JBL Pulse Wireless Bluetooth Speaker

VERDICT

It's gimmicky but the JBL Pulse brings the auditory goods. 

PROS:

• Fun visuals display
• Good sound quality
• Well built and easy to transport

CONS:

• No speakerphone function

Have you ever been enticed by the mesmerizing glow of a lava lamp? The JBL Pulse Bluetooth Speaker is the auditory equivalent, an excellent portable speaker that lets you "see" sounds for RS.8,800 on Flipkart.

Speaker reviews don't usual highlight visuals, but JBL put as much emphasis on sight as well as on sound when designing the this cylindrical "jambox." The speaker puts on a Multi-LED light show with five pre-programmed display options. Manual control lets you choose from seven colors, and an array of interactions. The ability for an audio device to "pulse" visually with your music is definitely an eye-catching feature, and something friends will notice immediately.

In fact, they might start dissing your purchase as gimmicky until the Pulse starts filling the room with audio worthy of its price tag. Sure, it's flashy, but this bluetooth speaker does an excellent job of projecting audio, especially indoors, whether it be a small office for low volume, or a larger get-together featuring loud and energetic music. Even at full blast the device produces minimal to no distortion, and comes equipped with two high performance drivers and a built in bass port.

The JBL Pulse is relatively compact and easy to bring to the party. It's about 3-inches wide and 7-inches long and weighs a little more than one pound. It might be bigger than a Beats Pill or the Bose SoundLink Mini, but it's still easy to grab with one hand, and goes nicely in an office or even in your car, as an alternative to a pricey auxiliary port installation. The wireless Bluetooth capability allows you to take the JBL Pulse anywhere, as long as it's charged and ready to go. Just don't let its football-like shape tempt you into throwing a spiral.

Battery life on the JBL Pulse is around 10 hours for audio only, and about five hours with the accompanying light show, so skip the visuals if you need it for the long haul. The JBL Pulse is charged via a standard Micro-USB port. The lack of proprietary cable makes it even more travel friendly, chances are no matter where you bring it, someone can loan you a cable for a quick charge.

Pairing the JBL Pulse is simple and intuitive, like it should be. The process of hitting the link button on top of the speaker, then diving into your phone's bluetooth device menu never caused any grief. In fact, we successfully paired the Pulse with a number of mobile devices including an iPhone 5, Samsung Galaxy Note 3 and a Nokia Lumia 1520. The JBL also supports NFC Bluetooth Pairing, which means that you can pair your NFC-enabled Android smartphone by simply tapping it against the bottom of the speaker.

If you're not a fan of using Bluetooth for fear of draining your phone's battery or other resources, you can always play audio the old fashion way via a standard 3.5mm Auxiliary audio connection cord. This feature is great for not only playing music from your phone, but also from your laptop, desktop, or any non-Bluetooth-enabled device like an old school mp3 player.

There are some limitations to the device, but mostly due to its size. Since the speaker is small compared to non-portable devices, it won't be able to replace larger speakers or anything that can really cut above the roar of a crowd like professional equipment. Due to this, it's clearly not the right solution for situations that requires loud music in larger open spaces. Also, compared to the Bose SoundLink Mini the bass in the JBL Pulse comes up a bit short.

One frankly odd omission is the lack of speakerphone function. There's no way to pick up a call and have the JBL project it.

We Liked

Considering its size, sound quality and price, there's very little not to like. It's able to easily fill a room with great sounding audio, and is easy to move around from one room to another. Another great feature is its visual display. The enticing virtual display is an immediate attention grabber. Some may see it as a gimmicky feature, but it does a great job of bringing your attention towards wherever it is in the room.

Verdict

The JBL Pulse may be seen as "gimmicky" due in most part to its visual display. However, the Pulse is a high quality speaker that delivers great sound with the ease of being completely wireless. The convenience and ease of the device is also a really great. It's very easy to use, and the controls are very intuitive. When comparing the Pulse to similar speakers around the same price, the Pulse definitely stands out. It provides comparable if not superior sound quality, and the alluring visually display is cooler than you realize.

