Huawei has come up with some surprises over the last few months and here's yet another. The Ascend P6, which it debuted today, is the thinnest smartphone ever created. The 4.7inch screen mobile comes in at just 6.18mm, which is slimmer than all its rivals. Incidentally the phone to get anywhere near that is the Xperia Z Ultra from Sony which rumoured to be 6.5mm but you will have to wait for that one.

Other features include a 1.5GHz quad-core processor, 5MP front-facing camera (an industry record), Android 4.2.2 operating system, 2000mAh battery,and a shed load of software. It has a pretty nifty 8MP rear facing camera too that has F2.0 aperture and 4cm macro view and also enables 1080P full HD video recording and playback.

It also boasts 'MagicTouch' which mans users can operate the smartphone even when wearing gloves. It is also wrapped in rather striking metallic body too

"The HUAWEI Ascend P6 is a star among smartphones with its industry-leading design, high-quality camera, and intuitive user interface, Huawei's proprietary Emotion UI," said Richard Yu, Chief Executive Officer, Huawei Consumer Business Group. "Building on the success of our Ascend P series of fashion smartphones, the HUAWEI Ascend P6 provides unsurpassed technology and a design that is simply stunning."

It is available in black, white and pink with matching color cases and will begin shipping in Western Europe from July through Vodafone, Telefonica, Orange, H3G, O2, Carphone Warehouse, TalkTalk, Media Markt & Saturn, TIM and online via Amazon and CDiscount with other markets to follow.

So how do you make the next iPhone really stand out? Easy you add a touch of bling. There's a rumour which has been picked up by Mashable that the iPhone 5S is going to be available in a gold version.

Sounds bonkers, but apparently this isn't the first time a gold mobile has been mooted. The story comes from Japanese site Macotakara which suggests that a reliable source aren't they always has told them that the iPhone 5S will be gold.

There have been other mentions of a gold iPhone before but we'd assumed that they were the work of over imaginative teenagers who are dab hands on Photoshop.

Incidentally you can already get an iPhone 5 in gold here. It will cost you though.

Well we will see. Anyhow forget the gold. Apple really needs to focus on the iPhone 6 having a big screen and stunning camera or else it will be losing ground to mobiles like this.

Yesterday we wrote about how Sony was on a roll in delivering exciting innovative and very stylish products. Well according to Xpreia blog there's another one coming and if the press invitation is anything to go by it could well be a very big phone aka a phablet.

The invitation to the Sony Mobile event in France uses the words "Sony Mobile reserves a big surprise for you".

And as Xperia Blog points out note the 'big' in that sentence.

It also adds

The graphic then shows the following hand written text: "Do not forget to mark your calendars!" It shows the text being written by a stylus, giving more credence to rumours that the 6.4-inch device will support an input device such as a stylus or pencil.

There have been rumours of a Sony phablet for a while now and it appears to have the moniker of the Xperia Z Ultra.

The interesting question for Sony is whether it can take the large screen phone design developed by Samsung to another level. Maybe making the phone slimmer and lighter, and possibly replacing the plastic with something a little more sexy.

The rumours are that the phone will be 6.5mm thin - the Galaxy Note 2 is 9.4mm - though we know nothing of its finish yet.

Other possible specs included 6.44-inch 1080p screen, a Snapdragon 800 chipset (2.2GHz quad-core processor and Adreno 330 graphics), 2GB RAM, 16GB internal storage and microSD memory card slot. It will run Android 4. and sport an eight mega pixel camera.

As you are probably very aware Apple unveiled its latest operating system for the iPhone - iOS 7 - on Monday. The jury seems out on the upgrade with some critics praising the simplicity and cleanness of the design and the interesting new features.

Others have been a bit more cynical. Among them is the team ITProPortal who have put together a list of the features on iOS 7 that it alleges that Apple have copied from other platforms.

