Oppo has become the best-selling smartphone brand in China for the first time ever, according to figures from Counterpoint Research. Counterpoint’s report says that Oppo managed to capture 21 percent of the world’s biggest smartphone market in January, ahead of Vivo and Huawei, which both achieved 20 percent. Apple and Xiaomi rounded out the top five with 16 percent apiece.
Oppo’s sales were up 26 percent year on year and increased 33 percent from the previous month. Counterpoint says that the new Reno 5 series had a successful launch due to offering better specs at a lower price point than the earlier Reno 4.
But for Oppo to gain market share, someone has to lose it, and the report shows that Huawei’s smartphone troubles are taking hold in China too. Counterpoint says Huawei has increased its focus on the premium market because of component shortages caused by US sanctions, so Chinese distributors have been focusing on other brands for volume. Huawei’s sale of Honor, which was also sparked by sanctions, will cut its market share down further, with Honor now considered a competitor as opposed to an asset.
These figures are just for one month, but Counterpoint expects Huawei’s share of the market to continue its decline throughout 2021. Oppo will look to capitalize on the opportunity with the launch of its latest flagship phone, the Find X3 Pro, which is being announced in full on Thursday. If you want an early look, the company just tweeted a teaser that doesn’t leave a whole lot to the imagination.
Oppo introduced the Oppo Band back in June 2020, and nine months later, the wearable finally will escape the domestic scene. Its first overseas market will be India, with a launch scheduled for Monday, March 8 and the name is slightly changed – it will now be called Oppo Band Style.
The wearable comes in two variants – one with a simple TPU wrist band and a more fashionable option with a metal ring.
The Oppo Band Style has 12 exercise modes, including one for long-distance runners – a specific group of athletes that rarely gets recognition in the world of affordable wearables. There is also a continuous heart rate monitor and SpO2 tracking – Oppo claims the Band can make a measurement every second for eight hours straight.
Oppo Band Style
The band’s typical battery life is 14 days, with 1.5 hours charging time after the two-week period. The wearable in China has NFC, but Oppo India said nothing about this type of connectivity in a press release about the launch date. Another unknown is the price – in China, it costs the equivalent of $30/€27, so it should be no more than INR2,500.
Oppo has teased a new wireless charging solution that works when a phone is up to 10 cm (3.9 inches) away from a charging pad. The company has shown off its Wireless Air Charging tech in a 30-second clip on its Weibo page to coincide with MWC Shanghai. The clip shows the Oppo X 2021 rollable concept phone, announced in November, charging above the pad, even when held at an angle. The technology offers charging speeds of up to 7.5W, Oppo says.
The Chinese manufacturer is the latest to announce a truly wireless air charging solution, following Xiaomi and Motorola’s teases from earlier this year. Back in January, Xiaomi announced Mi Air Charge Technology, which it says can charge multiple devices at 5W “within a radius of several meters.” The next day, XDA-Developers reported on a demonstration from Motorola which showed one of its phones charging 100 cm (40 inches) away from a charger.
At 10 cm, the range of Oppo’s technology is more limited than Xiaomi’s competitor, Android Authority notes. The video’s presenter makes a very deliberate effort to hold the phone directly above the charging mat. However, the charging is shown working even when the phone is slightly tilted above the wireless charger, and while playing back a video.
Distinctions like this are academic right now since none of these technologies have been released in commercial products. Xiaomi has confirmed its technology won’t be ready to release this year, and the rollable phone that Oppo used for its demonstration also doesn’t have an official release date.
As well as developing wireless chargers that work over longer distances, manufacturers are also working to make standard wireless charging faster. Xiaomi is developing an 80W wireless charging solution, which it announced just months after Oppo revealed its own 65W wireless charging tech.
Update February 23rd, 6:53AM ET: Updated with official name of charging solution, and more details.
Images of the unannounced Oppo Find X3 Neo have leaked again, this time giving us our best look yet at the third phone in Oppo’s upcoming Find X3 phone lineup, NieuweMobiel.nl reports. As tipster Evan Blass has subsequently pointed out, the handset appears to be a rebranded version of Oppo’s Reno5 Pro Plus 5G. The phone is expected to be announced next month alongside the Find X3 Pro and Find X3 Lite.
Since the Find X3 Neo is based on an existing phone, we already have a pretty good idea of what its specs might be. These include a Snapdragon 865 processor, 4,500mAh battery with 65W fast charging, and a 6.55-inch 90Hz OLED display. Around back there are four cameras: a 50-megapixel wide-angle camera, a 13-megapixel telephoto, a 16-megapixel ultrawide, and a 2-megapixel macro.
The Find X3 Pro, meanwhile, appears to be an all-new device. Blass detailed many of its features in a post on Voice last December, noting that it’ll be powered by a Snapdragon 888 processor and will have a 6.7-inch 1440p display with a dynamic refresh rate that goes up to 120Hz. It also has a 4,500mAh battery with support for 65W fast charging, but it’ll also be able to wirelessly charge at up to 30W.
The Find X3 Pro’s cameras are particularly interesting. It’s reportedly got a pair of 50-megapixel sensors — one wide-angle and one ultrawide — as well as a 13-megapixel camera with a 2x optical zoom and a 3-megapixel macro camera. According to Blass, this macro camera could offer a 25x zoom, allowing it to work like a microscope. Check out more images of the upcoming phone over on Voice.
The Oppo Find X3 Lite.Image: Evan Blass / Voice
Finally there’s the Find X3 Lite, which Blass notes appears to be a rebranded Oppo Reno5 5G. That means it’s likely to have a 6.43-inch 90Hz OLED display and four rear cameras: a 64-megapixel wide camera, an 8-megapixel ultrawide, a 2-megapixel macro, and a 2-megapixel depth camera. Internally, it’ll be powered by a Snapdragon 765G, and there’s a 4,300mAh battery that’s also capable of 65W fast charging.
All three phones are expected to be announced soon, with a release in April.
(Pocket-lint) – In the recent past there was a moment when Huawei – the then champion Chinese export – looked poised to strike as the next brand (sure, it’s still huge, just less global right now). But the tables turned fast, locking out Google Services – largely down to tumultuous political wars – which left the door open somewhat in Europe.
Pushing its foot through that gap with keen assertion is Xiaomi. No, this other Chinese tech mega-company is no stranger to phone-making – having revealed some of the earliest near bezel-free devices to the market – but it’s now at a position, in design terms at least, where it’s at the very cutting edge.
For the Mi 11, complete with its curved screen design and fresh take on cameras, is a visual delight (to us it somewhat echoes Huawei’s P40 Pro, hence the comparison).
But the Mi 11 is also the first phone to every deploy Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 888 top-tier processor, showing Xiaomi is a step ahead in the hardware stakes too. So are we looking at the next big brand that’s about to blow up?
Design & Display
Dimensions: 164.3 x 74.6 x 8.06mm / Weight: 196g
Frosted glass finishes: Midnight Gray, Horizon Blue
Display: 6.81-inch AMOLED quad-curved panel
Resolution: 3200 x 1440 (WQHD+)
Refresh rate: adaptive 120Hz
In-screen fingerprint scanner
Sound by Harman Kardon
“It’s just a phone”, right? Sure, there’s only so far you can push the mold when it comes to creating a rectangular interactive screen, but the Mi 11 is refined at every turn.
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Whether it’s the subtle curved glass edges, the subtle gradient and light-catching properties of the frosted glass rear, or the deftly cut punch-hole camera to the front (it’s way neater than most others), the Mi 11 is poised to perfection; a chiselled model on a flagship phone catwalk.
Wrapped into that design is a lot of top quality specification too. The screen, a 6.81-inch AMOLED panel, is large but proportioned so it’s not ridiculous for thumb-reach across it (the aspect ratio is 20:9). The always-on panel can glow to those subtle curved edges as a not-too-intrusive alert mechanism, too, which looks wonderful.
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As is often the case with OLED panel balancing, however, when the screen is dimmed it crushes the blacks somewhat. Not nearly as badly as, say, the Oppo Find X2 Pro, but it’s definitely there. And, to some degree, the software seems a bit too keen to push the brightness down a notch – one of the number of quirks to Xiaomi’s MIUI software (here reviewed as 12.0.1, but 12.5 is expected very soon – and that could largely change things up).
The screen’s spec doesn’t stop reaching for the stars there either. It’s got a 2K resolution, with an adaptive 120Hz refresh rate to help smooth out animations and gameplay (oddly the refresh rate page in the settings calls 120Hz ‘Medium’ compared to 60Hz’s ‘Standard’, with no ‘High’ option – it’s not very well termed).
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As ever with refresh rate, it impacts battery life, as does the resolution chosen. But the Mi 11 can run WQHD+ (that’s 3200 x 1440 pixels) at the 120Hz rate – which is as good as things get at this moment in time. There’s also FHD+ (2400 x 1080) and automatic switching options to help save that battery life all the more.
The high-spec screen is matched with high-spec innards too. As the first device to sport the Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 platform – here with 8GB RAM, there’s supposedly a 12GB option that we don’t anticipate for global markets – it’s put heaps of core power at your fingertips.
