#Replace Back Glass On Google Pixel 6

[sirenwireless]

Learn how to replace the back glass on Google Pixel 6 with this Google Pixel 6 repair guide. Discover the tools needed to repair your device successfully.

[inkribbon796]

Like a House of Cards Ch. 1: Showtime

Summary: Four heroes have been replaced and their intentions are less than pure. The city is dangling on a knife’s edge over a precipice. Dominoes knocked over as the city tumbles like a house of cards.

Chapters: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13

It was a long time coming. A long time coming.

It was early, almost sunrise when Logan and Ethan walked into the base. The door opening like the curtains of a show for them. It was early, the only people who saw them walking in who weren’t already gone on the early patrol were Chase and J.J.

So needless to say, they weren’t in danger of getting caught.

Because the four of them weren’t who they were pretending to be. They were the Suits, sent to replace and impersonate certain heroes they were similar to.

Hearts, Diamonds, Spades, and Clubs. Disguised as heroes meant to protect and save people.

Logan and Ethan walked in, Logan casting a glance to the hidden camera he knew for a certainty was in the entry hall, his pupils displaying with robotic precision and aura tapping against the barriers Marvin and Nate had long since set up as a defense, but since Mare and Lunky had passed by the sensors so many times it didn’t trip an alarm.

Chase and J.J watched them from the communications room, not altering the cameras so that Bing wasn’t tipped off. He’d been conducting his private investigations recently and none of them wanted to tip him off while he was so suspicious of all of them. Since talking to Joan, the android had cleared those in Dark’s family, and Jackie but that was it.

Ethan went into the kitchen to make some coffee as Logan relieved Chase and J.J from the watch and slid into the seat where he performed the duties that the real Logan was supposed to do. This close to their mission point precision was crucial, and any time wasted fighting Bing was a detrimental loss.

Logan was sitting in the communications room, working at one of the computers, when Ethan brought him a coffee. The room was empty except for him.

Ethan walked in, sipping on his coffee, smiling as he set one down for Logan, “So, how’s it going?”

“Without incident,” Logan answered. “You should get to bed, get ready for the next mission?”

“Geez, Sargent Frowns, it’ll all be taken care of,” Ethan took another sip. “Bastards won’t know what hit them.”

Ethan chuckled as he took a couple sips of his coffee, “Well if you don’t mind me I’ll just “go to bed” or whatever.”

Logan nodded and as Ethan was leaving the room, Joan was coming up the hallway.

“You seen any of the Sides recently?” Joan asked Ethan, looking worried.

“Yeah,” Ethan pointed to the door, “Logan’s in the comms room.”

“Is Patton in there with him?” Joan looked a little bit relieved.

“I saw him while I was out on patrol,” Ethan lied to them. “Why? Is something wrong?”

“Get everyone in the base together, we’ve got a security problem,” Joan explained.

“Got it,” Ethan hurried away as Joan walked into the comma room.

“Fucker’s gonna get us caught,” Ethan muttered angrily under his breath, tipping back the rest of his coffee.

Bing and Jackie joined Joan in the comms room with “Logan” and they started talking about another sighting of Spade in downtown Brighton and they wanted to compile information.

Something that was eyebrow raising to Spade because he’d been making his way from Janus and Remus’s house to the heroes’ base. But the real Logan wouldn’t be privy to that information so Spade, pretending to be Logan, did a pretty good impression of being surprised as he exchanged places with Bing so the android could take a seat in front of the computer.

“An’[1] that’s the report,” Jackie concluded.

“It certainly is good information to have if they’re becoming more active again,” Logan told them.

“My thoughts exactly,” Bing pointed some finger guns at Logan. “Here, I’ll get some images I got of the guy.”

“Hey Logan,” Joan smiled at him as Bing was integrating himself with the computer to look for something. “How have things been?”

“They could certainly be improved upon,” Logan commented, turning towards Joan and letting out a long, tired sigh.

“Yeah, I bet they could,” Joan agreed before a blast of magic hit Logan square in the back. Pain rocketed up the Suit’s body and his nanites glitched as Joan and Jackie threw down a disc on either side and Bing’s nanites came up and wrapped around Logan so that when the Suit stopped feeling like he was being used as a live wire, he was trapped.

When Logan turned his head he saw that Marvin was standing at the door, magic at his fingertips. The Suit was literally and figuratively surrounded. His eyes and glasses glitched, “Something always gets in the way.”

“He’s covered in nanites,” Bing warned.

“My spell should have ripped his illusion off,” Marvin told them. “I can hit him again.”

Logan looked down at the nanite constructed wires and cords trapping him and rolled his eyes, then he looked up at Joan, “Do you mind telling me what gave me away, for data correlation’s sake?”

Joan held up their phone, “Morality doesn’t use punctuation when he types, he barely uses words at all.”

“Ahh,” Logan commented cooly, smiling. “My mistake. I always tend to forget his atrocious insistence against punctuation is the only awful part of him.”

“Where’s Logic?” Jackie demanded. “Why are yeh here? Are yeh Spade or some demon? ‘Cause this is a shite time ta do this.”[2]

“Now why would I tell any of you,” Logan threatened.

“Yeh can tell us or we’ll beat the shite outta yah,”[3] Jackie threatened right back. “Logic’s been through enough shite lately ta e’en tolerate this.”[4]

“Oh trust me,” “Logan” frowned. “He hasn’t even begun to suffer.”

