Beats PowerBeats 3 review || TECH REV

Design

The design of the PowerBeats 3 doesn’t really deviate too much from the previous iterations, with the buds housed on long plastic oblongs, which connect to your ears with rubberised hooks - and of course, the obvious Beats logo on the side for the cachet owning such a brand confers for some.

There are a variety of tips in the box, with flanged buds among our favourites. However, while the hook design does stop the headphones falling off your head completely, it means that the seal in the ear isn’t always total - the hook pressing against the outside of one’s ear can prise the buds out slightly, so noise isolation isn’t perfect.

Initially the hooks were far too wide, and the Powerbeats 3 fell out the ear and dangled around too often. However, the hooks will bend slightly, and if you narrow the angle you’ll get a pretty comfortable fit.

They did start to come loose once during a 5K race, where there was no time to stop and refit them properly (and thus were just left to flap about a bit), but otherwise we had no issue with fit during testing.

The power button, which is flush along the top of the oblong units the buds are attached to, can be hard to find with the finger - especially if you didn’t realise it was there at first, as we did. And as it’s not proud from the unit, turning the PowerBeats 3 on and off with gloves is a nightmare, with guesswork really your only friend.

The inline remote is strong and easy to use though, with pronounced buttons and a strong build quality making it easy to click to change the volume, take a call or skip tracks with double or triple taps.

Good build quality is something we expect from Apple products, and the PowerBeats 3 offer just that - everything from the logo to the attached toggle to let you customise the length of the cord dangling around your neck feels premium, and helps make the higher cost more palatable.

Sound quality and connection

Where many fitness headphones err on the tinny side when it comes to sound quality, preferring to pump up the volume so your music can be heard when pounding the streets or grunting through weight-lifting, the PowerBeats 3 do have a richer sound to them.

The bass is higher than you’ll find on many other headphones, but not to an insane level - the buds don’t reverberate in your ears, just give more of a fullness to what you’re listening to.

It's the level of bass that makes the headphones feel like a pair of sports earbuds. Bass response is tight rather than booming, but we'd be lying if we said it didn't overwhelm on occasion. Perfect for when your on a workout, but less good when you want a more laid-back, relaxed listen. 

That's not to say the headphones don't have mids and highs aplenty, but they can get a little trapped behind that bass. 

Detail is also good, with lots of pleasing little touches apparent in your favorite songs. 

The volume is actually a touch lower than it could be, as the fact they don’t always fit snugly meaning that you’re not always able to hear the action in noisy environments - but then again, that might be a helpful thing for saving your ear drums later in life.

The connection on the PowerBeats is strong throughout their use - although we did have a couple of issues with them during the test. It only occurred on a run in -6C (21.2F) temperature, but twice the PowerBeats just shut off and needed to be re-paired with the iPhone 7 Plus to get music playing again.

This initial connection can sometimes be tough to work out - the way most people use Bluetooth headphones is to place them on their head then turn the power on, using the audio prompts to confirm connection.

With the PowerBeats 3, turning them on doesn’t offer an instant audio signal that they’d been powered on - you’d need to wait a few seconds to hear a sound confirming connection with the phone.

However, holding the power button for too long initiates pairing mode, so it became a choice between just guessing how long before the headphones were turned on or doing so before placing them on.

And even then, there were times when you needed to re-pair the headphones by holding them close to an iPhone or iPad - it’s cool to see the pop-up box appear when in proximity to the headphones, but it’s unclear why it was needed from time to time. 

However, outside of these issues we found the range of the headphones to be excellent, allowing us to venture much further from our phone without the connection dropping off. 

Battery life

One of the most impressive things about the PowerBeats 3 is the battery life on offer, with it being nothing short of excellent. 

While the decision to use microUSB as a charging port might seem odd for an Apple product, it does mean that many people will have a few cables lying around - and there’s obviously one included in the box.

Given the fact these headphones are designed to work so well with products in the Apple ecosystem, it won’t be a surprise if future models are Lightning-connected instead.

