Category: Companies
I went out to SanDisk earlier today and thought it would be a good plan to check out thread latest wares. Unlike last year where they announced the 200GB memory card -the largest on the market – they did not have such a huge amount to shout about …
Sony has just finished their announcement for MWC 16 and along with some interesting looking non-phone devices, they released the new Xperia X Series. This series will come in two different versions; the Xperia X and the Xperia XA, there is also a Xperia X Performance but unfortunately …
Long when we thought Windows 10 Mobile wasn’t going to see any support further than the Lumias and the Acer Jade Primo, HP has surprised quite a few people with the announcement of the Elite X3. Yes, that’s right – not only are HP going in on Windows …
Today MWC 2016 starts proper and what better way to kick it off than by seeing what Sony have brought to the party. We are on their stand now and looking to see what new toys they have to play with. Rumours are pointing to a new MediaTec …
Some of us haven’t bought into this whole paid streaming music malarky for reasons. It may be that you already have a big enough music selection that you don’t get time to listen to the artists you already have, it could be that when people talk about discoverability …
Microsoft is pushing out a new mid-tier device that is going to be aimed at the business sector, however, we are hearing stories that the expected launch date has been moved from the beginning of February to the middle of the month. The phone sports some fairly basic …
Was £130 million enough to catch up on a tax bill for the last 10 years? Sales of £4.6 billion in 2014 and profits of £106 million in 18 months? It just doesn’t seem like a reasonable amount, and it’s becoming a political football. This, despite the fact …
We finally have the Lumia 950 XL on our testbed. We had to wait a long time for this one – it has been nearly two years since the last flagship-spec device from the Microsoft brand. Many people were hoping for a direct Lumia 1020 upgrade, which has …
In more CES news, the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset will be available to pre-order from today, the 6th of January. You’ll be glad to hear that you can order one from 4PM UK time, but we have no idea regarding price or when we will get our …
Las Vegas isn’t filled with just gamblers and drinkers this week, oh no. It’s a tech-fest as the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) kicks off and the very latest gadgets get shown off. Two big car manufacturers are there too – Ford and Fiat Chrysler. They’ve announced that Android …
We have one in the house – the infamous Lumia 950 XL from Microsoft. The kind people at Lumia Voices have decided to lend us a review kit with not just the Lumia device, but the full package. This includes a Lumia 950 XL of course, but in …
Welcome to the Coolsmartphone Award Ceremony and Podcast, coming to you, prerecorded from Coolsmartphone Towers. Our team of experts got together yesterday and decided on the best and worst bits of 2015 in order to entertain you and reward/shame those responsible. As with all good awards ceremonies we’re …
Don’t know who Honor are? For one they are the company that pinched our own James Pearce, secondly they are part of the phone manufacturer Huawei. They’re based more on-line than having retail outlets, but they’re still able to supply high spec’d devices with reasonable price tags. As …
In November, Chinese phone manufacturer Huawei announced their highest specced phone to date, the upcoming Mate 8. On-paper specifications do look mighty impressive. The Huawei Mate 8 is now available for sale, with the promise of better performance and battery life. The device features the new Kirin 950 …
Remember recently when Microsoft announced that it was going to reduce the storage it offered on OneDrive, and that the unlimited tier was going away because some people were treating it as – well, unlimited? I know that some people were using up to 75 TB of that …
The achillies heel of the modern smartphone is battery life, hence the multitude of battery packs and third-party battery boosting cases flooding onto the market. It’s solved a problem, but you’ve had to get that solution from elsewhere. Now Apple has finally decided to step into the battery …
Today Samsung announced the details and specs of the 2016 Galaxy A series range of devices. They will be coming in three screen size options: 5.5-inch for the A7, 5.2-inch for the A5 and 4.7-inch for the A3. Equipped with an enhanced camera system for brighter and clearer …
Since it was announced earlier in the year, people have been waiting for for the launch of the hotly anticipated Motorola 360 Sport smartwatch. Now Motorola has finally announced the launch date for their latest device. This will now be available to purchase from 18th December for £219.00 …
My little boy loves YouTube: he particularly loves watching people playing Lego video games. But I’m constantly worried he might come across something inappropriate for him. Seven months ago, I thought my prayers had been answered when YouTube announced its YouTube kids app. However (unsurprisingly, yet again) unfortunately …
The time has come to put Sony’s finest under a microscope and to see what you are getting when you plonk down £610* on the counter. We know that the camera is meant to be the best thing since they made the camera obscura back in the early …