“An’[1] why should we trust yeh[5]?” Jackie demanded. “What’d yah do ta the real Logic?”[6]

The false Logan let out an amused chuckle, “You all have never even met the real Logan. I’m doing all of you a favor.”

“It’s Spade, fry ‘em[7],” Joan decided.

The snare lit up and electricity began coursing through the Suit’s nanite body, frying his nanite shell by inches.

Locket Payload: Critical Failure Imminent!

In a panic, that was visible on his face, Logan let out a scream as he curled around his chest and an EMP blast came from him that fried almost every electronic in the room, Bing only managing to not have to reset himself. By the time Bing was recovering, he was able to watch with the other three organic beings in the room as “Logan” burst into pixels and a cloud of nanites and shot into the light switch to hide. The young glitch demon curled around a central point of aura protectively in case Bing came after him.

Those precious seconds of hiding let Bing force the controls back on line and initiate a complete physical and electrical lockdown of the base. People, texts, calls, all unable to leave the base.

“Emergency lockdown engaged,” Bing’s voice rang out through the base just as an explosion rocked the building.

It was a small explosive charge that had been placed by Hearts, not enough to blow a hole in the side of the base but enough for the contents of the bomb to set the room on fire.

To set Marvin’s library on fire.

To Marvin’s good luck, Wade was close by and saw the fire starting up as magical tomes and spell ingredients, turning a normal fire into a popping magical one that was threatening to burn the entire base down.

The fire alarm and the sprinkles kicked up, causing further damage to the books.

Wade swore as he tried putting out the magical fire.

At the sound of the explosion, Marvin and Jackie raced over and Marvin screamed in agony as he helped put out the fire. Nate racing in to help. J.J, Chase, and Ethan came over to help but were pushed back by the others.

It took another minute to get the fire contained and Marvin was kneeling in front of the doorway to his library and looking at the ash and burnt books in horror.

“Sorry, Marv,” Jackie sat down next to his friend.

“They burned my library down,” Marvin said in grief.

“What is going on?” Wade demanded. “Last I heard there was some kind of meeting but when met with Crank, Nate, Average, and J.J the fire alarm went off. Who called the meeting?”

“We did,” Jackie told him, standing up. “It was just bad fookin’ timin’. Spade’s in the base, he got in. It must’a been him who caused the explosions.”[8]

“It’s not Spade,” Bing shouted as he ran down the halls, his nanites still fixing up the patches of metal and wires that had died in the EMP blast. “Or if it is the situation just got much worse ‘cause[9] that’s Logic.”

“What do you mean that’s Logic?” Joan demanded in a panic.

“Either Logic’s been Spade the whole time or Spade infected him with somethin’ ‘cause he’s been actin’ weird for a while,”[10] Bing said. “Lo’s still in the base. I’ve got him cornered in the sprinkler system, but he won’t stay there.”

“How could it possibly be Logan?” Joan demanded in irritated frustration. “He would never.”

“We might not be dealing with the actual Logan,” Nate spoke up, his mind already racing with possibilities. “We might be dealing with the same guy who attack me outside of a bar over a camera of all fucking things.”

“That was his suit right, Logic’s fine,” Joan defended.

Then Nate thought about that, it had been a question that Logan had always been dodgy and evasive on how the logical and scientific hero had wound up with a cursed soul splitter that didn’t work . . .

“Either way he’s got my nanites,” Bing interrupted. “Which explains how Spade got them in the first place. His suit is laced with them.”

“Are yeh[5] sure?” Jackie demanded.

“I’d recognize them anywhere, my Bluetooth was even tryin’[11] ta[12] connect with them,” Bing asserted.

. . . That didn’t . . . Nate was still trying to reason in his head.

“Which is weird because humans can’t use nanites raw,” Bing replied. “Only the Googles an’[1] Anti have the ability ta[12] use my nanites like that.”

“Shit, he’s a glitch!” Mare warned internally. “A damn smart one since he was covering his tracks as he was turning. I knew something smelt off about him. He always smelt like burnt wires and electricity.”

You tell me this now? Nate cursed himself for not realizing it sooner. While Nate was thinking the rest of the heroes were talking.

Nate felt the eye roll, “I always forget you sacks of meat can’t smell aura. I just figured, since he was supposed to be a null, that some other demon or one of the other Sides had their claws in him. The rest of them are dripping with aura.”

“Joan,” Nate spoke up, his voice soft and almost scared.

“Yeah?” Joan sat up.

“How long has Logic been Logic?” Nate asked desperately.

“Always, what kind of question is that?” They asked in return.

“I just have to rule it out, does Logic come from a family of mages? Is anyone else in his family magical.”

Joan paused for an abnormally long amount of time. “No.”

“Okay, that makes sense, being null is recessive,” Nate reasoned. You needed and aura and magic for a soul to become a demon. Logic didn’t have that, ergo he wasn’t a demon.

“Nate,” Mare tried to urge.

“He only targeted Marvin, nothing was stolen, nothing was taken from the computers, he just impersonated him and took off,” Wade reminded.

“The Sides are still gone, what are we gonna do?” Jackie demanded.

“Well when we find him, we’ll ask,” Joan reassured. “Logic’s a level-headed guy, I wish I knew where Morality was, or Princey. They’re able to calm him down.”

“Nate, let me go, and I can scent Logic out, if I don’t find him, then I’m wrong and he’s clear,” Mare tried to bargain.

“Fine,” Nate agreed and Mare broke free and looked around.

“Great,” Marvin growled.