In terms of battery longevity, we used the PowerBeats 3 for four to five days on average before needing to charge them again, and that’s with both regular runs and general commuting use.

For instance, a two hour run at the weekend saw just a 20% drop, which was an excellent performance from headphones that don’t look like they’ve got massive batteries inside.

Charging times are also swift, with just a few minutes on charge easily enough to see you home if you’ve realised they’re empty just ahead of your train ride.

Verdict

The PowerBeats 3 are well-made, long-lasting and with good sound quality, which is a pleasing trio of merit for fitness headphones.

The fit is pretty good, and for people with more ‘enclosed’ ears likely almost perfect. Some might struggle to get a good seal with the tips, thanks to the hooks holding the buds at a slightly wider angle, but overall the PowerBeats are comfortable to wear.

The main sticking point will be the price, which isn’t going to be alien to Beats customers. If you’re just after a pair of headphones you can throw on before you go for a run, there are plenty of other cheaper options out there which will pump sound into your ears if that’s all you’re after (check out the Optoma NuForce BE6i as a good example). 

Likewise if you want a non-fitness focussed pair of headphones there are cheaper, better-sounding alternatives out there. 

Where the Powerbeats 3 impress is when used as a combination of the two - being able to drift from fitness speakers to headphones you can use walking down the street, these stay in place and offer great sound quality.

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Bose SoundLink Mini II review || TECH REV

From the spec sheet, you may be disappointed to find all the things the Bose SoundLink Mini Ii lacks. There’s no NFC for easy pairing, no multipoint Bluetooth for pairing to multiple devices simultaneously and it's not water resistant. Its battery life is also rated for an average 10 hours where speakers like the JBL Charge 3 can last up to 20 hours and charges your phone in a pinch. 

While the lack of features may turn off some buyers, it would be a mistake to write off the SoundLink Mini II entirely because it remains one of the best sounding wireless speakers on the market.

Design

The Bose SoundLink Mini II is built like a tank. The speaker exudes quality the moment you pick it up with its hefty 1.5 lb ( 0.7 kg) weight and aluminum casing. That’s quite heavy considering the speaker’s small 2 x 7.1 x 2.3 inch (51 x 180 x 58 mm; H x W x D) dimensions. 

On top of the speaker you’ll find all of the speakers controls including power, volume pairing and multi-function button. The multi-function can be used to change tracks or for activating voice assistants like Siri. The speaker also contains a mic so you can take calls

. 

On the left side of the speaker you’ll find the microUSB charging port and a 3.5mm headphone jack for using legacy devices. Last but not least, there are pins at the bottom of the speaker for using the included dock. The dock isn’t necessary as you can simply plug in a microUSB cable to charge, but it’s nice to be able to set the speaker down to charge in one motion.

 

Overall, the Bose SoundLink Mini II is a handsome looking speaker that exudes quality thanks to its aluminum case and weight. It’s small enough to easily place in a bag but think twice before taking the SoundLink Mini II to the beach as it’s not water resistant. 

Performance

Although light on features, the Bose SoundLink MIni II remains one of the best-sounding wireless speakers we’ve ever heard. The speaker wowed us by punching way above what its diminutive size would suggest. 

While most compact wireless speakers struggle to output bass, the SoundLink Mini II has it in spades while still maintaining a lovely balanced sound. We were impressed by the quality and impact of the bass as the speaker played bass heavy songs with authority and without distortion, even at high volume. 

Compared to the competition, the Bose SoundLink Mini II just sounds better. The JBL Charge 3 may produce more bass, but it is less controlled and overwhelms the high frequency at times. The similarly sized Razer Leviathan Mini sounded wooden compared to the Bose and failed to retrieve as many micro details.

Bose didn’t neglect other parts of the audio spectrum either. Highs were energetic and helped made violins and cymbals sound spacious. The SoundLink Mini II is one of the few speakers that has the ability to produce a sense of space around instruments where most other wireless speakers of this size sound dull. 

