The OnePlus 3 is an almost perfect fit to fill in the void created by the lack of a Nexus release this year. You get stellar hardware at affordable price range, and an experience that does justice to this hardware. OnePlus had also released the kernel source code and device tree for the OnePlus 3 (and OnePlus 3T as well) early on, so the enthusiast community had the opportunity to really dig in.
Our forums are testimony to the love that the developer community has extended on to the OnePlus 3. With a wide variety of custom ROMs with different bases (CM, AOSP, OxygenOS and even MIUI) to choose from, the OnePlus 3 is currently the flashaholic's device with good reason.
Even after all the developer friendliness that OnePlus has recently shown to the community by fulfilling their obligations and more, they still showed interest in going on ahead. The company promised to look into improving camera performance on non-OxygenOS ROMs, and we kept inquiring about it a few times after their promise. This is what Carl had to say on the issue, from our last interview:
Mario: Do you guys have any plans on helping with the development of the camera software for Custom ROMs?
Carl: We want to, and we've been talking about internally. So there's a challenge with the camera because if we want a blob, then there are two major challenges. The first one being, the code relating to the camera is on a lot of layers, so you have something related to the camera on the framework level, something on the Android level, something on a system level. So we're gonna have to rewrite a lot of code to be able to separate it in a way that allows us to blob it. And the second reason is, if we were to blob it the result is that the speed will suffer, so the speed of the camera UX on custom ROMs will suffer. We're still trying to figure out a way of how we can release something that will help people improve the camera in their custom ROMs without making the experience become too bad. And we don't want something with our logo to have a poor experience either. So it is going to be a little bit harder than we thought, but we've been discussing this.
In a forum post at the OnePlus forums, Bradon from the OnePlus Community team has given an update to the current camera situation.
Bradon mentions that discussions are still ongoing internally on how to best manage the release. The issue at hand is that camera code is something that OEMs need to spend a lot of time and effort to develop and fine-tune, effectively making it intellectual property. The various stakeholder involved in a company would definitely not be happy if OnePlus openly distributed its IP, as that would lead to OnePlus losing its edge against all competitors, big or small, as far as the camera performance is concerned.
But at the same time, lack of camera code has led to below-average camera performance on custom ROMs. ROMs are amongst one of the main draws on the OnePlus 3 right now, so a handicap like this presents a virtual roadblock in getting the best performance out of your device.
OnePlus was contemplating releasing camera blobs instead of code directly. This would allow ROM developers to directly insert the custom software into their ROMs without directly being privy to the code intricacies. While camera quality would improve for photos and videos to come at par with the OxygenOS experience, the overall camera experience would become slower than that of OxygenOS (which could have indirect implications for the Oxygen branding).
OnePlus is unhappy about this trade-off and how this would affect user experience on the device. But they are open to discussion, so the company has posed the following questions:
Would you be interested in camera blobs given these tradeoffs? Are there any alternative solutions that might make sense for you?
If you would like to chime in the discussion and share your thoughts, head on over to the OnePlus forum thread. Make yourself heard!
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As we start the last month of the year, we get a look at how Android is being divided up among the current active install base (which are also visiting the Google Play Store). These stats were collected during a 7-day period that ended on December 5th, and as usual, any version of Android that is less than 0.1% of the active install base will not be shown in this graph. So let's take a look at how things compare to last month's distribution numbers.
Starting with the newest version of Android, we can see that 7.x Nougat is now up to 0.4% of the active install base. This is an increase of 0.1% compared to November, and includes devices like the Pixel, Pixel XL, LG V20 (among others) and custom ROMs that are based on Android 7.x Nougat. With so many devices in the market though, a 0.1% increase is at least 1.4 million devices. So that's something to keep in mind.
