Samsung had a tough year in 2018 as its midrange J-series simply couldn’t compete against the likes of Xiaomi, Asus, and Realme. However, recently, Samsung changed the strategy and announced a completely new series, the Galaxy M. The company launched the Galaxy M10 and Galaxy M20 in India. Samsung Nepal has also not been behindhand to launch these phones in Nepal as the company launched the Galaxy M10 (see the price here) last week and today the company has made the Galaxy M20 available to the Nepali audience for a great budget price.
Samsung Galaxy M20 Overview
The Galaxy M20 is offered in 3GB RAM and 32GB storage variant in Nepal. It comes with a 6.3-inch display with FULL HD+ resolution and a tiny notch on top. The company has included a dragontrail glass for protection against drops and scratches.
It is powered by a new Exynos 7904 Octa-core processor which should handle most of your tasks with a breeze, except for the high-end games. On our test, we found it to be comparable to Snapdragon 630 which means you can play high-end games like PUBG on low-end settings.
In terms of camera, there’s a dual-camera on the back which comprises of a 13MP primary lens and a 5MP wide-angle lens. There’s an 8MP front camera on the front. On our test, we found both the front and back camera to be “good enough”, nothing extraordinary though.
What we found extraordinary is the big 5000mAh battery. It’s easily one of the best battery life smartphones we have tested so far. It should last you for 2 days if you are a moderate user. Samsung has also included 15W fast charging and USB Type C port.
Battery: 5000mAh with fast charging support (15W fast charging, takes 2 hours and 15 minutes for full charge)
Price: Rs. 17,490 (3+32)
Samsung Galaxy M20 Price in Nepal & Availability
Samsung has launched the Galaxy M20 aggressively in Nepal and carries a price tag of just Rs. 17,490. This makes the Galaxy M20 unbeatable at this price tag, at least for now. So, what do you think of the Galaxy M20? Do you think its the best smartphone under Rs. 20,000 in Nepal? Would you recommend someone? Let us know in the comments below.
DxOMark scores have been in the hype lately, a set in stone benchmark with its fair share of controversies. Just yesterday, the newly released Samsung Galaxy S10+ made a visit to the DxOMark lab. Managing to secure a score of 109 points, although not the highest, is still impressive as it is. So, with a total of five cameras, three at the back and two at the front, let’s look at how the Samsung flagship faired.
Samsung Galaxy S10+ Front Camera
10 MP, f/1.9, 26mm (wide), Dual Pixel PDAF
8 MP, f/2.2, 22mm (wide), depth sensor
Up to 2160p@30fps video recording
Starting off with a front camera score of 96, a new highest. DxOMark states the selfie camera captures good skin color, are natural, pleasant, has a fairly wide dynamic range, and manages to contain noise very well. It has also improved over its predecessor by a margin, mostly thanks to the secondary depth sensor which has improved portrait selfies a lot. Take a look at the scores it received in individual categories.
Samsung Galaxy S10+ Rear Camera
Primary: 12Mp sensor with 1.4µm pixels and 26mm-equivalent, f/1.5–2.4 aperture lens, Dual-Pixel AF, OIS
Ultra-wide: 16Mp sensor 1.0µm pixels and 13mm-equivalent, f/2.4-aperture lens
Telephoto: 12Mp sensor with 1.0µm pixels and 52mm-equivalent, f/2.4 aperture lens, PDAF, OIS
Up to 2160p/60fps video recording
As for the rear camera, it scored 109 points, tieing it up with the Huawei P20 Pro and the Mate 20 Pro. The camera does especially well in exposure, color and bokeh category. The tests also reveal the S10+ is capable of “outstanding dynamic range”, pleasant colors and good exposure. Although, they also state that the testing did not include it’s ultrawide camera’s capabilities. Take a look at the score sheet below:
Conclusion
These are obviously great scores, but still, fall short in comparison to the Huawei P20 Pro or the Mate 20 Pro and those are already aging at this point. Again, the S10+ does offer an all-rounder camera performance, safe to say it’s a complete package that no other smartphone offers right now. But in the end, you also need to consider if DxOMark scores are a viable way of judging a smartphone camera, and a huge chunk of people disagree.