Likewise, mids are lush and warm, helping make vocal heavy tracks shine. Norah Jones sounded particularly good with tons of detail and texture around her voice. We're also impressed by the speaker’s ability to retrieve details like a musician’s breath and the clinking of glasses from the audience in live jazz tracks. 

Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the SoundLink Mini II’s performance is its ability to sound great at any volume. The speaker manages to produce the same bass impact and depth at low listening volume, which we can’t say for most wireless speakers of its size. 

Speaking of volume, the SoundLink Mini II has seemingly unlimited levels of volume adjustment so you can dial in exactly how loud you want your music. There’s also no speaker hiss at low listening volumes either, which is great new for classical music lovers. 

Final verdict

Wireless speakers have changed rapidly since the Bose SoundLink Mini II was introduced in 2015. Consumers expecting NFC pairing, multi speaker pairing, multipoint Bluetooth, waterproofing and multi-day battery life will be disappointed by the SoundLink Mini II.

However, writing off the SoundLink Mini II would be a mistake, as it remains one of the best sounding wireless speakers. This diminutive speaker punches way above what its size would suggest, producing deep bass, sparkling highs and a lush midrange. While most wireless speakers sound OK, the Bose SoundLink Mini II proves that small speakers don’t need to compromise on sound.

At $199 (£170, AU$300), the SoundLink Mini II is expensive for what you get. But if you want one of the best sounding wireless speakers for under $200, it’s hard to do better than the Bose SoundLink Mini II. If you want more features and are willing to trade off some sound quality, the water resistant Bose SoundLink Color II is a great choice. 

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Xbox One X review || TECH REV

At $499 (£449 / AU$649), the Xbox One X is the powerful premium console Microsoft promised us over a year and a half ago. It delivers 4K HDR at 60 frames per second (at least on a handful of titles) and, because it’s a part of Microsoft’s Xbox Family of Consoles, it doesn’t force you to throw out the games you already own for new ‘enhanced’ editions.

Games you might have played a year ago now look absolutely stunning on Xbox One X. Free updates for Rise of the Tomb Raider, Star Wars Battlefront II and Forza Motorsport 7 will help them look their absolute best when they arrive in the coming weeks and months, while Gears of War 4, Quantum Break and Super Lucky’s Tale have already been treated to the visual upgrade. 

The games we mentioned above are just a small sliver of the ones found on the Enhanced for Xbox games list - there are close to 200 more games slated for updates in 2017 and 2018 alone, not counting the vast quantity of unknown titles in the works right now.

Beyond gaming, the console is also perfect for media junkies - there’s 4K Netflix on-board alongside a 4K app for YouTube, Amazon will make its Prime Video app UHD compatible starting on November 7 and, when all else fails, there’s a 4K Blu-ray player built into the box - a feature that no other console maker has at the moment. The console also supports Dolby Atmos audio, among other audio formats, making video playback sound as good as it looks.

While you can make a strong case for the Xbox One X based on its specs alone, it’s not an open-and-shut case: The X, while powerful and sleek and wonderful, is essentially a souped up version of the $279 (£249 / AU$399) Xbox One S. 

The X can play games in native 4K while the S only does upscaled 4K, sure, but Xbox One S does upscaled 4K so well that you might not even be able to notice a difference between the two. And, even if you could see a small difference between them, is it enough to warrant the $200/£200 gap in price? Honestly, no, it doesn’t.

Even if you disregard the One S’s existence, the Xbox One X isn’t bullet-proof. Its 1TB hard drive might seem like enough room to store your entire library but, consider the fact that all these new Enhanced for Xbox One X titles use 4K image assets, and suddenly 1TB doesn't seem so big any more. 

Gears of War 4, for example, takes up 100GB on the Xbox One X. Another flagship Xbox game, Forza Motorsport 7, will be about the same when it releases its patch. Quantum Break, the Sci-Fi shooter from the studio behind Alan Wake, comes in at an internet crippling 178GB. Together, three of the Xbox One X’s most popular games will take up around 40% of your hard drive space. 

