There are not a lot of gaming machines out there in the portable segment that can do what the Acer Nitro 5 Spin can — deliver extreme performance and at the same time swivel 360 degrees. Yes, this machine can do that and much more. We got our hands on this sweet rig to find out what the hoo-ha is all about. This is our review of the Acer Nitro 5 Spin.
Design and Blueprint
As soon as you open the plane black packaging of the Acer Nitro 5 Spin and remove the covers, the gaming notebook screams for attention. It demands you to fall in love with it and to do that it is ready to woo you at every stage. We for one, took it slow, but to tell you the truth it did grow on us quite quickly.
Acer Nitro 5 Spin is not like the usual gaming laptops you get in the Indian market, instead it is much lighter than other machines of the same configuration. More on that a few paras down. From factor is where this portable gaming rig gets full marks. Acer has designed it perfectly in most aspects. The touch screen is placed well in between a black bezel, the keyboard is large and is backlit, the sides have maroon lining which can also be seen on the hinges and around the keyboard. Then there is a nicely placed keypad and to top it off a 360 degree rotating touch display.
Well, those things do get us racing, but that was just the tip of the iceberg. The sides also sport couple of USB 3.0 ports, a mini USB type C port, an HDMI jack, card reader and a 3.5mm audio port. In case you want to use it like a large tablet acer has provided a nice power button with volume rocker keys on the right side, these can be accessed easily. All this in under 2.2 Kg.Performance
Let’s start with the configuration. The Acer Nitro 5 Spin comes in a few specs starting with Intel Core i5 8th gen, however the one we are reviewing is the top of the line with Intel Core i7 8th gen CPU with clock speed of 1.8 GHz and turbo boost. It has 8 GB of RAM and comes with dual storage drives. One SSD with 256 GB capacity (primary boot drive) and a secondary 1 TB 2.5 HDD, so together they make sure you get best performance and have lot of space at the same time.
The IPS display is 15.6-inches wide and supports full HD 1080p graphics. Talking about which, the graphics are powered by a NVIDA Geforce 1050 GTX graphic card that kicks in beautifully and makes sure all the latest games run at high, if not ultra-high settings. To test the performance further we ran PC Mark 8 home test on it and it scored a nice 3,627 points. On 3D Mark Sky Diver test it scored 6,286 points. Both, put the Acer Nitro 5 Spin in the higher order of gaming laptops in India.
The battery life is exquisite and we were able to extract 6 hours of it with mixed usage of watching movies, playing a game or two and listening to music. This machine amazed us at many steps, till we saw the smudges on the top side of the panel and the screen. It is a touch screen device so these are meant to be there, but they do really show when the lights are dim and are distracting. Our suggestion is to keep a cleaning cloth handy in the carry case of backpack.
Also, while playing games on it for long we found that the right side of the keyboard did get a little hot and the fan gets really loud. Oh yes, loudness reminds us that the twin speaker system is quite loud too, this time in a good way. For movie and casual gaming, it is really good, however when playing games like Counter Strike we trusted our good old headphones.Verdict and Final Thoughts
The backlit keyboard is a blessing when you are gaming at night. The full length keyboard is also great for strategy games where you need to use more keys. Combine this with a great pair of headphones and a gaming mouse, you have a winning combination at LAN events or game nights with friends. At a price of Rs 91,989 the Acer Nitro 5 Spin might be out of reach of many. But, if you can afford it, we give it a thumbs up.
Motorola has been a brand that has seen its ups and downs. Right now it is at a stage where it has again emerged as somewhat of a force to reckon with. It has got some decent set of smartphones under its belt and with launch of G6 and G6 Play today in India it has become even stronger.
The smartphones were first showcased in Brazil in April, with a third variant called Moto G6 Plus. However, the company has gone ahead brought just the G6 and G6 Play version to India. The Plus variant will come in few weeks’ time. Moto G6 and Moto G6 Play lie in the budget segment and have decent specifications. So what are they?
