PATREONItems tagged with Mobile
LG's upcoming V30 flagship smartphone looks to offer a lot of what people want, and the company has been releasing bits and pieces of information over time to help whet our appetites. Last week, we learned that the phone will sport a 6-inch OLED display with curved bezels and a resolution of 2880x1440. Today, we learn a bit more about its camera. If you asked a room full of people what feature they'd want to see improved on their phone, chances are many would say "the camera", even if they have one of the top options available. People simply want better, clearer photos, and with its dual camera V30, LG promises to deliver them. The V30 will mark the first smartphone with a f/1.6 lens, allowing...
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A sometimes unfortunate thing about loving a vendor's hardware is the fact that the same kind of care that makes you love the device itself might not be shown towards the software solution. Sometimes, too much care can be given, resulting in a bloated OS that can become sluggish. Many vendors have come to their senses over the years, as we've seen a trend of more and more companies decide to go with stock Android on their devices - or at least stock Android with minor modifications. We now find out that Lenovo is the latest company to jump on this bandwagon of clean OSes, as its upcoming K8 Note will include Android 7.1.1 in an almost default state. Lenovo's K6 Note smartphone In talking...
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If history is any indication, LG is getting ready announce another handset as part of its V series. This will most likely take place during a press event at this year's IFA in Berlin, Germany. While LG has not come right out and said it will be announcing the V30 at IFA, the hints are anything but subtle—the letter V is splashed across a press rendering of a new smartphone with rounded corners, along with the words "Save the date" printed on top. That date is August 31, one day before IFA officially kicks off. And on the bottom corner, LG's press rendering says, "Berlin, Germany," which is where IFA is being held. You do not need Nicholas Cage's character from the National Treasure series to...
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When it comes to battery capacity, ASUS is thinking big with its upcoming ZenFone Max. Really big. ASUS is not making a lot of noise about the ZenFone Max just yet, but a listing on the company's Russian website reveals that it will wield a massive 5,000 mAh battery pack. According to ASUS, that is enough juice to power up to 40 hours of talk time in 3G mode, or up to 26 hours of non-stop web surfing over a Wi-Fi network.Want more battery stats? ASUS further claims you can squeeze our 22 hours of constant video playback before the 5,000 mAh runs dry. And in standby mode on a 4G LTE network, the ZenFone Max can last longer than a month—up to 46 days, to be precise. The bottom line here is that...
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A current smartphone trend has seen vendors put fingerprint readers on the backs of our devices, which also might beg the question, "what else could we put back there?" According to a newly granted Google patent, a touchpad could be in the cards for the Android creator's future branded Pixel smartphone devices. If that sounds a bit bizarre, bear in mind that many patents may appear odd at first glance, but often are the sparks of true innovation. Google foresees the use of a touchpad on the back of a smartphone to grant the user additional interaction possibilities. As seen in the example image from the patent below, the touchpad would settle below the camera, and could be of equal size. It'll...
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We might be reaching a point where mid-range smartphones are good enough for most people. That may seem like a double-edged sword for Qualcomm, which just announced its new Snapdragon 450 processor for such devices, but there is still room at the high-end for things like virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), mixed reality (MR), artificial intelligence, and other tasks that push the limits of today's mobile processors. Meanwhile, mid-range devices are about to get a performance boost.The Snapdragon 450 is the first mid-range processor to be built on a 14-nanometer FinFET process. Compared to its predecessor (Snapdragon 435), it brings with it a meatier octa-core ARM Cortex A53 CPU that...
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A Colorado dad is one step closer to getting his wish for a mobile phone ban to minors. Tim Farnum, a Denver-area father and anesthesiologist is spearheading the campaign to forbid the sale of cellphones to children younger than 13 years old as part of a broader effort to see less children engaged in hours of smartphone use on any given day. He has the attention of Colorado officials, who have drafted a proposed ballot for a 2018 vote. For that to happen, Farnum and officials would have to obtain 300,000 voter signatures to the proposal. If that were to happen, Colorado residents would then vote on a bill to require cellphone retailers to ask potential customers the age of the primary user of...