Next up we have Android 6.x Marshmallow up to 26.3% of the active install base, which is an increase of 2.3% compared to last month. Then we have Android 5.x Lollipop, that is currently the king with 34% of the active install base, which is actually down 0.1% compared to November's numbers. Then there is Android 4.4.x KitKat with 24% of the active install base, which saw a drop of 1.2% when compared to last month's distribution numbers.
At the tail end we have Android 4.1.x, 4.2.x and 4.3 Jelly Bean with 12.8%, which is down from 13.7% last month. Android 4.0.x Ice Cream Sandwich only has 1.2% (down a whole 0.1%), Android 2.3.x Gingerbread is at 1.2% (also down a whole 0.1%), and then Android 2.2 Froyo is still holding strong at 0.1% of the active install base. It will be interesting to see if Android Nougat will be able to beat Marshmallow's yearly progress and hit over 26.3% by December of next year.
Remember the Samsung Galaxy Note 7? Everyone does. It came in with a bang, and went out with a literal one. But everyone will agree that we do need to move on, hoping to look forward to other different offerings that Samsung is planning for the future.
We have a few interesting tidbits on the next big thing from Samsung, the Samsung Galaxy S8. There has been nuggets of new information from different sources coming in, so we will take a look at these and figure out how Samsung's next move will appear to the market.
Starting off, one of the upgrades on the Galaxy S8 will come in an area which has not seen as much focus in terms of hardware as other areas of the smartphone. The front facing camera on the upcoming Samsung flagship will be finally upgraded with autofocus technology. Reports coming in from Korea mention that the S8 will use an encoder type focusing mechanism as against the current voice coil motor implementations. This will allow the camera module to be of shallow physical depth as the focusing actuator is mounted on the side of the lens instead of the middle. Having a camera bump on the front of the device would be poor aesthetic choice, so this upgrade will allow Samsung to hopefully continue on with a flat front design with no camera bump as seen on the rear. The report unfortunately, does not mention the resolution of the camera, so that is left for future leaks to figure out.
On the topic of cameras, the rear camera on the Galaxy S8 is not expected to use a dual-camera setup. There was speculation on this end, claiming that Samsung might be planning to use dual cameras on the rear. It turns out that was wishful thinking indeed, as the latest reports maintain that Samsung will stick to one sensor on the back only.
Moving on, we look at the claimed design and screen aspects of the Galaxy S8. Reports in early November claimed that the Galaxy S8 will come in two variants based on display sizes: a 5.7″ display variant and a 6.2″ display variant. The screen sizes do seem unreasonable for mass adoption as most consumers do not like the handling of devices with displays bigger than 6″, but Samsung has a trick up its sleeve. Samsung is expected to ditch all bezels on the OLED display on the S8's. This also means that the home button and capacitive buttons might finally be on their way out as well, something that another independent report claims.
As far as names go, the "Edge" moniker may also be on its way out as Samsung looks to standardize the Edge across its flagship lineup. The Galaxy S8 and the Galaxy S8 Plus will have edge displays but not the name, and will likely be close to the current physical dimensions despite the increase in screen diagonal size as a result of the bezel-less and curved design. A flat variant of the S8 may not be revealed at launch.
The display itself on the Galaxy S8's will retain the 2K resolution as its predecessor, and not a 4K resolution display. However, the Super AMOLED display is likely to shift from the Diamond PenTile layout and go ahead with a Standard RGB arrangement which is claimed to consume less power and have a longer service life. The report claims that the new display will provide significant improvements for the purposes of virtual reality.
Since the physical home button is on its way out, the question that then pops up is: where will the fingerprint scanner go? Under the display, as per reports. The fingerprint sensor will be embedded within the display for optical fingerprint indentification, claimed to be faster and more accurate than an ultrasonic sensor.
In the audio department, the Galaxy S8 will get mixed reactions as it adds, and removes, features in this area. As a shocker, the Samsung Galaxy S8 will be the next smartphone that will ditch the 3.5mm headphone jack slot, as per report from Sammobile. The Note 7 kept the 3.5mm jack in harmony with the USB Type-C slot that is used for charging and data transfer, but the S8 is said to get rid of the 3.5mm port and opt for audio out through the Type-C port itself.