Moto G6 Specifications, price, offers and availability
Let’s start with the Moto G6 first, as this is the more powerful of the two and is aimed at audiences who can spend a little more to get that extra power in their device. Priced at Rs 13,999 for the 3 GB RAM/32GB memory version and Rs 15,999 for the 4GB RAM/64 GB memory variant, the Moto G6 sports a 5.7-inch FHD+ IPS touch screen. It is powered by the Octacore Qualcomm snapdragon 450 CPU with a clock speed of 1.8 GHz. This is fastened with Adreno 506 GPU.
Moto G6 comes with a dual camera rear setup with 12MP + 5MP sensors with f/1.8 aperture. We did test out some of the camera modes on the smartphone and quite liked the one where you can choose a colour on screen and everything else besides that particular shade turns black and white. The form factor of this phone is quite nice and is light to hold as it has just a 3,000 mAh battery inside. Which the company claims will last for a full day. Yes, it has a dual sim tray which is slightly curved, placed at the top of the smartphone.
At the moment the Moto G6 is available in only the blue shade, which when kept under a direct light source reflects an ‘S’ pattern, something seen on the OnePlus 6. Moto G6 runs Android 8.0.0 out of the box and not 8.1, which came across as strange to us as they are Google’s premium partner. This smartphone will go on sale on Monday midnight and is an Amazon Exclusive. If you have an HDFC credit card then you can get a flat discount of Rs 1,250 and up to Rs 1,000 extra on exchange of your last smartphone. Airtel prepaid users can also avail a cashback of Rs 2,000.
Moto G6 Play specifications, price and availability
Next in line is the Moto G6 Play that is priced at Rs 11,999 and is available with just one RAM memory combo (3GB RAM/ 32GB memory). It too has a dual SIM tray on it which can accommodate two Nano SIM. Screen-wise this smartphone has the same size display of 5.7-inches, however the resolution is HD+ and not FHD+ like the one found on Moto G6. This one is powered by the lesser powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 SoC with clock speed of 1.4 GHz.
Graphics are powered by the 505 Adreno GPU, but the battery on this one gets a boost. It can stay on for longer as it has much bigger 4,000 mAh battery that can be turbo charged. The rear of the Moto G6 Play has just one camera with a 13 MP lens, with the front one powered by an 8 MP sensor. Moto G6 Play will be available in gold and indigo colour variations and can be picked up from Flipkart exclusively (online) and offline from the Moto hub stores. There is no-cost EMI service available on this smartphone by Bajaj and there is also an assured buy back offer running of Rs 5,100 when you buy this smartphone. Moto G6 Play also runs Android 8.0 out of the box and not 8.1
We did get to hear that the next Apple iPhone models will sport a large screen. Now, OnLeaks has pushed out new renders of the Apple iPhone, which could be the upcoming model. This one seems to have a 6.5-inch touch display. By the looks of it, this model design is very similar to the iPhone X, perhaps it is an upgrade to the last model that company has been talking about, since they will stop the production of the iPhone X this year.
Other details known to us that are still running in the rumour mill are that the new Apple iPhone top-end model will have a new chipset by Apple, which might be 15-30% faster than the previous gen. It will also have 4 GB of RAM and 256 GB of storage. A twin camera setup is going to be there and it can be seen in the latest leaks as well. Over that, the front array will again have dual cameras, but the notch might by slightly smaller.
Speaker, MIC and charging ports will be at the bottom while the volume keys will be placed on the left with the power button and SIM tray on the right. Like the last one, there is no 3.5 MM jack on this device, too. The reports also suggest that the display on this Apple iPhone model will be OLED and might support 4K graphics.
Apple’s Bezel-less body is still the best and no manufacturer has come close to designing it like Apple does, yes the notch on some of the phones like the OnePlus 6 is better, but the form factor of the Apple iPhone X and this one seems to be much better. If this is the real deal, we cannot wait to get our hands on the new device, which will be out this September.