All this isn’t said to shame the Microsoft fan base for its excitement with the new console - in fact, for a certain type of gamer, the Xbox One X is still the greatest console ever made in spite of its limitations. It’s just that, for most folks, the One X imposes a premium tax on a system that’s only marginally better in most ways than the cheaper Xbox One S. 

So, are you someone that needs an Xbox One X? Read on to find out. 

Design

If you’ve seen an Xbox One S at some point, you should be able to picture the Xbox One X - if it weren’t for the difference in color schemes, the two consoles would be nearly identical. 

If you’ve never seen a One S before, the Xbox One X is a rectangular box the size of a large Blu-ray player that’s coated with a matte space grey color. It’s a far cry from the bulky VHS player-stylings of the original Xbox One, and the design only becomes more impressive when you consider what’s under the hood.

The noticeable differences here between Microsoft's last console and its latest one (if you can even notice them) are the color change from the white sheen of the Xbox One S to the space grey of Xbox One X, and the shifting of the disc tray from the top-left side of the console’s face to sitting discreetly lower down the front. 

These changes are aesthetic, however, and neither add nor take away any functionality from the system … which isn’t a bad thing considering how well-equipped the Xbox One S was. 

The aforementioned disc tray not only plays Xbox One games, but 4K Blu-rays as well. This might sound sort of mundane if you’re not totally up-to-date on what 4K Blu-rays are, but considering that Microsoft’s 4K consoles is the only ones on the market with that ability, you can understand why it’s worth pointing out.

Round the back the similarities to the One S continue. From left to right you’ve got a power connector, HDMI out, HDMI in, two USB ports, an IR out, an Optical Audio port and an Ethernet port. To the surprise of no one, the console will not see the return of the original Xbox One's Kinect port - if you haven’t heard, Kinect (Microsoft's motion-sensing camera) is officially dead.

Controller-wise the new machine is packing a new darker gamepad which, for all intents and purposes, is exactly the same mechanically as the one that currently ships with the Xbox One S. You can't fix what isn't broken, apparently. 

If controllers are a bit too imprecise for your liking, Xbox One X will support keyboard and mouse controls sometime in the near future. It's not the first console to do so (that award goes to the Dreamcast), but the feature will be welcomed by gamers who prefer this more accurate and responsive control scheme. 

Hardware specs

If you’re looking to see the real differences between the Xbox One X and every other console that’s come before it, all you’d need to do is open the lid. 

The console comes equipped with an eight-core CPU clocked at 2.3GHz, alongside 12GB of GDDR5 RAM. It features a GPU clocked at 1172MHz leaving the console with 6 teraflops of graphical computing power. It’s a fairly extensive offering, and one that should help usher in a new era of 4K HDR gaming in the living room. 

But before you jump on the PC Gamer forums to tell them how consoles have finally surpassed PCs in terms of value performance, just know that unlike a video card’s dedicated VRAM, the Xbox One X’s 12GB of RAM is split in between the system and the GPU, i.e. you wouldn't be comparing apples to apples. 

On the CPU side of things, the Xbox One X is running a custom chip with eight Jaguar CPU cores clocked at 2.3GHz. That’s a 76% increase compared to the CPU inside the original Xbox One and Xbox One S, but probably only puts it in the ballpark of a current-gen Intel Core i3 processor (Remember, however, that these numbers don’t translate to PCs very well).

he more important comparison for the Xbox One X, and the one Microsoft would rather you focus on, is to the PS4 Pro. Sony’s system is a fairly competent competitor – its GPU has 36 compute units at 911Mhz that work in tandem with a 2.1GHz CPU and 8GB of GDDR5 memory. That memory runs into a bit of a bottleneck at the buffer, which is limited to 218GB/s, but it still puts out around 4 Tflops of performance. Point, Microsoft.

Where the One X falters is on its hard drive - a small 1TB drive that comes standard in every system. It’s also non-negotiable: the only configuration Microsoft plans on selling for the holidays is a 1TB system. 

This wouldn’t be such a huge sticking point if we knew Microsoft wasn’t capable of installing larger hard drives in its systems, but the existence of the 2TB Xbox One S proves that it is indeed possible and Microsoft willingly chose not to include one here.  