If you're looking for a great Bluetooth speaker which you can move from room to room, you'd do well to consider the JBL Pulse. It's a great way to liven a room, whether it's for your own amusement, or for wowing your friends and family. Overall, the JBL Pulse is a great portable audio solution.

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Sony Xperia Z3 review

It was only a year and a half ago that Sony launched its Xperia Z range of flagship smartphones and we have already seen the launch of four models in this series. No other company launches a top-end smartphone in the same series every six months, but there seems to be a method to the madness. With each upgrade, Sony has tinkered with the hardware and software little by little, making changes that improve the user experience in one way or other.

So, has Sony finally achieved perfection with Xperia Z3, the latest and greatest in its Xperia Z series? We find out in our Sony Xperia Z3 review...

Design

Xperia Z3 is the most refined version of Sony's smartphones yet. It sticks to the Omnibalance design theme, but the small design tweaks Sony has added to Xperia Z3 compared to Xperia Z2 add up to make a lot of difference.

Like Xperia Z2, the front and back panels of Xperia Z3 are made of glass, while the rim on the sides remains metallic. The corners are more rounded this time and the glass back has rather silken feel to it, which makes it feel as premium as any all-metal smartphone in the market. The volume rocker and camera keys are flat instead of curved as they were in Xperia Z2.

A major change in the design is that it is more compact than Xperia Z2. Sony has shaved off 0.8mm in the length, 1.3mm in width and 0.9mm in thickness of Xperia Z3 compared to that of its predecessor. This may seem like a small difference in the dimensions of the two smartphones, but the real difference becomes apparent only when you hold Xperia Z3. It feels much smaller in size than Xperia Z2 and is easier to hold as well as slip in and out of the pocket.



Being a water- and dust-resistant smartphone, Xperia Z3 has metallic flaps that cover the microUSB as well as sim+microSD card slots. These flaps are fixed into place with just a light press, but don't let in any water as we saw in our review period. You can take a dip in the water while keeping Xperia Z3 in the pocket and will not have to worry about water damage at all.

Like other top Sony smartphones, Xperia Z3 has points of contact for docking station on the left edge.

Display



At 5.2-inch Sony Xperia Z3's display size is same as that of its predecessor's. The two smartphones have the same Full HD resolution and, therefore, pixel density. However, there are a couple of subtle differences that we noticed.

Firstly, the Xperia Z3 display is much brighter, not only compared to that of its predecessor but also to that of all other smartphones we have reviewed recently. Sony says that this smartphone can push the brightness to 600 candela, the highest among smartphones and we are inclined to believe this claim.

Secondly, the colours are more vivid by default, but you can alter the colour temperature and tone in settings. However, shades of blue were not accurate in some of the videos we watched on the display.

In terms of display quality, we observed excellent viewing angles; you will not see the display lose colours even when seen from acute angles. Sunlight legibility is also great, as the colours and clarity under direct sunlight were great even when the brightness was at 50%.

Hardware

When hardware specifications are compared, Sony Xperia Z3 seems like only a minor upgrade over its predecessor. It has the same quad-core Snapdragon 801 processor as its predecessor, but the four cores run at 2.5GHz this time instead of 2.3GHz. This is of course not the latest smartphone processor in the market, as that title belongs to Snapdragon 805 (which is present in the global version of Samsung Galaxy Note 4, but not the Indian model).

The graphics processor remains Adreno 330 in Xperia Z2 and Z3, and RAM remains constant at 3GB. The connectivity options are also the same between the two smartphones. The rear camera maintains the 20.7MP resolution, but it has a wide angle lens this time. Battery capacity has been reduced from 3,200mAh in Xperia Z2 to 3,100mAh in 3,100mAh in Z3.

Software

There are not too many software additions in Xperia Z3 compared to Z2 or even Z1. The smartphone runs on Android 4.4 with Sony's custom UI on top. The menu button looks like the one used in Nexus launcher, but there is no other hint of Google's software skin apart from this. The only useful apps, according to us, in the smartphone are Walkman, Album and the small apps (floating apps that can be moved around the screen with a flick of the finger).

You also get access to Sony's content ecosystem with this smartphone. Sony has preloaded its LIV, Music and Sports apps on the smartphone, along with PlayStation Network app.