HMD Global has today finally taken the raps of its much talked about smartphones – Nokia 5.1, Nokia 3.1 and Nokia 2.1. The smartphones are successors of last year’s Nokia 5, Nokia 3 and Nokia 2 smartphones and refresh HMD Global’s budget line-up for the year. Much like other Nokia 8 Sirocco, Nokia 7 Plus and Nokia 6 2018, all three smartphones fall under Google’s Android One program.Nokia 5.1HMD Global’s Nokia 5.1 features a 6000 series aluminium unibody design and runs Android 8.0 Oreo. The device will get an upgrade to Android P and is powered by 2GHz octa-core MediaTek Helio P18 processor. Nokia 5.1 comes with a 5.5-inch full-HD+ IPS LCD display with an aspect ratio of 18:9. It is available in two storage variants –2GB RAM/16GB onboard storage and 3GB RAM/32GB of inbuilt storage. For more storage, users can install a microSD card. For imaging duties, Nokia 5.1 sports a 16MP primary camera with LED flash and an 8MP selfie camera. The device houses a 3200mAh battery and offers 3G, 4G VoLTE, Wi-FI, Bluetooth and GPS for connectivity. Nokia 5.1 bears a starting price tag of 189 Euros and its global roll out will begin in July 2018.Nokia 3.1Nokia 3.1 comes with a 5.2-inch HD+ display with an aspect ratio of 18:9. It runs the Android 8.0 Oreo and much like Nokia 5.1, it too is upgradable to Android P. Powered by an octa-core MediaTek processor, the smartphone comes in two storage variants – 2GB RAM/16GB storage and 3GB RAM/32GB onboard storage. For imaging duties, it sports a 13MP rear camera and an 8MP front facing snapper for selfies and video calls. The smartphone houses a 2900mAh battery and offers 4G LTE, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.0, GPS/ A-GPS, a 3.5mm headphone jack, and a Micro-USB port for connectivity. Nokia 3.1’s starting price is 139 Euros and it will be rolled out globally in June 2018.Nokia 2.1Powered by 1.4GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 425 processor, Nokia 2.1 runs Android 8.0 Oreo and will be getting an upgrade to Android P. The smartphone sports a 5.5-inch HD display that comes with an anti-fingerprint coating. Nokia 2.1 offers 1GB RAM and 8GB of internal storage and can hold microSD cards of up to 32GB. While it does not have as much storage as other two devices, it beats them both with its 4100mAh battery. Nokia 2.1 is priced at $115 and will be made available in July this year.
Apple’s World Wide Developer Conference 2018 is set to begin on June 4. Needless to say, there are a number of rumours on the internet about what the Cupertino based technology giant has up its sleeve for the event. In addition to software announcements that Apple does every year at WWDC, the technology giant is also expected to make some announcements on hardware. Declarations on Artificial Intelligence, Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality are also likely. While we would have to wait to see what Apple has planned for this year’s WWDC, here we bring to you everything that is projected to happen:
New iPad Pro: It is fully possible that Apple will be unveiling the next generation iPads on WWDC 2018. Considering that the last update to iPad Pro came in June 2017, it is a possibility that definitely cannot be ruled out. According to various reports, the new iPad Pro will be available in two variants – 12.9-inch and 10.5-inch. Much like the iPhone X, the new iPad Pro will come with a bezel-less design, Face ID and a TrueDepth camera. There has also been some speculation about Apple planning to separately launch the next generation iPad Pro. However, we’ll have to wait till WWDC 2018 to see how true that is.
Apple iPhone SE 2: The biggest and the best attraction at this years’ WWDC will be the iPhone SE 2. The first iPhone SE was launched in 2016 and fans have been expecting a new version for a long time. Ahead of WWDC 2018, a number of leaks have given away some specifications of the upcoming iPhone SE 2. To begin with, the new iPhone SE will sport an iPhone X like edge-to-edge display. Maybe Apple plans to do this in order to offer more screen space without altering the dimensions too much. The iPhone SE 2 is also expected to come with a glass design like the iPhone X and will be powered by the A11 Bionic processor. It will house a 1,750mAh battery and come in two storage variants – one with 32GB and the other with 128GB onboard storage.
Apple AirPower: Were you completely fascinated by Apple’s wireless charging mat when it launched the iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X in 2017? Well, the wait for it might be over as the Cupertino based technology giant may launch it in WWDC 2018. Apple’s senior vice president of worldwide marketing, Phil Schiller, had said during the September 2017 launch that the AirPower will be launched ‘next year.’ If Apple wants the multi-charging pad to go on sale before it launches its next iPhones, the best opportunity to launch it will be WWDC 2018.