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And a fair bit of heat to match – a powerful processor, even a 5nm platform such as the SD888, can’t exactly run cool, so expect some hand-warming (which, given it’s snowing at the time of writing here in the UK, hasn’t been something of complaint).
So while the setup will run your favourite games and apps at their best – enhanced by the available refresh rate and resolution of that screen – it will of course impact battery life. Inside the Mi 11 there’s a 4,600mAh cell which is reasonable enough – and also sports 55W fast-charging and 50W wireless charging – but will drain faster than your average on account of the high-end specification.
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But we’re not talking to a problematic level: we ran from 9am to 1am, including four hours of gaming off and on, and those 16 hours of use took the battery into its final 15 per cent. So even with pretty solid usage – the above meant nearly seven hours of screen time – the Mi 11 will get you through the day.
Part of the reason for this is the fairly high impact of Xiaomi’s MIUI software. There are lots of options, a number of alerts to suggest limiting certain functions to retain battery, and a lot of per-app permissions that you’ll need to tinker with to ensure everything runs as you please.
When we reviewed the Redmi Note 9T, which was initially running the same MIUI 12.0.1 software as this review Mi 11, we hit walls and walls of problems. The Mi 11, however, hasn’t suffered the same – being far more stable. That said, we’ve found some off-and-on issues with notifications not being immediate at all times – likely a tucked-away battery-saving technique? – and other little quirks.
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Now, the Mi 11 is expected to launch globally with MIUI 12.5, which should bring an updated and fresher approach. How much difference this will make and what tweaks it will bring is yet to be seen. But as we find the tinkering nature of MIUI to be the biggest hurdle of this device, seeing the software advance to a more natural, usable state would be great too see.
On the cameras front the Mi 11 takes a different, rather refreshing approach: yes there’s quite a number of lenses here – three, count ’em – but none are there for the heck of it.
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Each lens has its own task: the main camera is super high-resolution; there’s an ultra-wide to cram more into a scene; while the 5-megapixel telemacro is the best we’ve seen yet for close-up shooting (although it’s still not quite perfect).
That’s refreshing compared to the various phone camera setups that appear with four or five lenses, many of which do little or nothing at all. The Mi 11’s only real absence is there’s no optical zoom of any kind – which seems like an oddity at this level, but then the expected €749 starting price more than goes to explain that.
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Anyway, back to the cameras themselves. The main lens is 108-megapixels, but it uses four-in-one pixel processing to produce 27-megapixel images. Those are, inevitably, still massive – 6016 x 4512 pixels in 4:3 aspect ratio – but there’s heaps of detail crammed in. It’s a decent optic with good results, including from low-light conditions.
Indeed, the night mode does a grand job of long exposure handheld shots too, aided by the optical image stabilisation system to keep things steady.
The telemacro, however, doesn’t feature any stabilisation – which can make it a bit tricky to use. You’ll get some great close-ups, but there’s not the same degree of accomplishment with sharpness or detail – partly because it’s 5-megapixels only, partly because the autofocus feedback here is limited and not entirely helpful (but, hey, at least it’s a macro lens with autofocus – something you’ll barely see elsewhere).
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All in all, despite the absence of proper optical zoom lenses, the Mi 11’s take on cameras is pretty strong. The main lens is great, the wide-angle accomplished, and the telemacro actually useful for creating unusual close-up shots. Here’s hoping the alleged Pro and Ultra models – if they come to fruition – expand on this already great camera setup and make it better yet.
First Impressions
So is Xiaomi about to blow up as the next big thing? Well, it could suffer a similar fate as Huawei – what with the US Administration adding it to its blacklist – which would be a shame as the Mi 11 is a potentially storming flagship.
No only does the Mi 11 hit a number of firsts – such as introducing the Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 to the world – it’s also attractively priced, with €749 set as the opening sum. For all that’s on offer here that’s super value.
The Mi 11’s fresh take on cameras – there aren’t lenses here for the heck of it – and accomplished design are among its highlights. Sure, the MIUI software has its quirks, which we think is the most questionable part of the package, but it’s stable and tinkerable enough to shape into a strong overall experience.
The Xiaomi Mi 11 is packed full of potential. At this price, it’s certainly worth you taking a moment of your time to mull it over as your next Android flagship.
(Pocket-lint) – Huami has been turning out various smartwatches that sit under its Amazfit brand, with the square-shape GTS 2 sitting at the top of its fashion watch category.
That GTS family also includes the cheaper GTS 2e and the GTS 2 Mini. If you want the best in terms of features and a stylish design then the GTS 2 is the one to look at.
Along with making some welcome changes in the design department, the GTS 2 also performs more like a smartwatch than the original GTS did, bringing smart assistants and a music player into the mix. But that’s also seen the price creep up, so does it warrant its worth?
Design & Display
Display: 1.65-inch, 348 x 442 resolution
Measures 42.8 x 35.6 x 9.7mm
Size options: 42mm only
5ATM waterproofing
Like the original GTS, the GTS 2 goes square – much like an Apple Watch – but you certainly wouldn’t mistake if for a Series 6 or an SE.
That doesn’t mean you don’t get an attractive smartwatch for your money, though. There are notable improvements with the materials used and the design of the display that gives the GTS 2 a more stylish look compared to its predecessor.
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You’re getting a 42mm watch case with a matte titanium alloy used around the display, with plastic on the back where the sensors and charging points lie. That’s paired up with a removable 20mm silicone strap.
There’s the pick of black, grey or gold looks, which does mean you have fewer colour options to pick from than the first GTS, but you do still have that option to switch up things in the strap department if you prefer to go for an overall more formal watch look.
What has really elevated the look of the GTS 2 is its display, which is made from 3D curved glass that creates a more unified look with the watch case. Overall it just makes it feel like a much nicer watch to wear.
That screen measures in with the same 1.65-inches and offers the same resolution as the GTS and, again, it’s a really good quality display. It’s nice and responsive to swipes and taps, isn’t a fingerprint magnet, and offers great sharpness and colours. The viewing angles are strong too, plus there’s an always-on display mode option if you want that screen on full-time.
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Away from using the touchscreen, there’s a solitary button that sits closer to the watch body to help create that more streamlined look. As a package it’s got the same 5ATM water resistant rating, which means it’s safe to swim and shower with it (as that rating is good for 50 metres depth).
While the first GTS definitely had a more sporty look and feel to it, that curved screen and titanium addition certainly makes the GTS 2 a more attractive proposition. It’s no Apple Watch, but it’s certainly a step in the right direction for the GTS range.
Software & Performance
Customizable watch faces
Works with Android and iOS
Once again, Huami is using its own operating system to run the software and doesn’t divulge details of the processor or components. The performance is satisfying on the whole, whether that’s getting around menu screens or putting its key features to work.
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The software experience hasn’t dramatically changed over the first GTS. The selection of customisable watch faces have certainly been better optimised for that curved display and getting to menu screens or your notifications are done in the same manner. There’s widgets to show off elements like your daily activity stats and weather forecasts.
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Huami’s smartwatches are generally very easy to get to grips with and that doesn’t really change with the GTS 2.
When you need to sync your data or tinker with settings you can’t access on the watch, you’ll now have to head to the Zepp companion app, which is a rebranded Amazfit app. Huami now owns Zepp, the sports tech brand that made its name using sports tracking sensors for baseball and golf.
Getting setup is pretty straightforward, especially if you take the QR code scanning route to pairing it with your phone. We used it with Oppo and Realme Android phones and didn’t have issues with syncing or pairing. While it’s a device you can use with iPhone too, pairing with an Android device will give you the optimal experience.
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The two most important area of the app is the main Homepage where you can delve deeper into your health, fitness and exercise stats. The dedicated devices page is where you can adjust settings, such as notification support, set health monitoring modes, and get hold of more watch faces.
Sports & Fitness Tracking
GPS and Glonass satellite systems
Automatic exercise recognition
Built-in heart rate monitor
24/7 fitness tracking
Blood oxygen read
Like the GTS, the GTS 2 is well equipped as far as tracking your health, fitness and exercise. It has added a new improved heart rate sensor – BioTracker 2 PPG – and ramped up the number of sports with exercise recognition support also in tow.
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On the sensor count, there’s GPS and GLONASS to accurately track outdoor activities, and the same motion sensors as included in the GTS. Huami’s new sensor can read blood oxygen (SpO2) levels – but that blood oxygen sensor, much like the one on Huawei, Garmin, Fitbit and Apple’s smartwatches, is not designed for medical purposes.
That sensor delivers resting heart rate, continuous monitoring, and heart rate during exercise. It also powers its PAI Health Assessment, which shifts the emphasis on raising your heart rate regularly as opposed to focusing on nailing your daily step counts.
There’s no 90 sports modes, which is significantly up from the 12 included on the GTS. That includes core sports like running, cycling and swimming (pool and open water), along with tracking support for skiing and climbing.
In terms of that tracking performance indoors and outdoors, accuracy definitely feels better suited to someone who has a more casual approach to fitness. Accuracy for things like GPS and heart rate feel better suited to steady paced workouts. As soon as you up the intensity, whether that’s running or riding for longer distances, those key sensors do have a tendency to falter. Heart rate testing against a Garmin HRM Pro heart rate chest strap monitor showed that the GTS 2’s sensor struggles to handle the sudden spikes and drops in heart rate with high intensity training.