So for example, it points out that Automatic Updates are not news to Android phone owners as they have been able to update their phones on the fly via Wi-For for awhile. Also FaceTime Audio is not a great deal removed from BlackBerry Messenger and the 'find and kill option' which has been available on both Windows and BlackBerry phones for a while now.

Then there's the similarities between Pandora and Apple's new iTunes Radio streaming service which we looked at here.

The list runs to 13 items.

For me it underlines what are in fact Apple's key strengths and weaknesses. In many ways it isn't always an innovator in the truest sense of the word. There were touch screen phone before the iPhone, MP3 players before the iPod and so on. What Apple does brilliantly is to take innovations that other people have made and take them mainstream by offering a smoother more engaging users experience integrated within beautiful product.

I wonder if this will also be the case for the iWatch. There have been smart watches on sale for almost two years now, but the clever money is on Apple being the first to get the interface and the features correct?

So what do you think? Does it matter if much if features on iOS are cribbed from other platforms?

An interesting spot by the team at Omio which has noted that one UK retailer has got a price and on sale date for the BlackBerry Q5.

Announced last month the Q5 is the cut down version of its handset the Q10 - that's the one with the proper QWERTY keypad. It has a similar sized screen - 3.1 inches though it is slightly lower quality LCD rather than AMOLED, and slower processor and a five mega pixel camera as opposed to the eight mega pixel on on the Q10.

Anyhow unlocked-mobiles.com, is now taking pre-orders of the phone which it says will come in the middle of July and retail for £349.98.

More from its website here.

Time was when you couldn't move for pink phones aimed at young women. Then the iPhone came along and the craze died down a little. Vodafone, however, may be about to bring them back too after announcing that it will have a pink version of its new cheap and cheerful phone the Smart Mini.

With a PAYG price of £50, it's a mobile that's aimed at punters who want smartphone facilities but are restricted by a tight budget.

Nevertheless the specs aren't bad, It runs Android 4.1, sports a 3.5-inch HVGA touchscreen and comes with a 1 GHz single-core processor and 512MB of RAM.

Wi-Fi, 3G, GPS and Bluetooth connectivity are also on board too. Its weakest link is quite possibly its camera which only snap two megapixel images.

And if you don't fancy a pink version - which will be on sale shortly - you can also have it in black or white.

It goes on sale today.

One of the most highly rated mobiles of 2013 has been the HTC's One with its stunning designs and glorious aluminium build.

So the HTC One Mini, which has been rumoured for a while, is set to be a big deal for the company especially given that it is facing difficult financial times.

There have been a few leaks but today two informants have been talking to Bloomberg and have given a fair amount of detail about the phone.

Take it with a pinch of salt, but they say that the Mini will sport 4.3inch display (the one has a 4.7inch one), and feature a less-powerful Qualcomm processor and a lower-resolution screen than the sibling.

So the specs shape up like this - a dual-core processor, possibly a Snapdragon 400 rather than the Snapdragon 600 quad-core on the HTC One, 2GB RAM, 16GB of internal storage space, and a 4-megapixel camera.

The phone is expected to go one sale in late summer or early autumn. HTC has obviously not commented on the leak, but the specs do tally with those that have been circulating for a while now.

There was a time when Sony was the ultimate name in consumer electronics. It had a superb range of high-end products in a number of sectors that were just better designed, better built and crammed with more useful and innovative features than its rivals.

Then about a decade or so ago things started to go a little awry. Hamstrung by its ties to content companies it let some of its leading brands ie the Walkman slide to be superseded by the brilliant products coming out of Cupertino.

The level of innovation declined and even in gaming it found itself running a poor third behind Microsoft and Nintendo.

More recently there has been a subtle change at the company. Maybe it has just focused more on product design (maybe taking a cue or two from Apple) or maybe it has decided to really give consumers what they want (and not agonise about the impact on its music, games and video sles) but its products have once again become, whisper it, rather cool.

The ditching of the unwieldy Sony Ericsson combination has certainly helped and the arrival of 4K TVs and tablets has opened up new opportunities for the company, but it just feels like Sony has rediscovered its mojo.

