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The Meizu X is now official The Meizu X is now official, having been unveiled today by the manufacturer. The handset is equipped with a 5.5-inch AMOLED screen with 2.5D double-sided glass. With its 1080 x 1920 resolution, the X features a 401ppi pixel density. The MediaTek Helio P20 chipset is under the hood, containing an octa-core 2.3GHz CPU and the Mali-T880 GPU. There are two different variants of the phone. One carries 3GB of LPDDR4 RAM with 32GB of internal storage. The other version  comes with 4GB of LPDDR4 RAM along with 64GB of native storage. The rear-facing 12MP camera includes a Sony IMX 386 sensor with a pixel size of 1.25µm and PDAF laser auto focus. The front-facing camera weighs in at 5MP. Keeping the lights on is a 3200mAh battery with mCharge rapid charging. A 3.5mm earphone jack is included, as is a fingerprint scanner embedded in the home button. It can unlock the device in .2 seconds. The Meizu X also offers VoLTE capabilities an...

Back in May 2014, an epic patent infringement legal battle between Apple and Samsung resulted in $119.6 million verdict for Samsung to pay on violating three Apple patents. This was down from the original $2.2 billion in damages sought, and concerned the OG iPhone's slide-to-unlock, quick links and auto-correct features.  Samsung then filed an appeal, succeeding in overturning the verdict, but Apple countered with a review which reconfirmed it last month. The lawyers of the Korean conglomerate went to the US Court of Appeals for a whole court hearing, but now the judges there have overturned this second appeal.  The only chance that Samsung stands of not paying in this situation, is if it goes all the way up to the Supreme Court, and it probably will, as the first patent case that involved Apple and Samsung has also reached Supreme Court level, and a verdict is expected in the spring. For what it's worth, Samsung's slide-to-unlock and auto-correct us...

One of the features we modern smartphone lovers crave the most right now is long and reliable battery life. For the past few years, manufacturers have gotten performance, camera, and displays down pretty well, but the race for thinning out devices has taken its toll on battery life. Currently, a regular smartphone with a display around 5 inches and proportions like the Galaxy S7 will have a juice box with a capacity of about 3,000 mAh. And sure, phone makers and software developers have managed to optimize energy usage immensely bu developing power-efficient hardware and not-so-power-hungry software, but there's still room for improvement. Some manufacturers get that there are users out there that would rather carry a brick of a device that has a massive power bank in its trunk than a thin phone that can't last 5 hours of heavy usage. These are few and far in-between, but the resulting devices are usually worth a mention, if only for the "interesting facts"...

To finish 2016 on a high note, Meizu took to Twitter to announce the Pro 6 Plus, a refresh of its flagship smartphone that features some savvy new specs. Housing a bigger, 5.7-inch 1440 x 2560 AMOLED display, the handset is powered by the Samsung Exynos 8890 chipset, the same unit that drives the Samsung Galaxy S7 and S7 edge, rather than a MediaTek chip. There are 4GB of RAM and up to 128GB of internal storage. The smartphone also offers a fingerprint sensor, a heart-rate monitor, and 3D Touch technology. There's a 12MP camera on its back, which utilizes the Sony IMX386 CMOS sensor that Meizu previously used in the MX6 smartphone. This time, though, the camera module is paired with Samsung's image signal processor and optical image stabilization system, which ought to provide better-looking photos. Hi-Fi audio, global LTE support (with the likely exception of the United States), and USB Type-C connectivity complete the configuration. Powered by a 3400mAh battery w...

The end of each year sees Apple stop reviewing app and update submissions for around a week in late December. This year's annual shutdown will commence between Dec 23 and Dec 27, thus app developers are warned to submit their projects on time. Apple's policy makes it tricky for them, as Christmas Day sees the most volume of app downloads of any day in the year, due to many users receiving a new smartphone as a Christmas gift. Yet, the App Store review process won't function during Christmas. App developers must, therefore, plan ahead if they want their apps to be available for download in the winter holidays. Interestingly, Apple is taking less time off this year, compared to previous years. In 2014 and 2015, the App Store was closed for new apps and updates between Dec 22 and Dec 29. This year, though, app reviewers will get only five days off. Of course, regular users will be able to download apps, updates, and in-app purchases during the shutdown, whil...