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Samsung's Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8+ smartphones are some of the best Android models available right now (read our review), but despite that, many of their users haven't been using them to their full potential. While Bixby Voice was revealed alongside the phone, it still hasn't made it to the United States in stable form. If you're keen on trying Bixby Voice and don't mind that it's not in stable form, Samsung has the hook-up. At its website, the company is allowing S8 owners to sign up for an early access program that will ensure they get the latest Bixby features before anyone else. Note that this early access program is only for the Bixby solution. Bixby Voice is going to prove to be one of...
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If you are a Canadian with a cell phone, we have some excellent news for you regrading regulations surrounding device unlocking. In this case, nearly everyone should be happy with the outcome; well with the exception of the executives at Canadian mobile carriers. Canada's CRTC (Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission) has just announced that beginning on December 1st, mobile carriers will be unable to charge a fee to allow someone to unlock their phone. It's a move that will save most people about $50, if they need to make use of the service. Samsung's beautiful Galaxy S8 is available in an unlocked variant Over the years, it's become commonplace to lock phones to the carrier...
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Having identified the issue that doomed the ill-fated Galaxy Note 7 and subsequently put in place more rigorous testing methods to ensure that situation does not repeat itself, Samsung is now getting ready to launch the Galaxy Note 8. That will take place sometime later this year. In the meantime, the Internet is awash with rumors and speculation, the latest of which points to the Galaxy Note 8 debuting with an Infinity Display and Android 7.1.1 Nougat out of the box.The Galaxy Note series is popular among people who crave a larger size handset. It was previously rumored that the Galaxy Note 8 would fit the bill with a 6.3-inch OLED display, putting the device squarely into phablet territory....
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Smartphones have become a big part of our daily lives. Whether it is texting a buddy or looking up driving directions, smartphones see a lot of use. That is why battery life is such an important metric. Equally as important is how fast a mobile device can charge. Qualcomm has been leading the charge in that regard with its Quick Charge technology, and its new Quick Charge 4+ program ups the ante with several improvements. "When Quick Charge 4 was announced, it promised to bring even faster charging than its predecessor, allowing a device to go from empty to 50 percent in just 15 minutes. We added new technologies designed to further extend battery cycle life, enhance safety, and expand charging...
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Once again, Andy Rubin, the co-creator of Android and former boss of Google's Android division has taken to Twitter in order to tease a smartphone being developed at Essential, a new company he started last year. Essential joined Twitter in November 2016 and has just two tweets, both of which were posted in the past 24 hours "to let you know something big is coming May 30th." We heard you @renan_batista - here's something to hold you over until next week: pic.twitter.com/QSIeXyjKNq — Essential (@essential) May 25, 2017 The most recent tweet shows a darkened image of a smartphone with an odd protrusion at the top. While Rubin did not offer up any clues as to what that might be, the consensus on...
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AMD made a flurry of announcements this evening during its Financial Analyst Day presentation, one of which includes new mobile solutions that pairs the company's Ryzen CPU architecture with its forthcoming Vega GPU architecture. Or put another way, AMD is readying its first Zen-based mobile APU (accelerated processing unit) with on-die Vega graphics, both for desktops and laptops.Click to EnlargeWe're still in the process of gathering information, but here is what we know so far. Compared to AMD's 7th generation APUs, Ryzen Mobile will up the CPU performance ante by 50 percent while offering 40 percent better graphics performance. Those gains will not come at the expense of battery life, either—AMD...
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Earlier this month, OnePlus announced that its forthcoming OnePlus 5 flagship is indeed real, and that it would be landing this summer. As useful as that information might have been, though, it was the only morsel that we got out of the company. Everything else has been left up to rumor. However, today, we get our best look at the phone to date. Etailer GeekBuyer has the phone listed for preorder right now, and owing to the authenticity of the listing is the backing-up of some key specs. Listed, for example, is the Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processor, 64GB of storage, and a very generous 8GB of RAM. OnePlus 3 (2016) Those specs are impressive, but they're just the beginning. Also listed...
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These days, we all take Google’s Android operating system for granted. We just accept that Android is highly capable, customizable, and ubiquitous enough that it is installed on over 70 percent of smartphones sold around the globe. However, could you imagine a mobile landscape without Android? It appears that Google definitely is, and it may be pinning its future on Fuchsia. We first learned about Fuchsia back in August, when the project was discovered on Google’s GitHub repository. At the time, we learned that this new operating system supports both x86 and aarch64 (ARM 64-bit) architectures and that it isn’t built using a variant of Linux. Google recently updated its GitHub page for...