On the software end, Samsung will very likely also integrate an improved AI based assistant competitor. This will be the result of their acquisition of Viv Labs and its AI platform.
Lastly, there's the usual set of rumors and speculation that accompanies most talks of flagship successors. The S8 is claimed to come bearing the Qualcomm Snapdragon 830 or the 10nm-based Exynos 8895 SoC (depending on market). Qualcomm launched the Snapdragon 835 instead of the 830, so we await more information on this end. Similarly, the speculation that the S8 will come with 6GB of RAM and 256GB of storage also needs more substantiation.
Samsung is expect to unveil the Galaxy S8 at Mobile World Congress in late February 2017. With all of these new features which are cutting edge in their own right, and the whole Note 7 fiasco behind it (and the estimated $17 Billion loss), it is unclear what pricing Samsung will look at adopting for the Note 8.
Many expected Samsung to play it safe with the S8 and exercise caution and prudence, but Samsung does not seem to be in the mood to hold any punches back.
What are your thoughts on the Galaxy S8 so far? Do you like the improvements that Samsung is expected to bring to the table? Let us know in the comments below!
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HTC has been very vocal about which devices they plan on updating to Android 7.0 Nougat. Starting all the way back in May of this year, HTC announced their official roadmap for Android 7.0 Nougat (called Android N at the time). We were told they had plans to update the HTC One M9, HTC One A9, and the HTC 10 with Google's latest version of Android. The one device left off in this list was the HTC One M8, which didn't have any plans to get officially updated at that time.
Then in August, we did a piece that detailed HTC breaking their 15-day promise for delivering Google's latest Android update to the HTC One A9. A promise they made to the public when the device was announced. HTC did say they had plans to update the HTC 10 with Android 7.0 Nougat within the fourth quarter of the year, but the One A9 should have received the update quicker (according to their promise).
HTC had an official response to the issue and said HTC had changed their mind, and instead assigned their available engineers to work on the update for the "most popular flagship products" first since they felt this benefited the most customers. HTC did keep their Q4 promise for the HTC 10's Nougat update as it started to roll out to devices a little over a week ago. With unlocked HTC 10 units receiving their update, the HTC One M9 seems to be next on the list.
Yesterday, HTC confirmed that the unlocked version of the HTC One M9 would begin receiving its Android 7.0 Nougat update. They said it would start late that evening, so current owners should look out for this OTA update notification soon. The company also confirmed that carrier variants of the HTC One M9 should expect to see the Nougat update hitting their device "early next year."
Google unwrapped a new application yesterday called Trusted Contacts, that's somewhat similar to other services like Google+ Location Sharing and Google Latitude. The idea behind it is to offer a solution for those who need to know the location of a friend or loved one. Trusted Contacts isn't tied to a specific service though (like Google+ Location Sharing and Google Latitude were), which is what we're seeing a lot of from Google lately.
Once you install the application, you'll be allowed to label a number of the contacts you have in your phone as 'trusted'. By setting a contact to be trusted, you're not allowing them to automatically see your location though (and vice versa). You're basically just allowing them the opportunity to see your location. So, after you have set someone as a trusted contact, they'll be able to request your location from the new application.
At first, this will only be a request because the recipient can deny it. The person you are requesting the location status from will receive a full screen notification (similar to a phone call). If the person does not respond in 5 minutes, then the location of that person will automatically be sent to the one who requested it. Once they receive that full screen notification, they will have the ability to decline the location request or instantly share it.
Trusted Contacts is currently available for Android and can be downloaded directly from the Play Store right now. They tell us the app is coming to iOS in the future, but didn't give an estimation about when it will be made available. They did set up a landing page for it here though, so you can request to be notified when the iOS application will be made available to the public.