Mobile image sensors embedded in smartphones are revolutionising journalism and photography. Ever taken a selfie or a picture of your pizza? Or maybe a high quality image of the Eiffel Tower or the Taj Mahal for bragging purposes? Yep, we’ve all been there. There’s no doubt image sensor …
That time of year has come. It’s the time that all geeks look forward to every year. It is, of course, upgrade time. Those of you who are frequent readers will no doubt be aware that I am currently using the Xperia Z3 as my daily driver. Although I …
I like the Sony Z range. They look like well-designed and distinctive pieces of kit, but I was a little hesitant. I never knew what their upgrade strategy would be from handset to handset, so when I heard about this Concept for Android initiative, where Sony allows you …
Clove has opened up their preorders on those two new fantastic Lumia devices that we saw the other day. Yes, of course, I am talking about the Lumia 950 and 950XL. Both Lumia 950 and 950 XL pre-orders are now up and available. They don’t yet have the estimated …
That day has come when we finally see a long overdue Microsoft Lumia flagship. Now, for those of you wanting a Surface Phone … you might as well stop reading. That is not what we have here. What we do have is two really nice looking Lumia devices …
It’s well-rumoured that Microsoft have a new handset or two just over the horizon, namely the Lumia 950 and the 950 XL. It’s believed these will be shown to the world at the beginning of next month at an event in New York. Well, on Forever Nokia Latinoamérica’s Facebook, they …
Last years Nexus 6 was the first Nexus handset to have a maximum storage capacity of 64 GB. Before that, the maximum storage space that Google offered in a Nexus device was a measly 32 GB. As apps grow in size, (I remember when I though that 12 …
It looks like the wait is over. Google have sent out invites for their ‘Google Event’ on September 29th, at 9 a.m. PT (Pacific Time – that’s 5 p.m for us folks in Blighty and CSP Towers). We are expected to finally get a good look at the …
This one was a bit of a shock to see, especially given their marketing campaign. The latest news out of camp Sony is that they are advising not to use the phone underwater. This is a phone which is billed as waterproof in the specs WWWWHHHHaaaa…. ?! The …
Processor manufacturer Qualcomm has announced the latest version of its Quick charge system, now imaginatively named “Quick Charge 3.0”. It’ll debut on the Snapdragon 820 chipset next year and will then roll out to the Snapdragon 620, 618, 617 and 430 platforms. Quick Charge 3.0 will allow compatible phones …
According to a leaked image posted on social networking site Weibo, the next new processor from Qualcomm, the Snapdragon 820 (which is expected to be launched later this month) is 35% faster than the current leader the Snapdragon 810. Right here’s the geeky bit. The 820’s newer Hydra …
It was meant to be the next cheaper and easy to get into era in gaming. I was the Ouya, based on Android and using the ecosystem that Android provided. It was a lovely dream, but that dream is now fading to black – almost. No, Ouya isn’t quite …
Newly leaked photos showing the Samsung Galaxy S6 edge Plus and the Galaxy Note 5 have emerged on the internwebs. The photos show the S6 edge Plus as having a model number of SM-G928A, and the device is running Android 5.1.1 Lollipop. There’s also snaps of the Note 5 …
Samsung Electronics have announced the global launch of the Galaxy Tab S2, which Samsung state is the “most immersive” Samsung tablet to-date. There’s a 9.7″ 2048×1536 (QXGA) Super AMOLED screen, 4G connectivity, 8 megapixel rear camera, 2.1 megapixel shooter and it’s powered by Android 5.0. This is all powered …
Here at CoolSmartPhone Towers we receive many items through for review from a range of different manufacturers and suppliers. One such company, Inateck (who have made many products that I’ve reviewed here on CoolSmartPhone), have contacted us to share some of the deals they currently have in conjunction with …
Another year has gone by and another Sony Tablet has arrived on our desk at Coolsmartphone towers. Today I have the real pleasure of unboxing the new Xperia Z4 Tablet. We first saw this stunning device at MWC, which we covered live. It was here that we were …
OnePlus have announced that the latest version of Cyanogen OS, Cyanogen OS 12.1 (based on Android 5.1), which is currently undergoing testing and Google certification. On the other side of things OxygenOS, which is OnePlus’s own operating system update based on Android 5.1, is in the works. Sadly …
Currently confined to the US Apple Pay, (the tap to buy service that uses the NFC to beam your relevant card details to the vendors terminal, similar to “contactless payment we already have fitted to some UK credit/debit cards.) might not be US only for much longer. …
Rumoured for a July release, California-based company Microdia announced plans to launch The Microdia Xtra Elite microSD card. It’s the biggest yet at a whopping 512GB, and was announced at the Computex 2015 show (but strangely no working versions were displayed. In that case, keep ’em peeled for the …
Today we were lucky enough to get hands on with Sony’s new flagship the Xepria Z3+. This is a really nice evolution of the Z3 and one that would make a nice upgrade from anyone who is using a Xperia Z or Xperia Z2. It is also a …