Tech News

Yesterday Google introduced two new phones, Pixel 5 and Pixel 4a 5G, both falling short of the term “true flagship” with the lack of top-notch chipset, telephoto camera and an UD fingerprint scanner. Apparently, the Mountain View company doesn't expect the phones to be particularly hot with customers as indicated by the conservative orders placed with suppliers - 800,000 Pixel 5 units by the end of the year, as reported by Nikkei Asia. The total...

Most smartphones these days come with bloatware in some form or the other, and users can’t uninstall those apps and services. Such apps not only take up additional storage space, but they are also used for marketing activities and push unnecessary notifications. However, smartphone OEMs might have to offer users an option to uninstall bloatware. According to a report from the Financial Times,...

Yesterday Google announced the Pixel 4a 5G and Pixel 5, but neither of them is coming to India for the time being. Yet Google subsequently confirmed that the Pixel 4a, which came out in August will be hitting the country on October 17. Google's official account revealed the release date and confirmed that the Pixel 4a will be sold through Flipkart. Its price wasn't confirmed, so we'll have to wait until October 17 for that. The Google Pixel 4a is...

Samsung has announced that it is launching its new, all-in-one outdoor LED signage display lineup for small and medium-sized businesses in the US. The company calls its XPR-B lineup of outdoor LED signages ‘LED in a Box,’ which means that it includes the display and a web-based content management system. The XPR-B lineup includes models that come in two sizes: 1m x 2m and 1.5m x 3m. Each of these sizes is offered in single and double face designs,...

Google’s Pixel 5 doesn’t bring any major changes the to the camera hardware. The 2X telephoto camera from the Pixel 4 has been replaced with a new 16MP ultra wide camera with f/2.2 aperture and 1µn pixels. Meanwhile, the main camera remains unchanged from the Pixel 4. It’s a 12.2MP 1/2.55” sensor with f/1.7 aperture, Dual Pixel AF, and OIS. We don’t yet know how much the image quality can improved solely based on software advancements as we don’t...

With the announcement of Google’s new Chromecast device today, “Google TV” is debuting with the new hardware. “Google TV” was Google’s first smart TV platform that was co-developed with Sony, Qualcomm, Google, and Logitech that first launched back in 2010. It was an OS for TVs that offered support for streaming apps, and as a core TV operating system. The platform would eventually be succeeded by “Android TV” until this day. The new Google TV is...

Realme unveiled the Narzo 20 family with three members - Narzo 20A, Narzo 20 and Narzo 20 Pro. The aggressively priced trio has resonated well with the customers according to the numbers from the first flash sales - the entire stock of over 230,000 units was taken in minues. The achievement was announced on Twitter by Madhav Sheth, CEO of Realme India and Europe. He revealed that the middle child Narzo 20 sold over 130,000 units, while the Narzo...

At the start of the month, Realme unveiled its 7 series phones in India. Now, we have confirmation that both phones will make their way to Europe next Wednesday. The launch keynote is scheduled for 10:30AM CEST (8:30AM UTC) on October 7. Europe, get ready for #FAS7ER charging and performance! Tune in at 10:30AM CEST on October 7th for the #realme7series European livestream launch.RT if you're reading this from Europe! pic.twitter.com/XUMc6Jx6xD—...

The Xiaomi Mi Watch is coming to Europe. This is a Wear OS watch with MIUI customizations and long battery life. A big, bright display • 6 wrist straps You get a large circular AMOLED display, measuring 1.39” in diameter, so you can easily read notifications and there’s plenty of room for at-a-glance info. Speaking of, the watch can track your heart rate and blood-oxygen saturation (SpO2) as well as the ambient air pressure. The watch has 117 exercise...

The Xiaomi Mi 10T Lite is the budget-friendly model in the T-series, even so it maintains some of the best features. This includes the 6.67” LCD with adaptive refresh rate – it goes up to 120Hz (the other two do 144Hz, but it's not a huge difference) and has multiple intermediate steps down to 30Hz. Xiaomi Mi 10T Lite The HDR10-certified display has 1080p+ resolution (20:9) and promises 84% NTSC color coverage and 450 nits of brightness. The phone...

Samsung only recently realized that longer software support for Galaxy phones has been one of the biggest demands of its fans. At long last, Samsung announced that it will offer three generations of Android updates to its flagships along with some mid-range devices. However, as long-time users of Galaxy smartwatches will know, the updated, er, update policy for Galaxy phones and tablets still doesn’t...