Game performance and library

Of course, what’s the end-goal of all this extra horsepower if not a better gaming experience? Thankfully here we’re happy to report that the Xbox One X performs exactly as advertised: Games look great across the board. Whether you’re using a 1080p TV with the Xbox One X or playing in 4K HDR, games look fantastic on the next-gen console. 

But let’s break down each use case individually. 

If you’re a 1080p TV owner, the Xbox One X will do something called supersampling to create better-looking images. Supersampling is a complex term but the basic idea is that the game renders itself in 4K thinking it’s connected to a 4K screen, which means objects are rendered with four times the detail. All this data can’t be displayed because, at the end it’s still being shown on a 1080p TV with a set number of pixels on its display, but the resulting image is one that is more detail-rich. 

In practice that means images are going to look a bit sharper. Trees, branches and foliage in general won’t look so jagged, for example, and basic fog on an Xbox One might become thicker and more realistic while using an Xbox One X.

Once you see a game running in 1080p with supersampling it’s very obvious that it looks better than a game running in standard 1080p. But if you’re not the kind of person who takes a minute to smell the roses in games - the kind who can appreciate a fine edge on a shrub or a rich, dense fog in the morning - then Xbox One X isn’t going to impress you. 

That is, unless you upgrade to a 4K HDR TV. 

On a 4K HDR TV, the Xbox One X unleashes its full power. Games render at up to native 4K, offering offer four times the detail of regular 1080p. Better still, some of those games will have a wider array of color options thanks to a technology called high dynamic range or HDR. Skies look bluer, grass looks greener and colors drip from every scene. The results speak for themselves.

But visual upgrades aren’t the only type of upgrades the Xbox One X offers. The other is performance - i.e. the frames per second at which a game runs. 

We’ll save you another long-winded explanation on the subject, but the basic idea here is that when scenes become really detail-rich and filled with a vast number of objects, the console becomes overwhelmed. Instead of being able to output, say, 60 frames per second, it drops down to 55 or even less. It was a big problem on the original Xbox One, but one that the Xbox One S seemed to do away with under all but the most extreme circumstances. 

Xbox One X tries its best to output games at 60 frames per second, a sort of golden number for the industry that matches the native refresh rate of most TVs and mainstream monitors. And while the results are noticeably better on Xbox One X, games still don’t always hit that 60 frames per second number - there are occasional dropped frames and slow downs. 

So what are you to make of all this? Well, Enhanced for Xbox games do look better on an Xbox One X console, whether you’re connected to a 1080p TV or not. Performance, also, is generally great on the new console.Games don’t run at a perfect 60 frames per second like you’ll find on mid- to high-end gaming PCs, but most of the time it’s great.

OK, Enhanced for Xbox One X games look great and play great. But what exactly makes a game Enhanced for Xbox One X? How many of these games are there? 

Microsoft itself hasn't set a minimum standard for what constitutes an Enhanced for Xbox One X title but there are three broad categories that developers are using: enhanced 4K visual assets, HDR visual processing or higher frame rate. And just one of three will suffice.

To that point, it’s possible for a game to offer HDR or a 60 frames-per-second framerate, but not native 4K and vice versa. Developers can pick and choose which enhancements make sense for their games and roll with it. 

To make matters all-the-more complicated, Microsoft’s Xbox Chief, Phil Spencer, has gone on record saying that new games aren’t necessarily required to support the new hardware, i.e. there’s no mandate for developers to take advantage of the Xbox One X’s capabilities.

What we can say for certain is that, right now, there are well over 100 titles that are going to be Enhanced for Xbox One X. Not all of these patches will be available when the system launches on November 7, but most will be here by the end of the year, with even more coming in 2018. 

New Xbox One interface

Before we close out the review, we thought it'd be a good idea to examine the interface for the Xbox One, that ever-changing software that is somehow still so divisive now three years and two major updates after launch. 

If you’ve yet to download it on your Xbox One at home, the new Xbox One interface is a sort of mash-up of the Xbox 360 blade design and the Windows 10 block-and-pin-heavy design. 

