Huge battery as the next trend in smartphones industry ?

Sometimes, it is funny how things are coming and going. When we got feature phones, we wanted them to become smaller and smaller.
When we got smartphones, we took the opposite direction quite quickly, the phones got bigger but we also wanted them to be good looking, fashion. It is a trend initiated by Apple and every others manufacturers followed and phones became thinner.

As phones reached the limit of thickness, now it is time for upgrading battery. A few years back, having a 1500 mAh battery, it was considered to be big. Nowadays, 2000 mAh is the minimum amount and you will need to monitor your phone usage in order to last the day especially if you have a 5 inch smartphone.

But things are evolving and are looking good so far. Big batteries are coming out and they already reached the 3000 mAh limit (this amount of energy last me 2 days with the XiaoMi Mi 2S) but it doesn't seem to stop there and we are looking to the 4000 mAh threshold.

The Boway U5 might be the first one to get to a Tablet like battery (the Nexus 7 has a 4000 mAh battery).
What's gonna be next ? We will be there for sure.

Meizu is teasing about a 128 GB MX3 !

Jack Wong, CEO of Meizu has been very talkative these last few days before the official announcing date on September, 2nd.
The messages from Mister Wong has been suggesting a 128 GB alongside a LG display which would be 26% more efficient power consuming wise than the Samsung Galaxy S4 Super Amoled Display.
The photo above is a partially screenshot of the upcoming Flyme OS.

Clear leaked photos of the Oppo N1

This morning, there have been several leaks from all over the place about the anticipated OPPO N1 with the special N lens.

From those first clear leaked images, we can assume a much more angular phone which is supposed to sport a 5.5 inch FHD display and maybe a rear touch panel.

From evleaks twitter account, we can see that the front panel offers a notifications led on the top right corner.

The official teaser from OPPO suggests a 3.5 jack, microUSB and speaker at the base of the phone. 

Huawei Glory 3 Water Resist will be released on August 28th

Here are the first commercial shots of the Huawei Glory 3. The media was already talking about the Glory 3 but we were waiting for more details since at first, we were a bit disappointed.

Our internal source told us there was more to what meet the eyes and there is indeed a surprise. The Glory 3 is water proof, like the Sony Xperia Z, it got the IP 57 certification which means it is water resistant.
The smartphone can go underwater up to 1 meter and 30 minutes.

The rest of the specs sheet is, somewhat, very classic for the mid range market :
- 4.7 inch 720p HD screen
- Dimensions 133 x 67.2 x 9.9mm
- Huawei SoC K3V2 Quad Core 1.5 GHz Cortex A9 based
- 2 GB ram and 8 GB rom

The smarpthone will be available in China Mainland on August, 28th, and we will offer it a little after that, on September in our store (around $350).

XiaoMi White HongMi (Red Rice) with 3G WCDMA compatibility soon to be available

A few hours ago, Lei Jun, the CEO of XiaoMi posted a photo of a White HongMi from his Sina Weibo account.
This model is a brand new one, it is the first HongMi with a white face (usually, only the back changes colors) and the CEO is stating that the new HongMi (should we call it BaiMi for White Rice ?) will be compatible with the 3G WCDMA network.

So far, we have not hear any details about the supported frequency but we bet it will be very similar to what is already in place in the XiaoMi Mi 2A and Mi 2S (850/1900/2100 MHz for 3G WCDMA).
The final specs are not out either, but we can assumer it will look like a lot the original : Quad Core Mediatek MT6589T chip alongside 1GB ram, a 4.7 inch HD screen and an 8 MP Sony photo shooter.

XiaoMi HongMi 2 might sport a 8 core MediaTek chip according to Taiwanese Press

We were reporting yesterday that Xiaocai could be the first manufacturer to offer an MT6592 Octo-core smartphone. Others already confirmed, as we reported, that they would upgrade their line up next year.

Until now, XiaoMi didn't make any comments, but Taiwanese press is stating a HongMi 2 (Red Rice 2) is coming (probably next year) in 8 cores flavor.

No informations have been released as if this Octo-Core HongMi 2 would be the much anticipated international version (compatible with 3G WCDMA network) or the official upgrade of the actual HongMi next year.

"XiaoMi is now $10 billions worth" said CEO Lei Jun

After a new successful funding round, the XiaoMi CEO, Lei Jun confirms through his Sina Weibo account a valuation of XiaoMi of $10 billions. A year ago, his company was "only" worth $4 billions.