The Mi 10T and Mi 10T Pro are the first Xiaomi phones with 144Hz displays. Better yet, the flat LCDs have an adaptive refresh rate and can go as low as 30Hz to fit the content. There are intermediate modes too, like 48Hz for movies, 60Hz for regular video, 90Hz and 120Hz too. Xiaomi Mi 10T Pro The displays measure 6.67” in diagonal and have 1080p+ resolution (20:9). They are HDR10-certified and put out up to 650 nits at full blast. The front is...

The US Department of Justice will file a lawsuit against Google next week, reports Reuters citing three inside sources. This suit will accuse the company of trying to undermine rival search engines (Microsoft’s Bing and others). By limiting their access to data about users and their preferences, Google is preventing its rivals from improving their search and advertising platforms. The search giant has denied these accusations. The DoJ is also looking...

At $1,299, the Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra isn’t a cheap phone by any stretch of the imagination. If you’re one of the many who bought it then perhaps you’d like to protect your investment. It would be a good idea to look at these best Galaxy Note 20 Ultra cases and pick one that appeals to you the most. There are some good Galaxy Note 20 Ultra cases that Samsung itself sells but you’re not just limited to first-party options. There are countless...

With the Kirin 1000 chip shortage that Huawei is experiencing, there were speculations the Huawei Mate X2 won't come around until next year. But the new Wi-Fi certification from the Wi-Fi Alliance is indicating otherwise. Screenshot from the Wi-Fi Alliance certification The fact that Mate X2 had passed the certification process clearly indicates that its launch is around the corner. Other than the fact that it would support Wi-Fi 6 and run EMUI...

Xiaomi is about to unveil its Mi 10T series, and we expect two flagships on stage - the Mi 10T and the Mi 10T Pro. A Mi 10T Lite might be joining them too - we've heard less about that one, but that's likely down to its mid-range nature. The event is scheduled for 12 noon UTC and will be streamed live for all fans to enjoy. We’ve embedded the video below so you can tune in from the comfort of your home or office. The Mi 10T and Mi 10T Pro are expected...

It certainly took a while, but Samsung finally brought the Galaxy M11 to Europe, with the smartphone officially arriving to the Old Continent earlier today. This release is a significant boost to Samsung’s entry-level portfolio in the region as the Galaxy M11 does a pretty decent job of punching well above its modest price tag. Speaking of which, the smartphone will retail at €159 in the Netherlands...

As you may know Google takes 30% from in-app purchases on most apps in the Play Store and the company has now declared that it plans on enforcing it more strictly starting September 30, 2021. Google said that about 97% of the apps in Play Store already use the store's system for in-app purchases and are compliant with the policies. Still major apps like Spotify and Netflix, for example, ask for your credit/debit card directly, circumventing the...

The vivo V20 lineup was introduced last week in Thailand, but today the midrangers are finally going on sale, hitting Southeast Asia and becoming the first phones in the world to ship with Android 11, out of the box. The family includes three phones - vivo V20 SE, vivo V20 Pro, and vivo V20. The initial announcements brought us all the specs of the first two, but the middle option is only now getting detailed. The vanilla vivo V20 is powered by...

The battery capacity of the Galaxy S21 Ultra seems to be as good as confirmed, as suggested by yet another highly credible leak on the matter. Well, an early product certificate, to be more precise; one coming out of China, i.e. Chinese telecom authority 3C. The documentation concerns a battery carrying model number EB-BG998ABY. Which is a pretty unambiguous reference to the SM-998, previously identified as the Galaxy S21 Ultra. According to this...

Earlier this month, we saw a report about the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra’s battery and now we have more proof that it will indeed launch with a 4,855mAh cell. A recent certification from China’s 3C agency reveals the next Ultra flagship in Samsung’s lineup will carry a battery with the EB-BG998ABY model number which features a rated capacity of 4,855mAh. This will likely translate to a typical capacity of about 5,000 mAh. Galaxy S21 Ultra battery...

vivo just delivered a new midrange smartphone for the Taiwanese market dubbed vivo X50e 5G. With quad cameras, 33W charging, and a Snapdragon 765G chipset, the vivo X50e is the cheapest 5G-enabled member of the X50 lineup. There’s a 6.44-inch AMOLED screen complete with an in-display fingerprint scanner. The panel covers 103% of the NTSC color space, while its waterdrop notch houses a 32MP selfie camera with f/2.0 aperture. Around back is the diamond...