Though it has Play Store access, Xperia Z3 also has a separate Games Store and What's New apps, which show curated content (such as apps, music, games) that users can buy. Though recommendations by these apps are okay, they take you to Play Store eventually in order to download the app.

Performance

What you may have observed till now is that the software as well as hardware of Xperia Z3 is quite similar to that of its predecessor and it will be only natural to think that it will offer the same level of performance with only a little difference. However, the difference in the performance levels of the two smartphones in actual, everyday usage is vast.

Whereas Xperia Z3 is a fine performer that feels a little behind HTC One (M8) and Samsung Galaxy S5 when put under the same battery of tests, Xperia Z3 comes out as the clear winner, that too by a significant margin. The user experience is easily among the smoothest we have used in a long time and it feels much more fluid than Xperia Z2's.

Xperia Z3 came out with flying colours irrespective of what task we threw at it. Switching between apps quickly was a butter-smooth experience and the phone did not show any lag whatsoever. This smartphone certainly belongs to the big league.

Our experience with gaming on Xperia Z3 was also similar, as it did not falter while playing resource-hogging, graphics-intensive games like 'Injustice: Gods Among Us' and 'Real Racing 3'. There were no dropped frame rates or jarring when punched in several actions in the game at all. The Full HD display renders graphics very nicely, so you can notice the small details in such games with ease.



As Xperia Z3 has a 5.2-inch screen, it is only natural to use it as a multimedia device. The Full HD screen is great for watching videos, and can easily handle all video formats. But the real pleasure of playing content on Xperia Z3 is not with the video but the audio. The audio quality is great, and next only to HTC One (M8)'s in the smartphone industry. The rich sound is high on output and does not betray even a hint of the tinny sound that smartphones are prone to delivering at high volumes. The front speakers are not as prominent as HTC One (M8)'s BoomSound speakers, but deliver a pretty great experience.

Battery life of Xperia Z3 is also pretty good, matching the day and a half life that its predecessor delivered. With moderate usage, you can even squeeze out two days of battery life. During our testing period, we played music for approximately three hours, made calls for around an hour, played games for half an hour and watched YouTube videos for approximately an hour.

Xperia Z2's Ultra Stamina power saving mode is present in this smartphone too. It keeps only the basic phone functions, namely dialler, messaging, FM radio, alarm, calculator and calendar, active and disables the remaining functions. When our review unit's battery was at 82%, it showed expected battery life of over 17 days in this mode. Other smartphones like HTC One (M8), Samsung Galaxy S5 and Note 4 also have such battery saving modes.

One problem we faced with Xperia Z3 is that it keeps slipping out of the hands. The material that gives a silken touch to the glass body also makes it vulnerable to accidental drops. This needs to be fixed as we almost dropped the smartphone more than a few times during the review period.

Camera



Sony Xperia Z3 has a 20.7MP rear camera with LED flash; this camera has a wide-angle lens that helps capture more area than most other smartphones. This smartphone has the same camera app that Sony uses in other smartphones. The camera app has modes like Superior Auto, Manual, Sound Photo, Multi Camera, Timeshift Burst etc.



Photos we took in Manual mode show accurate colours, excellent level of detail, no shadows in relatively dark areas and pretty good white balance in daylight as well as indoors. Shots taken at night also offered decent amount of details due to a sensor that can support up to ISO 12800 when most other smartphones are in the 800-900 ISO range. By default, photos are taken in 8MP resolution, so you need to set the resolution to 15.5MP (16:9 aspect ratio) or 20.7MP (4:3 resolution).

In Superior Auto mode, you get photos that have a glazed look to them due to the overprocessing that the sensor does to the object. Therefore, whatever little noise you will observe in Manual shots will not be noticeable in Superior Auto photos.

All in all, the Xperia Z3 camera finds itself a place among the best smartphone cameras in the market today, and way ahead of what Xperia Z2's camera offered.