Here then are five examples of how Sony has returned to form.

1 The new PS4 trumps the X Box One

The two new games consoles are fairly similar in terms of looks, hardware and range of games. But the Sony has a few trump cards. Firstly it has removed the restrictions regarding the playing of used games - which has been massively well received by gamers. Also you don't need an online connection to play games and the console is region-free. The clincher though might just be the price, with the PS4 coming in at £349, which could be as much as £80 cheaper than its Microsoft rival.

2 Sony has the only Android tablet to seriously rival the iPad

In fact a few writers have even suggested that the Sony Xperia Z tablet has the edge over its 10inch Apple competitor. It is an absolute stunner. Incredibly thin and light, yet a breeze to use and has a superb screen and excellent sound quality. It is waterproof so you can watch movies in the bath too. If you have £400 to spend on 10inch tablet you need to look at this beauty first.

3 Sony is leading the way in 4K TVs

Super high resolution 4K TVs are set to become big news later in 2013 and Sony is already setting the standard. On its books it has the flagship monster screen 84-inch 84X9005 and coming soon are the Sony KD-55X9000A and the Sony KD-65X9000A.55 and 65inch screen sets respectively which have prices tags starting at £4,000. This will start to begin the coast of 4K Tvs down and Sony is very well placed to dominate the 4k market.

4 It is rumoured to have an amazing smartphone on its way

As if the excellent Xperia Z with its groundbreaking waterproof screen wasn't enough, there's already quite a buzz about the next big smartphone from the company. The rumours are that the Honami will pack Qualcomm's Snapdragon 800 quad-core chip clocked at a staggering 2.3GHz - way faster that any of its rivals. It will also be powered by a huge 3,000mAh battery pack that will deliver running times that are well clear of rival smartphones. The screen is rumoured to be stunning too in that it is a 5-inch Full HD 1080p display running 'Triluminos' technology. The phone will be made from glass, metal and carbon fibre, and be absolutely stunning to look at. And to top it all it will sport a 20-megapixel camera accompanied by a huge 1/1.6-inch Exmor RS sensor.

5 It is making great laptops again

For while now Sony laptops have been also rans. Which a shame because there was a time when if you wanted a Windows laptop the extra you paid for design and build quality for a Sony was a very sensible investment. The new Vaio Pro is definitely a return to form. It is light, made from carbon fibre and has an Intel Haswell heart. There's a lovely screen, very good quality battery life and a decent keyboard - which not all Sony laptops have featured recently. It might be pricey at around £1000 but this might just be the best Windows 8 laptop on sale.

We were talking in the Shiny offices the other day about how mobile manufacturers are differentiating themselves from Apple in a bid to capture the high-end. For some it is about offering significantly larger screens. For others it is about build quality and there are also makers who are taking phones into niche areas like rugged mobiles for outdoor sports.

To be fair Samsung are actually doing all of the above as well as tackling another key areas - serious cameras on a phone.

So no surprise that today it has announced the Samsung Galaxy Zoom, a high-end mobile that it is selling on its camera facilities.

It is clearly no match for this camera phone hybrid, but it does have plenty going for it including a Xenon flash, 10x optical zoom (which certainly protrudes from the back), a 16-megapixel BSI (back-illuminated) CMOS sensor.

Together the system is designed to deliver great images in low lighting - which has traditionally been a real weakness of camera phones.

Other useful camera features include an OIS (Optical Imaging Systems) to reduce blur and easy camera navigation, which offers instant access to multiple camera mode like auto, gallery and smart mode. A "Zoom ring" lets you share snapped photos from a social network, as well as booting straight to the camera from sleep. Sadly there's no optical zoom hardware control though.

The rest of the specs are less than say the Galaxy S4. So the camera packs a 4.3-inch Super AMOLED 960 x 540 screen, features a dual-core 1.5GHz processor, and boasts 1.5GB of RAM; 8GB of internal storage.