Google Camera received an update that added new shooting modes. These modes will adjust your camera for the appropriate lighting situations. This update will push to the Nexus 5X, Nexus 6P, Pixel and Pixel XL. I tried installing the APK on other devices with no success.
Check out the video to see how the different shooting modes make your pictures better.
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For Android fans, 2016 has been rather uneventful. Sure, we've seen the end of the Google Nexus line, the release of Android Nougat, and the rise and fall of the Samsung Galaxy Note 7. The two Google Pixel phones, besides the price hike, are not that different than the Nexus phones of old. Android Nougat, while finally implementing multi-window, hasn't really revolutionized the Android software landscape. And as for Samsung's disastrous Galaxy Note 7 – eh, they'll survive. But outside of the Android tech sphere bubble, events in 2016 have led to a huge shake up in the way the world does business. Sometimes, these major geopolitical events trickle down into the lives of your everyday Android fan.
We've talked before about how Brexit has temporarily affected the prices of certain smartphones, and how an Android enthusiast gets by in a 'third-world' country, but today we're going to discuss something that is highly relevant to a dedicated portion of our readers – India's recent demonetization of its highest currency denominations. While the whole issue is largely political in nature (and we do not hold an opinion on the motives or effectiveness), we are here to analyze how this move is likely going to affect the massive potential of the smartphone market in this developing country. Furthermore, we will touch upon how the Indian smartphone scene has been shaken up and changed by this move.
[This article will not touch upon the politics involved with the decision or its ramifications outside of the Android tech scene, so please don't get political in the comments — we are a technology forum first and foremost.]
Demonetization – A Primer
If you've been keeping up with the latest in global news, you may have heard of India's recent demonetization move. For a short summary, the Government of India decided to withdraw the legal tender status of ₹500 and ₹1000 currency notes (valued at ~$7.5 and ~$15 respectively), both of which are (or were) the highest denominations of currency available in the country, with the next highest being ₹100 only (~$1.5) from the old currency; new currency notes of ₹2000 ( ~$30) and ₹500 also were to be put into circulation. The move was announced on 8th November 2016, and was put into effect in a very short time period of less than four hours, effective from 9th November 2016.
For some perspective, refer to the figures quoted in Reserve Bank of India's (the Central monetary authority in the country) Annual Report: the older currency denominations accounted for 86.4% of the country's cash circulation in value (not volume), all of which are now deemed worthless for barter exchange in their old state. Citizens had to deposit their older notes with banks to achieve any more use out of them, and strict withdrawal limits have been imposed (and slightly relaxed since) to make sure that tight control is maintained.
In essence, the largest cash denominations were essentially wiped out overnight, and the sheer value loss caused by the move saw a severe cash crunch in the country. To understand how the recent events would affect the Indian smartphone industry, it is important to look at the scenario before the event and the predictions that were made alongside.
Smartphone Sales
Recent reports from Morgan Stanley, released a few months prior to the surprise move, stated that India was in the running to overtake the United States as the second-largest smartphone market by 2017, riding on top of robust annual growth in the smartphone market. The country would have grown at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 23% through 2018 (compared to 5% estimation for China for the same period), and would account for 30% of the global growth during the period.
As growth in China had decelerated and was expected to stagnate, the moment was ripe for India to become the next point-of-interest for smartphone OEMs and their product strategies. Morgan Stanley's report from April of 2016 puts the number of smartphone users in India at 225 million. That figure – which is already impressive – actually only accounts for 18% of the total population of the country; 82% of the population of India does not have a smartphone, so the potential was (and is) absolutely massive. We saw plenty of OEMs shift their focus in smartphone production and marketing towards India precisely because of the huge potential for growth, and India has also been one of the engines driving smartphone prices down.
With Reliance Jio, a major LTE mobile network operator, expected to launch in 2016, Internet penetration in India was also bound to increase by a very good margin in a short time. All in all, the bigger picture was definitely rosy, a fact that was not lost on international OEMs that looked forward to a piece of the pie.
