commissioned phone, and it carries the first competent Nexus camera that fares better than the iPhone 6S in low light situations.

It’s also the first Android, along with the Nexus 6P, to run Android 6.0 Marshmallow. It’s a fine introduction to the new software, even if there are better Android phones out there. The Nexus 5X isn’t a small phone, but it does fit snugly in one hand and we can operate it with a little stretch. It’s as if the Nexus 5 from two years ago has been reborn for modern times.

Surprisingly, while it’s taller and broader versus the 2013 Nexus 5, its dimensions of 147 x 72.6 x 7.9mm make it thinner. Our hands wrapped around this phone with great ease.

Apple iPhone 6S review: A touch of the future

Apple announced its ninth-generation iPhones, the iPhone 6s and the iPhone 6s Plus, at a media event in San Francisco, California on September 9, 2015. The iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus can be summed up beautifully with a single quote from Apple CEO Tim Cook: “While they may look familiar, we have changed everythingabout these new iPhones.”

Available with the same 4.7 and 5.5-inch Retina displays, the iPhone 6s and the iPhone 6s Plus have the same exterior design as the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, but much of the hardware inside, from the camera to the processor, is new and improved. Core technologies like the touchscreen and the vibration engine have been updated, and the new devices are even constructed from an entirely new material.

The iPhone 6s and 6s Plus are made from a 7000 Series aluminum alloy, which is stronger and more durable than the 6000 series used in the previous-generation iPhones. Apple’s also updated the devices with stronger glass, made using a dual ion exchange process. One of the biggest changes is the introduction of a new aluminum finish in Rose Gold, which accompanies the traditional Silver, Space Gray, and Gold color options.

A new second-generation Touch ID module makes fingerprint detection twice as fast, and the 64-bit A9 processor in the two devices is 70 percent faster at CPU tasks and 90 percent faster at GPU tasks than the A8 processor in the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. Abuilt-in M9 motion coprocessor enables new features, such as always-on “Hey Siri” functionality.

Google+ is now faster for the few who use it

It has been almost a year since Intel and Nokia began converging their respective mobile Linux platforms to create the MeeGo project. The effort has attracted interest among hardware vendors, but hasn’t quite reached the stage where it is ready for mainstream consumer devices. A growing body of evidence suggests that the wait might soon be over.

Nokia had hoped to deliver its first MeeGo-based product in the fourth quarter of 2010, but pushed back the launch into 2011. Nokia’s MeeGo debut device was originally expected to be the rumored N9 handset, but the subsequent flow of conflicting rumors and leaks has left little in the way of clarity, leaving broad speculation in their wake.

The latest round of rumors suggests that Nokia is still aiming to bring the N9 to market, but that it will be powered by an Intel Atom processor. This seemingly dubious suggestion got a boost last week when Intel showed off a smartphone with the company’s Medfield SoC.

We are also starting to see some signs that Nokia is polishing up MeeGo for a product launch. In a brief and informal note posted on the Qt Labs blog earlier this week, Nokia’s Henrik Hartz acknowledged that Nokia has temporarily closed the MeeGo-themed branch of its Qt Quick components project. The contents of that branch will allow third-party Qt applications to conform with the MeeGo look and feel. Nokia says that this code is being finalized and that the developers are “unable to make certain pieces of the final user experience public” during the last stages of development.

Moto 360 (2015) review: loveable, but still flawed

Despite having rather significant flaws, the original Moto 360 was the most popular Android Wear smartwatch. Has Motorola learnt from their previous mistakes, or is the second generation just as flawed as the first?

I’ve been wearing the 2015 Moto 360 for several weeks now, here’s the verdict.

Design, Screen and Battery

We loved the design of the original Moto 360, it was sleek, stylish, futuristic, and of course, round.

The 2015 version follows on in the same vain. Although the design is very similar, there are some slight improvements.

The home button has been moved around the bezel to a more ergonomic location, the strap attaches to extended lugs (so they can be changed easily), and it now comes in black, silver, and gold.

The watch also now comes in two sizes, a 46mm watch face (the same as the original, but 0.1mm thinner, at 11.4mm) and a new, smaller 42mm watch face (again, measuring 11.4mm thick).

I’ve tried both on and much preferred the smaller version. It feels like a more natural size for a watch, and doesn’t hamper usability. There’s also a new ‘for Women’ version, which features a slimmer strap, and more blingy bezel.

The Moto 360 is very comfortable to wear, the size is fine for men’s wrists, and just about passes for women. It’s also reasonably lightweight, so you won’t suffer from watch fatigue.

In terms of design, it’s probably one of the best looking smartwatches around.

Motorola Moto X Style Review: One of 2015’s best Android phones

If you’re looking for a comparison, Motorola are the Leicester City of the smartphone world. The Olly Murs. Maybe the Donald Trump. Whichever way you put it, they’re the once-ridiculed brand who are now most definitely in-form, and exceeding all expectations.