Verdict

Sony Xperia Z3 is a pretty good smartphone, one that can easily give tough competition to smartphones like Samsung Galaxy Note 4 and Alpha, HTC One (M8) and iPhone 6. Its slippery body is a concern, and the lack of any fancy features (such as fingerprint sensor, heart rate monitor or dual rear cameras) keeps it out of consideration of people who want a smartphone with something different.

Nevertheless, Xperia Z3 is a great smartphone that can go head-to-head with the best smartphones in the market and hold its own. It is Sony's most well-rounded smartphone yet and shows that the tinkering with the smartphone every six months has paid off for the company.

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Motorola Moto X (second gen) India pricing, starts at Rs 31,999

Motorola India has announced the pricing of Moto X (second generation) in India. The smartphone will go on sale on e-commerce website Flipkart at midnight today at a starting price of Rs 31,999.

The wood finish and leather back panel versions of the phone have been priced at Rs 33,999.

The Motorola Moto X sports a 5.2-inch full-HD (1080x1920p) AMOLED display. It features a curved metal frame.

Powered by a 2.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 quad-core processor and 2GB RAM, the phone comes with 16GB internal storage. The phone is 9.9mm thick and weighs 144gram.

Moto X also runs Android 4.4 KitKat and comes with Motorola's own suite of apps.

It features a 13MP rear camera and a 2MP front-camera. The rear camera features a dual-LED ring flash and can record 4K video. It has a 2300mAh battery. In terms of connectivity, the phone supports 3G , Bluetooth 4.0 and GPS. 

It is worth pointing out that the first-generation Moto X was launched at a starting price of Rs 23,999. However, the phone made its India debut more than six months of its US launch after receiving a major price cut (The unlocked version's price had dropped from $579 to $399). This time, the Moto X will be available just weeks after going on sale in the US.

Also, the second-generation Moto X sports hardware specifications comparable to high-end flagship phones like the HTC One (M8) and LG G3. It comes with a more premium form factor including a metal frame.

Pure style. Pure performance. The new MotoX starts at Rs. 31,999. Available only @Flipkart

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Karbonn Titanium Octane Plus review

Key Features: 

• Karbonn Titanium S5 Plus runs on Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean operating system

• The device features a 5” IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen having pixel density of 220 PPI

• The smartphone hosts an 8 MP primary rear camera with LED flash and a VGA front camera

• The device is powered by a 1.3 GHz quad-core processor

• The phone houses 1 GB RAM & 4 GB internal storage with further extension capacity of 32 GB

• Connectivity options included are GPRS, EDGE, WLAN, Bluetooth, and USB

• The device is powered by a Li-Ion 1800 mAh battery

A number of 5-inch devices have been launched in the market and it has become quite difficult to choose one from them all. The Titanium S5 Plus by Karbonn is also a member of the 5 inch family and is available @ RS. 6,770 on Flipkart. So does it offer enough at the price?

Specifications

The specs of the Titanium S5 Plus include a 1.3GHz quad-core processor with 1GB of RAM, 4GB of inbuilt storage and a microSD card slot to expand your memory. It has a 5 inch IPS display with qHD (960x540 pixels) resolution, an 8MP rear camera, a 0.3MP front camera, dual-SIM capability, Wi-Fi and an 1800mAh battery. The smartphone runs on Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean.

Design and build

When looking for a smartphone in the low to mid segment, one has to usually compromise on either some features or the build quality. The Titanium S5 Plus, quite frankly, has decent build quality; it has glossy plastic all around with some chrome accents which make it look good. The handset actually feels good in the hand as it isn’t that bulky, although it does tend to slip thanks to the glossy body.

With respect to the 5 inch IPS display, we really wished it was a 720p display. The display, even though crisp, lacks a certain punch to it. The glass on the front panel did annoy us a bit as it is prone to fingerprints and smudges. There are the usual sensors above the display along with a VGA front camera.

On the left we have the volume control keys finished off in chrome, the top has the microUSB port with the 3.5mm audio jack and on the right there is the power/lock key (also in chrome). The back houses the 8MP camera with an LED flash and the speaker is at the bottom. Under the back panel we have an 1800mAh battery, two SIM slots and a microSD care expansion slot. The hardware on the Titanium S5 Plus is pretty good which includes a 1.3GHz quad-core processor with 1GB of RAM and 4GB of internal memory.

