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HTC shows off 6 new devices at the Mobile World Congress
HTC has unveiled a slew of new devices at the Mobile World Congress today and while none of them are as attention grabbing as the dual-core Samsung Galaxy S 2 or the Galaxy Tab 10.1, they look like they can hold their own ground, especially HTC’s debut tablet, the HTC Flyer. The HTC Flyer is a 7″ Android tablet that runs on Android 2.4 (surprise!) instead of Android 3.0 that we’ve come to expect from tablets this year. HTC has decided to focus on improving the tablet experience through the use of HTC Sense for tablets and features such as HTC Scribe and OnLive gaming support. Head here to read more about the tablet and here for some video footage of it in action.
In addition to their tablet, HTC introduced a whole bunch of new phones. Three of them being successors (refreshes?) of their popular phones – the HTC Wildfire S, HTC Desire S and HTC Incredible S. Although the phones don’t innovate much from their previous models, the phones will all ship with Android 2.4 (Gingerbread) and HTC Sense to enhance the user interface and experience and most importantly ensure that consumers don’t have to worry so much about not having the latest version of Android (at least for awhile). Head over to our sister site Ubergizmo for the lowdown on the HTC Wildfire S, HTC Desire S and HTC Incredible S.
Last but not least, all the previous rumors about the HTC “Facebook phones”? Turns out to be the truth after all. HTC has announced the HTC ChaCha and HTC Salsa – Android phones that feature a context-sensitive Facebook button that allows users to share whatever they are doing on the world’s most popular social network with the press of a button. For example if you’ve just taken a photograph and you would like to share it on your profile, all you have to do is hit the Facebook button and viola, your photograph will be uploaded onto your Facebook page immediately. It doesn’t get any simpler than this, but is it necessary? Head here for more details about the HTC ChaCha and HTC Salsa.
The Fairphone 2 was first unveiled in June earlier this year, where this particular handset carried a modular design while featuring majority of its components that have been sourced from conflict-free mines. It seems that this particular handset that you can purchase with a clear conscience has begun to ship to those who happen to live across Europe.
Fairphone announced in a blog post, “It’s been almost two years in the making, and some of the earliest buyers have been patiently waiting since July to receive their new phones. As community manager, I want to personally welcome the new batch of Fairphone owners to our community.” The initial 1,000 units are tipped to ship this month, before the other pre-orders follow in January 2016.
In terms of hardware specifications, the Fairphone 2 will run on a Snapdragon 801 chipset, has a 5″ 1080p screen with Gorilla Glass 3 protection, 2GB of RAM, an 8MP camera, with Android 5.1 Lollipop in tow. It will be a dual SIM capable handset with a microSD memory card slot and plays nice with 4G LTE networks, retailing for approximately €525 a pop.
It looks like the upcoming flagship model from Xiaomi will feature NFC support, at least based on a document that was released by China UnionPay. Just in case you are scratching your head and wondering who China UnionPay is, they happen to be the only domestic payment gateway supplier and card organization, and hence, to see them offer detailed support concerning the newly released NFC-based payment system points to the very real possibility of the upcoming Xiaomi Mi 5 featuring NFC capability.
After all, the Xiaomi Mi 3 was also mentioned on the list, which so happens to feature NFC, and there is no mention of the Xiaomi Mi 4 which does not come with NFC. Still, such a new payment system would be the ideal tool to see the reintroduction of NFC to the flagship model.
OnePlus did make an announcement in the previous month that the Ceramic variant of the OnePlus X will be released on November 24. True to their word, they did exactly that – although only a pitiful number of units were made available, and not only that, this was through a charity auction. Thankfully for the rest of the masses who are on the lookout for this device, it has gone on sale officially already.
Needless to say, this particular variant is available only by an invitation, although do bear in mind that standard OnePlus X invites are not good here – you will still need to snag yourself a specific Ceramic variant invite before you make a purchase. OnePlus is also on the lookout to offer additional methods of picking up this smartphone, although no further details were revealed.
The OnePlus X Ceramic will be available only in select markets, where among them include Europe, India, and Hong Kong. To date, we do know that OnePlus had made only 10,000 units of the handset available. A case of the early bird getting the proverbial worm here?