Apple iOS 12: Apple has traditionally used its developer conference to showcase the latest version of its mobile operating system. And this year should be no exception as Apple is expected to unveil iOS 12. iOS 12 is expected to come with deeper integration with Augmented Reality, added security features, and tweaks in user interface. Apple may also add a feature which will enable users to control their smartphone addiction. If you suddenly recall the newly launched feature in Android P, we don’t blame you as it is meant for precisely the same function.
Siri: Google’s Assistant recently got six new voices including John Legend’s. So how can Apple lag behind? According to rumours, Siri will be getting new voices too. And Siri will also soon power a new home speaker and open a number of third party applications. Apple is also expected to get new machine learning features to Siri.
WatchOS 5: Not much is known about the WatchOS yet, but what do know is that it is set to make the Apple Watch 3 even more wellness-focussed. With WatchOS 5, Apple’s smartwatch is set to get a sleep tracking feature. There is also a possibility of more watch face customizations.
New Macbooks and iMacs: Last year on WWDC, Apple refreshed its entire line-up of laptops and desktops. And it is fully expected to do the same on WWDC 2018 with new MacBooks and iMacs. Its new line-up of laptops and desktops will be powered by latest 8th generation Intel processors. How much the hardware will change is something we’ll have to wait to see. There are also rumours about Apple planning to unveil a comeback model of MacBook Air.
Kingston and HyperX are some of the well-trusted brands in India, when it comes to PC accessories and components. We had a chance to interact with Mr Vishal Parekh, Marketing Director, Kingston Technology India to understand how the company was doing here. We got some great insights on how the firm is faring and its roadmap, products to come and a special note on the Indian gaming industry. Here is what our conversation was all about.
How is Kingston and HyperX business doing in India? Any numbers you want to share?
India is a key Asian market for both, Kingston and HyperX, in terms of sales, channel partners and community engagements. The market size itself creates immense opportunities for us to showcase products and solutions that help strengthen business operations and productivity. We have focused our energies to strengthen our communication with our stakeholders and to strategically ensure that our value propositions reach the right audience. More essentially from business perspective, we offer the best-in-class after sales service support and with certain internal improvements, we have been able to increase our National TAT (Turn Around Time) for Service to 80% from 60% last year.
From what we see, HyperX has an interesting segment to cater to, which is gaming. There’re growing business opportunities in this segment as the demand for our products has been ever growing. We work with our channel and ecosystem partners to cater to our customers better.
What can we expect from the brand Kingston/HyperX in 2018 in terms of products and devices?
2018 seems to be ‘The Year of Many Firsts’ for us in terms of products. From the HyperX stable, we launched the HyperX Cloud Alpha, the World’s First Gaming headset with Dual Chamber technology and HyperX Stinger Core, our first headset especially for PlayStation 4. From Kingston’s value proposition, we recently launched our Kingston UV500 family of SSDs, our first storage offering with 3D NAND and Hardware Encryption, and the Kingston A1000 SSD, which is our first entry-level NVMe PCIe SSD with 3D NAND.
The list doesn’t end there as there are quite a few exciting products that the Indian market has its eyes glued to. Very soon, your readers will see and probably experience our first HyperX RGB products in India. Not just that, you can expect more revisions and upgrades to our existing portfolio of products and solutions.
A gadget you wished Kingston or HyperX had designed?
This is an interesting question. The speed at which we are adding successful product lines, I wouldn’t be surprised if the product I mention gets added to our portfolio. But, from my opinion and quality that HyperX promises, I would have been excited if we had designed the Tesla X car.
Besides the usual memory and audio products, is Kingston planning to foray into any other gadget segment, maybe a smartphone?
I had a feeling that there would be a similar question. There are no plans at this point to foray into smartphones. However, the answer to the question is still Yes. There are gadget segments that Kingston is adding like the upcoming Nucleum, which sports 7 high quality ports from one USB-C connection or the DataTraveler Bolt Duo, a Dual USB drive for iPhone or iPad.
Vishal Parekh, Marketing Director, Kingston Technology India
What is your take of the Indian gaming scenario? There was a lull period, but it’s gradually picking up, will it finally explode and reach new heights?