For a sub-11k smartphone, the Titanium S5 plus is very good looking device. Of course the brand does matter a lot to many buyers, but then again, a lot of Indian manufacturers have been producing some real quality hardware.

OS and performance

The Karbonn Titanium S5 Plus runs on Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean with a custom layer on top which includes options for customizing the UI via themes, wallpapers, fonts and more. The handset handles the OS pretty well and we didn’t see any issues in the response time or any lags in the overall performance. Multitasking didn’t show any issues either as we were able to run about 8-10 apps at the same time without any crashes.

We did some benchmark testing on the Titanium S5 Plus and it did impress us. In most of the synthetic benchmarks, the smartphone scored better than the LG Nexus 4. As you can see Quadrant Standard and Smartbench 2012 scores for the Titanium S5 Plus outmatch the Nexus 4.

Our battery test showed that the battery backup on the smartphone is pretty decent. We ran a full HD video for one hour (full brightness and connected to Wi-Fi) and found a battery loss of 22% which translates to 4.5 hours of battery backup on continuous full HD video playback.

We tried some well know game titles like Temple Run 2, FIFA 14 and Dead Trigger 2 for the gaming test. All of the games ran smoothly without any major lags; however we did see minor stuttering on some occasions. After about 20 minutes of continuous gameplay, the smartphone got a little warm, which is standard on almost all Android smartphones.

Camera

We played around with the 8MP camera on the Titanium S5 Plus which is capable of taking full HD videos. The colours and sharpness are not up to the mark, and low light performance takes a toll on the camera as it seems there is no noise reduction. There is a zero-shutter delay option and a nice burst mode which is quite handy. Pictures in bright conditions are fairly good, but again lack a bit of crispness.

The colours seem slightly washed out and the pictures aren't that sharp.

The camera doesn't have a high dynamic range and pictures have a lot of noise.

In the video mode, we saw the same issues. Colours seem slightly washed out and for the weirdest reason the video are stored in 3GP format rather than MP4.

Conclusion

For a budget of around Rs. 7,000, we think the Karbonn Titanium S5 Plus is very good option if you are looking for good performance and smart looks. The handset performs very well considering the segment it falls in and we would definitely suggest this smartphone, if you need an Android device. 

Buy Now on Flipkart @ RS. 6770Buy Now on Amazon @ RS. 6890

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Soon you can train your smartphone to respond to gestures

Researchers, including one of Indian-origin, have developed new wireless sensing technology that could allow users to ‘train’ their smartphones to recognize and respond to hand gestures near the device.

University of Washington researchers said some smartphones are starting to incorporate 3-D gesture sensing based on cameras, but cameras consume significant battery power and require a clear view of the user’s hands.

Researchers have now developed a new form of low-power wireless sensing technology that recognises gestures in the space around the phone.

The technology – developed in the labs of Matt Reynolds and Shwetak Patel, UW associate professors of electrical engineering and of computer science and engineering – uses the phone’s wireless transmissions to sense nearby gestures, so it works when a device is out of sight in a pocket or bag and could easily be built into future smartphones and tablets.

“Today’s smartphones have many different sensors built in, ranging from cameras to accelerometers and gyroscopes that can track the motion of the phone itself,” Reynolds said.

“We have developed a new type of sensor that uses the reflection of the phone’s own wireless transmissions to sense nearby gestures, enabling users to interact with their phones even when they are not holding the phone, looking at the display or touching the screen,” he said.

When a person makes a call or an app exchanges data with the Internet, a phone transmits radio signals on a 2G, 3G or 4G cellular network to communicate with a cellular base station.

When a user’s hand moves through space near the phone, the user’s body reflects some of the transmitted signal back toward the phone.

The new system uses multiple small antennas to capture the changes in the reflected signal and classify the changes to detect the type of gesture performed.

In this way, tapping, hovering and sliding gestures could correspond to various commands for the phone, such as silencing a ring, changing which song is playing or muting the speakerphone.

Because the phone’s wireless transmissions pass easily through the fabric of clothing or a handbag, the system works even when the phone is stowed away.

