Bucket Tech: Lenovo Legion

A gaming phone? Whats this? 2002? I mean that is the last time I remember a fully fledged gaming phone being available, the Nokia N-Gage but it's 2020 and there's a lot of strange things going on this year, so here's another, a new gaming mobile phone! Lenovo have released their Legion Phone Duel which is the first 5G1 mobile gaming phone that incorporates speed and smarter features. While the thought of a phone made for gaming might seem odd, you have to look at the reality of whats going on, mobile gaming has been on the surge for the past decade, while games that gained popularity didn't require complex coding and graphics,, for example Candy Crush and Angry Birds,  it still proved to be a lucrative market for gaming companies. With the advancement in mobile phone technology over the years which saw phones getting fitted with cameras that can zoom into the moon, what was stopping them from using these superfast processors to power high graphics games? That's exactly what the folks at Lenovo thought when developing their Legion. 

Gaming on a smartphone can be very resource intensive, with this in mind ,the Lenovo Legion mobile gaming engineers and designers worked with the gaming community to prioritize their most valued product attributes Turns out, may mobile gamers agree with PC players on the must-have features, such as balanced performance, reliable stamina, incredible performance and more in the lineup of high-powered Lenovo Legion PCs earlier this year, the Lenovo Legion team was well positioned to deliver on mobile and PC gamers shared needs. The device is powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 chipset with 16GB LPDDR5 high capacity RAM. By inventing advanced methods to better dissipate heat with dual liquid-cooling and copper tubes, plus moving the dual 2500mAh batteries off to the sides, where gamers hands would rest (vs forcing them to touch the warm logic board encasing the processor), Lenovo made the handset easier to hold while also extending game play without the feature of overheating. They even made the charging port more convenient which wont get in your way whil playing. The gull 90W Turbo Power charging has two ports from center and side ports to power up both batteries for a combined total of 5000mAh. Go from 0 to 50% power in just 10 minutes and a full charge takes 30 minutes. 

The phone is pretty stylish, features a 6.65 inch full HS AMOLED touchscreen display with 144Hz refresh rate for videos and games. The phones unibody is hexagonal shape, and available in two colours, high-octane red and cool blue. Both have programmable RGB lighting effects from the Lenovo Legions Y icon on the back of the device. The devices weighs in at 239 grams and just 9.9mm at its thickest point. The Legion features a high powered 20MP front facing camera that stays tucked inside the bezel and pops out for selfies and live streaming, it also features auto-reach drop protection, so it ducts back in when it detects the phone is falling. The main camera is a 64MP which also has a quad pixel sensor for shooting high-quality 16MP resolution photos in dark and bright conditions. Video recording can be done in HD 1080p as well as 4K at up to 30FPS. You can also self-record your voice and reactions as you play, simply wake the built-in front camera while gaming to simultaneously record and overlay your image on-screen. This featured is compatible with popular streaming apps 

The Lenovo Legion 5G is the ultimate gaming phone, offering 5G speeds capable of speeds up to 2.52 Gb/s, created especially for the gamer in mind. From the design, to the colours and functionality will have every gamer frothing at the mouth for one. It's powered by Android OS and will be available in China by the end of the month, local pricing and availability still to be confirmed. 

Bucket Tech: LG G5

The Mobile World Conference is currently on the go in Barcelona and today saw one of the main days in terms of phone releases, Samsung unveiled their S7 Galaxy but while that was pretty big, many had their eyes cast over at the rival Korean stand of LG.

LG launched their latest premium smart phone the G5 and although the phone it self is a pretty good product, more was said about the accessories made available for it. The companies catch phrase/ hashtag for the G5 is #LGPlayMore which encourages users to have more fun with their phone and with that they've launch a host of portable accessories that connect and transform the device. 

More about that later, the phone it self is much different from the older models with the G5 shedding the plastic casing and opting for a full metal semi sealed unit. I say semi sealed because what they've done is pretty smart, the battery is still removable unlike many of it's competitors. The bottom bit of the phone slides out with the battery attached and you can purchase an additional battery that slots in. Also apart from the material the phones shape is more modular, none of those funny curves that we've become accustom to in previous gen devices.

The device makes use of a snapdragon 820 chipset with 4 gigs of RAM, the screen size is reduced from 5.5" to 5.3" making the over all size much more manageable in your hand and it is remarkably thing at only 7.7mm. The standard battery that comes with this device is slightly smaller than the G4 at 2800mAh and it has the same camera as it's older brother with teh 16 megapxel, 2160 resolution at the back with wide angle capability and 8 megapixel in the front. 