It has not been very long that the Samsung Galaxy Watch launched. And now, we have another one, the Samsung Galaxy Watch Active! Sure, it is more of a fitness tracker that also acts as a smartwatch. But all of these many products can be confusing and overwhelming. Plus, there are also two Fitness trackers now!
Samsung Galaxy Watch Active
The Samsung Galaxy Watch Active comes in a smaller form factor at 40 mm. It is protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 3, so, it’s definitely meant for the active ones. It has IP68 Water and Dust Resistance and is water-proof up to 5 ATM or 50 meters.
The watch packs a 360 x 360 circular display, weighs only 25 grams and has wireless charging. It only has a 230 mAh of battery, but with S10 supporting reverse wireless charging, you can charge it on your phone as well! However, the rotating bezels we loved so much on the Galaxy Watch is now no longer here. Also, it can’t do all that the Galaxy Watch can do. After all, it costs $200 whereas the Galaxy Watch cost quite a lot more. It runs on Tizen OS 4.0, has 768 MB of RAM and 4 GB storage, very similar to the Galaxy Watch.
The most important feature on this one has to be the new Heart Rate Monitor, which can now, also measure your blood pressure. It also offers Sleep Tracking, Fitness Tracking, various exercises, and overall health tracking. This watch can also detect up to 6 workout activities automatically, which is nice. But users will be able to engage in about 39 activities on it. It will cost $199 when it launches on March 8th.
Samsung Galaxy Fit
This is more of a FitBit from Samsung rather than a smartwatch. It also has rectangular screens like a traditional Fitbit. The Galaxy Fit features a 0.95″ AMOLED touchscreen with 120 x 240 resolution. It runs on the Realtime OS and shares many fitness features with the Samsung Galaxy Active – like the automatic workout detection and heart rate monitor. However, this is built to be tougher – with STD 810G Military Grade durability certification. And this one is also 5 ATM water resistant. In addition, this also supports iOS.
There’s NFC connectivity as well and connects to your watch via BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy) as this one will have a smaller 120 mAh battery. Availability and pricing are not yet known for this.
Samsung Galaxy Fit E
This is nothing new, but a stripped down version of the Samsung Galaxy Fit. It comes with a smaller 0.74″ PMOLED (Passive Matrix OLED) display. It also packs a smaller 70 mAh battery and connects via BLE. Running on Real-time OS, too, the features in it are more or less the same as the Galaxy Fit too. Pricing on this one is also not known.
Vivo stayed low in the smartphone business for most of its time. Staying the midrange territory, the smartphone maker has quite satisfied its customers. And Vivo’s V-series and Y-series smartphones are here to tell all the tales. Now the Chinese tech titan seems to be pushing its limits. With under-display fingerprint sensor on the Vivo X21 UD, pop-up selfie camera on the Vivo Nex and the hole-less design on the Vivo APEX 2019, Vivo has garnered tons of applauds. And continuing with that innovative and winning spirits, Vivo has planned to drop a capable smartphone really soon. And Vivo iQOO is the phone, which seems to carry all the capable internals to place itself on the category of gaming phones.
Vivo iQOO smartphone
Most of the Chinese smartphone companies have a sub-brand. Huawei has the Honor, Oppo has the Realme, and Xiaomi has the Pocophone and Redmi. Vivo has also planned to expand its business implementing the same strategy. And for that, the company recently announced its sub-brand IQOO. Vivo is yet to launch a smartphone under the sub-brand iQOO. But we shouldn’t have to wait too long for that. Vivo recently announced to launch an iQOO smartphone on March 1. And going by the specifications, the handset looks quite like a performer.
