Microsoft has finally unveiled the Lumia 650 and officially confirmed the launch of the smartphone after several rumours about it surfaced in the last few months.

It will come with a 5-inch 720p screen, but contrary to the predecessor Lumia 550, the 650 boasts an AMOLED display panel. Microsoft is super excited and they have gone ahead to name it as their most beautiful screen ever at this time.

This Windows 10 device will be backed by the Snapdragon 212 SoC without Continuum, and its quad-core Cortex-A7 processor will be clocked at 1.3GHZ - the unique thing in comparison to the S210 in the Lumia 550. It's packed with 1GB of RAM and the 16 gig internal storage could be expanded by microSD. The primary snapper will be of 8MP (type 1/4 inch sensor, 28mm equiv. focal length, f/2.2 aperture), while the front camera will have 5MP sensor with f/2.2 lens.

There are wide range of connectivity options - multi-band 2G/3G/4G, and LTE with Cat 4 (150Mbps down, 50Mbps up). It also has Bluetooth v4.1, NFC, Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n, and GPS with A-GPS, GLONASS, and Beidou. There will also be a dual-SIM variant of the device. Radio listeners can surely enjoy the FM Radio.

The Lumia 650 features solid aluminum body, replaceable back covers and comes with two color options - black and white. It weighs 122g and dimension wise it quite sleek (142 x 70.9 x 6.9mm). Its 2,000mAh battery can be replaced by the users..

From February 18th, this device will be available in some of the European markets and cost around $199 before taxes or subsidies (US dollar pricing announcement in Europe is surprising though).

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Xiaomi is about to launch a new variant of its budget phablet, the Redmi Note 3. Although the original Redmi Note 3 was showcased back in November, the upcoming version is better. The Mediatek Helio X10 SoC was quite a beast in the budget segment in 2015, but now it is going to be replaced with an even more powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon 650 SoC.

The second change that Xiaomi is about to offer with its new Note is a significantly improved 16 megapixel camera sensor with f2.0 aperture, which is going to replace the previous generation 13 megapixel sensor on its back. These are significant changes that will enhance both the camera quality as well as the overall performance of the Redmi Note 3, both of which are usually high priorities for most smartphone users.

There will be a 16GB model with 2GB Ram and a 32GB model with 3GB RAM just as with the current Note 3. The 4050mAh battery should be more than sufficient to power the device for a whole working day at least, if not more. As far as pricing is concerned, we only know that the 16GB/2GB variant will be available for around $150 or RMB 999.

Among other Asian countries, Xiaomi has decided to launch the Redmi Note 3 v2.0 in India. In fact, a competition is on its way online right now as 100 Indian fans will get a chance to win the Redmi Note 3 if they can complete the 100 "missions" given to them. The Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 was already a great device within the budget segment and from what we know so far, it seems like it's about to get much better.

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