Android Advisorの Issue 26 の目次

£449 inc VAT • consumer.huawei.com/uk Huawei took to the stage in London in early April to announce the widely anticipated (and hugely leaked) Huawei P9, the latest Android flagship with a dual-camera arrangement never seen before on a phone. Design The Chinese company has a history of releasing top-end smartphones at a much cheaper price point than its rivals, and the Huawei P9 is no exception. While its design is reminiscent of the Huawei P8 and Mate 8, the P9 has a number of changes including a brand new fingerprint scanner on the rear (similar to many other Huawei smartphones, including the Mate S) but with more advanced technology inside. There are two Leica cameras on the rear, but we’ll come to those later. The 6.95mm thick Huawei P9 has…

£286 (plus import duty) • xiaomi-mi.com Xiaomi’s phones are rarely seen in the UK, but the company’s market dominance in China and increasingly India means many more people are starting to hear of Xiaomi. Not officially sold here, the only way you’ll get your hands on one is through unofficial channels. Price Our Xiaomi Mi 5 came from GearBest, which stocks all three versions of the Mi 5 in white, black and gold. We tested the white Mi 5 with 3GB of RAM and 32GB of storage, which is currently available for £286.09 (note that prices will fluctuate daily at grey-market sites). Shipping to the UK is free, but note that you should pay import duty on anything you buy from China, and you will be billed for this if…

In a perfect world we’d all have smartphones that came with free, ultrafast 10G internet connections boasting unlimited data plans. Actually that scenario could create some kind of nightmarish future where people never look up from their devices, so maybe life isn’t so bad after all, especially when it’s quite possible to use free Wi-Fi when you’re out and about. Here are some easy ways to keep in touch with friends, view pictures on Instagram, or stream your Spotify playlist – all for free. Coffee shops It’s an obvious place to start as these days you can’t move in branches of Costa or Starbucks for people working on their laptops or browsing the internet on their phones. This is because coffee shops are one of the easiest places to get…

As the old adage goes, the best camera is the one that’s with you. Since most people carry a smartphone with them just about everywhere, it’s no wonder we’re taking more photos on phones than cameras these days. And now that phone cameras can actually take decent photos and videos, we’re using them to record special events such as weddings and birthdays instead of lugging around a DSLR. But which smartphone has the best cameras, takes the best photos and is the best for taking videos? What about selfies? We’ve rounded up seven flagship phones in order to put their cameras to the test and answer these questions. Google Nexus 6P HTC 10 Huawei P9 LG G5 Samsung Galaxy S7 Sony Xperia Z5 Xiaomi Mi 5 What to look for…

Amazon Fire HD tablet(s) Amazon recently announced updates to its Kindle Fire and Kindle Fire Kids Edition, with new colours and an upgraded 16GB of internal storage, but we’re more interested in forthcoming updates to its Fire HD tablet line-up. The Fire HD 8 and HD 10 were announced in September 2015, so it’s likely we’ll be waiting until September 2016 for any new models. These are likely to be wallet-friendly budget tablets that will appeal to customers primarily for their value. We might see slightly faster performance and higher-resolution screens, but we don’t suppose you’ll feel the need to rush out to upgrade. New Google Nexus 7 (2016) We’ve seen various Android tablets from Google over the years, including the Nexus 9, Nexus 10 and Pixel C, but none…

£569 inc VAT • htc.com/uk HTC had been hyping and teasing the launch for the weeks leading up with the slogan ‘power of 10’ and it’s not just because the phone is called the HTC 10. It also represents a decade of building smartphones and the perfect score – the bar is set high then. “Symbolizing greatness and independence but also that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts,” said HTC claiming “this newest addition to the HTC phone family combines a world class camera with gold standard audio, bold new metal unibody design and unparalleled performance.” Design While the HTC 10 follows a clear pattern of design – it along with its predecessors is essentially the same size and shape – there are a number of…

So you really want a shiny new Android smartphone or tablet but can’t afford one and your current device is getting slow and annoying. Well there are numerous things you can do to improve the situation. Before we begin, every situation involving a slow Android device is going to be different so we’re going to cover a number of ways in which you can speed things up. You can try them all or the ones which apply to you. 1. Delete unused apps A common cause of a slow Android smartphone or tablet is that you’ve filled it up with app, many of which you probably downloaded on a whim and don’t actually use. Like a PC or laptop, your Android device will slow down if it’s become bloated with…

Rush Rally 2 Rush Rally 2 is an upcoming racing game for not only Android, but iOS and Apple TV too – and it boasts some impressive features. First of all, the developers claim that the game will run at 60 frames per second and will feature over 72 tracks across a number of game modes including Rallycross and Rally Championship. There are eight cars available at launch with a plan to add more over time, all featuring realistic physics gathered from “real car telemetry data”. The iOS/Apple TV variants even feature MFi controller support, allowing you to use a gaming controller to play. The good news is that the developers claim the game is completed, and it’s just a matter of deciding on a launch date. The developers hope…

£529 inc VAT • lg.com/uk Alongside Samsung’s Galaxy S7 and S7 edge, the LG G5 is one of the biggest phone launches of 2016 – and we’re not just talking in the Android world. It’s one of the heavyweights and LG will be looking to set the market alight with the G5’s alternative and innovative modular design. Design It’s great to see LG doing something different with the design of the G5. After all, it’s easy to follow a formula, but the firm has ripped up the blueprints for its flagship phone and gone back to the drawing board. Brand recognition is important, but over the course of years devices can become a bit boring and too similar if the same design is simply tweaked each time. Dimensions and the…

Securing your Android phone or Android tablet is more involved than adding a PIN lock (although you should certainly do that). Here we run through 14 ways you can keep Android secure, from dealing with app permissions to locking down apps, dealing with Android viruses and tracking down a stolen phone. 1. Screen lock Setting up a screen lock is the simplest way to protect Android when your phone or tablet falls into the wrong hands. These days you can set a PIN lock, pattern lock, password lock and, if your device supports it, a fingerprint or eye scanner lock. It’s so easy to do you really have no excuse. Head to Settings > Security > Screen lock to get started. 2. Lock individual apps & media You can add…