MWC 2018: Here’s everything that was worth the hype

Samsung Galaxy S9/S9+

First things first. The biggest attraction at the MWC 2018 was Samsung's flagship smartphone. The South Korean tech giant finally took the wraps off its much-talked flagship smartphones - the Galaxy S9 and S9+ in Barcelona. It's just a matter of weeks when users will get their hands on the new smartphones.

The Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ come with many highlights. Some of the notable ones are on the camera front. These smartphones have a variable aperture that can range from a narrower f/2.4 aperture to a wider f/1.5 aperture based on the lighting conditions.

Also, there is an AR Emoji feature that is similar to Animoji on iPhone X. When it comes to the US availability, the Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ will go on pre-orders starting from March 2 and will be priced at $720 (approx. Rs. 47,000) and $840 (approx. Rs. 55,000) respectively. Indian market will get the Exynos 9810 SoC variant of the Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ and not the Snapdragon 845 SoC variant.

 

Nokia 8 Sirroco

The comeback lion Nokia finally announced its long-rumored Nokia 8. The device comes with high-end features such as an edge-to-edge curved P-OLED 5.5" display Corning Gorilla Glass 5 on top for added protection.

It is powered by a Snapdragon 835 processor clubbed with 6GB RAM and 128GB inbuilt storage space. In terms of optics, the smartphone features a dual rear camera setup comprising of a 12MP wide-angle lens and 13MP Telephoto lens. There is a 5MP front camera as well. The smartphone draws power from a 3260mAh battery reservoir and also carries an IP67 rating for water and dust resistance.

Vivo Apex

Vivo also managed to catch everyone's eyes with its new concept phone - the Apex. The new device sets new benchmarks for future smartphone design, featuring the world's highest screen-to-body ratio and Vivo's Half-Screen In-Display Fingerprint Scanning Technology.

Following the success of In-Display Fingerprint Scanning Technology at CES 2018, Vivo has installed the world's first Half-Screen In-Display Fingerprint Scanning Technology in the APEX. Transforming the entire bottom half of the OLED screen, users can touch anywhere on the bottom half of the screen to perform fingerprint recognition, enabling a more flexible and intuitive experience while meeting industry standards for security.

APEX deploys a new System in Package (SIP) technology to integrate the DAC and the three operational amplifiers together, reducing the need for circuit board space by nearly 60% compared to previous Xplay6. As this frees up more space in the smartphone's interior, this technology can allow for increased battery size as well as cooling, thus opening  the potential for even more design improvements in future smartphones.

MediaTek Helio P60 processor

MediaTek also got a chance to come into the limelight at the MWC 2018. The company announced its first SoC platform featuring a multi-core AI processing unit (mobile APU) and MediaTek's NeuroPilot AI technology.

The SoC has four Arm A73 2.0 GHz processors and four Arm A53 2.0 GHz processors in an octa-core big.LITTLE configuration. The new processor is up to 12 percent more efficient when compared to the previous gen Helio P23 SoC.

Managed by MediaTek's CorePilot 4.0 technology, with thermal management, user experience monitoring and Energy Aware Scheduling (EAS), the chipset optimizes processor performance and power conservation for a sustainable user experience even across the most compute-intensive tasks.

Asus Zenfone 5Z

Asus unveiled its flagship alongside two other smartphones. Although the device resembles the iPhone X because of the notch on the screen, it sure does offer some top-of-the-line features. It comes with a 6.2-inch full-HD+ (1080x2246 pixels) display with a 19:9 aspect ratio and is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 SoC with the AIE (Artificial Intelligence Engine) and it is paired with Adreno 630 GPU and either 4GB, 6GB or 8GB of RAM.

It boasts a dual camera setup at the rear with the primary camera consisting of a 12-megapixel Sony IMX363 sensor with a f/1.8 aperture, 83-degree field of view, 24mm equivalent focal length in 35mm film camera, and a Softlight LED flash.

Additional features include a fingerprint sensor on the rear panel which the company has claimed that it unlocks the phone in as little 0.3 seconds, dual 5-magnet speakers with dual NXP smart amplifiers, a PMIC internal dual amplifier, triple internal microphones with noise reduction, Hi-Res Audio (192KHz/ 24-bit standard audio output on HRA certified earbuds) support, as well as DTS Headphone: X support.