Like the blade design of yore, the interface is separated by purpose: there’s Home and Store tabs, which are pretty self-explanatory, but also tabs for Community, Entertainment and Mixer, a Microsoft-owned Twitch competitor. Navigating from one tab to the next is a fast and fluid experience and, to its credit, there’s always something new to look at.

One of its most unique features is turning the idea of pins - games or apps that you are really attached to - into full rows on the Home screen. This row might call attention to DLC, note how close you are to a particular achievement or show you a highlight from Mixer. It’s a novel way to keep you thinking about a game long after you quit out and something we found ourselves appreciating every time we saw it. 

What we were less appreciative of, however, was how deep Microsoft buries things like friends lists, achievements and settings, all of which were a crucial part of the UI throughout the 360 years. These sections are usually relegated to the small Xbox Help Bar that’s accessed when you press the Xbox jewel. 

Ultimately, while the UI looks nice and has no problem showing us strangers playing games, it still has problems showing us what what we care about most without burying us under loads of content that simply doesn't interest us.

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OnePlus 5T review || TECH REV

The OnePlus 5T, as the name suggests, isn’t a completely new handset – rather, it’s an incremental upgrade of the OnePlus 5.

It’s not just an upgrade though – it’s also a replacement, as OnePlus has ceased production and sales of the phone it launched just six months prior to the arrival of the OnePlus 5T.

This isn’t a surprising move, as OnePlus did exactly the same thing in 2016 when it introduced the OnePlus 3T half a year after launching the OnePlus 3.

So what do you get with OnePlus’ second generation ‘T’? The main talking points are a bigger screen, tweaked design, improved rear camera and face recognition, plus a few software additions to boot. 

In short, there’s enough new stuff to justify its existence without it offering a radically new smartphone experience.

OnePlus 5T price and availability

• OnePlus 5T launch price: from £449
• OnePlus 5T release date: November 21

The good news is that the OnePlus 5T price is exactly the same as the OnePlus 5’s, which means SIM-free you’re looking at £449 ($479, AU$599) for the 6GB/64GB model, and £499 ($539, AU$699) for the 8GB/128GB variant.

It means the OnePlus 5T is cheaper than pretty much all of its flagship rivals – but significantly the difference in spec between them is the smallest it’s ever been.

As far as a OnePlus 5T release date goes, the handset will be available from November 21 in the US, UK and Europe, with China, Hong Kong and India getting the phone soon after.

Display

• Biggest-ever screen on a OnePlus phone
• 6.01-inch Full HD, AMOLED display with 18:9 aspect ratio

he single biggest change on the OnePus 5T is the display, with the handset boasting a 6.01-inch Full HD AMOLED panel with a 18:9 aspect ratio that follows this year’s trend of elongated screens on the iPhone X, Google Pixel 2 XL, Samsung Galaxy S8 and LG V30.

It's the first time OnePlus has increased the size of the display on its core handset (the smaller OnePlus X aside), making this the biggest screen we've ever seen on a handset from the Chinese firm. 

While its size and aspect ratio may see the OnePlus 5T pull inline with the flagship handsets it’s looking to topple, there is still one spec which denies it full membership of the high-end display club: resolution.

OnePlus has once again opted to stick with a Full HD resolution, at 1080 x 2160 with a 401ppi pixel density, while rivals all boast QHD (2K) displays.

It doesn’t mean the screen on the OnePlus 5T is poor, and thanks to the AMOLED panel colors are bright and punchy, but when you slide it alongside the competition you can see it’s not as sharp. In isolation though, it’s difficult to pick any real fault with it.

Design

• Premium metal unibody
• Fingerprint scanner on rear with smaller bezels up front

The bigger display has had a knock-on effect in terms of design as well, with the bezels above and below the screen getting slimmed down to provide a sleeker look and a 80.5% screen-to-body ratio. 

That reduction in bezel has led to another design change too, with the fingerprint scanner and physical navigation keys disappearing from the front of the phone.