See for yourself. The third-gen Moto G continues to reshape the expectations of affordable phones. The Moto X Play is the best sub-£300 handset available. And the Moto X Force looks set to revolutionise the mobile industry with its indestructible display. So what, then, of the company’s iPhone 6S-rivalling flagship phone – the Moto X Style?

Well, at £399 the phone isn’t as affordable as its siblings, but still undercuts the direct competition. Considerably. It plays host to features you’d be more inclined to see on devices north of the £500 marker – namely a QHD display and OIS-enhanced camera – and wraps them together in a stunningly simple user experience.

OnePlus made a big deal about the OnePlus X’s design, claiming it to be the first “truly premium affordable smartphone” at its London launch. The OnePlus X is available in two variants: Onyx and Ceramic. The Ceramic version is the more premium of the two, made using a laborious crafting process that OnePlus claims takes 25 days.

The process begins with a zirconia mould that’s fire-baked up to 1,482^oC for more than 28 hours. It’s then cooled for two days before going through a rigorous “polishing process”.

The OnePlus X Onyx retails at £199, while the OnePlus X Ceramic costs £269. If you want to get your hands on the Ceramic version, you’ll have a battle on your hands. The company is making a meagre 10,000 Ceramic units and will continue running a strict invite-only sales model until stocks run dry.

Samsung Galaxy S7 Britecell camera should be thinner, faster and excel at low-light photography

Android 4.4 KitKat now has a home on 5.3 percent of all Android devices, at least those that visit the Google Play store.

In its latest Android Developer Dashboard, Google revealed Google Play stats for all Android versions during the seven days that ended April 1. KitKat’s newest cut of the action doubles the 2.5 percentshare seen a month ago and shows continued growth from the 1.8 percent recorded at the beginning of February.

Nexus 6P vs iPhone 6s Plus – Speed Test and Benchmarks

With the Gingerbread barely cooled on the Android 2.3 SDK, Google has now pushed another iteration to developers. In Android 2.3.3, it’s all about expanding support for near-field communications — that non-Packers NFC business we’ve been hearing so much about.

In Android 2.3.3, Google has added a full-featured NFC read and write API, which will work with “almost any standard NFC tag in use today.” They’re also providing developers with better control over how their apps react when an NFC tag comes into range.

Last but not least, similar to the Touchstone transfer wizardry shown off by HP on its new line of webOS hardware today, Android 2.3.3 has initial support for peer-to-peer connections with “other NFC devices.”

Google obviously wants to get some momentum behind Android’s NFC support, not least because the company is likely working on an NFC-driven payment system.

Let the proximity application awesomeness begin!

Sky Q first impressions: Hands-on with Sky’s new Netflix-rivalling TV experience

It might finally be worth dusting off that little shelf under your telly: Sky has just given its TV services the biggest update in the company’s history. Called Sky Q, on a basic level it adds a new set-top box to the mix, along with 4K TV support. But that’s only the half of it. If Sky has its way, it means to entirely change our TV-viewing experience – melding together the modern world of live and on-demand content with multi-screen viewing.

With the addition of multi-room enabling Sky Q Mini boxes and dedicated apps, Sky Q hopes to take the service well beyond the living room experience – with live, on-demand and recorded content viewable across three TVs and two tablets simultaneously. Cherry-picking the best elements of Netflix, Apple TV and Amazon Fire TV and squeezing them together into a single box, Sky Q is designed to be the ultimate menu to service our greedy, mass-consumption ways.

Of course, aside from 4K resolutions, the content itself is unlikely to change that much. And one key aspect was missing from the announcement – the price, with some experts suggesting an all-in Sky Q package could top £100 a month. But ahead of its consumer release in “early 2016′, we’ve had a brief play with the big brother to Sky+ HD. Here’s what we made of it.

10 of the best micro-ATX and mini-ITX cases for your next PC build

Picking the right case can make or break a PC build. It’s the exoskeleton of your rig, and everything has to fit perfectly within it. This becomes even more important when you’re planning on getting a smaller motherboard, as you’ll have even less space to work with. There are a lot of case options out there, and picking the right one for you is a personal decision. Many cases can fill the same role, but they’ll look different doing it.

We already took a look at 25 of the best computer cases to start with for your next system build, but now we’re going to take a more specialized look at 10 of the best cases for a micro-ATX or mini-ITX motherboard.

These aren’t just cases that look pretty. Some are our personal favorites, cases we’ve built our own rigs with. Others come highly recommended by do-it-yourselfers and professional reviewers. We’ve gone digging through buyer feedback and reviews to find cases that are as cleverly designed and reliable as they are attractive.

A note on affiliates: some of our stories, like this one, include affiliate links to stores like Amazon. These online stores share a small amount of revenue with us if you buy something through one of these links, which helps support our work evaluating PC components