“I’ll be back soon,” Mare didn’t spare Marvin a glance, “sorry about your cache.”

Then Mare stopped and looked at a corner of the wall and floated up to tap at it. “Hey there, don’t think I don’t see you.”

Then he ripped a camera out of the wall.

“Mine are visible,” Bing told him as the demon tossed the camera to the android.

Mare stood next to Nate, “I know, bet you that there are more, and there’s a glitch in the walls. Probably has been for a while now.”

“Is it Anti?” Jackie asked.

“Nah, Anti smells like a thunderstorm that was cooked in the oven too long,” Mare reported. “Young, likes to identify as a male; so King’s kid is out. It’s Logic, I’ve picked up that scent on him before. Maybe it’s a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde thing, or Logic’s always been a spy. Can’t say.”

“Maybe that soul splitter did work after all,” Nate reasoned. “Which means that he’s not wanting to come out ‘cause[9] he’s scared, so I can’t blame him. Just where’d he find the camera? That probably turned him, which makes sense why he likes to hover around the thing, he probably wants the fragments of his soul back.”

“First off, morbid,” Joan held up one of their hands. “And second, I found it at an estate sale. I gave it to Thomas, who—”

Joan trailed off, already knowing they’d made a mistake.

Nate stared at him, “Logic’s name is Logan, who’s Thomas? Is that Princey or Anxiety?”

“Not exactly,” Joan tried to evade.

“What does that mean? Is Logan like a middle name or a name he just prefers more?” Mare asked. “Or was Thomas, Logic’s name before he was split?”

Joan really didn’t want to have this discussion without any of the Sides, but Logan was apparently hiding in the walls and the other Sides were all missing. So maybe this was as good a time as any. “Look, if you’re right and Lo is some kind of demon, which he’s not because Logic is a harmless sweetheart, then we didn’t know because a soul splitter is only supposed to make one demon right?”

The room descended into chilling silence.

“The fook yeh mean one, Logic got like a twin or somethin’?”[13] Marvin demanded.

“More like septuplets,” Joan admitted, holding up seven fingers.

“Oh shit,” Mare realized.

“They all came from the same person?” Nate gasped. Logic. Morality. Creativity. Deceit. Anxiety . . . A glitch. Two showmen. Two empaths. A deal maker. And whatever the hell Orange is.

“I’ve never seen a spilt this clean, or create so many, usually a splitter just makes one and it can’t even do that right,” Nate commented. “But they’re all so lifelike. How powerful of a mage was Thomas?”

“He wasn’t,” Joan tried to explain. “Or at least, I never saw him do anything.”

“Well, at least we know where the other Sides went,” Mare spat through clenched teeth.

“No, no,” Nate cut him off. “That’s not a fight a glitch can win, not on their own. We should just focus on finding Logic and containing him before we accuse him of anything.”

“Yeah, that’s a good idea,” Joan agreed.

The heroes and Mare began completely cleaning the room of any cameras or listening devices, whether they were Bing’s or not. Then they made a plan to ensnare Logan. They started by taking out the cameras and bugs in the major room before Bing began actively trying to catch Logan.

It was an endeavor that Bing was not successful in. But the Suit saw an opening and went for the unlocked front door.

When he did, Logan slammed into an invisible barrier, sparks and magic arcing everywhere.

Nate quickly moved in to seal off the containment circle with more salt as Logan was picking himself up.