On the recent post on Weibo, Vivo teased the iQOO smartphone with the tagline “Monster Inside”. And this “Monster” will feature Snapdragon 855 chipset and a whopping 12GB of RAM. On the storage side, the phone will get 256GB of onboard memory. A chunk of specs spilled also mentioned that the phone would come with 4000mAh battery. With this setup, the handset undoubtedly cues to be of gaming genre. We have seen such configuration with a powerful processor, tons of RAM, and massive batteries on the phones like Xiaomi Black Shark, ASUS ROG phone, and Razer Phone 2. So we can expect the same with the Vivo iQOO smartphone.
Other than that, the phone may get the 44-watt fast charging, which probably would go by the name of FlashCharge. If it comes true, the FlashCharge would be the second fastest charging standard lagging just behind the Oppo’s Super VOOC charging technology.
On the optics front, the phone should be getting triple camera setup at the back. Although nothing has been mentioned about the front camera, it may feature the pop-up style camera which we recently saw on the Vivo V15 Pro. The Vivo iQOO is also said to come with an under-display fingerprint sensor. It cues that the display on the device will be of Super AMOLED type.
Following the MI 9 launch, Xiaomi also threw in a particularly unique smartphone, the MI 9 SE. The SE stands for Special Edition, and given its price tag and features on offer, so we won’t argue with that. The phone also comes with most of the features from it’s bigger brother. Although this one flexes the world’s first Snapdragon 712chipset.
Qualcomm Snapdragon 712 Chipset
So, the Snapdragon 712 makes its first appearance in the wild. Based on a 10nm process, the SoC gets eight Kryo 360 cores clocked at 2.3GHz. The chipset comes with the Adreno 616 GPU, scoring 32fps on Manhattan Offscreen GFXBench 3.0. This is overall an incremental upgrade over the SD710, an already capable processor by default.
Internals
Furthermore, you get 6GB of RAM to go with the chipset. Storage options include either 64GB or 128GB, but remember, it is unexpandable. Battery size comes in at 3070mAh, with 18W fast charging support over USB-C. On the software side, the phone runs on Android 9.0 Pie with MIUI 10 on top.
Yes, this comes with an AMOLED display, like the last time, but the size of the display and it’s aspect ratio has gone up. It now comes with a 5.97-inch 19.5:9 AMOLED display with resolutions of 1080 x 2340px. The display also houses a fingerprint sensor, is protected by Gorilla Glass 5 and supports HDR 10 content.
Camera
Xiaomi treated this phone with triple cameras. It’s a 48MP f/1.8 primary camera aided by a 13MP f/2.4 ultrawide sensor and an 8MP f/2.4 telephoto lens. The one aspect this Special Edition Mi 9 misses out on is 4k@60fps video capture capability. At the front, that notch houses a 20MP f/2.0 selfie shooter, which can capture videos at 1080p@30fps max.
Pricing starts at CNY 1,999 (approx $300) for the 6GB/64GB variant. There is another version of the Xiaomi MI 9 SE with 6GB/128GB configuration priced at CNY 2,299 (approx $340). Availability should start around the month of March, while the phone will come with Violet, Blue and Gray color options.
JEDEC (Joint Electron Device Engineering Council), the Solid State Technology Association recently announced the new LPDDR RAM standard: namely known as the LPDDR5 RAM standard. This new standard promises faster data transfer, better power management, and improved efficiency over its predecessor.
LPDDR5 RAM Modules Overview
The LPDDR4 standard has been in the business for around four years now. Although it was well-remarked for its speed and capabilities, the new one now has much better things to offer. The data rate on this new generation of RAM has received an improvement of 50%. This enhancement will also boost the performance of the next generation of portable electronics devices to a whole new level. The new RAM also promises improvements in capabilities of the mobile devices.
Other than that, the LPDDR5 RAM progresses on the throughput side. The LPDDR5 has a throughput of 6400 MT/s, which is a significant leap from the 3200 MT/s found on the LPDDR4. This advancement will considerably boost memory speed and efficiency for a variety of applications including mobile computing devices.