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OnePlus has been on a bit of a roll since... well, its inception. All of its flagship devices have been well-received and have sold well, leading us to believe that its next major launch could continue the tradition. Even though the phone hasn't been officially announced yet, we know that it's going to be called OnePlus 5, skipping over "OnePlus 4" entirely. Last fall, OnePlus released its OnePlus 3T, an upgraded OnePlus 3. That in effect should have been called OP4, simply because it's the phone to preface the OP5T. But, it's just a matter of semantics, we suppose. According to The Verge, which was given exclusive information by OnePlus, the company's next flagship is going to arrive this summer,...
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When I first heard about Nintendo's plan to build a hybrid console, I thought it was a long shot. And truthfully, it was. But I also reckoned the response to a 2-in-1 console (or 3-in-1 if you count tabletop mode, as Nintendo does) would ultimately be lukewarm. Having now spent the past couple of weeks actually playing with the Nintendo Switch, I can say I was (mostly) wrong in my original assessment, and certainly in my expectations. We'll get to my own thoughts in a little bit, but first let's talk about the Switch's reception. Despite the skepticism by myself and many others leading up to the Switch's launch, gamers have been tripping over themselves in a mad dash to get their hands on one....
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When you're doing battle with the biggest social network in existence, it's pretty difficult to make sure that you're always offering your customers fresh functionality to stay ahead of the pack - which has been Snapchat's modus operandi for quite some time. Just a month ago, Facebook copied Snapchat's Stories feature, and mere weeks later, it copied Snap's ability to add a variety of filters to your Stories. At some point in the future, Facebook should be bringing the ability to add 3D objects to the videos you share, as Snapchat has just unveiled the feature today. A quick, but great example of its use can be seen in this video (a static image like the one above doesn't do the feature...
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This spring, Microsoft is going to be launching a brand new online store for its ultra-popular Minecraft world builder. There are multiple goals that can be accomplished through this new portal: fans will have a lot of great new content to play, and community members who produce good content could reap the benefits of being featured on the store. One thing that will make this online store different from most is the fact that all of the content is curated, meaning that not just anyone can produce content and expect it to appear there. Ultimately, this is a very good thing, as it means that the content available is guaranteed to be of good quality. As it appears right now, nothing on this...
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It has been quite the tumultuous journey for BlackBerry, the company formerly known as Research In Motion (RIM). After a series of failed attempts to claw its way back into relevance through various hardware releases and software strategies, BlackBerry sort of faded from view, at least in the media. What actually happened is that it pivoted to software almost exclusively, and found a potentially winning strategy in the process. BlackBerry's latest financial results are promising. In the company's fourth quarter of fiscal 2017, it raked in $297 million, racing past the average estimate by analysts of $289.3 million. Of that tally, $193 million came from its software and services business. With...
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Based on its features, specs and power consumption claims, Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 835 SoC (or Mobile Platform, as Qualcomm is referring to it now) was already looking like a notable improvement over the Snapdragon 820 and 821. The Snapdragon 835 is expected to provide up to 11 hours of 4K video playback and more than a day of talk time on next-gen smartphones with a single charge, for starters. However, it will also serve up hours of VR gaming and claimed general performance lifts of up to 25 percent in both CPU and graphics/gaming workloads. Regardless, until now, we could only speculate about the Snapdragon 835’s performance. Qualcomm, however, recently invited us out to its sprawling...
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T-Mobile just changed the amount of data its customers are allowed to consume before they face potential throttling, depending on network usage. The limit now sits at 30 gigabytes per billing cycle, whereas previously T-Mobile's network management policy listed the ceiling at 28GB. Obviously that is not a ginormous change, and it still underscores the funny way that wireless carriers have of defining "unlimited." According to Merriam-Webster, the word unlimited has three definitions: lacking any controls: unrestricted / unlimited access boundless, infinite / unlimited possibilities not bounded by exceptions: undefined / the unlimited and unconditional surrender of the enemy—Sir Winston Churchill...
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