As we mentioned in many of our reports, the growth rate is accelerating and it won't slow down with the XiaoMi Mi 3, a Zi Mi (Purple Rice) Tablet or/and Smart TVs.

Lei Jun was a lot compared to Steve Jobs but the man recused that statement a few weeks ago. The CEO says that his company is a lot like Amazon and it is e-commerce first and not a phone maker. Seeing how the Mi Store is growing, Lei Jun might be right since its online store is offering more and more products and most of them are not XiaoMi made.

It's Thursday : Weekly App Selection 04 by PhonAsia

Like every week, we're gonna start by our Games of the Week as usual.

Minecraft PE new upgrade 0.7.3 version (5.49 €)

Lei Jun, XiaoMi CEO, makes the annual press event on September, 5th official

Lei Jun posted this picture yesterday night on his Sina Weibo account confirming us the annual press conference held by XiaoMi each year.

Everything is getting bigger and faster for XiaoMi : bigger sales, bigger influence and finally bigger stage. Last year, the press conference was held in Beijing's 768 arts district, but in 2013, the new venue will be the National Conference Center.

While no details were given as to which products would be announced, the two swords might represent the XiaoMi Mi 3 and and second device : Smart TV, Table Zi Mi (Purple Rice) ?

The World might finally see the first Tegra 4 powered device : ZTE U988S

We were growing more and more desperate to see a Tegra 4 powered phone in 2013.

The main issue of the Tegra 4 SoC is its power consumption. While it is arguably the best chip out there raw performance wise, four Cortex A15 consumes just too much energy.
That is why we saw all year long smartphones equipped with Snadragon, Mediatek and some Samsung chips.
Qualcomm chose to modify the raw Cortex A15 a lot to meet energy consumption requirements, losing some power in the process.
MediaTek is using the low power Cortex A7 which is almost on par with the Cortex A9.
Samsung decided to put Cortex A7 alongside the A15, using the big.Little design, but somewhat failed to distribute the new Exynos line worldwide (production issues).

But finally, aside from the Nvidia Shield Project (don't even get me started on this), there was no Tegra 4 device nor smartphone.
Somewhat, ZTE is risking itself to launch the U988S, the very first smartphone with the Nvidia chip : the Tegra 4 is clocked at 1.8 GHz powering a 5 inch 1090 FHD display, 2 GB Ram and a 13 MP rear camera.

We are very excited to see how it will perform and if it can address the battery life issue. We will offer the ZTE U988S around the same price tag as the XiaoMi Mi 2S (~ USD 380)

Stay tuned on PhonAsia for more informations.

Xiaocai, first 8 cores smartphone by the end of 2013

Xiaocai could be the first manufacturer to launch a smartphone with the MTK6592 Octo-Core chip from Mediatek.

We got some sources telling us that the small Chinese company secured an early deal with Mediatek and is ready to bring the fight to the actual leaders (Meizu, XiaoMi).

The next Xiaocai phone should sport a 5 inch FHD display and comes in 16 GB (with 1 GB ram) or 32 GB (with 2 GB ram)  flavors.

Get ready, XiaoMi is going to make an announcement tomorrow morning !

As we were going to sleep, we received a message from XiaoMi inviting us to attend to press conference tomorrow morning at 10 am (Chinese time).

Most likely, some launch dates should be revealed but about which devices ? XiaoMi Mi 3, Tablet Zi Mi (Purple Rice) or the Smart TV ?

Anyway, in the meantime, here is the latest leaked photo but it seems to us to be more of concept phone since the Micro USB port is changing.

OPPO should unveils their flagship N1 in September

While the summer is the hottest season in the world, it seems that September is becoming the hottest month technology wise.

We are already waiting for the XiaoMi Mi 3 and the Meizu MX3, two flagships considered as heavy weights among smartphones. But Oppo seems to want its share of the pie too.
A few days ago, OPPO stated that they got a new lens technology to compete against the likes of Nokia Lumia 1020, the HTC One or the Samsung Galaxy S 4 Zoom.

The Oppo N1 is rumored to sport a Snapdragon S800 alongside with a 5.5" FHD display.

XiaoMi Smart TV rumored to launch soon at RMB 4 000

XiaoMi Smart TV might be available this fall too along with the flagship Mi 3 and the tablet Zi Mi (Purple Rice).
It should be a 47 inch TV connected to Internet. What Apple couldn't do, XiaoMi does. It really could be a truly amazing second semester for XiaoMi.