It runs Android 4.2 Jelly Bean and is available in both 4G LTE and 3G versions.
It will go on sale later in the summer.

Three has announced that Nokia's new flagship Windows Mobile phone, the Lumia 925, is now available for pre-order and will be on sale from 21 June.

It follows Vodafone and O2 which made similar announcements recently.

The handset will cost £35 a month on Three's Ultimate Internet 500 plan and £37 a month on The One Plan. Both plans come with all- you-can-eat data. Three is also throwing in a free wireless charging stand and cover.

The mobile got a fairly warm reception when it was unveiled a few weeks back. It has a 4.5inch screen, runs exciting and near future versions of 4G and sports a very striking aluminum shell.

It also is also compatible with Nokia's signature recent feature - wireless charging.
A great deal of attention though has been focused on the mobile's camera.. It sports an 8.7 MP PureView camera which is packed with six lenses, and features Carl Zeiss optics that Nokia claims are able to let in five times more light than other smartphones which means higher quality low light images.

Some fairly interesting news coming out of the Apple camp tonight. Bloomberg is reporting that the US consumer electronics giant is about to unveil a trade in programme for its iPhones.

The deal is that if you own an older model you will be able to take it to an Apple Store and swap it for money off new products. The theory is that it might encourage those people who still have the iPhone 3GS for example to finally swap it for a shiny new iPhone 5 or even the 5S when it launches in the autumn.

The phones that Apple collects are then sold off to customers in emerging markets.
The concept of trading in an old phone isn't a new one, especially not in the UK where there are countless sites which will give you cash for your old handset.

However the lure of offering a trade-in price in the Apple store will surely tempt more puters into upgrading and hopefully Apple will launch it in the UK soon too.

Apparently Brightstar Corp., a mobile-phone distributor, is partnering with Apple to run the exchange programme.

So how do you differentiate your flagship phone from your rivals?If you are Samsung you go for a larger screen size and stack it out with software goodies. If you are Sony you make it waterproof and ensure that the build quality is outstanding.

And as for Nokia, well the maker seems to be focusing on producing the best camera phones ever. To be fair the Finnish maker has always lead the pack with its snappers. They were among the first to really push for serious mega pixels on mobiles while at the same time experimenting with high-end Carl Zeis lenses

Last year they launched the intriguing 808 PureView. This was slightly bizarre handset that featured an astonishing camera which could take 41 mega pixel images and sported Carl Zeiss-branded optics in a mobile that way was thinner and lighter than it had any right to be.

The only problem was that it ran Nokia's rather outdated Symbian operating system which rendered it rather second rate as a general smartphone.

Well judging by the amount of leaks the company is having another crack at re-inventing the camera phone. It has lined up a model, which is known by the moniker of Elvis but is likely to land as with a more sensible name, that pairs the best camera ever on a smartphone with the Windows Mobile OS used on its recent Lumia mobiles. For now we can call it the EOS PureView.

There has been a deluge of leaks of the product in the last few days, which the clever money says will launch in July or August, and they show a phone with a huge bulge on the back which is there to accomodate the rather serious lens that a high end camera phone requires.

As for the rumours about the handset, well it is expected to sport at least a 41 mega pixel camera and a powerful Xenon flash. The really smart bit is that it takes two copies of each image you take - a 35-megapixel shot and 5-megapixel shot so you have one for storing and one for instant uploading - genius idea!

Also on board is likely to be the Nokia Pro Camera app which has a range of effects and tools such as an 11x zoom, anti-shake, manual focus, face detection and a self timer.

The pics and rumours are here and here.

I like quite a lot of what Sony is doing in the mobile and tablet space at the moment this looks like it is going to be a good move too.

Android Geeks is speculating that the Japanese maker is the latest to be swayed by the potential of stock Android and will release a version of its flagship phone, the Xperia Z, in that format very soon.

In case you missed the buzz about stock Android it means that the phone is available without all the software that the software and interfaces etc that the maker adds. The first stock Android phone to get the nod was the Samsung Galaxy S4 Google Edition, announced at the Google I/O conference.