To achieve such an impressive result, the LPDDR5 RAM received an overhaul in architecture. It now features 16 Banks programmable architecture and multi-clocking architecture.
Other notable inclusion on it is the Data-Copy and Write-X features. Both of these features promise to make the device more efficient in terms of power.
According to Business Wire, “The Data-Copy command instructs the LPDDR5 device to copy data transmitted on a single I/O pin to the other I/O pins. This eliminates the need to transmit data to the other pins. The Write-X command instructs the device to write all-ones or all-zeros to a specific address. This eliminates the need to send data from the SoC to the LPDDR5 device.”
With such features, the LPDDR5 RAM modules sound amazing. But although it sounds promising when peeked into its feature list, we should really have to use LPDDR5 equipped device to truly feel the performance boost.
Talking about the pricing, it’s now available for JEDEC’s official website at a solid price of $355.
The event that gave us the S10 lineup also included a few other devices and one of them was the Samsung Galaxy Buds. These earbuds come with Bixby assistant, charge wirelessly, are tuned by AKG and come with noise filter. They also look a lot better and are cheaper than Apple’s AirPods.
Battery Life
Being a wireless earbud, the first thing one asks about is battery life. The Galaxy Buds run for around 5 hours of talk and 6 hours of music playback. The case adds another 7 hours of music playback and 6 hours of talk to these buds. These numbers are pretty much the best in business, and you get wireless charging.
Charging
And yes, they can be charged through Samsung’s reverse wireless charging feature on the new S10 smartphones. This delivers 5W of charging, so the total time for the battery to from nill to full would be around 1 hour. Alternatively, the cases itself come with a USB-C port, so you can also do it the old fashion way.
The buds itself offer better quality sounds, with more focus on music experience rather than fitness. Personally tuned by AKG (the first wireless earphones from Samsung to be tuned by AKG), we are bound to expect more. Further aided by dual microphones for enhanced noise filter during calls.
Connectivity
As with premium wireless earbuds, this one also comes with Bluetooth 5. Now, they will work with any Bluetooth enabled phone, but Samsung also says it will work seamlessly with non-Samsung wearables. Samsung also introduced “Connect Shift”, a between device connection feature to swap the earbuds between a watch and a phone.
Now the Bixby assistant lets go of the fitness-focused features on this one, but it still gets its fair share of Bixbyness. It’s on by default, let’s you control your phone through voice commands. Tasks like making calls, check the battery, send texts to name a few. But you do have the option to choose from whichever assistant fits you best.
Hardware
The buds get tap sensitive spots for input, although Samsung didn’t specify much on this part. The buds itself is 30% smaller than the Gear Icon X, and the case comes with an in-built battery that can later charge the buds. Color options include the usual Black and White, alongside a striking Yellow alternative.
Pricing and Availability
Samsung is giving away Galaxy Buds to those who pre-order any one of the Galaxy S10 models until March 8. If you wanna buy it without spends on an S10, the earbuds will cost you $130. So, compared to AirPods, of which we are waiting for the second generation, the Samsung Galaxy Buds are cheaper, better and last longer.
It’s here people, it’s here! Samsung’s long-rumored, long- tested, long- conceptualized foldable phone is finally here. And we also have a name to it, Samsung Fold! It’s been seen along with the latest S- series smartphones today and as fancy as it looks, it will be sold as a premium smartphone. In terms of availability, the device will be launched on March 26th this year with a massive price tag of $1980. Wow, now that is a lot of money!
Let’s talk specs now. The device has a huge 7.3- inch Infinity Flex Display. The main display, the unfolded one, has a QXGA+ resolution (4.2:3) and when the display is folded, the smaller one has a 4.6- inch HD+ (12:9) display. The Infinity Flex display makes the phone to have a huge screen that can be folded to fit in your pocket.