“Hey, Lo,” Nate knelt down, “rough week?”

~~~~~~~~~~~

Accessibility Translations

1. And

2. Why are you here? Are you Spade or some demon? Because this is a shit time to do this.

3. You can tell us or we’ll beat the shit out of you

4. Logic’s been through enough shit lately to even tolerate this.

5. you

6. What did you do to the real Logic?

7. them

8. It was just bad fucking timing. Spade’s in the base, he got in. It must have been him who caused the explosion.

9. because

10. Either Logic’s been Spade the whole time or Spade infected him with something because he’s been acting weird for a while

11. trying

12. to

13. The fuck you mean one, does Logic have like a twin or something?

[weingenious12]

Top 12 in-demand Tech Skills for 2021

The market is transforming at a breakneck pace. Within rapid technological adoption across organizations, several conventional job roles are becoming redundant and are being displaced by newer profiles with evolved skills requirements.

The solution for professionals in this environment is the continuous acquisition of industry-relevant skills. With a firm finger on the pulse of the fast-changing business ecosystem, here are the 12 most in-demand tech skills that companies will look for in 2021.

App Development – Mobile – iOS/Android

In an epoch when the world is heading towards digitalization, mobile apps are gaining incredible traction in all spheres of life and are becoming an indispensable part of the digital ecosystem. Smartphones have become essential items.

These days smartphones, numerous technologies have become unavoidably in our lives. And you can’t ignore that app development has given increased revenue and mobile app development trends started rising and materializing. Both app developers and users are responsible for this evolution.

However, we cannot ignore the fact that these trends have simplified our lives in most of the ways. Hence mobile app development trends will dominate the year 2021. Given the growth in mobile apps, it should come as no surprise that opportunities to work as a mobile developer will only increase in the coming years.

Burning Glass, which compiles and analyses many job postings from across the earth, estimates that mobile app developer jobs will grow 30.7 percent over the next decade.

Cloud – AWS/Azure/GCP

Now, it is no longer the question of whether organizations have to opt for cloud computing or not, the question now is which cloud platform to opt. it has grown into a vast and complex ecosystem of technologies, products, and services that is boosting the economy into a multi-billion-dollar economy. numerous cloud providers compete for an ever-expanding cloud market share. You can find top it companies in india also so you can understand how they work in this concept

A Gartner report predicts that by the end of 2021, the market for public cloud is all set to reach $411 billion in 2021 from $260 billion in 2017.

The cloud computing market is currently flooded with numerous cloud service providers, but AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud Platform (GCP) proudly retain the top three slots.

Machine Learning

Machine learning is attracting more popularity in modern tech. It is a crucial tech skill as it can be applied to diverse industries, including finance, education, health care, agriculture, etc. Businesses across the world are looking at it as the most profitable and innovative skills to adopt. IT firms have already started counting on and adapting solutions supported ML models.

The companies using AI and machine learning are going to be on the top-notch tech firms within the 2021s. Those IT experts who started educating in AI and ML themselves are bound to earn top salaries in 2021. According to McKinsey, 49% of companies are currently exploring or getting to use machine learning. From 2021 to 2024 The global machine learning market is projected to grow from $7.3B to $30.6B, attaining a CAGR of 43%.

UI/UX

It’s no secret that design-led companies outperform their competitors, and we’re increasingly hearing how designers are making their way into corporate boardrooms. With more companies competing to get consumers’ attention today, there is a growing demand for good UI/UX designers.

LinkedIn listed it as one of the 10 most in-demand skills for 2021. In India alone each month, it is estimated that 1,500 to 2,000 UI/UX design jobs for junior designers are added. However, despite encouraging factors like the growing prevalence of a gig economy, the high demand for UI/UX designers, and how lucrative the jobs are when it comes to qualified professionals who can fill these positions. There still exists a significant skill gap.

This skill gap is something that has impacted India’s economy as a whole. A recent skill gap analysis by the Government of India concluded that by 2022, approximately 109 million more skilled workers would be needed. Demand for pixel perfect, usable, and pleasant UX demand is high, especially with accelerating digital transformation underway globally.

Low Code – Mendix, OutSystems

While the Covid-19 has impacted the marketplace for low-code development platforms, overall growth outlook looks promising. Despite the economic recession and negative impact on technology investments, the Low-Code App Development platforms market in 2021 is expected to post double-digit growth in the coming years.

The Universal low-code development platform market is expected to grow from USD 13.2 billion in 2021 to USD 45.5 billion by 2025, at a CAGR of 28.1% during the forecast period. The growing need for digitalization and maturity of agile DevOps practices are expected to strengthen the use of low-code development platform market across the planet.

Adopting low-code development platform solutions for Many Industries like Information Technology (IT), healthcare, manufacturing, government and defence, retail and eCommerce, Banking, Financial Services and Insurance (BFSI) are expected at the simplest rate. Mendix and OutSystems are the best Low-code Development platforms of 2021.

Cyber Security

Security experts are much required in every company and industry, no matter the organization’s size and nature. With organizations fighting a never-ending battle against cyber attackers, the necessity for defenders is generously increasing. As for the longer term, cybercrimes will annually damage $6 trillion of worldwide property by 2021.

While cybersecurity jobs are in high demand, impacting 74% of organizations by remaining unaffected for the third year in a row, in such a scenario, the demand for cybersecurity professionals is going to be high as it is for several years to come.

Cybersecurity professionals are among the foremost sought-after talent this year as companies across sectors seek to strengthen their data security. There are currently over 67,000 job openings in cybersecurity within the country, additionally, to the present, the growing beeline of digital back offices and GICs being found out by large MNCs is also adding to the need for data security and hence the demand for talent in 2021.

