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Today’s Deal is on the all new BLU Life One X2 Mini.  This new 5″ phone was announced on Friday and for a phone priced at $180, it is reasonably well appointed.  BLU has made a name for themselves for offering good spec’d phones at a reasonable price and the X2 Mini is another example of this go-to-market strategy.  The 5″ X2 Mini has a curved Full HD display that renders at 1080 x 1920.  That gives you roughly 435 ppi for excellent color and detail while being easy on the eyes.  The display is protected by Gorilla glass 3 while the chassis of the phone itself is made of solid aluminium construction.

Internally, the phone is powered by the Octa-Core Snapdragon 430 processor running at 1.4GHz.  It is coupled with 4GB of RAM and has 64GB of internal storage.  That storage can be expanded a further 64GB thanks to the MicroSD slot.  The phone is sold unlocked at a Dual-SIM configuration that supports a wide range of GSM and LTE bands here in the United States.  You should be able to run this phone on the likes of AT&T, T-Mobile and Cricket to name a few.  Unfortunately for Verizon and Sprint customers, this phone is not compatible with your service.  Here are the frequencies

BLU Life One X2 Mini

and bands that the X2 Mini supports:

• 4G LTE, (2/4/7/12/17)
• 4G HSPA+ (850/1700/1900/2100)

Powering all of this is a 2,300mAh battery that recharges via a MicroUSB cable.  The phone supports Quick Charge 3.0 technology for rapid charging.  For security, the X2 Mini has a fingerprint scanner

Rounding out the specs of the BLU Life One X2 Mini is a solid camera configuration.  The main camera is a 13MP shooter with PDAF (Phase-Detection Auto Focus) while the front facing selfie camera is an 8MP shooter with a wide-angel and a flash.  Front flashes are a bit rare still so it’s nice to see it pop up on a budget friendly device like this one.

If there is one knock on the X2 Mini it likely will be that it ships with Android Marshmallow and not Nougat.  Even for a budget phone this is a bit of a head scratcher.

Currently the X2 Mini is available for $179.99 in Gold, Rose Gold and Grey.  If you are an Amazon Prime customer, shipping is free and all three colors at the time of this post were in stock.  To get more details & to order, head over to Amazon.

With Google Assistant rolling out widely to Android Marshmallow and Nougat running phones, the question of if the new feature would be hitting Android tablets too.  The answer is no.  The team over at Android Police got confirmation from Google directly that the feature will only be rolling out to phones and not to tablets.  As an Android tablet user (albeit limited these days), its a bit disappointing that the feature won’t be rolling out.  That said, it’s understandable.  Given that tablet sales are stagnate at best and most people are driving activity and searches from their phones, it just makes sense for Google not to invest the time and effort into getting it onto tablets.

If you are desperate to get Google Assistant on your tablet, there are hacks that will get it there for you.  If you hit the link to the Android Police article, they have a link to show you how to do it.  But,

Google Assistant

as always, proceed with caution.

Keep in mind that you can still use OK Google on your tablet, you just won’t have all the new benefits of Google Assistant on it.

Is this disappointing news for you?  Are you surprised?  Leave a comment and let me know your thoughts.

The new LG G6 is coming to T-Mobile on April 7th.  The carrier announced that the latest LG flagship would be coming to them at a price of $26 per month for 24 months & a $26 down payment.  That roughly works out to $650 for the phone which is about what expected to the street price.  The G6 has already caught a lot of people’s attention with its 5.7″ display that has an 18:9 aspect ratio. Having held a near-final version of the phone, it feels long in your hand but is comfortable.

The specs of the LG G6 are solid.  It is powered by the Snapdragon 821 processor and is coupled with 4GB of RAM.  Storage wise, it has 32GB onboard which can be expanded up to an additional 256GB thanks to the MicroSD slot.  It is powered by a 33oomAh battery and supports Quick Charge 3.0 technology for rapid charging.  The G6 has a fingerprint scanner in the back which is also the

LG G6

physical power button for the device.   Finally, do remember that the G6 is the first phone to ship with Google Assistant out-of-the-box and runs Android Nougat 7.0.

For those of you who are wanting to pick up the G6, if you place your order at T-Mobile before April 30th, you will also get a Google Home at no additional cost.  That’s a $129 value so not a bad deal at all.  Head over to T-Mobile to get all the details.

Today’s Deal is on the solid performing BlackBerry Priv.  Right now you can pick up the 2015 flagship for $319 on Amazon.  The Priv is a unique phone in that it has a slide-down physical QWERTY keyboard, the hallmark of BlackBerry devices in the past.  It is a solid performing phone with good specifications, especially for a late 2015 device.  It has a 5.43″ curved QHD display and is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 808 processor.  That hexa-core processor runs at 1.8GHz and is coupled with 3GB of RAM.

Storage wise, the Priv comes with 32GB onboard but that can be expanded up to and additional 256GB thanks to the MicroSD card.  It has a 3410 mAh battery to keep you going throughout the day and it supports Quick Charge 2.0 technology to get recharged quickly.  Camera wise, the BlackBerry Priv has an 18MP rear shooter with OIS and dual-tone flash while the front camera is 2MP

Blackberry Priv

shooter.

One thing to keep in mind is that BlackBerry has given no clear indication if the Priv will receive the Android Nougat update.  That may be a big deal for some readers so bear that in mind if you consider this phone.  Overall though, for what it offers along with the security that the company has built into this device, it is a solid option at this price.

To get the details and to order, head over to Amazon.