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It definitely does a better impression as a daily fitness tracker if you care mainly about steps, continuous heart rate monitoring and tracking sleep. Daily step counts were in the ballpark of the step counts we tracked on a Fitbit Sense and you’ll still get those inactivity alerts buzzing you to keep moving during the day.
For sleep, the GTS 2 posted similar sleep duration periods as the Sense and similar breakdowns of sleep stages, including REM sleep. There’s some nice additional insights and tips to improve sleep quality and is definitely one of the GTS 2’s strengths.
Smartwatch features
View notifications
Built-in music player
Offline voice assistant
Microphone and speaker
Phone calls over Bluetooth
The GTS was pretty light on smartwatch features, so thankfully that’s changed with the GTS 2.
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You still have notifications that are still not actionable while multiple notifications from the same app can still bunch up as was the case on the GTS. There’s also weather forecasts, the ability to set alarms and access to music controls, with the latter accessible during workouts.
Huami has added in a microphone and speaker, which brings a collection of new features into the mix. It means you can now take phone calls when connected to your phone via Bluetooth. More interestingly is the introduction of a smart assistant that works without a data connection.
The new offline voice assistant will give you control of core watch features like turning settings on and off or to start a workout. The commands supported are all listed on the watch and the assistant can be woken up in a variety of ways including turning it on as soon as you raise your wrist. It’s an assistant that works well and is responsive to commands, making it a useful feature to have when you’ve got your hands full.
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The other big feature is the built-in music player, giving you 3GB of storage to fit in roughly 300-600 songs. To get that music onto the watch, you’ll need to sync it over from the Zepp companion app. Currently, it only supports music you own and doesn’t work with any music streaming services. If you own a lot of music and it’s already piled onto your phone, then you’ll no doubt appreciate its inclusion as a feature. Hopefully though, Huami will add some streaming service support as well to make it even more useful.
Battery Life
Up to 20 days in basic watch mode
Up to 7 days in smartwatch mode
3.5 days in heavy usage
Huami has included a bigger 246mAh battery on the GTS 2, which is capable of giving you around a week of use in typical scenarios – and up to 20 days when you disable features like Bluetooth and heart rate monitoring. If you put features into play like the always-on display mode, that battery is likely to drop to around three days or so.
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Based on our experience, you can get that week of use, but if you’re making use of all of those new features, it’s more likely to be a few days shorter than that. Features like continuous heart rate monitoring, advanced sleep monitoring, keeping the screen bright and having a steady stream of notifications, will see it fall short of that seven days. If you’re willing to compromise on what features are enabled, you can go further.
GPS tracking battery life is an impressive 25 hours, which betters a lot of more expensive GPS-packing smartwatches and sports watches. Putting that GPS to good use doesn’t horribly drain the battery either.
When you do hit zero there’s an identical charger to the one used on the GTS to get things powered back up. It takes 2.5 hours to get to 100 per cent, though, which certainly doesn’t make it the snappiest of chargers.
Verdict
While the first GTS offered great value for money at a price point where it stood up well against the competition, the GTS 2 is promising to be a better smartwatch – but a pricier one too.
It certainly steps things up in the looks department, while features such as the offline voice assistant is a great new addition. However, the music player is going to have limited appeal until it can partner up with some streaming services. And while fitness tracking is once again solid, you won’t get high-end accuracy for tracking sports and active heart rate.
All in all, the GTS 2 is a transformation for the series – and a decent one at that. But at the now elevated price point you’ll be able to find a more complete smartwatch experience elsewhere, which is why the original GTS scored better than this follow-up.
Also consider
Fitbit Versa 2
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While not its latest product, this watch offers richer music and notification features, plus all the great fitness tracking and health features you would expect from a Fitbit watch.
Read our review
Huawei Watch GT 2e
squirrel_widget_234512
Huawei offers a step up in sports tracking features and is capable of giving you weeks of battery life with its full gamut of features in play.
(Pocket-lint) – For years Google Wear OS watches have been round in shape. That traditional watch look has been a big draw for smartwatch buyers, particularly with fashion watch brands (mostly from Fossil Group) building watches that look and feel just like watches should.
Despite that, round screens don’t necessarily make the best platform for apps and text fields that appear on screen. After all, it’s harder to get a lot of information on a display that gets narrower at the top and bottom, and so a square screen actually makes a lot more sense from that point of view.
The Oppo Watch is one such square-screened device. The question, then, is whether being this different shape acts as enough of a draw?
Familiar looks
Dimensions (46mm model): 46 x 39 x 11.35mm
Weighs 40g minus the strap
Ceramic & plastic underside
Aluminium alloy case
Fluororubber strap
Getting the elephant out of the room as quickly as possible: yes, the Oppo Watch looks a lot like a certain Apple-branded series of smart wrist wear. Of course, it’s not exactly the same, but if you glance at the Oppo from a distance then you’d likely assume it was an Apple Watch. Even some of the watchfaces are strikingly similar.
There are of course differences to point out. For instance, the glass on the front of the Oppo slopes down towards the left and right edges more noticeably – so it doesn’t have the completely even rounding around all four sides. It’s quite a long/tall display too, which means this 46mm model is going to be too big for smaller wrists.
Just like an Oppo phone the Watch also has very slim and long buttons on the side – with one of these featuring the company’s trademark green accent. These buttons are housed in the side of a very glossy metal case, which in this instance is a midnight blue colour, complimenting the black glass on the front and the matte black silicone strap.
The top button launches your apps screen when on the watch face – press it anywhere else in navigation and it’s a ‘back to watch face’ button. Or press-and-hold it to launch Google Assistant. The bottom button launches an activity by default – or, rather, launches the screen that lets you choose to start a workout. Press-and-hold it and you’ll launch the power/shutdown menu.
The watch itself is comfortable to wear for long periods, thanks to being quite lightweight, and the silicone band has just the right amount of stretch and grip to keep it in place without needing to be over tightened.
On the underside you’ll find Oppo’s take on heart rate monitoring. It’s an attractive setup, with five sensors/LEDs arranged symmetrically inside a glossy dome, with four contact points for the charging base underneath that. You also get a pill-shaped button on the top and bottom sides for releasing the strap.
It’s a little fiddly to get the strap halves removed, but it’s a method that makes a lot of sense from a visual perspective. It gives the strap the look of being a deliberate, seamless part of the watch’s design. With the button pressed in, you simply pull the corresponding strap half off the case to conveniently reveal the two catches that hold it in place.
But it’s also hugely inconvenient, purely because actually getting hold of additional band styles or new straps with this proprietary connection point is not the easiest of tasks. Oppo’s UK store doesn’t even seem to have additional first-party bands to choose from. And looking for third-party options usually leads to inexpensive unofficial ones from stores that we don’t necessarily have huge confidence in.
We think if Oppo is has gone to the trouble of creating this strap removal system, which is quick and easy, then the company also needs to give an appealing reason for customers to want to do that. And the only way to do it is to offer multiple materials and finishes of bands to go with the watch, which in the Western market don’t seem to exist.
Wear OS, but with Oppo flavour
Wear OS platform
Additional Oppo layers
With its own take on Google’s Wear OS platform, Oppo has full taken advantage of the additional screen space offered by its square panel. For instance, launching the apps screen reveals a 3×3 grid of small round icons, which you can scroll up and down through. That means nine app icons fit in one screen at a time without the awkward, curved list of maybe three or four that you get on round screens.
Similarly, dropping down the settings tiles from the top of the screen gives you nine easy icons with tap-to-activate features such as torch, do not disturb mode, Google Pay, find my phone, or access to other everyday settings.
Of course, it’s still very much Wear OS platform, so swiping left on the home watch face goes to your full screen widgets for tracking things like your heart rate, daily activity, or sleep. Swiping right goes to your Google Home Screen with useful shortcuts and updates. Swiping up goes to your notification – and, again, because it’s a square screen, you can see more text and more notifications clearly.
Want to install wearable apps? Easy. Just tap the Google Play Store icon in the apps list and you can find anything in there. Which – when it comes to fitness and health (which we’ll get to it in a bit) – is kind of necessary. There’s even NFC and support for Google Pay, which is accepted in a lot of retail locations and supported by a good number of banks these days.
All of this is displayed on a 1.9-inch curved AMOLED panel which is bright and vivid. It’s worth noting that the smaller 41mm model has a flat 1.6-inch display. Either choice is easy to see outdoors in daylight, while the always-on feature means you can glance and see the time whenever you like. The always-on display option does drain more battery, and switches off your tilt-to-wake functionality, but it gives a more natural watch-like experience.
Fitness and health
Oppo HeyTap Health + Google Fit installed
All day heart rate and sleep tracking
Step counter + GPS
Modern smartwatches are essentially fitness trackers with fancy screens, in the form of a watch. It’s the fitness and daily activity tracking element that makes one a worthwhile investment. It’s where a number of Wear OS manufacturers fall down, though, and why having an ecosystem of third-party apps is needed.
Oppo has built its own fitness tracking platform, however, which does offer all the essentials. It’s called HeyTap Health and it collects information from you including daily steps, estimated calories burned, your daily heart rate averages, and can show you how you slept the night before (providing you wore the watch to bed).