Realme’s China is going to introduce a new phone from its Q family, speculated to be called Realme Q2. While the original Realme Q was merely a rebranded Realme 5 Pro, this one is likely to be an entirely new handset with an OLED screen and 65W fast charging. The phone with model number RMX2173 has appeared on AnTuTu, scoring nearly 520,000 points, equaling flagship-tier phones' results like the Galaxy S20 or Honor 30 Pro+. A previously published...

Samsung had unveiled its lineup of 4K Ultra Short Throw (UST) laser projectors, The Premiere, earlier this month. However, the company had not announced the official pricing for the US. Now, the South Korean firm has announced the prices and shipping dates of its new projectors. The Premiere currently consists of two models: LSP7T and LSP9T. The 130-inch LSP9T is the world’s first 4K HDR10+ laser...

A dark theme is making its way to Google Maps as some users are reporting. Google is rolling out an app-wide dark mode to Google Maps as of version 10.51.1 running on Android 11. It seems the change is gradually rolling out on the server side as updating to the latest version of Google Maps is not enough to see the option appear in the app’s settings menu. The appearance setting in the app will let you force the dark theme indefinitely or match...

Samsung has dropped the prices of three of its affordable smartphones in India. The Galaxy M01, Galaxy M11, and the Galaxy M31s are now available at slightly reduced prices in the country. While the Galaxy M11 is seeing a price drop for the first time since its launch, it is the second price drop for the Galaxy M01. The Galaxy M01 was launched in India with a price tag of INR 8,999 (around $122),...

In November of last year, Google announced its plans to acquire the fitness smartwatch maker Fitbit. At this point, the acquisition is still pending regulatory approvals, and according to a report from Reuters the $2.1 billion purchase will be receiving the EU’s antitrust approval. This, as per “people familiar with the matter said.” Privacy of user data remains a great concern, and the report mentions that Google offered to limit the use of Fitbit...

Samsung had announced earlier this month that it will bring some of the best Galaxy Watch 3 features to the Galaxy Watch Active 2. Last week, the update started rolling out in the US, bringing Fall Detection to the smartwatch. The company has now started rolling out the new update to the Galaxy Watch Active 2 in India. The new software update brings Tizen 5.5 and One UI 2.0 to the Galaxy Watch Active 2. It carries firmware version R820XXU1CTI4 and...

Motorola made the new Razr 5G official earlier this month, and now it's almost ready to hit T-Mobile. That's actually one of its main differentiating points from its predecessor (aside from the improved internals) - the original foldable Razr was Verizon exclusive, the Razr 5G isn't. Anyway, back to T-Mobile. You'll find the device in stores at the magenta carrier, in Polished Graphite and Blush Gold, starting on October 2. The Razr 5G is priced...

LG officially took the wraps off its Wing smartphone about two weeks ago, and we already have one at the office and are working hard on our review. In the meantime, Verizon has gone ahead and announced its pricing and availability details for the device. The Wing will be up for pre-order at Big Red from October 1, for $999.99 full retail. Of course you can also get it with 24 monthly installments, in which case you pay $41.66 per month. You can...

App stores are typically described as walled gardens, but some walls are higher than others. Google announced plans to make it easier to use third-party app stores on smartphones starting with Android 12, which is coming next year. These changes are still on the drawing board, so it’s not clear what they will entail. The goal is to make using other app stores a smoother experience without compromising the phone’s security. Google already allows...

OnePlus has revealed that the upcoming OnePlus 8T will ship with OxygenOS 11 out of the box. OxygenOS 11 is the company's latest operating system based on Android 11 and is currently still in beta phase. The OS can be downloaded on the existing OnePlus 8 and OnePlus 8 Pro devices but only if you don't mind the issues that come with unpolished new software. The OnePlus 8T is the company's upcoming flagship device that will be officially launched...

Roku has launched two new products, the updated Roku Ultra and the new Roku Streambar. The Roku Streambar is a 2-in-1 product that works as a soundbar while also providing a 4K streaming device for your television. On the audio front, the Streambar has four 1.9-inch full-range drivers placed around the front and side of the soundbar. The device also supports Dolby Audio for audio processing. You can get optional wireless surround speakers and wireless...