Since then other makers including HTC and LG have hinted that they too will offer stock Android handsets, so Sony is in many ways the only big name not have offer it.

Android Geeks suggest that Sony will partner with Google to make the project happen.

Sounds interesting. So what about you. Is stock Android really the way to go, or would you miss all those extra bits and bobs?

Huawei continues its campaign to take the UK smartphone scene by storm by unveiling a new entry level model that's an exclusive to Carphone Warehouse

The Ascend Y300 smartphone debuts in the store tomorrow and will be available in black from £59.95 on prepay and from £7.50 per month on contract.

The company has s made quite a splash recently with products like its super large and its very striking Ascend P2. With this model though it is back to smartphone basics. It packs a four inch screen, 1GHz dual-core processor and comes with a five mega pixel camera with auto-focus, flash, panorama function and video record at 30 frames per second. It runs Android 4.1 Jellybean operating system and features Huawei's own power saving technology to give power efficiencies of around 30% on a 1730mAh battery.

Rhys Saunders, UK Sales Director at Huawei Device, said: "The partnership with Carphone will help cement Huawei's products and brand firmly in the British consciousness in the coming months. In the entry-level, the Ascend Y300 does not scrimp on anything. It combines hardware and features to deliver a compelling smartphone experience to a part of the market that has been under-served in the UK."

The Samsung Galaxy S4 Active, which has been rumoured for a while has got the official nod from the maker this morning.

The handset which is aimed at those who enjoy an active lifestyle - ie mountain biking, skiing and other outdoor pursuits - comes with a protective casing to help it withstand dust and water. In fact it can actually withstand 30 minutes of water at a depth of one metre - which kind of kicks sand in the face of the other water-friendly mobile the Sony Xperia Z.

In addition the the new super sturdy casing and rugged design the Active sports a 1.9 GHZ Quad-Core processor and a 5-inch Full HD TFT LCD screen that can be operated by someone wearing gloves. It runs Android 4.2.2 and includes an 8-megapixel camera with LED flash.It wilbe avaialble in the summer and comes in Urban Grey, Dive Blue and Orange Flare color options.

Samsung says of the new handset

"The Samsung Galaxy S4 Active is designed to enhance life experiences of the active user who wants to stay connected while exploring environments from the most rugged mountain trails to the roughest rivers,"

Sony Mobile is seemingly on a bit of a roll at the moment, so it will be very interesting to get a proper look at its new mid range smartphone, - the Xperia M - which it has just announced today.

It doesn't have the high-end facilities of say the Xperia Z, but there's plenty on board to keep it interesting. The phone packs a FWVGA touchscreen display, comes with a five megapixel cameras and sports a 1 GHz Qualcomm MSM8227 dual-core processor. It will run Google™ Android™ 4.1 (Jelly Bean). It also has a NFC chip on board which enables owners to share images quickly and easily with suitably equipped Sony Bravia TVs or music with NFC chipped headphones.

It will be available in Black, White and Purple for the dual SIM version which is tagged the Sony Xperia M dual - while a Yellow colour variation will also be available for the single SIM model.

The models are both due in August.

After a few quiet days the old iPhone 5S rumour circuit has been buzzing today with a very interesting claim coming from the Wei Feng Network reported here.

It suggests that the next iPhone will keep the iPhone 5's four inch screen but will have twice its number of pixels, an upgrade from 730K to 1.5 million. It will also sport a much narrower bezel and feel much more like the iPad mini like design.

So, how do you feel about those rumours?

Personally I think it a massive error for Apple not to offer a larger screen handset. However it was always unlikely that the 5s would be larger though, so an upgrade in the number of pixels is very welcome.

Will it provide a major reason for phone buyers to upgrade. Possibly not. Bizarrely enough last night I caught an episode of the kids TV programme Victorious which ran with a story about a new iPhone-esque mobile (the new Pear) that everyone apparently wanted. When asked about what was different about the next incarnation they shared that it had a much better screen. Cue a lot of shrugging. There's loads more about the Pear phone here.