Biometric fans needn’t worry though, as the digit reader has been relocated to the rear of the device, and its centralized position means it’s easy to hit with your forefinger - and of course there’s face recognition too, but more of that in a moment.

The OnePlus 5T continues with the premium metal unibody design of the phone it’s replacing, which makes it look good and feel great in the hand, with the gently-curving rear helping it nestle nicely into the palm.

You’ll find that the power/lock key on the right, and the volume rocker on the left, fall easily under thumb and finger when you’re holding the phone in portrait, and OnePlus continues with its notification slider on the side of the handset, allowing you to easily switch between silent, do not disturb and loud modes.

Another plus point on the OnePlus 5T is the fact that the headphone jack has also been retained, allowing you to plug in your headphones without the need for a clunky adapter.

At launch the OnePlus 5T is available in just one color, midnight black, with no word on whether more hues will be on offer in the future. 

Face recognition

• Fast, easy and effective
• Not as accomplished as iPhone X

Another key feature, and a first for OnePlus, is the inclusion of face recognition tech as the fledgling brand attempts to ride the coattails of the iPhone X.

Face recognition on the OnePlus 5T isn't as advanced as Apple’s offering, but it's still surprisingly good, using over 100 facial identifiers to check it's you. 

It's used only for unlocking the handset, and you'll need to double-tap the screen or press the power key to ultilize it.

It's incredibly fast, with almost no delay between you tapping the screen or button and your home screen appearing before you.

We also found that it works at some impressive angles, which means you don't have to hold the OnePlus 5T directly in front of you face for it to work. 

Something it can't do, but which the iPhone X can, is see you in the dark. That's because, unlike Apple, OnePlus hasn't used an infrared camera to spy you in the dark. It requires a light source – street lights at night are enough, but the screen brightness itself isn't – to check your face.

We're yet to attempt to try to fool it with siblings, photos, glasses and hats, but we'll be putting it through its paces for our full review.

In the future OnePlus plans to expand the use of face recognition to enable you to log in to apps and verify purchases, but for now it's using the OnePlus 5T as a test bed for the technology to make sure it's secure.

Camera

• Dual rear cameras: 16MP + 20MP Sony sensors
• Revamped camera app for easier one-handed use

Like the OnePlus 5 the OnePlus 5T comes with dual cameras on the rear, but it's not an identical setup.

The OnePlus 5T has a 16MP Sony Sensor and 20MP Sony sensor, both of which boast an increased aperture of f/1.7 for better low-light shots and the same focal length.

It also features a Pro mode for those who like to fine-tune settings, and there's a Portrait mode allowing you to capture those popular bokeh-effect shots.

You can even long-press the fingerprint scanner on the rear to take a photo, which we found to be surprisingly intuitive. 

Meanwhile on the front you get the same 16MP selfie snapper as the OnePlus 5. 

OnePlus has also overhauled its camera app for a simpler look and easy-to-use gesture controls. Swiping up gives you mode select, while swiping down brings up quick settings. It makes things much easier to do one-handed. 

Taking a few quick snaps with the OnePlus 5T shutter speed was easy, and image quality was good, with plenty of detail and natural-looking colors.

Battery

• 3,300mAh may be a little small
• Dash Charge gives you 60% in 30 minutes

The OnePlus 5T comes with a 3,300mAh battery which the firm claims will last a full day on a single charge – a claim we'll be sure to put to the test during our in-depth review process.

It also features OnePlus’ Dash Charge technology, which is claimed to give you 'a day's power in half an hour’, which in reality means just under 60% in 30 minutes. There's no wireless charging though.

OnePlus has, as usual stuck its Oxygen OS interface over the top of Android, which keeps the general look and feel of Google's platform while adding in extra customization options.

These include App Priority, which keeps your most frequently used apps running in the background for easier access and faster load times, while the parallel apps feature lets you effectively clone certain apps (such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram) so that you can log in to two separate accounts without having to switch in-app.

It's a feature we didn't have time to explore during our hands-on time with the OnePlus 5T, but keep an eye out for our full findings in our final review.

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