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It’s quite basic in terms of how it displays the data though. There’s not a lot you can dive into, although if you’re tracking a run with it, you do get to see useful metrics like distance, pace, heart rate, elevation and cadence. And it does seem pretty much on par with our other trackers in terms of location and data consistency.
If you’re into anything other than running, walking, cycling or swimming, you’ll not be served at all by Oppo’s fitness tracking options. Those are the only four workouts you can utilise, and so you’ll need to look at a different watch if that’s what you need.
There’s also Google’s own fitness tracking, Google Fit, which can also track the basics throughout the day. It’s neatly organised to show you how you’re doing versus your heart points and steps goals, while also showing easy-to-understand graphics for any workouts you’ve done. Run sessions, as an example, show up in the smartphone companion app as a neat map graphic with the route lined in blue. You also get to see your heart rate, weight and sleep duration in compact cards.
Performance and battery
430mAh battery – up to 30 hours smartwatch mode
Snapdragon Wear 3100 + 4G LTE
Ambiq Apollo3 Wireless SoC
Magnetic charging
On the whole, the Oppo Watch is a strong performer. We weren’t left waiting for ages for apps to download from the Play Store. Animations are relatively smooth and fluid, and apps load quickly enough.
The one area where improvements are needed – as with many smartwatches – is battery life. In our testing, with the always-on display switched on (showing a low power black and white watch face), and with the ’tilt-to-wake’ feature enabled (so we didn’t have to keep tapping the screen to wake it up properly), the watch gets through a full charge in less than two days. Realistically, then, that means charging it every night, which isn’t great – but then the Apple Watch is much the same.
It’s worth noting, this is without the 4G/LTE connection enabled, just using it as a regular smartwatch connected to our phone for notifications. Even on days where we didn’t do any workout tracking, it didn’t have enough juice left to make it through a full second day, which means sleep tracking being a feature is approaching pointless.
What is the Pocket-lint daily and how do you get it for free?
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To charge it Oppo has designed a magnetic snap-on cradle which uses those four contact points for charging and not a wireless charging method. That’s both good and bad, like a few of Oppo’s choices on this watch. It’s good, because it’s quicker than typical wireless standards. It’s bad because the charging cradly is quite clunky and can be a inconvenient, if only because the plastic build is quite light and the magnets aren’t especially strong.
Practically speaking that sometimes means it’s tricky to get the watch lying on the cradle completely flat, but also that if it gets knocked it can detach quite easily. On the plus side, it does have some quite grippy silicon padding around the hole in the centre to help it not slip quite as easily once you do get it resting completely flat on a surface. But we often found ourselves double and triple checking it was stable and in position before leaving it to charge.
Verdict
With a few refinements and additional features the Oppo Watch could be a genuinely great smartwatch. It’s just a few tweaks short of getting it absolutely right. The lack of customisation choices from Oppo and the fitness features being a little light on data depth and quantity of workout types are the main downsides.
But it’s a good first go with a lot to like. Despite it’s Apple-a-like looks, there aren’t many other square Wear OS watches out there, and this does get all the basics right in terms of smartphone notifications and replying to messates on the fly. It also has Google Pay support and that display is bright and colourful. All for a fair price point indeed.
Also consider
Fossil Gen 5 Garrett
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For a classic watch look, full Wear OS feature list, and easy-swappable bands, there are few watches like the Gen 5 Garret. It looks like a watch should and offers pretty much anything you could need from a Wear OS smartwatch.
Read our review
Samsung Galaxy Watch 3
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Samsung went all-out on fitness with the Watch 3 and now offers some pretty impressive running data and a bunch of other fitness-focused features without losing any of the smartwatch features we’ve come to expect in this day and age.
Samsung patents a smartphone with a triple camera on the rear. The camera can rotate and enables users to use one of these cameras for taking selfies.
Like previous years Samsung is expected to release a wide variety of smartphones this year. The Galaxy S21 series has now been officially introduced, as has the cheap Galaxy A32. More mid-range A-series and budget M-series models will follow later this year, as well as several foldable smartphones. What can we expect in the field of camera design this year; Will new types of pop-up cameras be used in 2021 or will phone manufacturers prefer the cheaper and easier to implement punch-hole camera?
Samsung released the Galaxy A80 in mid-2019, this mobile phone was equipped with a rotating camera with which you can take selfies as well as regular photo and video recordings. It seems that Samsung intends to announce its successor this year, in the form of a Galaxy A82 5G.
For the time being, it remains unknown what kind of (selfie) camera the Galaxy A82 will have. Samsung may be considering implementing the following technology for its Galaxy A-series.
Samsung smartphone with rotating pop-up camera
In mid-2020, Samsung Electronics applied for a patent for an “Electronic device including camera module”. The 70-page documentation was published by the WIPO (World Intellectual Property Office) on January 14, 2021 and describes a Samsung smartphone with an ingenious pop-up camera that can be aimed both forwards and backwards, in order to take selfies and regular photos and videos. It is a fairly small, cylindrical shaped retractable camera. The pop-up system houses no less than 3 camera lenses.
By default, the triple camera will be aimed backwards, all three camera lenses are then visible. The camera will be completely stored in the housing. As soon as you want to take a selfie, the pop-up camera will be rotated and it will partly come out of the housing.
When taking selfies and making video calls, you only have one of the three cameras at your disposal. The two bottom cameras remain in the housing and are automatically deactivated.
The pop-up camera system works fully automatically. A motor is installed that supplies power. In addition, two gears and a long screw shaft are used to enable the rotation and the pop-up mechanism. Finally, a movable frame is built in. The flexible printed circuit board is stored in this frame, which moves up and down, along with the camera system.
This frame is located directly under the pop-up camera system. When the camera rises, an opening is created at the back, which is covered by the frame. Samsung can optionally design this in such a way that you can see the flexible circuit board through it, as described in the extensive documentation.
For a better visual representation of the patented technology, Jermaine Smit, aka Concept Creator, made a series of product images for LetsGoDigital illustrating this unique Samsung smartphone with rotating pop-up camera.
When taking selfies, you basically only have one lens at your disposal. Nevertheless, more options have been set out. Optionally, the camera can rise even further to expose a second camera lens, as described in the documentation.
In practice, however, this appears to be a less solid and durable solution, all the more so because it is a fairly small pop-up system, which will then have to protrude quite far from the housing. This would make the camera system extra vulnerable.
Apart from the Galaxy S10 Plus, Samsung has integrated very few dual selfie cameras. For the renders, we therefore assumed that only one camera will come out of the housing – as the patent images also illustrate, by the way.
Smartphones with a pop-up selfie camera
A large number of phone models with a pop-up camera were introduced in 2019. Not only Samsung, also brands such as Oppo, Vivo, OnePlus, Motorola, Huawei, Honor and Xiaomi introduced several phone models with a pop-up selfie camera that year.
Such a camera system has several advantages. First of all, the use of a pop-up camera makes it possible to apply a larger screen area, without notches or screen holes. It gives the smartphone an extra modern and elegant look. Nevertheless, significantly fewer mobile phones with such a camera were introduced in 2020. This brings us to the disadvantages of an pop-up camera.
A common flaw is the durability. In practice, this is not too bad. Most retractable cameras used to date have been tested to last at least 200,000 times. This means that you can use the selfie camera no less than 100 times a day for 5 years. Another disadvantage is the waterproofness, because of the moving parts and the recess that is needed at the top of the frame, it is difficult to make the smartphone dust and waterproof.
Still, there’s a completely different problem that developers run into. The implementation of a pop-up camera requires a relatively large number of adjustments to the housing. Such a camera system also simply requires a lot more space, while the housing is already so small to accommodate all the necessary components.
In addition, other parts are also getting better, which often results into larger parts. Consider, for example, the battery, today’s 5G phones require an extra large battery capacity. The same also applies to heat dissipation, better and more complex systems are being devised for good heat dissipation. These parts also take up the necessary space.
In addition, the flexible circuit board must be able to move along, which makes it extra vulnerable. Competitor Xiaomi has recently come up with something ingenious for this: a smartphone with a pop-up camera that uses a reflective mirror.
By using a mirror, the flexible printed circuit board does not have to be attached to the camera system, which saves both costs and space in the housing. Moreover, with this solution it was also possible to use the camera in two directions.
All in all, it is certainly possible that pop-up camera smartphones will be introduced again in the future. It is not without reason that patents are still being applied for for such technology. Moreover, it simply appears to be the best selfie camera solution available to date.
In the background, manufacturers are working on the development of an under-display camera, which is expected to become the next selfie camera trend. Logically, however, not all smartphone models will immediately incorporate a camera under the screen.
It is possible that this pop-up camera can therefore offer a good alternative, all the more because manufacturers have been playing with the idea of using a single camera system for some time, with which you can take selfies as well as regular photo and video recordings. As a result, the number of cameras can be saved, which means that both costs and space can be saved without compromising image quality.
We do not expect that Samsung will opt for such a solution for its new flagship devices. On the other hand, it could be a nice addition to the Galaxy A series. The budget and mid-range smartphones of the company are housed within this series.