DevSecOps

DevSecOps concept will become more important in the field of software development in 2021. The demand for cloud-based architecture to supply mission-critical information technology services to businesses requires a replacement and a more robust methodology. 

Growing demand for DevSecOps which provides highly secure application delivery processes by small and medium scale enterprises across the globe is a key factor expected to drive the growth of the market owing to its ability to provide high speed and agility in the development of delivery cycle of a software.

The Asia Pacific DevSecOps market is primarily attributed to increasing advancements and adoption of emerging technologies such as cloud computing, the Internet of Things (IoT), and many others across various industry verticals in 2021.

Data Visualization

People love stories, and the concept of data visualization for storytelling is rapidly gaining popularity. In 2021, The data visualization market is moderately competitive. The players within the market are innovating in providing strategic solutions to extend their market presence and customer base. This is allowing them to secure new contracts and Knock new markets.

The global data visualization market is expected to register a CAGR of over 9% during the forecast period (2021 – 2025). The emerging nature of knowledge visualization is encouraging a shift toward analytically driven businesses, where users can explore data in various sorts of graphical representations, which were initially only available in tabular reports. Need for Data Visualization engineer is additionally increasing as data is increasing day by day.

Data Engineering

The demand for Data Engineers will still fuel a shortage of knowledge engineering talent in 2021. Data Engineers make it possible for businesses to interact altogether with the flamboyant, advanced analytics, and insight generation that data science produces.

Companies realize as they try to quickly implement data science and AI initiatives, and most urgently, try to enable self-service data science and analytics across their entire organization, that they need more Data Engineers to make this all possible. 

The global big data and data engineering services market is facing high demand. Growth estimates from 2017-2025 range from 18% to a whopping 31% p.a. Companies are investing in data transformational projects with no end in sight. This indicates a tremendous future need for Data Engineer skills.

Internet of things – IoT

The evolution of the IoT has already been around for a short time. After the introduction of the latest metrics for a post-ISA era, Internet-of-Things technologies are successfully re-engineering businesses and modifying optimal ways of running them. These technologies affect nearly all the prevailing industries: healthcare, insurance, smart buildings, manufacturing, transportation & logistics, retailing, and more. 

The most significant IoT trend for 2021 is that IoT networks of connected devices that folks are interacting with are getting to extend, and therefore the amount of knowledge that one can experience from these networks will increase, too. We have deliberately adopted a new lifestyle of being connected all the time.

This is impossible to ignore, and the IoT industry is meeting us halfway. IoT trends 2021 promises to place a spotlight on in both consumer and industrial fields prove that the longer term has already begun, and therefore the technology will keep changing our lives.

Blockchain

The Blockchain Era is has arrived, and it’s now. Enterprises across various sectors of the industry are warming up to the concept of the decentralized ledger. There’s a global wave of Blockchain adoption among companies and businesses to deal with fundamental business problems.

The adoption of Blockchain technology is occurring at such a rapid scale that Gartner predicts the business value of Blockchain tech will exceed $3 trillion by 2030. Blockchain is one of the fastest-growing skill sets now a days with jobs during this domain growing at a mind-blowing rate of two,000-6,000%, and therefore the salaries of Blockchain Developers being 50-100% higher than conventional developer jobs.

The most promising blockchain trends in 2021 are BaaS, short for Blockchain As A Service. It is a new blockchain trend that is currently integrated with several start-ups as well as enterprises.

Gamification

In 2021, we will expect Gamification to step into a replacement level of approachability, functionality, and lifestyle integration because it would appear Gamification has grown up. Gamification in 2021 will make a bigger impact within industries, which have customary processes like education, healthcare, pharmaceuticals, financial services, and so on.

In such industries, Gamification of learning was implemented mainly in areas of compliance and important operations, but with sustained results, Gamification will find application in other areas of learning as well as sales training, onboarding as well as soft skills. The benefits of Gamification to consumer and employee engagement are so apparent, and there’s no doubt about that.

In recent times, we’ve seen companies prioritize the implementation of Gamification to incorporate learning. It has been a permanent fixture in marketing, corporate learning, and training.

However, Gamification is slowly creeping into fields where people were skeptical about its adoption. For example, civic and political organizations were hesitant to embrace Gamification. But it’s predicted that as Gamification finds new meaning, its use in these fields will become more prevalent.

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[droneseco]

AGM M7: The Unsmashable Anti-Smartphone

AGM M7

7.50 / 10

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The AGM M7 is a budget semi-smartphone that is almost unbreakable and looks like something from the pre-smartphone era but offers much more. Those looking for a smartphone experience will be disappointed, but those looking for something unique will find this hybrid beast compelling.

Specifications

Brand: AGM

Storage: 8GB

CPU: MediaTek MT6739

Memory: 1GB

Operating System: Android 8.1 (Custom)

Battery: 2500mAh (TYP), removable

Ports: USB2.0 Type-C

Camera (Rear, Front): 2M/0.3M

Display (Size, Resolution): 2.4inch QVGA Touch Panel

Pros

Almost unbreakable

Battery lasts 4 days and is replaceable

Incredibly loud speaker

Dual-SIM and expandible with SD card

Cons

No Play Store or Google Account integration

Typing is clunky

Facebook, Tiktok and Browser apps poorly implemented

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AGM M7 other

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Smartphones complement modern living. Their bright touch input displays bring endless media sources from hundreds of apps right into our pockets. If smartphones are less robust and have shorter battery lives than the mobile phones that preceded them, the trade-offs seem worth it.