The Smart TV market already started but it still lack a major hit. The world was waiting for Apple but it seems the Chinese firm would be the pioneer this time.

We heard first of the XiaoMi Smart TV when it got the 3C certification from China authorities. Those reports stated also a 47 inch TV, a 1080 FHD panel, Dolby Stereo Sound and built-in Wi-Fi chip.

mydrivers.com got an allegedly beta XiaoMi Smart TV publishing the above receipt which states "closed beta machine" and it got an official XiaoMi financial stamp.

We already know that something big is coming on September, 5th : the next smartphone XiaoMi Mi 3 or the tablet Zi Mi (Purple Rice), will a Smart TV be there ? It would certainly be an excellent surprise.

Jyayu Final Specs and Promotional Photos finally out

In 2013, Jiyayu was essentially focused on the mid range market with MediaTek chips and so far, no FHD phones. But things are changing and the Chinese firm wants its share where the big money is, the high end market.

The anticipated Jiayu S1 (soon to be available) should take the company into the likes of XiaoMi and its Mi 2S and next smartphone Mi 3 :
- 5 inches Full HD Display with OGS (One Glass Solution) technology made by Sharp
- SoC Snapdragon S600 at 1.7 GHz with the Adreno 320 as GPU
- 2GB RAM
- 32 GB Storage with no Micro SD card port
- NFC with wireless charging capability
- 13 MP Rear Sony Camera
- 2 MP Front Sony Camera
- 138 x 69 x 9mm
- 2300 mAh battery

The press released insists on the primary material steel chassis to keep in check the heat generated by the Snapdragon S600. 

It should be available at the same price tag as the XiaoMi Mi 2S.

China has 591 millions Internet users, here are the details

We talked in our previous post about the rise of Chinese companies, but this growth is not the unique privilege of professionals, the people of China consumer more online content than ever.

Here are some facts about Chinese internet users : 50% are less than 30 years old, they spend a average time of 20.5 hours (from 18 the previous year), the value of online sales match the US market.

Everything is detailed in the following Infographic made by Go-Globe.com.


Infographic by- GO-Globe.com

Is this the first photo taken by a XiaoMi Mi 3 ?

A night-time photo of the XiaoMi office in Beijing just showed up on the web. It has allegedly taken by a XiaoMi Mi 3 and its new 13 MP Camera.
The new camera should top the Mi 2S' one, we heard that the new lens would get a focal length of 3.51 mm and a F.2.2 aperture.

If those rumors would revealed to be true, it would be in line with the general improvement : Snapdragon S800 (or/and a Tegra 4 SoC exclusive for China 4G LTE), 2 to 3 GB ram, 5 MP front facing camera and at least a 5 inch FHD display

If you are one of those people who like to guess from some photo shots, there were also 3 leaked photos of the Mi 3 itself (during night time too). Colors seem vibrant and fine so far.

Source : cnbeta

WeChat passed 100 millions users outside of China

WeChat is a instant messaging app which among others things allows to exchange voice messages. It is the leading messaging app topping Whatsapp.

One month and a half after signing Lionel Messi in July, WeChat made an official announcement about reaching 100 millions created accounts outside of China

The growth rate of the app is even more impressive for Tencent, the company owner of WeChat,. It is definitively getting faster, 3 months ago, the Chinese app only got 50 millions registered users overseas, this number has doubled over the summer.

While the main audience still resides in China with a whopping number of 300 millions accounts, Tencent wanted to turn their attention to a worldwide stage, working with Lionel Messi was its first big move towards that end.

WeChat represents the changes happened those last years in the technology field in China software wise and hardware wise. Sure, the majority of Chinese firms are only China center but when enterprises risked themselves to reach the world, it is not a joke anymore.
Now, nobody is laughing, the bad copies of hardware pieces made by Sony, Panasonic in the nineties are becoming a distant memory, fading away as new firms are rising : XiaoMi and WeChat are only the beginning of this trend.

XiaoMi 3rd Anniversary !

Happy Birthday XiaoMi !

We are actually a bit late since the company saw birth in 2010, on April but XiaoMi decided to celebrate their anniversary on August, 16th.

It is a real success story since the launch of the company, 7.2 millions units sold in 2012, 20 millions expected this year. Talk about growth, right ?