Samsung A series 2021 models
The A series is Samsung’s best-selling smartphone series. The Galaxy A51 and A71 were introduced exactly a year ago and were among the best-selling phones in Europe. Both the Samsung Galaxy A52 and the Galaxy A72 are expected soon. Both 5G phones will have a small punch-hole camera that is placed at the top center.
Earlier this month, the Galaxy A32 was already officially announced, this Samsung smartphone has a v-shaped notch. Just like the A42 also comes with a notch. The even cheaper A22 and A12 will most likely not get a pop-up camera either.
Thus, our thought quickly turns to the more expensive models within the Galaxy A series. The Samsung A82 is expected later this year, it would be a very suitable candidate to apply such a camera system. Just like its predecessor, the Samsung A80, also had a rotating camera. With the A80 however, you had to pay a relatively high amount for the camera system, possibly the new solution will be slightly more affordable.
View the documentation of the Samsung Galaxy smartphone with rotating pop-up camera here.
Note to editors:The concept renders and product video presented in this publication are made in collaboration with Jermaine Smit (aka Concept Creator). This product is not officially announced by Samsung. You are allowed to use the high-resolution images for free if you include a clickable source link into your publication. Thank you very much for understanding.
Apple overtook Huawei to reclaim its spot as the second-bestselling smartphone manufacturer in the world in 2020, according to new research reports from Counterpoint Research and Canalys. Samsung was still the leading seller in terms of number of smartphones shipped, while Xiaomi, Oppo, and Vivo took the next three spots, according to Counterpoint.
It was just under a year ago that the same research analysts reported that Huawei had overtaken Apple to take second place in 2019. But since then, US trade sanctions seem to have hit Huawei hard. The Chinese company’s smartphone shipments were 21 percent lower in 2020 compared to 2019, according to Counterpoint, and Huawei dropped out of the top five entirely in the fourth quarter of the year. It’s the first time in six years Huawei hasn’t been in the top five, Canalys notes.
Huawei’s smartphone shipments dropped out of the top five in Q4 2020.Image: Canalys
Although Huawei was still able to hold on to the number three spot overall, thanks to domestic sales in China (where it reportedly shipped 70 percent of its phones in 2019), Xiaomi seized the opportunity to expand internationally and saw shipments increase by 17 percent in 2020 compared to 2019. However, the fastest-growing smartphone brand in 2020 was reportedly Realme, which shipped 65 percent more phones than it did in 2019.
Apple’s gains were more modest, increasing by 3 or 5 percent year over year depending on whether you ask Counterpoint Research or Canalys. The latter notes that Apple shipped the most iPhones ever in the fourth quarter of last year.
Counterpoint Research reports that Apple overtook Huawei last year.Image: Counterpoint Research
Although it’s still the bestselling smartphone manufacturer in the world, both reports suggest that Samsung’s smartphone business is losing market share. Both Canalys and Counterpoint say its shipments fell 14 percent in 2020 compared to 2019. It’s still around 50 million smartphones ahead of second place Apple, but the gap appears to be narrowing. Counterpoint says that the South Korean electronics giant is facing stiff competition from Apple at the high end of the market and from Chinese manufacturers in the midrange.
Overall, the entire smartphone market was reportedly down compared to 2019. Canalys reports that shipments were down 7 percent, while Counterpoint reports a bigger 10 percent decline. Counterpoint blames the pandemic and resulting lockdowns for the drop, but notes that shipments began to pick up in the second half of the year.
Carl Pei, the OnePlus co-founder who parted ways with the company last year, has announced the name of his next venture: Nothing. It describes itself as a “London based consumer technology company” and counts the likes of iPod inventor Tony Fadell, Twitch co-founder Kevin Lin, Reddit CEO Steve Huffman, and YouTuber Casey Neistat as investors. It plans to release its first “smart devices” in the first half of this year.
“Nothing’s mission is to remove barriers between people and technology to create a seamless digital future,” says Pei, Nothing’s founder and CEO, in a press release. “We believe that the best technology is beautiful, yet natural and intuitive to use. When sufficiently advanced, it should fade into the background and feel like nothing.”
Carl Pei, who previously co-founded the smartphone brand OnePlus.Image: Nothing
What’s unclear at the moment is exactly what products Nothing plans to release. In an interview with The Verge ahead of today’s announcement, Pei declined to offer specific details on what form Nothing’s first “smart devices” will take. He also declined to say which companies Nothing plans to compete with.
Pei does confirm, however, that Nothing plans to release products across multiple categories, with the eventual aim of building up an ecosystem of devices.
“Right now… the team is being built, so we want to focus on simpler categories,” Pei says, “but as our team gains capabilities and skills we want to start moving up. The ultimate vision of having everything connected in a seamless way, that can only happen when you have multiple categories of products that are connected.”
During Pei’s tenure at OnePlus, the company released everything from smartphones to headphones and even TVs. Last year, Wired reported that Pei’s new company could focus on music and might include manufacturing headphones. When asked, Pei declined to confirm whether headphones would be among Nothing’s early products. When asked by Wired, he said the company’s plans were “so much more than that.”
While there’s been speculation that this could point toward Nothing developing an accompanying music service, Pei tells The Verge that Nothing plans to make most of its money by selling hardware rather than software subscriptions, at least initially. “We haven’t spent too much time thinking about the software portion of it,” Pei says. “It definitely needs to be a good user experience if you are to generate revenue from software.” In the long term, however, he admits that a “healthy business” requires both good hardware and good software.
Pei’s new company plans to differentiate itself by using “custom made” components in its products right from the start. Pei suggests this will stop Nothing’s products from looking too much like its competitors. “There’s a reason why a lot of products on the market look quite similar,” Pei observes. “It’s because they share a lot of the same components and the same building blocks.”
In contrast, OnePlus’ phones have faced frequent criticism over the years for the similarities they’ve shared with Oppo’s phones. In a recent video, Marques Brownlee outlined a series of Oppo and OnePlus devices with strikingly similar hardware, like the OnePlus 5 and Oppo R11, the OnePlus 6T and Oppo R17, and the OnePlus Nord N100 and Oppo A53. The two brands even use similar fast-charging technologies. OnePlus has Dash Charge, and Oppo has VOOC.
While OnePlus and Oppo are widely reported to exist under the same Chinese corporate giant BBK Electronics, Pei says Nothing is unencumbered by such an arrangement. “[Nothing is] a completely independent company owned by our founding team and our investors,” says Pei, with its own R&D department. And despite using contract manufacturers to build its devices, Pei says Nothing won’t just “relabel somebody else’s products.”
But while Pei hopes Nothing’s early products will feature “differentiated” designs without feeling “different for the sake of being different,” the eventual hope is for them to fade into the background.
“I kind of envision a grass field with people having a picnic and there’s no screen, there’s no laptop screen, there’s no phone screen, there’s no smartwatch screen, there’s no billboard screen,” Pei muses. “That’s kind of the end state.”
Verge columnist Walt Mossberg referred this future state as ambient computing in 2017. Pei admits that it may take 20 or 30 years to arrive, but he says the future his company is aiming for is one where its technology resembles… well, nothing.
(Pocket-lint) – Throughout 2020 the battle for dominance in the mid-range smartphone market burned fierce. With one group of companies in particular showing it was more than willing to add some competition to a market that had grown a little stagnant in the wake of manufacturers chasing that four-figure price bracket.
That group, of course, is BKK. For those unaware, that’s the family that contains Oppo, OnePlus and Realme. Look at the volume of phones released by those three brands in 2020 and you’ll see there are quite a number of devices.
One of the more affordable from that offering is the Reno 4 Z. It’s one of Oppo’s most accessible smartphones and one with plenty about it to make it more than useful for most people.
Sleek and shiny
Dimensions: 163.8 x 75.5 x 8.1 mm / Weight: 184 g
3.5mm input/output for headphones
Side-mounted fingerprint sensor
In this day and age, we’ve stopped being surprised when phones are included in certain families of phones but without really looking like they belong. Look at the Reno 4 Pro, then look at the Reno 4 Z, and you’ll likely assume the two phones aren’t related at all. They just don’t look the same.
Pocket-lint
The most obvious differences are apparent from the back, where the Reno 4 Z has square camera housing with a diagonal raised element in the middle. The 4 Pro features a nicer looking rectangle panel. Still, there’s something quite eye-catching about the Z’s arrangement. At least, there is if you go with the white and gold model. We were sent the navy and black model which doesn’t have that same visual ‘pop’. Although, in the right light, the way the dark blue gradients into silver is attractive.
Being a more affordable device means more affordable materials have been used. In this case, that means there’s a glossy plastic on the back and – unlike the Pro – it’s completely flat. You don’t get any fancy curved glass here, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. After all, it’s less likely to crack or break, but it being flat does mean it’s not the most ergonomic feeling phone in the world. It’s quite wide too, so definitely feels more like a two-handed device than a smaller, rounder phone would.
One other thing that’s worth noting about this glossy navy blue version: it attracts fingerprints like crazy. Hold it once and that shiny plastic soon turns into a grease-smudged mess, and being a dark colour also means it shows up any dust or pocket-fluff too. The panel on the front, covering the screen, seems to suffer from that same ease of smudging, but being glass it’s really easy to wipe off with a microfibre cloth.