The AGM M7 begs to differ. At first glance, it seems like the anti-smartphone. A rugged brick that harks back to the pre-smartphone era with big touch buttons, a replaceable battery that lasts 4 days, and an IP 69k rating all for just shy of $100.

However, this phone isn't a complete throwback, as it features a modified version of Android 8.1, and its color display is also a small touchscreen. Oh, and it also has a massive 3.5-watt speaker on the back.

The AGM M7 is a strange but wonderful, loud and unbreakable, semi-smart phone, but is it right for you?

AGM M7: First Impressions

The defining feature of AGM phones is their rugged, almost unbreakable design, and the M7 is no different. For its form factor, it is large. At 14 cm tall it's a hair shorter than a Google Pixel 4a, but it's almost 2cm thick. It's chunky.

This size accommodates big, tactile buttons and a textured, easy-to-grip exterior. You also get a user-definable button on the left side along with a top-mounted LED torch - which makes it a much more practical prospect than regular smartphone flashlights.

Glass screens can still be a point of failure for rugged phones, so a smaller area of glass overall is probably an advantage for the M7. It does have cameras, but we'll come back to those later, as the defining feature is the 3.5-watt rear speaker. I've never seen anything like this on a phone before, but the prospect of a super loud ringer that can be heard even over machinery or foul weather will be a draw to many.

The battery compartment is well designed. After removing the cover, you are presented with another composite plastic seal protecting the battery, which is removable.

Removable batteries in a rugged phone are something to get excited about, but it does also come with a problem that we'll cover later in the review.

It's Android, but Not as You Know It

The paired down version of Andoird 8.1 that comes with the M7 supports Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and use as a hotspot for other devices. It also features versions of WhatsApp, Facebook, TikTok, Skype, and Zello, along with some stock apps for calendar, clock, sound recording, and an FM radio. There is no play store, so what comes on the phone is what you get, and some things work a little better than others.

Unusually for an Android device, you can't sign in to your Google account, making it hard to bring contacts with you and sync the calendar without using a USB connection or storing data on your SIM card.

This is likely a product of the simplified Android build, but outside of that things like connectivity and setup feel identical to standard android.

How Rugged Is Now?

The AGM is IP69k rated, which means it is completely sealed from dust ingress, waterproof up to 2 meters underwater, and capable of taking drops of up to 2m. It's also functional from -20C to 60C.

In drop tests the M7 was solid. It took a few scrapes and a small dent to the speaker grate, but the phone never flinched or restarted when dropped. The battery cover would fly off sometimes, but the second cover kept the battery safe and in place.

The phone also survived being "forgotten" in a lake, used as a mud shovel, and being thrown around by a rampaging toddler for the best part of a day.

The phone also claims the MIL-STD-810H standard, which sounds fancy but doesn't actually have anything to do with the military directly, and is so unregulated that it's a meaningless metric of toughness.

However, it's not really an issue, as AGM takes ruggedness seriously. It's the hallmark of their phones and once again it seems like they've nailed it. This phone would survive things that I would not.

What's Good About the AGM M7?

On the surface, the AGM M7 is a simple phone designed to have a good battery life, take an absolute beating, and make a lot of noise. It does all of these things perfectly, and a phone that feels like a pre-smartphone era handset with WhatsApp, Skype and the Zello push-to-talk app (with the side button as transmit by default) is a good fit.

The top-mounted LED is bright and its position makes it an actually useful torch compared to other phones. Even when locked, a long press of the zero key toggles the torch, and the keypad is useable even with thick gloves.

The speaker is very loud, doesn't distort even at high volumes, and gives as close to a rounded sound as is possible for something this size.

The charging dock is a useful addition, though it is an optional extra available for a further $9.90 from AGM, and my M7 came with a fairly decent set of budget waterproof Bluetooth headphones made by JBL and AGM in tandem. I'm not sure if these come with every purchase, but it was a nice touch.

What's Bad About the AGM M7?

The Camera. In general. Low-quality cameras paired with low-fidelity color screens were little more than a gimmick when they emerged over a decade ago, and this is no different. It could be functional as a way of taking quick notes in good lighting, but nothing more.

The removable battery is a great idea and I applaud AGM for making it work in an IP69k rated phone. The only problem is that there doesn't appear to be any way to get spare batteries from AGM. They aren't listed on their website, and their EU aftersales website gives a 404 error. I'm sure that AGM will be able to provide them but at the time of recording this review, I haven't received a reply to the email I sent to the service team - though it has only been a few days.

No Play Store or Google account integration might seem a bad thing to you, but in fairness, the M7 does advertise this fact on the purchase page. The M7's failings don't come from what it lacks. Instead, they are the product of poorly integrating what is there. I'm not fully convinced that the smarter elements of this phone went through much development at all.

You Can Browse, But You Won't Enjoy It

When mobile phones initially began adding basic browsers to their firmware, they were a nice idea in principle, but functionally near unusable. Fifteen years on, the M7 falls into this trap for different reasons.

The browser works for basic searches, and you can even log in to your email services, watch YouTube, and enable desktop mode for logging into various services. The issue here is the screen. It's just too small and low resolution to really work. Pair with that the fact that the browser requires frequent use of the touch screen to access some buttons and selections, and it quickly becomes something you'd only use in a real pinch.

The same is true of the TikTok and Facebook apps: fine ideas in principle but not much fun to use with the small screen and keypad combination.

Demon Texters of the 90s Will Be Disappointed

Typing, in general, is painful on this phone. Now I'm sure some of you are thinking "of course it is, it's a keypad." That's fair.

But, to people of a certain age, keypad typing was the norm. When I was a teenager a seemingly revolutionary technology called T9 predictive texting made writing messages much faster. Instead of picking each letter individually, you could tap each letter key once, and the phone would predict words from the possible letter combinations and put them in place, allowing you to change it after the fact when it got it wrong.