Here are some numbers to back up its success :
- 20 000 apps on Mi Store (their own app store) with 3.5 downloads daily and more than 500 millions downloads overall
- 3.5 millions themes downloads daily on their theme app
- 7.45 millions HongMi pre-order
- more than 7 millions Mi 2 / Mi 2S sold during the first semester

Xiaomi is celebrating their birthday throughout activities and events on their own store (reserved to China though).

PhonAsia is glad to be a small part of this success.

Meizu MX3 on September, 2nd ?

What this image could possibly mean from Meizu ?

From what we heard (rumors and leaks from officials), this should be the launching date of what can become the most fearless rival  of the next XiaoMi Mi 3, the Meizu MX3.

The latest rumors are quite impressive : Samsung octo-core chip, 2 GB Ram, from 32 to 128 GB internal storage, 13 MP Camera and the home rom, Flyme OS 3 running Android 4.2.
More surprisingly, the name MX might be dropped and the next Meizu's flagship could get a whole new name.

This is our latest leaked image and it is very detailed. It reveals a very classy smartphone with a unibody design, materials are still unknown at this point. But final dimensions might be already there 139.9 x 70.9 x 8 mm including a 5.1 inch Full HD display.

The date is also key, it is scheduled 3 days before the official presentation of the XiaoMi Mi 3 (on September, 5th).

It's Thursday : Weekly App Selection 03 by PhonAsia

Welcome to our weekly app selection 03.

Game of the week : 1941 Frozen Front (Free)

XiaoMi beats Samsung and takes the crown for the best flagship

In the latest reports charts spotted by TechCrunch, XiaoMi sold more Mi 2 and Mi 2S during the first semester than Samsung and its Galaxy S4.
The Chinese company reached the staggering number of 7.19 millions units topping every others smartphone out there. People were not wrong on betting on the Chinese brand since it offers the same power as the Samsung Galaxy S4 but at half the price.

XiaoMi will not stop there and is preparing to launch its alleged Purple Rice (Zi Mi) Tablet on August, 16th followed by the XiaoMi Mi 3 this fall.

Soon to be unveiled a XiaoMi HongMi Red Rice compatible with 3G WCDMA ?

The late HongMi disappointed a lot of people including you and us since it is not compatible with the worldwide 3G WCDMA network as we pointed out earlier in this post.

Well, we were not alone and a lot of Chinese firms, customers voiced their concern about switching to China Mobile as a carrier in order to enjoy a full plain experience from the budget phone, the HongMi.

The CEO of XiaoMi made an announcement towards a Red Rice WCDMA compatible but he did not give us any further details as to when such a device should be out.

Stay tuned on PhonAsia for more informations.

XiaoMi Mi 3 Final Specs ?

So far, we refused to comment any rumors about the XiaoMi 3 because they were so many of them but we received some very consistent rumors/leakages from internal sources about the (alleged) final specs of the next big thing :
- SoC : Snapdragon S800
- Full HD 5" Display made by Sharp
- 2 GB RAM
- 16 GB of internal Storage (there might be also a 32 GB version)
- 13 MP rear Camera
- High speed Wi-Fi compatibility up to 5 GHz frequency
- NFC

Official announcement date should be made on September, 6th.
There should also be a Tegra 4 version, but it will only compatible with the exclusive China Mobile 3G network, the TD-SCDMA.

The price tag should be the same as the Mi 2S one, less than USD 400 in our store.
Stay tuned on PhonAsia for more informations.

XiaoMi launched the MIUI ROM Porting contest

MIUI has lanched a huge constest since August, 1st. Constestants have to port MIUI V5 on MediaTek chip based devices and can begin to submit their work from September 16 to September 30.
After the submission phase, the selected roms will be distributed during the following month. During October, people and MIUI will rank roms and on November, 1st, winners will be proclaimed.

Here are how prizes will given to :

1. ROM Grand Prize (20 Winners): RMB 10,000 + Trophy + Certificate + Gift Pack

2. Merit Award (30 Winners): Mi2 S + Certificate +Gift Pack
    *Gift Pack includes: Xiaomi Earbud + MIUI Doll + MIUI Hoodie

3. Once a contestant’s work is accepted and released, he/she will become a member of the MIUI Porting Team and enjoy

    related rights. Rights of MIUI Porting Team

So, are you ready ?

