Xperia X Updated with the Android 7.1.1 Nougat Concept

Back at the start of December, a member of Sony's concept developer team said the Android 7.1.1 Nougat update was their "number one priority." The team had a goal to be the first smartphone manufacturer (excluding Google) to release the latest 7.1.1 update and they just did. Granted, this is not a stable build of the update, but it is great for those who have joined in on Sony's Android concept program.

At the time, the concept developer team from Sony already had the source code for the update. They were able to tinker with this part of the OS, but they were still waiting for the application suite and Compatibility Test Suite from Google. At the time, they were unable to give us any ETA about the release of the concept update, but it seems we didn't have to wait very long. We're already seeing those with the Xperia X receiving the 7.1.1. OTA update right now.

Again, you have to be part of Sony's Xperia Concept Program to be eligible for this OTA update. The OTA update for this device comes with the firmware version 38.3.A.0.41, and it also includes the December security patches for Android as well. The changelog for this new update says it includes a restart option directly in Android's power menu. This OTA update also comes with support for Sony's PS4 Remote Play feature too (although DualShock support is not included right now).

We can also see that this new update enables the camera application to be launched faster than before too. We aren't seeing any complaints about this update when it comes to bugs or stability issues, so that's a good thing. Were you one of the people who received this 7.1.1 Nougat update? If so, we would love to hear what you think about the update so far.

Source: Xperia Blog

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UMi Z Presale to Start on January 4th

UMi has announced that the UMi Z flagship phone will start going on presale on January 4th. You can subscribe at UMi's official website where 100,000 subscriptions will be accepted and those users will receive $60 off of the device. Or, better yet, you can enter our UMi Z giveaway and get one for free.

The UMi Z has an aluminum unibody, 5.5-inch FHD display, 3780 mAh battery with fast charging and 13MP cameras in both front and back. The rear camera supports dual focus with a quad-led flash, while a soft-light is added for the front camera to illuminate dark scenes.

UMi Z comes with android 6.0 Marshmallow out of the box, but will be upgraded to Android 7.0 Nougat via OTA.

According to UMi, the Z model is backed by the concept  "Form Follows Function" , which is derived from modern industrial design genre – Bauhaus. The widely known Bauhaus principle seems to be embraced in UMi Z's design and manufacturing process.

Shop Link:

Gearbest Banggood Efox UMi official aliexpress store Find more shops at UMi website here

Thanks to UMi for sponsoring this post.

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Estimates Say the Mobile Payment Market is Hitting $780 Billion in 2017

According to a new report released by TrendForce, we're going to see huge growth within the mobile payment market this year. Their research says that people who own smartphones spent over $585 billion using mobile payments services in 2016. This includes Android Pay, Samsung Pay, Apple Pay and all of the other mobile payment solutions that are available. This means we could see an increase of more than 25% in this year alone.

Even though Google is pushing Android Pay pretty hard, TrendForce's research believes Samsung Pay and Apple Pay are the two who have an advantage over the current competition. They were impressed with how Android Pay entered the Japanese market though, as it has been tough for other foreign services to do. Still, they feel the advertising arm of Samsung and Apple are big enough that they will be the two to dominate the mobile payment market next year.

They did reveal some details about Google working with Sony to incorporate FeliCa into an NFC-enabled IC card though. FeliCa is an RFID smart payment solution that Sony has created, and they are a highly regarded company within Japan. The idea is that this NFC-enabled IC card will work with smartphones and could help strengthen their presence within the country. Google is also said to be working with eMoney, Visa, MasterCard, and Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, as well as other payment services and financial institutions.

TrendForce believes this year will see some much-needed security solutions for the mobile payment market. We've been seeing momentum toward the integration of different hardware technologies in encrypted chip design that has improved the security aspect of mobile payments. But they also feel that advances in encryption algorithms and multi-factor authentication methods will help to increase efficiency when verifying the user, confirming payments and securing the transfer of data.

Source: TrendForce

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Version 10 of Magisk Adds a New Way to Vendor Mirrors, and More

We've talked about Magisk here at XDA multiple times in the past, and it's been great to watch the development of this modification since it was first introduced. The goal of Magisk is to overcome the limitations of systemless mods for the Android platform. By creating a universal systemless interface, this enables developers and users to apply software mods in a way that doesn't interfere with the system partition.

Version 9 of Magisk was released just last month, and it came with a number of new changes like removing the interface for post-fs modules, re-writing the certain features, and preparing itself for MultiROM support. MultiROM support is still a work in progress, but you can watch a proof of concept video for that feature right here. This version 10 update comes with a new way to mount system (vendor) mirrors, a universal way of dealing with /vendor, and the ability to add anything to any place. Magic Mount will now use symlinks to mirroring back (if possible), which reduces bind mounts for adding files. It will also check init namespace and zygote namespace in an attempt to prevent Magic Mount from breakage. Magisk Hide will now send SIGSTOP to pause a target process ASAP so that it will cause a crash less if the unmounting was too late. And hiding should also work under any conditions now, even when adding libs and /system root.