The M7 does have word suggestions, but they pop up after the fact and it doesn't have any single keypad pressing input. I'm aware that this may not be an issue to some folks - T9 was popular for a relatively small slice of time, some older folks never adopted it, and some younger folks won't have even heard of it.

I can only assume this was the case in the AGM team, as when comparing the typing user experience with phones released 20 years ago, it is a massive step backward and a missed opportunity. T9 emulation for Android already exists, I don't know why it's missing here.

If there is one general flaw to this phone, it is the implementation of Android it uses. It is clearly still biased towards the touch screen and the keypad suffers as a result. This is no problem when using the M7 like an old-school mobile phone, it just makes the smart elements feel a little clunky overall. The thing is, once you've settled your expectations, even these seemingly glaring flaws don't matter much.

Criticizing elements of the M7 doesn't change the overall experience - one I did not expect to enjoy but thoroughly did, and still do.

AGM M7: The Verdict

It became clear while making this review that a phone with one foot in the mobile phone era and one in the smartphone era is never going to be able to stand up to either one individually, especially sitting at the $100 price point.

After a couple of days, the flaws were mostly forgotten, and this hybrid monster of a phone began to make sense. It's not going to replace a smartphone, and I'm not even convinced it would make a good phone for non-tech savvy folks or the elderly, but I'm still using it, and I think it comes down to what the M7 offers.

For some folks, limitations are liberating. We've grown accustomed to always having the digital world in our grasp, and it can be especially difficult to drag yourself from it when you are a freelancer with no concept of a healthy workday!

For the 9 days I reviewed this phone, I carried my smartphone turned off as well just in case I needed it. It turns out I didn't, and after day 3 I didn't even miss it. The AGM M7 takes away everything, then adds back a few things you need. Yes the Tiktok and Facebook integrations are clunky and yes the browser and text input is a mess, but it's functional enough to use in a pinch.

I've loaded albums onto into the memory that I meant to get round to listening to years ago, actually selectively downloaded podcasts rather than just listen to whatever is just there. I have relatively quickly let go of the feeling that I need to document every interesting aspect of life with photos I'll likely never even look at again.

It's nice to not worry about battery life, it's nice to know I can just throw it in my pack and head out riding, running, or even wild swimming, and know that not only will the phone be ok, but that checking emails, Slack or wasting time on Reddit aren't even viable options despite having a fully connected Android phone with me.

It's not a retro throwback, but it's not quite a smartphone either. The AGM M7 is unique, and for some people, it represents the balance they desire. I've no idea if AGM had this in mind when they threw this insane combination of features into a phone - but it works for me.

AGM M7: The Unsmashable Anti-Smartphone published first on http://droneseco.tumblr.com/

[icertifiedgeektexas]

Iphone Repair Service, Dallas

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MILLIONS OF IPHONE REPAIRS COMPLETED, AND WE’RE READY FOR YOURS

Apple Genuine Parts available.

Get your device back fast with Same-Day Turnaround.

All repairs backed by a 90-Day Warranty.

Whether you’re in need of an iPhone screen replacement or water damage repair, head to the repair experts at Icertified Geek Dallas, Texas. Our reliable repair services come from years of experience. We have the parts, tools, and expertise to fix all of the most common iPhone issues. Plus, we offer quick, hassle-free repair services to make this process as stress-free as possible.

Common Iphone Repair in IcertifiedGeek

Cracked screen repair & replacement

Home button repair & replacement

Battery replacement

Power button repair/replacement

Water damage repair

Motherboard repair

Camera repair/replacement

Speaker repair

USB port repair

Charging port repair/replacement

Data recovery/backup

WE FIX ALL MODELS OF IPHONE

Supported devices in Dallas

iPhone X, iPhone 8 Plus, iPhone 8, iPhone 7 Plus, iPhone 7, iPhone 6s Plus, iPhone 6s, iPhone 6 Plus, iPhone 6, iPhone SE iPhone5, iPhone 5s

Google Pixel, Google Pixel XL, Google Pixel 2, Google Pixel 2XL

iPhone Screen Repair

Accident happens. If your screen gets cracked. Don’t worry we are there for you

Schedule a repair

Make an appointment to bring your iPhone into an Apple Authorized Service Provider or the Genius Bar. 

CONTACT US TODAY FOR SPEEDY IPHONE REPAIR WITH WARRANTY

Frequently asked questions (FAQs)

Can you fix my phone even if it does not turn on?

If your iphone still turns on but you don’t see an image on the display, likely the LCD has been damaged or is malfunctioning. Bring your iphone in for a free diagnostic exam. We won’t undertake any repairs without informing you first.

How long does it take to fix my phone?

Most repairs take less than hour. For some iphone repairs, the process is slightly more complicated and can take 1-3 hours to complete. Most of our iPhone screen repairs take less than half an hour.

Do I need to make an appointment to have my phone repaired?

No appointments are necessary. You can bring your phone, tablet or laptop in any time for same day repair on most devices, and in under an hour!

What if already purchased the part need for repair?

We offer a lifetime warranty with our parts and service. In order to honor this warranty, we insist on using our own parts for repairs to your device. We cannot accept customer supplied parts for repair in most cases. There are exceptions so kindly call us to discuss your situation.

What devices do you repair?

We repair almost all Apple, Samsung, LG, Motorola, HTC and Nokia devices. In addition to the iPhone and Galaxy series, we also repair the LG Nexus 4 & 5, LG G2 & G3, Nokia 928 and 1020, and Blackberry Z10. We are also capable of fixing most other phones, so call us with your specific device.

Only my glass is cracked, why do I need to replace the entire screen?

The touchscreen and glass are separate elements, yet permanently joined. This allows your digitizer to still work even if your glass cracks, allowing temporary use of your phone or tablet. The downside is that we need to remove the whole front assembly to make a glass repair. On most iPhones you must replace both the glass and LCD however on many of the Samsung Galaxy phones we can offer a cheaper glass only repair provided your OLED is still functioning and un-damaged. For iPads we can generally replace the glass without harming the LCD display.

