With this year’s IFA trade show in Berlin is reaching its end, there have been a lot of talking points for several tech giants who announced their new hardware during summer’s biggest consumer electronics show. While 2018 didn’t bring the most exciting of tech lineup, there were a bunch that caught our eyes and here is a list of things we thought you might not want to miss out on.
HTC U12 Life
Nobody expected it and HTC capitalised on the surprise factor by revealing the U12 Life, a dual-tone finish on the ‘acrylic glass’ unibody, designed to look like a fancier Google Pixel but with more grip. The mid-tier smartphone came powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 636 processor with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of internal storage. It also packs a dual camera setup at the back with a 16MP + 5MP sensor while the front facing camera only equips a single 13MP lens, all of which employs a f/2.0 aperture. The HTC U12 Life comes in Twilight Purple and Moonlight Blue colour versions and will be retailed for an asking price of £300 (approx. Rs 27,620).
Sony Xperia XZ3
One thing that we expected from Sony was its new Xperia flagship and the company announced the Xperia XZ3 during its keynote with a 6-inch (1440 x 2880 pixels) OLED HDR panel. Remember when Sony said we don’t need UHD displays on a smartphone? Guess who forgot their principles. The handset is powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 with Adreno 630 GPU, 4GB RAM and 64GB of onboard storage. For the camera, it comes with a single 19MP rear camera with Exmos RS sensor, 1/2.μm, f/2.0 Aperture G Lens, 1.22μm pixel size, Predictive capture, 5-axis stabilization. The front-facing sensor is a 13MP camera with 1/ 3,06” Exmor RS sensor, 23mm wide-angle, f/2.0 aperture. It’s priced at £699 (approx. Rs 63,745) and will be available for sale globally in select markets from September. Camera good, the design is the same and if not for the flagship specs, the phone will be as irrelevant as Xperia is on the smartphone market. Oops!
BlackBerry KEY 2 LE
As was expected, BlackBerry revealed the stripped down version of its already mid-tier BlackBerry KEY2 smartphone which was launch in July. The KEY2 LE as it’s called comes with a starting price tag of $399 (approx. Rs 28,320) running the less-powerful Snapdragon 636 processor with Adreno 509 GPU. Focused primarily for privacy-minded consumers, the KEY2 LE comes with BlackBerry’s Privacy Shade and DTEK for controlling App permissions and personal data. The KEY2 LE has a dual rear camera of 13-megapixel primary sensor with f/2.2 aperture, dual-tone LED Flash and a 5-megapixel secondary rear camera with f/2.4 aperture. Great for business users who wouldn’t want to spend another Rs 10,000 to get their hands on the original KEY2. (laughs)
Motorola One / One Power
Another trade show. Another Motorola phone. And there’s the notch saying “Hello Moto” for the first time. Motorola released the One and One Power smartphones during the Berlin event, both mid-range smartphone with different chipsets, similar designs and that dreaded notch on the front. Why Motorola? While the One Power gets its strength from the Snapdragon 636, the cheaper Motorola One gets the almost three-year-old Snapdragon 625 chip. The main take on the two devices is that they’ll be covered under the Android One initiative and Motorola has promised Android Q and three years of security updates. The Motorola One will come at an asking price of 299 euros (approx. Rs 24,700) with the Motorola One Power yet to be priced.
Dell Inspiron 7000
The new Inspiron 7000 comes in a 2-in-1 laptop-tablet machined aluminium form factor with up to 17-inch or pure UHD Resolution and minimal bezels on all sides. The notebook features the latest Whiskey-Lake processors from Intel with up to 16GB RAM. What’s new is the integration of Alexa Voice commands for delivering your reminders, memos, lists, alarms and manage your appointments while playing your music at the same time. The Inspiron 7000 will start at an upwards of $880 (approx. Rs 62,100) to up to $1,250 (approx. Rs 88,250).
Acer Predator Triton 900 gaming laptop
A little experimenting and several hiccups later, we have the Acer Predator Triton 900 which is a gaming laptop but don’t be fooled around by ‘laptop’. The Triton 900 doesn’t behave like a conventional portable PC and can be used in such a way that its UHD panel on the front can be flipped around without flipping the entire laptop. If that wouldn’t turn your head, there’s the full-sized backlit mechanical keyboard, a switchable trackpad that can be used as a numpad and also Aeroblade 3D fans for cooling down the bulky laptop.
Acer Swift 7 ultrabook
Acer has also introduced the world’s thinnest Swift 7 laptop with a bezel-less display that spans for a screen-to-body ratio of 92 percent. Weighing in at just under 1kg, the ultrabook comes with a 14-inch display tucked under a magnesium material. The bezels around the display amount to a maximum of 4.27mm on the thickest side and the same can be said about the overall thickness of the laptop which takes up 0.35-inch.
Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme
Aimed toward professionals, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme will be able to be configured with the latest 8th generation Intel Core i9processors, NVIDIA’s GeForce 1050Ti graphics, up to 64GB of RAM and dual PCIe SSD storage. The premium laptop will come with a 15.6-inch screen that can be bought with a 4K resolution for immersive gaming and video editing experience. The laptop will be compatible with Windows Mixed Reality Ultra and all of this held inside a carbon fibre + aluminium allow sandwich for shock resistance and heat dissipation. The ThinkPad X1 Extreme will be available from September starting at $1859 (approx. Rs 1,31,500).
Asus ZenBook Pro 15
The newest ZenBook Pro 15 from Asus comes with the all-new ScreenPad technology, which turns the touchpad into a second screen with a host of interesting features and shortcuts to different apps. Apart from that, there’s a 15-inch NanoEdge Full HD display with ErgoLift hinge, fast face login and Alexa voice support. The laptop can be powered to up to 8th generation Intel Core i7-8565U processor coupled with NVIDIA GeForce GTX1050 Max-Q GPU.