Pocket-lint
The Reno 4 Z features Oppo’s trademark super-slim individual volume buttons on the left and – because it has an LCD display (which we’ll get to later) – there’s a physical fingerprint reader built into the power button on the right side. We’ve found it really quick to unlock and very responsive, so it’s certainly not a negative compared to an under-screen solution.
Those who want to can also use facial recognition using the dual camera system built into the front of the phone. That reliability makes unlocking the phone convenient, and there are other practicalities to consider. It has a 3.5mm input/output port for wired headphones and headsets and the removable SIM tray has space for a microSD card slot if you want to expand the onboard memory.
Screen and software
6.57-inch LCD display
1080 x 2400 resolution
Android 10 – ColorOS 7.2
The Reno 4 Z has an LCD panel on the front and that means a few things in terms of features. You don’t get the always-on display – which shows a clock and notification badges when it’s in standby – because, unlike OLED, an LCD display doesn’t switch off individual pixel lighting.
But that’s not really a problem, it just means you don’t get that one useful feature. The main issue with the display is that it doesn’t appear to have any sort of oleophobic protection over it. That means fingers leave smudges, and even when wiped clean, that can cause some unusual rainbowing patterns which is most noticeable on mostly white screens.
Pocket-lint
It’s worth noting this is true after removing the pre-applied screen protector. Not that a film is any better at reducing fingerprint smudges, but be aware that removing it won’t necessarily improve clarity or finger oil resistance like it would on properly coated glass.
Otherwise, it’s a decent enough display. It’s Full HD+ in resolution, so it’s plenty sharp enough for anything you’d want to use it for. Text is clear and colours – while lacking a tad in vividness – are natural enough, with whites coming through clean. It’s big enough and bright enough to make streaming Netflix or YouTube shows a pleasant experience.
It’s not great in brighter conditions – like outside in brighter daylight – and seems to struggle with reflections quite a lot. Even in rooms indoors with bright ceiling lights we had to adjust the angle often to avoid that reflective glare made worse by those aforementioned fingerprint smudges.
Of course the screen is mostly just the platform for the software which – in Oppo’s case – seems to be leaning more towards European or Western preferences with each iteration.
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That’s to say, it utilises more of Google’s default apps and doesn’t seek to add too much of its own influence. Even to the point now where it has Google’s own Snapshot screen on the left of the home screen, collating news and weather relevant to you, rather than the old Oppo-made version that did a similar thing, but in a slightly less useful way.
The main interface is still very much Oppo-esque, with its square, green quick settings button icons in the drop down menu. Learning from its cousin, OnePlus, Oppo’s ColorOS has more customisation tools here as well. You can change app icon size and shape as well as using system-wide themes. It’s worth noting though that this is ColorOS 7 based on Android 10, not the new Android 11 based software that it’s currently rolling out across Oppo’s flagship devices.
MediaTek powered – and that’s just fine
MediaTek Dimensity 800 5G processor, 8GB RAM
128GB storage, microSD card expansion
4,000mAh battery capacity
18W fast-charging
We often speak about compromises when discussing mid-range phones that are available for lower prices than premium handsets. It goes without saying that when you buy more affordable devices, the parts inside them are reflective of being able to obtain that lower sale price.
One such ‘compromise’ – as you might first think – is Oppo opting to go with a MediaTek processor. Specifically, this phone is powered by the Dimensity 800 5G. It may be seen as a bit of a bargain-basement 5G chipset by many, but with its 7nm process and eight powerful cores, it’s certainly no slouch.
Pocket-lint
As you’d likely expect from a more accessible product, the phone doesn’t especially feel zippy, but in our experience it’s reliable and doesn’t seem to struggle all that much with anything. We played a few of our favourite games like Forza Street, Mario Kart Tour and Sky, and it was responsive enough that it didn’t detract from the overall experience.
There was the odd occasion when we noticed some stutter and delay in action on screen, but it wasn’t hugely significant. Although saying that, it does seem to load lower resolution graphics in order to keep it feeling relatively smooth. It doesn’t seem all that sharp when loading games, with edges of items on screen looking quite rough at times. This is fairly typical of similar devices.
For important stuff like keeping in touch with friends on Messenger, WhatsApp or via Facebook, it’s a perfectly fine device. We didn’t have any issues with connectivity or any major problems with loading times and overall speed of such apps. It gets the job done – which is what you want from a phone at this price range.
Best smartphones 2021: The top mobile phones available to buy today
Pocket-lint
It’s a similar story with battery life. You’ll get plenty of mileage from the 4,000mAh cell inside the Reno 4 Z. Given its relatively low-powered internals, it’s not uncommon on a moderate day of use to get all the way through to bedtime with 40 per cent left over, but then mileage will certainly vary depending on user. For most users it’ll be more than enough to get you through the day.
More cameras than required
Quad rear camera system:
Main: 48-megapixel, f/1.7 aperture
Wide (119-degree): 8MP, f/2.2
Depth sensors: 2MP each
Dual selfie camera system:
16MP main & 2MP depth sensor
Sadly, one trend that’s stuck in 2020 – and one we hope dies in 2021 – is the compulsion for phone makers to put four cameras in the back of their phones, just to say it has a quad camera system. Truth is, for most of them – at least, most of the more affordable ones – is that they have one relatively decent camera, with the other three either being mostly useless, or poor quality. It’s the same with the Reno 4 Z.
Pocket-lint
This phone has not one, but two low resolution depth sensors in addition to the 8-megapixel ultra-wide and 48-megapixel primary camera. Having used it a number of times in testing, we can safely say that it’s the primary camera you’ll want to be using nearly all of the time. The dual depth sensor is really pointless.
With that out of the way, the primary lens is certainly good enough to keep any buyer happy. It’s perhaps a little happy to overexpose when left to its own devices, but a quick adjustment using the exposure gain slider on screen is enough to get it looking good again.
In good lighting conditions the main sensor takes good looking shots that represent colours naturally without being overly saturated nor muted. Similarly, when you get close to a subject, it focuses and is able to produce some nice-looking, soft background blur that blends evenly with the foreground. It doesn’t need the exaggerated portrait mode for that (although it does have it, of course, as those depth sensors are doing some work).
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The option of the ultra-wide angle lens means you get a bit more versatility, but the quality from this lens just isn’t quite as good as the main camera. Colours, light and contrast combine to make for a less vivid and harsher looking result. But that’s something that seems to be normal for a lot of mid-rangers with multiple cameras.
In the end, you’ll probably want to stick with the main camera, and if you do you’ll be more than happy with the shots that it produces in good outdoor daylight.
Verdict
The Reno 4 Z is capable phone that won’t let you down in all the ways that really matter. It’ll snap a photo, let you play pretty much any of your favourite games, and go all day without an issue. But even at this end of the market it’s not hugely competitive.
As with a few of Oppo’s phones, the Reno 4 Z is curiously positioned in terms of price. Compare its features and capabilities with sister brand, Realme, and you’ll feel you don’t get as much for your money. As an example, you could get the Realme 7 Pro; a phone with much faster charging, smoother performance, a bigger battery and an AMOLED display.
The one thing the Oppo does have over the Realme phone is 5G support which – depending on where you live – could be the clincher. Still, in our testing so far, 5G hasn’t proved all that essential in everyday life and – despite being much faster than 4G – still isn’t close to offering the reliable and consistent coverage required to make it necessary. At least, not in the UK just yet.
The Oppo Reno5 Pro 5G announced in India earlier this week is now available for purchase in the country through Flipkart and offline retail stores. It comes in a single 8GB/128GB variant priced at INR35,990 ($495/€405) and has two color options – Starry Black and Astral Blue.
The Reno5 Pro 5G is powered by the Dimensity 1000+ SoC and runs Android 11-based ColorOS 11.1. It’s built around a 6.55″ 90Hz FullHD+ Super AMOLED screen having a fingerprint reader underneath and a punch hole in the upper-left corner for the 32MP selfie camera.
The back of the smartphone houses a quad camera setup which is a combination of a 64MP primary, 8MP ultrawide, 2MP macro, and 2MP depth units. Fueling the entire package is a 4,350 mAh battery with 65W charging, which went from flat to 100% in under 30 minutes in our tests.
You can read our Oppo Reno5 Pro 5G hands-on review to learn more about it.
Alongside the Reno5 Pro 5G, Oppo also launched the Enco X TWS earphones in India. These are priced at INR9,990 ($135/€110) and are sold in White and Black colors.
Oppo Enco X
The Enco X come with hybrid active noise cancellation, pack an 11mm dynamic driver in each bud, and are co-created with Dynaudio. The TWS earphones are also IP54 rated, feature touch controls, and support wireless charging.
Each bud packs a 44 mAh battery claimed to offer 5.5 hours of endurance on a single charge, with the 535 mAh cell in the charging case adding another 19.5 hours of playback.
LG Electronics has been making headlines with reports that the company plans to exit the smartphone business. The latest development involves a Vietnamese conglomerate, which is reportedly in talks of buying the smartphone business from LG Electronics.