A group of 10 study participants tested the technology by performing 14 different hand gestures – including hovering, sliding and tapping – in various positions around a smartphone.

Each time, the phone was calibrated by learning a user’s hand movements, then trained itself to respond. The team found the smartphone recognized gestures with about 87 per cent accuracy.

Researchers will present their project, called SideSwipe, at the Association for Computing Machinery’s Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology in Honolulu next month.

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Spice Stellar 526 review:Good Phone

Following the release of MediaTek's new chipset that features a hexa-core processor, Indian handset vendors have come out with phones that features it. Spice's new hexa-core processor-powered phone is named Stellar 526 and comes with decent hardware specifications at a budget price of Rs 11,499 and which is available on fliplart for Rs.10,350 . Does it have the capability to take on the likes of Asus ZenFone 5 and Moto G? we try to find out in our review... 

Build and Design 

Spice Stellar 526 is available in the colour white, and has a silver back. Even though it's made of plastic, the phone has metallic finish, which makes it look more polished. however, it looks strikingly similar to Xolo Q1200. 

The back cover of the phone is partially removable, and hides its dual sim card slots as well as the micoSD card slot. The back of the phone also has a camera with LED flash, and a speaker at the bottom left of the phone. The camera protrudes out a little. The Spice logo is also on the back of the phone.

 

The front has the display, the touch buttons and the front facing camera. 

On the right edge of the phone, there are volume rocker keys and the power key.The 3.5mm jack is on the top, while the microUSB to transfer data and to charge the battery of the phone is right at the bottom. The volume and power keys are responsive and offer decent tactile feedback. 

Display 

The phone has a 5-inch HD display (720x1280p). The display of the phone is bright and vivid, and visibility is good even when the phone is used outdoors. Different viewing angles don't change the quality of display. The phone also responds well to touch. We found the colours to be a little saturated though. 

The screen is also a fingerprint magnet though. 

Software 

The phone runs on the latest version of Android 4.4 KitKat and Spice has also skinned the UI to some extent. While the navigation structure follows the traditional home screen and app launcher model, we noticed that the app icons for system apps have been borrowed from Xiaomi's MIUI interface. Some of the white and mint green UI elements look very tacky. 

There are a number of built-in apps in the phone, like Facebook, Flipkart, Floating Stickies, Olx, Quickr, Docs to go, Getit, WhatsApp, Line in addition to Spice Cloud cloud storage app. 

 

But there is an option of uninstalling these apps, which is a good thing as uses can utilize the storage space as per their preference. 

Camera 

The phone flaunts an 8MP rear camera and a 1.3MP front facing camera. The photos turn out better in a well lit room. The camera performance wears away if the lights in the room are dull.

 

The phone can still click fairly good photos outdoors but misses out on detail. The colour reproduction is more or less accurate. 

Speaking of the front facing camera, it can be used for clicking selfies, but the quality is not that great. 

Overall, the camera can be rated as above average, but not particularly good. 

Performance 

Powered by 1.5 GHz MediaTek Hexa Core Processor and 1GB RAM, the phone offers 8GB of internal storage, and can support a microSD card of up to 32GB. 

The screen of the phone responds well to touch, and you can easily open and navigate between several apps. 

When we speak of synthetic benchmarks, it scored 10,538 in Quadrant Standard, 25,453 in AnTuTu and 58.1 in NenaMark 2. But it is noteworthy, that the performance of a phone cannot solely be judged by these tests. It can differ when the phone is actually being used.

 

We did not experience any lag while navigating between apps, playing casual games and browsing the web. Even graphics intensive games like Asphalt 8 run fine though the phone gets a little warm after a few minutes of play. 

The phone has 2500mAh battery which also lasts long. The battery of the review unit lasted an entire working day. 

Even in terms of call quality and signal reception, the phone scores well.

 

Verdict 

The phone is a good option at a price of Rs 10,350 on Flipkart. It delivers a pleasant user experience, and is a decent performer. Spice Stellar 526 will compete against the new Moto G, Samsung Galaxy Grand Neo, ZTE V5 and Xolo Q2000.

Buy Now @ Rs 10,350 on Flipkart

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