Samsung customers not only have access to Samsung TV Plus on their smart TVs and smartphones, but they can often benefit from free access to a variety of other streaming services for a limited time, such as Spotify, YouTube Premium, and Xbox Game Pass Ultimate. These free trials are usually offered with new smartphone/tablet purchases or pre-orders and are available globally, but the company announced...

Samsung is redrawing the lines that separate flagship smartphones from the rest of the pack. While the Galaxy S10 Lite may have been viewed as a toned-down version of the Galaxy S10, it has positioned the Galaxy S20 FE as a flagship in its own right. Then again, the Galaxy S20 FE has a lot more similarities with the other devices in the S20 family. The company has a very specific demographic in mind for the Galaxy S20 FE. It’s targeting those...

The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Fold – the first foldable tablet in the world – is finally available for pre-order. “Finally” because this device was tentatively announced back in May 2019 and was supposed to be out in the first half of this year. Anyway, it’s ready to ship out in the next few weeks. The X1 has a 13.3” display, an OLED panel with 4:3 aspect ratio and 2,048 x 1,536 px resolution. It boasts 300 nits brightness and 95% coverage of the DCI-P3...

According to the latest rumors, Apple is going to announce its next-generation iPhones on October 13 and this one interesting report backs up these claims. Jon Prosser has had his fair share of Apple-related leaks in the past and they have proven mostly correct. He says that the first batch of iPhone 12s will arrive to distributors on October 5, just in time for the October 13 announcement. The first iPhones to hit the stores are going to be the...

If you’re in the market for a new Galaxy S20 FE then you might want to look into Best Buy’s latest deal involving the Sprint/T-Mobile variant. The retailer is offering Sprint/T-Mobile’s Galaxy S20 FE for virtually $0. The phone would normally set you back $29.17 a month for 24 months for a total of $700. However, the carrier is now offering that monthly fee back to customers in the form of bill credit...

It’s been over six years since Samsung’s engineering awed the world by bending a modern capacitive touchscreen, which looked pretty cool next to a bunch of boring old flat screens. And yet flat screens ended up being much more timeless than their arching counterparts. Ever since that seminal Galaxy Note Edge, Samsung has essentially been reverting on that design direction. That anti-trend has actually...

Rumors say OnePlus is ready to introduce another member in its Nord lineup but this time it will be powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon 690. The Nord N10 5G will reportedly come in at $400 and will be available in the US. Now we have a teaser from the OnePlus Nord Instagram account for a certain incoming product. There’s not much more we can take away from the post but it should be about the upcoming budget phone launch. Previously, we saw a certification...

Tecno introduced three Camon 16 phones earlier this month – all of them high-fliers with a Helio G-series chipsets. An entry-level device will be added to the series soon and the Google Play Console has the first details. The Tecno Camon 16 S will be powered by the MediaTek Helio P22, a 12nm chipset from 2018 with eight Cortex-A53 cores (2.0 + 1.5 GHz) and a PowerVR GE8320 GPU (650 MHz). In this phone it is paired with 3GB of RAM and runs Android...

Some early adopters of the Realme 7 and Realme Narzo 20 Pro that launched earlier this month, found a software issue, causing the screen to flicker and to register ghost touches. Now Realme is addressing that with an update, which also brings some extra goodies. Realme Narzo 20 Pro, sharing appearance with Realme 7 The package has version number RMX2151PU_11.A.53 and is 3.4 GB in size. It fixes the over-exposure bug when the front camera is facing...

The one and only reason why the Galaxy S20 Fan Edition is happening is that the original three models from the series sold poorly. That’s according to a new report out of South Korea which today delivered multiple insider perspectives on the current state of the global smartphone market. And the industry consensus regarding the latest Galaxy flagship is that Samsung would not have bothered with repackaging...

Oppo Malaysia spilled details on the upcoming Oppo A93 which will debut on October 6 at 3PM local time (7AM UTC). We have some images to show us the design alongside the phone’s key specs which reveal it’s a rebranded Oppo F17 Pro aka Reno4 Lite or Reno 4F in Indonesia. Oppo A93 posters The posters show a pill-shaped cutout display on the front, four rear cameras and the same 7.48mm thickness as the Reno 4 Lite. The A93 will also launch with 8GB...