According to BusinessKorea, Vietnam’s Vingroup Co has put the most attractive offer to buy LG’s smartphone business. The company accounts for 14% of the market capitalization of listed Vietnamese companies. It has a diverse portfolio of businesses with hands in various industries including hotels, real estate, distribution, cars, smartphones, and land development. The company already produces smartphones for LG under ODM contract and is the top third smartphone manufacturer in Vietnam behind Oppo and Samsung.
LG Wing
According to the report, Vingroup Co is interested in taking over LG’s smartphone business in the US and an acquisition would push Vingroup Co to a global presence. LG is reportedly interested in selling its smartphone business “piece by piece” as selling off the entire thing would prove to be very difficult.
Recently, LG sent an internal memo that foreshadowed imminent major changes to the mobile division including “sale, withdrawal, and downsizing of the smartphone business.” This does not bode well for the company’s recently teased LG Rollable with marketing date set for this year. The LG Rollable’ s future is now uncertain with this week’s news.
The Arche is well-built and beautifully designed in its simplicity, and is a great choice if you’re after a high quality DAC for your headphones, but if you’re using the Arche in your main setup, stick with the XLR outputs, as the RCA alternatives are sporadically noisy.
For
Beautiful, solid design
Exceptional isolation from USB noise
Can tune headphone output impedance
Against
Inconsistent RCA noise levels
No fixed line output level setting
Aus Hi-Fi mag review
(Image credit: Future)
This review and test originally appeared in Australian Hi-Fi magazine, one of What Hi-Fi?’s sister titles from Down Under. Click here for more information about Australian Hi-Fi, including links to buy individual digital editions and details on how to subscribe.
French company Focal makes loudspeakers and headphones. Some of its headphones are pretty high-end. As are some of its loudspeakers. So the company has lately taken to producing high-end electronics to drive them.
For example, the Focal Astral 16 A/V processor and amplifier runs to more than AU$30,000. Here we’re spending some time with the more modestly priced Focal Arche DAC and headphone amplifier.
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Equipment
In one way the Focal Arche looks very different. It comes with a curved section of metal. The straighter end has a home amongst the heat sink slots on top of the unit. Install it there and it forms a stylish headphone stand for your Focal (or other) headphones.
Apart from that, the layout of the unit is fairly conventional for this kind of product: deeper than it is wide, a flat well-built (over 4kg) slab of electronics.
On the front is a blue-on-black display screen. To its left is a 6.35mm stereo headphone socket. And to the left of that is a 4-pin XLR socket for balanced headphones. To the right of the display is a combination rotary control/press button. The principal use of that is for output level and switching the unit in and out of standby. But it also invokes the main menu, in which turning the wheel takes you through the options.
(Image credit: Focal)
On the back panel are the line outputs: a pair of unbalanced RCA sockets and a pair of balanced XLR sockets. The inputs are also at the back. There’s a USB Type-B for plugging into your computer, an optical digital audio input, a coaxial digital audio input and a pair of RCA sockets for analogue inputs.
The USB Type-A socket is only there for upgrading the firmware of the unit. As we write, the Focal Arche is on its original factory-installed firmware and no newer version is available for download. The regular digital audio inputs support PCM up to 192kHz sampling with 24-bits of resolution.
With a connection to a computer via USB, the unit supports PCM with up to 384kHz sampling and 24-bits of resolution and Direct Stream Digital in regular, double and quad speed versions (i.e. DSD64, DSD128 and DSD256). The driver objected to 32-bit audio. For Windows, it’s best to choose the ASIO driver rather than WASAPI. The latter worked with everything except for DSD256.
Every time I tried DSD256 with the WASAPI driver, not only did no sound come through, but it broke something in the driver, requiring a reboot of my computer before the DAC would produce any sound at all (with any format).
The Focal Arche employs dual AK4490 DAC chips for digital to analogue decoding. These are specified to support sampling rates up to 768kHz, use up to 32x oversampling, use 32-bits of resolution, offer five filter curves and run with a THD+Noise figure of 112dB.
The Class-A headphone amplifier is dual-mono and is rated at 2x one watt at 1kHz for impedances less than 32Ω. The frequency response is specified at 10Hz to 100kHz, S/N ratio at 116dB and THD at less than 0.001%. No additional criteria are provided for those numbers. I guess that these specs are for the amplifier alone. (16-bit PCM is going to bottom-out at a signal-to-noise ratio of around 97dBA for example.)
In the settings menu the unit can be set to ‘Low’ or ‘High’ gain and an amplifier mode can be selected for each of the current model Focal headphones, plus there are non-Focal settings labelled ‘Voltage’ and ‘Hybrid’. There was a definite mechanical click from within the unit when switching from some settings to others, suggesting to me that there’s a relay doing something in there.
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Installation
I did the great majority of listening and testing using my computer as the source.
For full use that required that I install USB Audio Class 2.0 drivers from Focal’s website.
Keeping one’s web presence in alignment with slower-moving formal documentation can be tricky, nonetheless it’s a good idea to take some effort. So when reading the ‘Firmware Update’ section of the manual, in which the first step is to ‘Go to http://www.focal.com/arche’, one really should not be confronted with a ‘403 Forbidden’ message.
Oh, you can navigate your way there through the usual links (here you go) but why put it in the manual if it’s going to be wrong? And why not put a redirection on the now-defunct page to send new owners to the correct page?
That wobble aside, there were no problems installing the drivers, and no problems with any of my Windows player software in using them. Windows reported supported PCM resolutions of 16- and 24-bits from 44.1kHz up to 384kHz.
Levels
I found I had to be a little careful using the line outputs. There wasn’t a ‘fixed’ line level output. It was controlled by the front-panel level control, just as the headphones were.
I initially made the assumption that, like some other DACs which lack a fixed line-level output, the appropriate thing to do was simply to advance the gain to the maximum position – an indicated ‘99’ on the front panel – and then use my amplifier’s volume control for level.
When I later checked the manual, that is indeed what Focal suggests. Note, also, that there is only one system-wide level. The unit does not maintain separate levels for headphones and line output. Indeed, inserting headphones does not stop the line output. If you have it on 99 for your main system and then decide to listen with headphones, do make sure you turn down the level.
But as the unit always switches on with the volume level set to ‘20’, which is way too low both for headphones and the line output, I’d recommend you never switch the unit off at all. This will also mean that you will also need to go into the settings menu to switch the Arche’s automatic standby function off.
Also, I would further suggest that you don’t use the ‘High’ gain setting. I tried it at one point while the RCA outputs were connected to my audio system. It did seem rather louder than usual for a given system output level setting. But as I played the bonus Yes cover of Simon and Garfunkel’s America from Fragile, there was this weird crackle on the right channel.
Well, not precisely a crackle, but rather a ‘crack’ on certain very loud notes. For a few moments I revelled in this: a little something previously unheard! But then I started to worry. Was there something wrong with the right-hand KEF LS50 speaker I was using (supplemented by a Krix subwoofer, but that’s not relevant here).
So I started fiddling with levels. I turned the Focal Arche down to ‘80’ output instead of ‘99’, and turned up the amplifier to restore the speaker output to the same volume level as previously. There were no more ‘cracks’… which I found a bit odd, because it was presumably input overload distortion, but input overload distortion doesn’t normally sound like that.
(Image credit: Focal)
Listening sessions
I should note that the unit does not decode MQA. If you use TIDAL, the TIDAL app will unfold any MQA high-resolution content and the Arche will indicate on its front panel display the higher sampling rate… or at least it will if you press the front panel control button or rotate the knob.
The default state of the display is a large pair of digits indicating the output level, with the selected input source in smaller type above it. To see sample rate and digital audio format you have to manipulate the control. After a few seconds it reverts to the previous state. There’s no option for changing the display mode permanently.
It’s good that the format and rate can be seen, but I’d prefer to have them showing by default. This was brought home when I discovered at one point that 192kHz tracks were coming out at 96kHz. I was using JRiver Media Centre and had previously set it to convert anything above 96kHz sampling to 88.2kHz or 96kHz as appropriate because it had previously been used in conjunction with my review of an AudioQuest DragonFly Cobalt DAC.
As I keep saying in all my reviews, it’s very easy to accidentally use the wrong output settings, but, of course, most normal people are not hi-fi reviewers and will therefore be setting up their computers for just the one DAC, not darting around between different ones.
I didn’t have an amplifier with XLR inputs available, so for loudspeaker listening used the RCA outputs. Generally the unit sounded excellent, just as I’d expected. But every so often there was just a little background noise, sounding somewhat like random electrical noise. Which of course had me suspecting some breakthrough of the noise from my home computer network, delivered by the USB connection.
I therefore unplugged the computer from the network as well as from mains power, but it made no difference. I only heard it in one listening session, so after a while I started to doubt that I’d heard it at all. There was certainly no such noise when using headphones. And, of course, it’s with headphones that one is most likely to hear such untoward things.
I used a pair of Focal Elear dynamic headphones – Focal’s ‘entry level’ model, priced at AU$1,599 – as well as Oppo PM3 planar magnetic headphones (the brand has now ceased to operate in this space), a pair of ancient Sennheiser HD-535 open-back models and a set of Final Audio B3 in-ear monitors (AU$729). The Arche’s output was set to ‘Elear’ for those headphones, of course, and to ‘Hybrid’ for the others.