And then, demonetization happened.
The effects of demonetization were immediately felt in the form of a liquidity crunch in the market. Mind you, there was no lack of funds as people had plenty in the form of assets and bank balances (and old notes). What was missing was the ability to spend these balances. Electronic means of payment (RTGS, NEFT, Debit and Credit Cards) are still mediums largely restricted to urban and semi-urban areas, and even then, these do not enjoy the universal acceptability and preference that physical cash did before. To get a better idea on the cash dependence, India's Cash-to-GDP ratio is reportedly at 10.86% of its GDP (which itself is growing), while countries like UK and USA have low cash dependence at 3.72% and 7.9% respectively. Further, for a population of 1.2 Billion, the country only has 22 Million credit cards and 636 Million debit cards (not taking into account the fact that people can hold multiple cards) as of March 2016.
Now, couple these with the fact that smartphones in India are still largely considered as a luxury rather than a necessity and you'll understand how this demonetization move disproportionately affects the market segment that depends largely on cash – which happens to be the group that largely do not already own a smartphone. Further, sales of smartphones in rural and semi-urban areas continue to rely on physical brick and mortar stores rather than online marketplaces – places where the consumers and the sellers jointly prefer the convenience of cash. The direct consequence of all of these factors combined will give us a sharp decline in smartphone sales in these areas. Sales in urban metropolitan regions are affected as well, but the quantum of drop (and lost potential) is less pronounced here.
Of course, you do not need to take my word for it. On November 26th the Indian Cellular Association (ICA), which is the apex body of mobile industry in India comprising of the various stakeholders in the industry, put forth a formal request to the Government of India to allow the usage of the older and now invalid currency notes specifically for buying mobile phones. ICA claims that sales of mobile phones (smartphones and feature phones combined) have fallen by 50% due to the domino effect that demonetization is having on the Indian economy.
"The mobile handset sales have crashed and the sales are down in the brick and mortar channel, which is more than 80 percent of our turnover… the daily collection of our trade and industry, which should be around Rs 350-400 crore [~ $51 Million – $59 Million] is down by 50 per cent."
Market research firm IDC forecasts that feature phone shipments (not actual sales, but a hard-cap on potential sales) will fall by 24.6% while smartphone shipments will fall 17.5% this quarter compared to the previous quarter.
Telephony Services
The importance of mobile services was not entirely lost on the government. Seeing how a very large part of the low and medium income groups prefer using prepaid SIM connections over postpaid billing connections for their telephony needs, the government did allow the use of older ₹500 notes for topping up prepaid connections up to December 15th. There are restrictions in place, such as a maximum ceiling for a prepaid recharge with the old note being fixed at ₹500 (the value of the old note) per prepaid connection (effectively allowing you the use of only one of your older currency notes). But, looking on the bright side, some respite is better than nothing. The government did recognize telephony as an essential service, but consumers are holding back unneeded expenditure in this sector as uncertainty on the liquidity crisis continues.
One telecom service operator is standing above the pack, being on the positive end of the demonetization move: Reliance Jio.
Jio launched commercially to the public in early September 2016, becoming India's first and only 100% VoLTE operator in the country with a full 4G LTE network (no provision of 3G/2G service, which is a very big step forward for India). When Jio launched commercially, it actually launched completely free for the end user — no contract, no security deposit, no monthly fee, no prepaid expense, no money to be paid even for the SIM card — no strings attached at all. The free service provided users with unlimited 4G data, free VoLTE calls and texts across all networks, along with access to Jio's multimedia app suite. The only catch here was that data was soft-capped at 4GB daily per user, after which the user was throttled down considerably. But seeing how this limit was generous and the service was entirely free, there is not much to complain here. The free period was to end by 31st December 2016, beyond which the still-affordable rates of the telecom operator would apply. Consumers still retain the choice of going ahead with the rates, as one could simply cancel the SIM and dispose it off after enjoying the freebies.