Yesterday, we saw a quick 10.2 update released that adds a few new changes to Magisk as well. The changelog mentions removing apps/priv-app from whitelist as a fix for crashes, it comes with a fix for the phh binary being out-of-date. And it fixes a bug that caused root to disappear when upgrading within Magisk Manager. You can find the full changelog for these two updates listed below. . .

v10.2

• [Magic Mount] Remove apps/priv-app from whitelist, should fix all crashes
• [phh] Fix binary out-of-date issue
• [scripts] Fix root disappear issue when upgrading within Magisk Manager

v10

• [Magic Mount] Use a new way to mount system (vendor) mirrors
• [Magic Mount] Use universal way to deal with /vendor, handle both separate partition or not
• [Magic Mount] Adding anything to any place is now officially supported (including /system root and /vendor root)
• [Magic Mount] Use symlinks for mirroring back if possible, reduce bind mounts for adding files
• [Magisk Hide] Check init namespace, zygote namespace to prevent Magic Mount breakage (a.k.a root loss)
• [Magisk Hide] Send SIGSTOP to pause target process ASAP to prevent crashing if unmounting too late
• [Magisk Hide] Hiding should work under any conditions, including adding libs and /system root etc.
• [phh] Root the device if no proper root detected
• [phh] Move /sbin to /sbin_orig and link back, fix Samsung no-suid issue
• [scripts] Improve SuperSU integration, now uses sukernel to patch ramdisk, support SuperSU built in ramdisk restore
• [template] Add PROPFILE option to load system.prop

Source: XDA Forum

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Unofficial Build of CM13 is Now Available for the Galaxy View (SM-T670)

The development forum for the Galaxy View has been bare since the product was released, but XDA Recognized Contributor deadman96385 has recently released unofficial builds of both TWRP, as well as CyanogenMod 13, for the huge 18.4″ Android tablet.

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CES 2017: Honor Launches the Affordable Dual-Camera Honor 6X in the US and Europe — XDA and Honor Collaborating to Seed Development

The mid-range smartphone market does not get as much media attention as the flagships usually do, and the issue has been compounded by the advent of affordable flagships — devices that are flagship-like but are priced cheaper, approaching the mid-end price bracket.

But even with affordable flagships in the picture, users with tighter budget constraints often find themselves in a fix as options in limited budget scenarios leave a lot to be desired.

Huawei's Honor sub-brand targets this audience with a lot of zest. The Honor 5X was crowned the Vanguard of the Mid-Range Segment when it was released, offering high value for the price it commanded upon launch. The successor to the Honor 5X, the Honor 6X, seems inline to deliver a similar package: high value at a low price. The device was launched in October in China, so we already knew what to expect in terms of specs.

honor 5X XDA Review: The Current Vanguard of the Mid-Range Segment

For a quick recap of the specs and build, the Honor 6X uses a metallic body, much like the Honor 5X. There's a 5.5-inch FHD LCD display on the front, with the "Honor" branding on the bottom chin. On the inside, you get an octa-core Kirin 655 SoC based on a 16nm process, with 4x cores at 2.1GHz and 4x cores at 1.7GHz, along with the Mali T830-MP2 GPU. The phone comes in three RAM + storage configurations: 3GB+32GB, 4GB+32GB and 4GB+64GB. There is microSD card support thanks to the hybrid dual SIM slot. The phone is powered by a 3,340 mAh battery with 5V/2A charging, and runs on EMUI 4.1 based on Android 6.0 Marshmallow. The device comes in three colors — gold, silver and gray.

The most advertised feature of the device is the dual-lens rear camera setup. It enables the Honor 6X to offer a wide aperture range (f/0.95 – f/16) and allows for good-looking bokeh shots, as seen on the Honor 8. The main camera provides images at 12MP resolution, while the secondary 2MP camera captures depth of field information. The wide aperture and the 1.25um pixel size aid in low light imagery as well. On the software side, EMUI adds in a few features like monochrome images with a color dash to provide wider use-cases for the camera.

Now, Honor has launched the Honor 6X in the US and European regions. Starting from January 4, the Honor 6X will be available for pre-order in the US for a price of $249.99 for the 3GB RAM variant. Sales of the device go live on January 15 in the US.

In other markets, like the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Netherlands, Russia and more, the device goes on sale on January 4 for a price of €249.

The 4GB RAM variant of the device will be up for sale in Q1 2017 in select markets. Expected price of the 4GB RAM variant is $299.99 / €299.

The Honor 6X focuses on our obsession with capturing great images, and provides a fulfilling mass-consumer oriented package at a price that many would find agreeable. Can it actually live up to its promises? Stay tuned for our in-depth and objective Honor 6X review written by Mario Serrafero.

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Seeding Development for the Honor 6X

As a separate announcement, we want to let users know that Honor has provided XDA with many Honor 6X units which we will be distributing to key developers in order to kickstart development for the device. We will also be gathering feedback regarding development and giving away several Honor 6X units in the following weeks, so stay tuned for our upcoming giveaways. For more information about Honor devices and discussion with fellow XDA members, visit the Honor 6X forums and the Honor Hub. Also, the Honor 6X's forums will be part of our Community Incentive Program, through which frequent contributors to the Honor forums receive swag and free hardware among other goodies.

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What are your thoughts on the Honor 6X? Let us know in the comments below!

>>> Check out XDA's Honor 6X Forums!

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We Are Hiring! Do You Have What it Takes?

Are you looking for a rewarding job, working with a great team of like-minded individuals? Want to work flexible hours from the comfort of your own home?

Then consider a career in journalism with xda-developers! We are looking for News Writers and Content Creators to expand our portal team — 2016 saw an incredible leap forward with the quality of original content we were able to deliver, and we hope to improve further in 2017.

As a part of our News and Editorial team you will be expected to:

• Report on events and news as they are happening
• Research new technologies to write thorough editorial or analytical content
• Attend product launches and other events around the world
• Analyse and review new devices
• Represent the company at developer conferences or conventions
• Any other relevant duties that may be required of you

You must:

• Be able to read and write in English
• Have a passion for writing or mobile technology
• Know your way around Android
• Have an analytical mind

Bugs:

• You tell me!

To apply for a position, fill in the form below. If you have any questions about the position, feel free to ask them in the comments below and one of our Portal writers will reply. Feel free to link to some of your work in the application if you feel the sample field is limiting.

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