The first thing to note was that with none of the headphones was there any chance of the output limits of the Focal Arche being approached. ‘Ample’ is not the word to describe the output on tap. It could be destructive if one wanted. You need not worry about your headphones being supplied insufficient power.
And that translated into a real authority in performance. At this point I’ll pause to slightly regret the order in which I did things. As is my usual practice, the measurements were made after the listening sessions had been completed. I do that intentionally because I’m fearful that my listening impressions may be coloured by knowledge of the unit’s objective performance.
But in this case I was later to discover that the one thing done by the named amplifier output settings was switch between three different output impedances. That means that to the extent that a set of headphones has an uneven impedance curve, its tonal balance will vary according to the setting of the amplifier.
That seemed to have an affect upon the performance of the Final Audio B3 in-ear monitors. These use dual balanced-armature drivers (sans crossover) and delivered a fuller, richer, more balanced performance with the Focal Arche than they did with the DragonFly Cobalt mini-DAC. It turns out that the ‘Hybrid’ setting of the Arche implements a 10Ω inline output impedance, and I’m thinking that this provided a fortuitous adjustment of tonal balance.
The effect was subtle, and the B3 buds sounded excellent anyway with the Cobalt, but they sounded even better with the Arche. I would have liked to experiment more with listening using the different modes, but the loaner review unit was by then already overdue for return.
With the Oppo PM-3 headphones, the sound was more traditional (they are closed back). They have an even impedance across the audible frequency band so they don’t really care about (modest) output impedances. They delivered an extremely solid performance with the Focal Arche amplifier. I went back in time to the debut Black Sabbath album. The thunder at the opening of the first track was utterly clean and deep. When the first riff cuts in, the drums pierced through the mix to hover above it all, even the toms. They were surrounded by substantial air, filled with their natural reverb. The hi-hat bit appropriately.
Going back to the Final Audio B3 in-ears, there was enormous life and dynamic range across all the music genres I tried (including prog rock, jazz, female vocalist, baroque and classical). The best sound came from the open-backed Elear headphones. Focal knows what it’s doing by providing a first-class signal to drive its own products: The Elears were open and airy, limitlessly detailed and beautifully balanced.
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Final verdict
If you’re after a high quality DAC to drive your Focal headphones (or really, any brand or model of headphones at all), the Focal Arche is a fine unit.
My same enthusiastic recommendation will also be the case if you intend to use the Focal Arche in your main system… but only if you’re using the XLR outputs.
Laboratory tests
I calculated the internal impedance of the Focal Arche’s headphone output at 2.5Ω. It delivered 1.9VRMS into a 300Ω load, which is around 12mW or nearly 11dB above the sensitivity rating used by most headphones. Into a 16Ω ohm load, it delivered 1.65VRMS, or 170mW and more than 22dB above sensitivity rating.
I figured that was that… but a couple of days later I started to wonder about the different amplifier settings. The Voltage setting is supposed to be a voltage amplifier, in which the unit need not provide much current. The Hybrid setting is supposed to combine voltage and current amplifier functionality. And the other five settings feature outputs optimised for particular models of Focal headphones. Would they make a difference?
Indeed they would! To four significant figures at nine different measurement criteria, the Voltage output setting was unique, while the Hybrid and Elear settings were the same, and the Utopia, Clear, Elegia and Stellia settings were the same. It was with the Voltage setting that the internal impedance of the Focal Arche was around 2.5Ω. With the Hybrid and Elear settings, it was around 10Ω. With the Utopia et al setting it was around 17.5Ω.
I did not repeat the measurements on the ‘High’ gain setting, just did a quick check to see what effect that had on level: it boosted it by 12dB. Into high-impedance loads you can expect the maximum output from the headphone amp to be about 7.5VRMS. Clearly there’s never going to be a shortage of power even with high-impedance, low-sensitivity headphones.
The unit has fairly aggressive output protection. Everything went smoothly at low gain, but when I tried to measure maximum output at high gain into low impedance loads (16Ω), I kept tripping the protection. Oh, don’t worry that this may constitute some limitation on performance. Oh no… the last measured output voltage with a 1kHz test signal into that low impedance was around 5.2VRMS. That equates to 1.7 watts – not milliwatts, watts – output. Add 32dB to the sensitivity rating of your earphones or headphones, and that’s the maximum it will deliver with the high gain setting. Enough, in other words, to do major damage to you or your ear gear in very short order.
All that was in voltage mode, which you will recall has a low output impedance. In Hybrid mode, with an output impedance of around 10Ω, the unit could be wound up to the maximum level at which point it was producing a ‘mere’ 4.7VRMS output. Or 1.4-watts and 31dB above the sensitivity rating.
The unbalanced line level outputs were a bit lower in voltage than the norm, delivering around 0.95RMS in ‘Low’ gain mode and 3.8VRMS in ‘High’ gain mode. Of course, that’s with the level control set to maximum in both cases.
Speaking of the level control, it has 100 indicated levels. Down very low each numerical increment amounts to around 1.5dB. At higher levels that drops to 1dB per indicated number, then 0.5dB and then from level 60 and up, 0.5dB per two number increments.
Graph 1 (Image credit: Australian Hi-Fi magazine)
Graph 1 shows the frequency response of the Focal Arche with 44.1kHz signals and you can see that the frequency response is sensible: it rolls off a little above 8kHz to be down by around 0.35dB at 20kHz, then drops rapidly beyond that. There’s also a very slight roll-off in the bass, with output down by 0.4dB at 10Hz.
Graph 2 (Image credit: Australian Hi-Fi magazine)
Graph 2 shows the frequency response with 96kHz sampling, and you can see that the bass was the same while output was down by 0.3dB at 20kHz, 0.7dB at 30kHz and 1.2dB at 40kHz.
Graph 3 (Image credit: Australian Hi-Fi magazine)
Graph 3 shows the frequency response with 192kHz sampling, and you can see that the the 96kHz performance is simply continued: –1.8dB at 50kHz, –2.6dB at 60kHz, –3.4dB at 70kHz and –4.3dB at 80kHz.
Clearly Focal has chosen the DAC filter settings to return a flatter, more extended frequency response than many other DACs.
With 24-bit audio, tested with both 96kHz and 192kHz sampling, the noise performance I measured from the Focal Arche was simply weird. Let’s start with the easiest bit.
With the XLR outputs, the noise was at –108dBA consistently with repeated measurements. And that figure was maintained irrespective of whether my Surface Pro 2017 was plugged in or not. When it was plugged in, it was connected by wire to my home network, and that is one horribly noisy affair. The great majority of DACs let some of this noise out into the analogue output.
The Focal Arche did not. Measurements, plugged in or not, were identical… at least they were when I was using the XLR outputs. But when using the RCA outputs, things were very different. First, the results I gained were inconsistent. From measurement to measurement they ranged from –79dBA to –97.6dBA.
Again, it didn’t matter whether the computer was plugged in or not. To double-check that, I pulled out a network streamer and connected it to the Focal Arche by optical digital audio, just to ensure that there was no way any electrical interference could be carried. It resulted in a middling –89.8dBA noise level.
To double-check the test setup, I then switched in a different DAC which I knew to provide good performance. Its RCA outputs delivered a noise performance of –114.5dBA when using exactly the same rig I used for the Arche.
Graph 4 (Image credit: Australian Hi-Fi magazine)
Graph 4 illustrates the variance of the noise levels depending on the output used. I have included a couple of the RCA outputs with and without the connected computer plugged in, plus the optical connection. They are the five traces up relatively high.
The white and green traces near the bottom are via the XLR outputs. The purple trace right at the very bottom is the RCA output from the comparison DAC. The point of that is to demonstrate that the test arrangement wasn’t the problem.
Note, also, that all the output measurements – apart from the one for the comparison DAC – had a weird bump in the noise around 60–70kHz of varying levels. This would not, of course, be audible, but it is just a little bit strange.
A report surfaced from DoNews that cited Oppo insiders who claimed that Oppo and OnePlus had merged their research and development departments, adding that new employees brought onto the new department were to be hired by Oppo and not OnePlus.
The merge reportedly happened as recently as December but hasn’t been officially stamped until recently. “It’s similar to the relationship between Xiaomi and Redmi, sharing the same R&D system”. This was quoted by the Oppo insider.
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Shortly after the report was covered by Android Authority, the outlet was emailed an official statement from a OnePlus spokesperson, confirming the initial report.
To better maximize resources and further position OnePlus for growth, we are in the process of further integrating some R&D capabilities within OPLUS, our long-term investor. OnePlus will continue operating independently and working to deliver the best possible user experience for existing and future OnePlus users.
The close relationship between Oppo and OnePlus was often undeniable. Both brands operated under parent company BBK and we sometimes were able to make out what we could expect from the next OnePlus device by looking at the latest Oppo flagship phone. The OnePlus Dash Charger even worked interchangeably with Oppo’s VOOC chargers.
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Despite the closeness in hardware likeness, OnePlus and Oppo’s software development teams will remain separate, as both Color OS and Oxygen OS are intended for different markets and audiences. In addition, both Oppo and OnePlus will continue to operate as separate brands.
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