To put it bluntly, Indian gaming was more than fragmented till late 2015. This was the time when brands, with interests like ours, worked together to identify and consolidate the gaming communities and help them grow. We worked and invested in creating a steady infrastructure for gamers to participate and improve their skillset. HyperX followed a 3-Tier approach where we
Empower gamers with quality, durable products
Help cafés get better at servicing gamers
Build national professional platforms for gamers to aim for
The gaming industry here is growing at a healthy pace due to the rise in its acceptance from families. What we also see is the increasing drive from gamers to improve their talent with better hardware and better competition. For youngsters, gaming has now become a major source of entertainment due to which there has been a rise in the popularity of the PC gaming, Console gaming and online gaming. It is expected that in coming years, India will emerge as one of the top gaming nations. With our engagements, we aim to develop the casual gamers to professional gaming
Vivo did woo the crowd when they first showcased the in-display fingerprint sensor in the Vivo X21 few months ago. Finally, the smartphone has arrived in India and boy-o-boy does it look good. With a price tag of Rs 35,990 this smartphone will take the fight to OnePlus 6 and Nokia 8, which also lie in the same price bracket.
Specifications
The Vivo X21 has a lot of good things going for it, but first let’s harp a little about its main USP. With the in-display fingerprint reader embed, there is no round or oval physical space/key anywhere on the phone that the user would need to tap to unlock the it. Instead one has to press lightly the bottom middle part of the touchscreen. A sensor lies here and it reads the fingerprint as soon as you tap on it. Pretty neat, if you ask us.
As for the other specifications, the Vivo X21 features an edge to edge 6.28-inch FHD+ super AMOLED touchscreen (2,280×1,080 pixel resolution). This has an aspect ratio of 19:9. 6GB of RAM and 128GB memory is placed on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 660 chipset, which for us is slightly off-putting as the other smartphones in the bracket have Qualcomm 835 and even 845 chipsets powering them. Moving on, the smartphone does support additional storage and one can install a microSD card up to 256 GB in this device.
Vivo X21 does come with a dual-camera setup at the back powered by a 12MP+5MP sensor combo. The front snapper is also powerful enough to take good selfies, as this one get a 12MP sensor too with f/2.0 aperture. Powering Vivo X21 is a 3,200 mAh battery with fast charge support. Other features include dual-SIM support, Bluetooth 5.0, Android 8.1 Oreo with Vivo’s own Funtouch OS 4.0 over it. This smartphone will be Flipkart exclusive and comes in gold colour option for the Indian market.
This season we have seen leaks, leaks and more leaks of smartphones that are about to be launched. The latest to join the leaked bandwagon is the leading smartphone brand of India, Xiaomi. Slashleaks have revealed the box of the Xiaomi Mi8 in this latest internet leak that shows most of its specifications that the users would want to know. This has come days before the smartphone will be revealed to the world at an event in China.
The photos surfaced by them show that the Xiaomi Mi8 will have a Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 chipset (the second phone to have it, after OnePlus 6), 6 GB RAM, 64 GB storage and a dual camera setup, with 20MP sensor. What’s more, is that this smartphone will also support dual-GPS mode that is first in its class. What will happen with the dual-GPS? Well, some say it will strengthen the signal for more accurate reading that apps can use.
Other than that, different reports suggest the Xiaomi Mi8 to have a 6.2-inch FHD+ display with 19:9 ratio. This phone will also have a notch like the OnePlus 6 and seems to be an edge to edge screen driven mobile. A 16 MP sensor will power the front facing camera module, while a 3,300 mAh battery will be giving this smartphone its life juice. This is most likely to be backed by a Quick charge feature that will give the user several hours of talk time in a matter of few minutes of charging.
This smartphone with other gadgets from Brand Xiaomi is set to release on 31st of May. Xiaomi Mi Band 3 and MIUI 10 is also slated to launch at the same event. If the above specs are true, then Xiaomi does seem to have a winner on its hands, as it will keep the price very competitive when compared to OnePlus and Oppo smartphones.
Vivo seems to be on a roll and is on a launching spree of new devices. Well, we have seen this strategy work in the past and makers like Samsung and Xiaomi have made it big using the same road. The company is all set to launch its new Vivo X21 UD smartphone in India on May 29, but before that they have gone ahead and announced the first in its Z series of smartphone called Vivo Z1.