While other telecom operators in the country are losing out on income as families look to cut down petty expenditure, Jio is gaining more and more subscribers. People who had held out on Jio are joining over if only to cut down on cash expenses. Jio sensed an opportunity with the demonetization policy, and thus the company recently announced that they will extend its free service offer until March 31, 2017. For consumers who are strapped for cash, a telecom service which does not want any of your money is an obvious winner. Other operators are most definitively feeling the heat, as many are now offering much more attractive deals to entice their customers to remain loyal to their services.
Digital Wallets
An EDC machine, used at merchant counters for card based transactions.
In the past few years, a strong emphasis was put on mobile payment solutions in order to transform the Indian economy from cash-heavy to cashless (or close). Banks and bank accounts are the center point in this equation, but more and more means are being adopted to add on factors of convenience. Not all merchants or consumers could practically afford Electronic Data Capture (EDC) machines, commonly known as card swipe machines, for all of their financial transaction needs. This is where digital wallets factor in.
The concept of a digital wallet in the current Indian context is very much alike Android Pay and other mobile payment solutions in functionality, but differs in its implementation. Android Pay stores information regarding your debit and credit cards and is used to facilitate transactions at merchant counters, but popular digital wallets in India like Paytm, MobiKwik, Oxigen, FreeCharge, Airtel Money, Jio Money (and many more offerings by banks too) try and act as a wallet to actually store currency value within digital accounts rather than just act as information gateways for your bank account. In this regard, these digital wallet solutions are much closer to the likes of PayPal than they are to Android Pay or Samsung Pay.
[The security of such digital wallet solutions is questionable, but that is a topic for a different debate. Personally, I hold only nominal value in such wallets.]
Paytm is the current leader in the Indian market thanks to its early entry as well as consistent marketing efforts. The demonetization move strongly bolstered its usefulness as the service even facilitates exchange transactions which do not necessarily have a financial/for-profit nature (like splitting a bill with friends). Paytm rightfully saw immense opportunity by the government move, and immediately reacted with advertisements across television, newspapers, and social media pages as well as aggressive on-the-ground marketing targeting local shopkeepers and first-time users alike. Within a period of days, the app registered a 700% increase in overall traffic, a 1000% growth in amount of money added to Paytm accounts, 300% increase in app downloads, and a 500% increase in user transactions per week. As of a few days ago, the platform claims to have 150 Million users with 5 Million transactions per day, and is on its way to processing ₹24,000 Crore (~$352 Million) in transaction value by the end of the fiscal year. Just for reference, Paytm started off humbly in 2010, and it was only in 2014 when Paytm's wallet solutions were launched.
Paytm's runaway success highlights one very important point: Google missed the mobile payment train in India. With the current turn of events heavily in favor of mobile wallets, Paytm's familiarity and ease-of-use appealed to the Indian demographics and provided relief in desperate times. By doing so, the company/app has gained trust and widespread acceptability (ranging from the small time newspaper vendors and local grocery stalls all the way to supermarkets and malls), something which currently-non-existent competitors like Android Pay will find extremely hard to compete with. Trust is of utmost importance wherever money is concerned, and Paytm has reached that critical mass where its familiarity will only accelerate its popularity.
Demonetization of the highest denominations is, no doubt, one of the biggest changes that the economy of India has seen in recent times. While not being directly related to the smartphone sector, it has still resulted in widespread ramifications less than a month out from the policy's implementation. The totality of the effects is very difficult to ascertain even in the long term. India was on track to become an even bigger market for smartphones and related services, and this move may have drastically altered the course of India's burgeoning smartphone market, influencing everything from smartphone sales and shipments to mobile carriers and digital wallet solutions. It even extends onto other scenarios, like spending on apps and effects on smartphone prices, but it's harder to draw conclusions on these aspects at the moment. All we can do right now, is wait, watch, and go with the flow.
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