Having an over flagship price, this one packs the Snapdragon 855 chipset that is built in a 7nm architecture and has a total of 12 GB RAM and 512 GB of storage. The storage provided here is a UFS 3.0 (eUFS) that aids faster speeds.
Battery wise, it’s not just one inside, but two! The two batteries are separated by the fold but are combined in the Android operating system. So, altogether, the battery is 4,380 mAh.
At the rear of the device, there are three cameras, a 12 MP wide-angle lens, a 16 MP ultra wide lens and a 12 MP telephoto lens along with a 10 MP cover camera for selfies.
So, the huge screen allows for a three app multitasking at once that is being made possible by using an app continuity system to adjust three apps when you move between tablet and phone modes. Similarly, many apps, including popular ones like Youtube, Whatsapp, etc have been made optimized for the new display type and word id, Samsung is working closely with Google to ensure that the Galaxy Fold display supports Android 9 Pie.
Samsung, with the Galaxy Fold, has made sure that the back of the phone is sturdy enough to support all the folding and unfolding. It has a hinge system that has multiple gears that allow the device to transform from phone to tablet and vice-versa.
Yes, it’s nice to see Samsung finally bring out something that it has been trying for so long. However, it’s not just them doing it. Xiaomi has also very recently revealed a foldable smartphone. Similarly, LG has brought foldable OLED TVs. But, we can always look for Samsung and other phone manufacturers to bring more of these in the near future.
After months of leaks, renders and speculations, Samsung have finally launched its first flagship series for 2019, the Samsung Galaxy S10. The phone has been garnering a lot of attention for all the right reasons, and there are a lot of features to be excited about in this year’s Galaxy S10.
Alongside the four new variants of the Galaxy S10, the Korean Giant also showed off the Galaxy Fold, which will go on sale this April 26 for the price of $1,980, and the Galaxy Buds, the company’s new wireless earbuds. Samsung also took the stage to announce the newer variant of the Galaxy watch that can measure blood pressure.
Samsung has focused on a few new features for the Galaxy S10 this year. There’s a new under-display fingerprint scanner, the phones have ditched bottom and top bezels, the camera has received a revamp, and there are lots of other extra features in place.
Samsung Galaxy S10 Series Overview
Display
Samsung makes the best displays, and this time, it’s no different with the new Dynamic AMOLED panel. The company had been taunting other companies for opting for notches, while they stayed traditional with little bezels on the top and bottom. However, this time around the Samsung Galaxy S10 sports the Infinity-O display that has a display hole on the top-right corner of the device. This is certainly a plus as it doesn’t pop-out like other notches. However, it only covers a small area of the display, so, there is no room for the Iris Scanner.
Camera
The cameras on the Galaxy S10 have also received few new add-ons this time. There is an ultra-wide camera on the Galaxy S10, S10 Plus, and the Galaxy S10 5G model. Also, the latter will also have 3D depth cameras on the front and back for Augmented Reality (AR).
Fingerprint
In-display fingerprint scanners have been around for a while now. Samsung has taken that to the next level with its ultrasonic fingerprint sensor. While the traditional in-display sensors use excessive light to read fingerprints, the one on the Galaxy S10 will use little-to-none and will also be able to unlock the phone without waking up the display.
Extras
For extras, there are a couple of things to talk about. The Samsung Galaxy S10 will be able to reverse-charge other devices wirelessly like the Huawei Mate 20 Pro. The new devices will be loaded with One UI out of the box. And you can apparently remap that infamous Bixby button this time. So, it will be interesting to see how the phones work in real life usage.
The Phones
The four new smartphones have been targeted towards different consumers. Like Apple came up with the iPhone XR alongside the iPhone XS and XS Max, Samsung has released the cheapest phone of the S10-series, the Galaxy S10E. Just Like the previous years, there are two variants, the normal one and the Plus one. And like I mentioned before, there is also a 5G model which will be officially available in the near future.