Now, back to the interesting part, LG have launched a host of devices that can be used with the G5. They call these "friends" and really gives value to their tag, LG Play More. First up is the Cam Plus Adaptor, not only does it have an increased battery size but also provides more area for the user to hold the phone and has buttons and a scroll zoom attached to it. 

The Audio DAC (Digital Audio Converter) module will be another popular one, it's basically a HiFi louder speak attachment for you to use with your phone. No need for a bluetooth speaker as this has been tuned by the guys at Bang & Olufsen and provides high quality stereo sound that is unrivaled by a phone. 

LG have also launched 360 Virtual Reality glasses that pairs with the phone, that can be used for apps like google cardboard as well as a 360 camera that snaps a 360 picture which you can view and manipulate on your phone. Another cool "friend" is the Rolling Bot, which if you watched the latest Star Wars movie, it's pretty similar to BB8. it's a drone but doesn't fly it rolls around and has a built in camera which you view and control from the G5.

Overall this phone has ticket all the right boxes so far, I'm keen to see it in the metal and LG have been tight lipped about it's local launch but I'd guess it will be here but the second quarter. Being an LG owner myself, I'm hoping they've improved on their software and OS issues they have had on previous models. 

                    

Buket Tech: LG G4 - First Impressions

You could only imagine my emotions after getting my LG G3, 2 months down the line LG release the G4. As would any tech fundy, you want the best and the latest that is out there on the market, not to say the G3 is bad but knowing there is a newer one out there just annoys me a tad bit. Anyway, LG invited me to the local launch of the LG G4 at the Oyster Box Hotel in Umhlanga, like all their events, theres an element of class to it. From the venue, to the presentations and the of course the product.

It was the first time I was going to get to see the phone in metal but before I could get my  hands on it, LG's GM for Marketing, Thomas van der Linde gave us an insight into the thought process that went into creating the G4 before Eric, LG's Mobile Product Manager took us through a video presentation of the features and design of the G4. 

One thing I've come to realised about LG is their dedication of perfecting something. Having the tech isn't enough till they know they have made it to the best possible level at that time and that's exactly what makes the LG G4 one step ahead of its competitors. During his talk, Thomas said that the LG G4 has the best camera on the market at the moment, with a F1.8 lens making pictures taken in low light brighter, even faster reacting laser focus and a choice of 3 modes for the user, with manual mode mimicking settings that of a DSLR. It's the first time I've seen a camera phone that offers such, giving you the opportunity to manipulate various settings before shooting the ideal picture that is captured on its 16 megapixel camera. The phone also gives the user access to the raw image file, which is another first.

Also worthy to note is the image stabilizer on the G4 which has a 2 degree offset which gives the phone a quicker response time to stabilize when taking pictures. LG have taken note the important of selfies and upgraded its front facing camera on the G4 to an 8 megapixel lens and like the G3 has the hand gesture trigger function but now with a slight twist. The single fist takes 1 snaps, opening and clasping your hand twice triggers the phone to take 4 consecutive photos. Everyone knows you don't take the perfect selfie in a single shot so this is the perfect way to work around that. 

The screen continues to marvel with an IPS Quantum Display in Quad High Definition, it really enhances the pictures and gives true representation of the pictures taken. It's the first Quad HD display to employ Advanced in-cell touch (AIT) technology, which combines the LCD and touch sensor into a single layer to provide better colour reproduction and touch sensitivity. This new display is calibrated for DCI (Digital Cineman Initiatives) standards for colour expression, championed by top Hollywood studios. Watching Videos in 4K is also great on the LG G4's display and gives you a true colour representation of what you're viewing.

Moving on to the design, although it looks very much like the G3 the G4 is a bit different with a the phone having a slight curvature to it. LG believe this is where the market is heading, with curved phones a thing of the future, it might not be as drastic as the G Flex but it is visible to the naked eye. They claim this minimises the risk of damage by 20% if the handset were to fall. 

The phone comes with both an aluminium diamond cut bad which feels very comfortable in your hand. The diamond cut provides better grip but the phone also comes with an interchangeable leather back. It was confirmed that this is 100% genuine leather that is hand stitched. It's a nice touch by the manufacturer and really adds to that premium product feel to the phone. When asked if these added to the price, it was noted that LG chose to absorb these things in offering the consumer a premium product at an acceptable price. No price for the phone has been released as yet but they said its in the region of R430 and R499 a month on contract which is about the same I'm paying for my G3! So you can only imagine my frustration now!

Overall, the phone looks like the market leader for now and I'm not just saying that because I own a LG. Every aspect on the phone from the screen, to the processor and the camera is unmatched by any devices currently on the market, not even that one with the beveled screen that serves no purpose. I'm looking forward to get on to test in the near future and then I can give you a more in depth review of it.