XiaoMi sold its first 100 000 HongMi Red Rice phones batch in 90 seconds and even more

We told your earlier this month that XiaoMi partened up with China Mobile and QQ to make a special event offering the very first HongMi in China Soil on August, 12th.

Well, everything is already sold out in 90 seconds, I didn't have the time to breath, it was so fast.
But even more impressive, the pre-orders just reached 7.45 millions for the budget phone HongMi which forced XiaoMi to revisit its annual previsions, the Chinese Smartphone firm wants to sell 20 millions devices from the old expectations of 15 millions.

PhonAsia is glad to be part of such a ambitious project and still offer the HongMi for pre-orders in our shop.
Be careful about the 3G network which works only in China using the TD-SCDMA technology only available in China.

We tested Android Device Manager by Google

Basically, Android Device Manager allows you to locate, ring the phone and erase all your data (if you previously allowed it).

The new Google Service launched yesterday and it is working very well. Our first try was not that successulf as it failed to rang our Nexus 7 tablet but it worked flawlessly with our XiaoMi Mi 2S phone.
A few hours later, everything is working like a charm.
Our first critic concerns the localization feature. It works now accurately on our Nexus 7 without enabling the GPS but only approximatively on our Mi 2S without enabling the GPS first. Somehow, Google finds a way to use the GPS chip on the Nexus 7 (and maybe others Nexus devices) but uses only 2G/3G network (and maybe Wi-Fi) to locate your non Nexus device.

To activate the erasing function, you need to allow it. Just ask Google (on the device manager page) to send your the notification to guide to the right option to enable.
If you choose to erase your device (in case, you lost it), it'll take just a few minutes.

The service is linked to your gmail account (you need to log in first) and detect all the devices linked to it. It is much needed feature since all the major manufacturers are already offering it (XiaoMi, Apple, HTC, Samsung at least).

Disney is getting serious about China

So far, the American Company well known for its animation movies, has launched some devices in China but they were not even worth looking at until now.

The Disney Magic 1 came equipped with a MediaTek quad-core, a 4.5 inch HD display and a 8MP primary camera. The smartphone is running Android 4.2.1.

With those specs, Disney wants to fight against others mid range Android phones but the main issue is the price tag. It is not cheap and cost at least $320 while the XiaoMi HongMi more than $100 cheaper in our store

Precisions about the XiaoMi HongMi Red Rice 3G Network

These days, after receiving a lot of questions about whether the Red Rice might support Western 3G, we decided to make a post to explain this clearly.

The XiaoMi HongMi supports 3G only through the TD-SCDMA technology which is a mainly a chinese technology, so it is certain that the HongMi does not support western 3G network based on the WCDMA technology.

If you buy a XiaoMi hongMi, you will be able to only use the 2G Edge network.

It's Thursday : Weekly App Selection 02 by PhonAsia

Every Thursday, we are going to publish an app selection with a brief review.

First things first, let's begin with some games.

Game Selection

Rymdkapsel (3.59 €)

Will 2014 see a landslide of 4G Chinese Smartphones ?

China government will be issuing 4G licences this fall.

The largest world carrier in terms of customers, China Mobile has already started to experiment the TD-LTE network since April and will expand with a RMB +40 billion plan. China Mobile should have around 200 000 4G base stations by the end of 2013.

In all likeliness, the two remaining carriers, China Telecom and China Unicom won't be there on the starting line up since they have not committed to the 4G yet.

So it should not be a huge surprise if we happen to see every major manufacturers upgrading their flagships to support 4G frenquency next year.

Source : Sina

XiaoMi may be preparing a BIG 2013 Q4 : Purple Rice Tablet ?

XiaoMi just unveiled the Red Rice (HongMi) and while we are 9 days ago, there is already a leak photo about the alleged Purple Rice (Zi Mi) Tablet. 

Stay tuned on PhonAsia and our blog for more informations in the coming days.

XiaoMi's market share just passed Apple's in China

According to the latest report of Canalys, XiaoMi became the 6th overall phone manufacturer in China putting Apple to the 7th place during Q3 2013.

The lack of innovation from one of the top worldwide phone maker pushed the market from high end innovative devices to mid range budget phones like XiaoMi's (which offers a lot of user friendly options such as back up, friendly dialer and great software support). PhonAsia already felt that the market is changing and we talked about that one month ago in our article : Why buy Chinese smartphone and tablet ?.