Samsung Galaxy S10E
The cheapest of the bunch, the Galaxy S10E is Samsung’s answer to the iPhone XR. This smartphone has donned a 5.8-inch Full HD+ Dynamic AMOLED display with a single 10-megapixel selfie camera cutout on the top. It has dual cameras on the back with the secondary lens working as an ultra-wide camera. The Galaxy S10E powered by the Exynos 9820 will be available a few Asian countries (including Nepal), and in other regions, Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 will power the phone. The processor is aided by 6 GB and 8GB RAM. The Galaxy S10E offers 128 GB and 256 GB storage with an option to expand via a microSD card. There is a 3,100 mAh battery backing up the device. Unlike its siblings, this model does not feature the new in-display fingerprint scanner as it has a side-mounted fingerprint sensor.
Samsung Galaxy S10E Specifications
Display: 5.8-inch Dynamic AMOLED Full HD+ Infinity-O display, HDR10+
The Samsung Galaxy S10 and S10 Plus are the successors to last year’s Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus. The Galaxy S10 and S10 Plus come with a 6.1-inch and 6.4-inch Dynamic AMOLED display with Quad HD resolution. There is a single selfie camera on the Galaxy S10 while the S10 Plus has dual lenses with the second lens working as a depth sensor.
Unlike the Galaxy S10E, these two devices feature triple cameras on the rear. There is a 12-megapixel primary lens, a 12-megapixel telephoto camera, and a 16-megapixel ultra-wide lens. The devices are powered by the same processor the Galaxy S10E is, with 8 GB and 12 GB RAM variants available for use, according to the models.
For storage purpose, the Galaxy S10 comes with 128 GB and 512 GB versions with the Galaxy S10 Plus featuring 512 GB and 1 TB memory. And all of this is expandable as well. The Galaxy S10 and S10 Plus run on Android v9 Pie with One UI on top. The regular model has 3,400 mAh battery whereas the Plus model comes with a larger 4,100 mAh battery.
Samsung hasn’t really revealed much about the Samsung Galaxy S10 5G. However, we do know a few specifications the phone will carry. The Galaxy S10 5G will sport large 6.7-inch Quad HD Dynamic AMOLED display which is coupled with a large 4,500 mAh battery. It will exclusively launch in the Verizon network before T-Mobile, AT&T, and Sprint release it in the second quarter. It will be powered by the same internal like its siblings with 8 GB RAM and 256 GB storage.
The cheapest device unveiled today, the Samsung Galaxy S10E’s pricing starts at $749.99. The Galaxy S10 will go on sale for $899.99 while the Galaxy S10 Plus will cost $999.99 for the respective base models. We are yet unknown about the pricing of the Galaxy S10 5G but expect it to be high due to the 5G support.
We have the Realme 1 and the Realme 2, so what’s next? Well, if 1+2 is 3 then the next phone from OPPO’s spinoff brand will be the Realme 3. Further reports confirm the tweet, claiming the phone will launch early March in India. Take a look at the official tweet from Realme below:
Jumping into the specs, well we have none to share with you. The rumor mill has been a bit on the quiet side with this smartphone. But with the launch date approaching soon, leaks should start to surface soon enough. What we can say for sure, for the time being, there is a Realme 3, and it’s launching soon.
The phone will debut in India, which seems to be the prime target for most smartphone manufacturers. With the growing economy, gigantic population, and an unquenched thirst of “value for money” smartphone, why not.
As for Realme’s presence in Nepal, they currently have two phones up for sale over here. Those being the Realme C1, posing a great value for money, alongside the Realme 2 Pro, a performer with a great set of cameras. Pricing of both smartphones are perfect and are easily two of the best options out here.
Their international presence has also been a pretty great one. With outstanding pricing, great specs, and decent cameras, it’s no wonder they sold over four million smartphones in just seven months. The Realme 3 is also expected to hit the market with the same level of price to performance ratio while adding something new to the table. A 48MP rear camera perhaps?