Price
This smartphone was showcased in China and carries a price tag of CNY 1,798 that is Rs 19,150 approximately in India. In terms of the specifications the Vivo Z1 will sport a 6.3-inch (19:9 aspect ratio) edge to edge touch screen with a notch on top, just like the one found on many other devices days, inspired by Apple iPhone X.
Specifications
The Vivo Z1 will have Qualcomm Snapdragon 660 SoC at its core and will come with 4 GB RAM. A Dual camera setup (13MP + 2 MP) is found on this smartphone and the front camera is powered by a 12MP selfie sensor. Fingerprint reader and facial recognition have been added to this smartphones security detail. Vivo Z1 is available in Black, Red and Blue colour variants.
Over that, the Vivo Z1 will also support dual-SIM with 4G and runs Android 8.1 Oreo out of the box. The CPU has clock speed of up to 2.2 GHz and is combined with a 512 Adreno GPU. As far as the storage is concerned, the Vivo Z1 has 64 GB inbuilt memory that can be expanded with the help of a microSD card up to 256 GB using the hybrid SIM tray.
Other features include VoLTE, Wi-Fi 802.11, GPS, Bluetooth and a 3,260 mAh battery. When is the arrival of this phone in India? Well, that is still unclear, but an industry insiders tell us it will be available in India in the next 30-60 days.
We got our hands on the OnePlus 6 and here is the unboxing and first impressions of the nifty little smartphone.
Technical Specifications of the OnePlus 6*20MP+16MP primary dual camera with OIS, Super Slow motion, Portrait mode and 16MP front facing camera*15.95 centimeters (6.28-inch) FHD+ Full Optic AMOLED 19:9 display with 2280 x 1080 pixels resolution. 2.5D Corning Gorilla Glass 5*OxygenOS based on Android Oreo 8.1 with Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 octa core processor*6/8 GB RAM, 64/128 GB internal memory and dual nano SIM dual-standby (4G+4G)*3300mAH lithium Polymer battery with Dash Charge technology*Face Unlock, Fingerprint scanner, Water Resistant, Glass back and NFC enabled
Performance
Let’s start with the configuration. The Acer Nitro 5 Spin comes in a few specs starting with Intel Core i5 8th gen, however the one we are reviewing is the top of the line with Intel Core i7 8th gen CPU with clock speed of 1.8 GHz and turbo boost. It has 8 GB of RAM and comes with dual storage drives. One SSD with 256 GB capacity (primary boot drive) and a secondary 1 TB 2.5 HDD, so together they make sure you get best performance and have lot of space at the same time.
The IPS display is 15.6-inches wide and supports full HD 1080p graphics. Talking about which, the graphics are powered by a NVIDA Geforce 1050 GTX graphic card that kicks in beautifully and makes sure all the latest games run at high, if not ultra-high settings. To test the performance further we ran PC Mark 8 home test on it and it scored a nice 3,627 points. On 3D Mark Sky Diver test it scored 6,286 points. Both, put the Acer Nitro 5 Spin in the higher order of gaming laptops in India.
The battery life is exquisite and we were able to extract 6 hours of it with mixed usage of watching movies, playing a game or two and listening to music. This machine amazed us at many steps, till we saw the smudges on the top side of the panel and the screen. It is a touch screen device so these are meant to be there, but they do really show when the lights are dim and are distracting. Our suggestion is to keep a cleaning cloth handy in the carry case of backpack.
Also, while playing games on it for long we found that the right side of the keyboard did get a little hot and the fan gets really loud. Oh yes, loudness reminds us that the twin speaker system is quite loud too, this time in a good way. For movie and casual gaming, it is really good, however when playing games like Counter Strike we trusted our good old headphones.
Verdict and Final Thoughts
The backlit keyboard is a blessing when you are gaming at night. The full length keyboard is also great for strategy games where you need to use more keys. Combine this with a great pair of headphones and a gaming mouse, you have a winning combination at LAN events or game nights with friends. At a price of Rs 91,989 the Acer Nitro 5 Spin might be out of reach of many. But, if you can afford it, we give it a thumbs up.