It has been a while since we saw a significant improvement on iPhone screen resolution and several of Apple rivals have phones which have better screens.

So it does feel like the iPhone 5S will be the maker playing catch up with its rivals. The real innovation is sure to come on the iPhone 6. Surely!?

Incidentally the iPhone 5S is, according to a deluge of web rumours, most likely to land in September.

So how does Apple make the next iteration of the iPhone the consumer electronics object that everyone will lust after? Well if some interesting rumours are to be believed it we might be about to see a total overhaul of the look of the iOS software.

The normally very reliable Mark Gurman at 9 to 5 Mac says that the new software is going to be overhauled by lead designer Jony Ive and it is going to be slicker and simple to use.

According to Gurman Ive is apparently going to change some of the icons on the handsets. So whereas in the past they resembled real world objects - eg Games Center has a Vegas style gaming table, in the future they will be more stylish and less literal in their interpretation.

Ive is going to unify the built-in Apple apps, giving them black, white, silver colors, says Gurman.

Ultimately though Apple fans shouldn't worry too much about how the future handsets might work, The icons may look prettier but the phone is going to operate in the same way.

There has been a fair bit of speculation in the last few days as to how many Samsung have sold of its flagship Galaxy S4 phone in the month since it launched.

Well today it offered up the figures and claimed to have cleared 10 million handsets since the end of April. Pretty impressive stuff eh, and all the more impressive when you consider that the Galaxy S III took 50 days after its launch to ship 10 million units, while the S II took five months and the original Galaxy S took almost seven months.

And then the phone isn't on sale globally yet with Samsung promising to deliver the handset to another fifty or so countries imminently. To celebrate the company is going to ship the S4 in other colours too including; "Blue Arctic", "Red Aurora", "Purple Mirage" and "Brown Autumn".

The big question then is how do sales of the S4 compare with the iPhones?

Interestingly Apple sold over five million iPhone 5 handsets in the opening weekend of sales. And as Apple Insider points out here that was in just nine countries and that figure was deemed by some analysts as disappointing.

The iPhone 5 went on to sell 33 million units in 2012 which was roughly the same number that Samsung sold of the S3 in the same period.

The iPhone 4S also got off to a flying start in with four million units sold in the first three days of release.

We don't have the exact figures for the first month of iPhone sales but hazarding a guess they are likely to be in excess of ten million.

Ultimately the S4 sales figures tell us two key things. Firstly that Samsung has produced a hit phone that even if hasn't usurped its Apple rivals in popularity is breathing down their necks. Secondly that Apple will need to post some pretty impressive stats for the iPhone 5S and 6 to keep its critics and the financial institutions happy.

HTC is countering rumours that it might be in a spot of bother by attacking on two fronts.

Firstly it claims that its flagship phone the HTC One - the one with the very classy silver stye finish - has sold half as many as the much higher profile Samsung Galaxy S4 - no mean achievement.

It has also unveiled a mid range-ish smartphone that have a very impressive specification.

The handset, which sports a 4.5in qHD Super LCD2 touchscreen, runs Google's Android Jelly Bean mobile operating system and baosts a quad-core 1.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor. All serious stuff.

It also boasts an eight mega pixel camera, dual-SIM support, Beats Audio integration, HTC's Boomsound speakers, a 1,860mAh battery and HSDPA and WiFi connectivity.

There is no 4G LTE support, which is perhaps why the price has been kept pretty low.

"The HTC Desire 600 dual sim combines speed and easy multitasking with the truly innovative HTC BlinkFeed home screen. The result is an affordable mid-range phone that sets the standard for its class, keeping the busiest user up-to-date at a glance and offering them the power and range of features to switch between work and play," said HTC CEO Peter Chou.

The HTC Desire 600 goes on sale in some markets in June but there's no firm commitment to launching the phone in the UK yet.