Do you offer a warranty on phone repairs?

Yes absolutely. We offer a lifetime warranty on our parts and labor. If any repair we undertake degrades or malfunctions we will repair the device for the lifetime of the phone or tablet. This warranty does not cover accidental damage.

What if you cannot repair my device, do I still have to pay?

We do not charge for diagnostics and if we cannot fix your phone, you will not be charged.

Do you fix water damage?

Yes, we do repair water damage. If your device has been wet, the best thing to do is to power it off right away. Do not plug it in to charge or try a new battery. We offer a free diagnosis on all repairs and for the highest probability of repair, bring it in ASAP.

What are some of the most common repairs?

We repair a lot of iphones . The most common repair we do is the glass screen replacement on these devices

Isn’t it cheaper if I just ordered the spare parts and repair the iphone myself?

Well, you’ll certainly save money, but there are many important aspects to be aware of. Repairs performed by yourself may void the warranty if something goes wrong. If you don’t have the technical skills to make the repairs, you may find yourself with a useless phone.

from iCertifiedGeek – iFix Mac PC & Data Recovery Repair Virus Windows Computer Apple iPhone Screen North Dallas Plano Texas https://icertifiedgeek.com/2021/05/04/7339/

[charger-batteries]

ZTE Blade A3 Prime Review

Times are tough and budgets are tight. You might be wondering whether to keep an aging phone for another year or replace it with something relatively inexpensive. Decent smartphones priced under $100 are rare, but Visible's ZTE Blade A3 Prime ($99) is one of the better ones in that bracket. It handles basic tasks with relative ease and has solid connectivity with surprisingly good call quality. You'll notice a bit of lag when you're using it, and battery life could definitely be better, but it's a fine option for the price. However, if you're willing to spend just a little more and shop around for discounts, you can probably find much better phones for $130 to $180.

Design: Blast From the Past

Remember "candy bar" budget phones from a few years back? The Blade A3 Prime feels just like one. It's a rectangle with a plastic back and a relatively small display. It measures 5.8 by 2.8 by 0.4 inches (HWD) and weighs 5.7 ounces, making it nicely balanced and easy to hold in one hand.

On the front of the Blade A3 Prime you'll find a 5.45-inch LCD with thick bezels. That's a little smaller than the 6.2-inch display you'll find on the slightly more expensive Motorola Moto e ($149.99). The screen has a resolution of 1,440 by 720 pixels for a density of 291ppi. Despite its low resolution, the display is pretty crisp. Color accuracy skews cool; in direct sunlight, seeing the display becomes a challenge.

The top is home to a headphone jack. The USB-C charging port is on the bottom. The left side is bare; a volume rocker and textured power button are on the right. The buttons are easy to identify and reach, though there is a bit of lag in response when pressing the buttons.

The back is a textured gray plastic shell that can be removed to swap out the battery—a rarity in today's phones—and insert SIM and microSD cards. There's a small camera stack in the upper left-hand corner and a grille for the speaker on the bottom right side. A fingerprint sensor sits top center; it's easy to reach with small hands and unlocks the phone quickly.

With the exception of the Motorola Moto e's strengthened glass display and water-resistant body, durability for just about any entry-level phone is a pain point. The Blade A3 Prime is no exception. If you drop it on its back, the back might fly off and let the battery pop out, which isn't a big deal. But the display appears to be made out of traditional glass. Drop it face down and you'll likely be shopping for a new phone. The phone also has no water protection whatsoever and its removable back makes it very easy for water to seep in from a spill. If you plan to use this phone daily, you'll want to get a sturdy case.

Clear Calls, Adequate Connectivity

The Blade A3 Prime is a Visible exclusive and has limited LTE band support. The phone supports LTE bands 2/4/5/12/13, which effectively locks it to Visible and Verizon's networks. Band 66, a superset of band 4 that Verizon uses to improve coverage in highly populated areas, is noticeably absent.

We tested the Blade A3 Prime on Visible's network in downtown Chicago and recorded poor speeds. Average download speeds came in at 15.8Mbps, and uploads averaged 6.3Mbps. Those speeds are fine for streaming and just about everything else but fail to compare to speeds we've recorded on other phones on the same network. We are pretty confident the reduced speeds are due to the phone's aging modem more than the network.

Call quality is excellent. We made several calls on the phone and the connection was perfect each time. Peak earpiece volume comes in at 78dB, which should be loud enough to hear the other party in most situations.

Dual-band Wi-Fi is onboard, as is Bluetooth 4.2. There's no NFC, which should come as no surprise for an entry-level phone.

The bottom-firing speaker has a maximum volume of 92dB. Audio quality is acceptable, though timbre is aggressive, with overly bright mids and not a hint of bass to be found. Overall, the speaker is fine for video calls or scrolling through your TikTok feed, but you'll want to take advantage of the headphone jack or a decent pair of Bluetooth headphones for Spotify or Netflix binges.

Entry-Level Cameras

The Blade A3 Prime sports a very basic camera setup and performs as well as you'd expect for an entry-level phone. It has an 8MP rear-facing camera with an f/2.0 aperture and a 5MP front-facing camera with an f/2.4 aperture.

In good light, the front camera does an adequate job. Our test shots appeared a little flat and there was noticeable loss of fine detail.

Low-light performance, on the other hand, is an absolute mess. Nearly all our test shots were flat, muddy, and filled with edge noise.

The 5MP camera on the front of the phone is fine for a quick selfie in good light. Most of our test shots lacked depth of field, but color accuracy was spot on. In low light, however, our selfies were completely blurred, with noise throughout the image.

Though we're not impressed by the cameras on the Blade A3 Prime, we think they're acceptable for the price. Smartphone manufacturers often cut corners with hardware in order to keep prices low, and camera sensors tend to be one of the first concessions made.

If image quality is important to you, your cheapest bet is the Moto G Power ($249)—though it's more than double the price of the Blade A3 Prime, unless you find a discount deal. The Google Pixel 4a takes flagship-worthy shots but also has a $349 price tag.

Fine for Basic Tasks, But Gaming Is a No-Go

A MediaTek Helio A22 chipset and 2GB of RAM provide moderate power for the Blade A3 Prime. It has 32GB of storage, of which a little over 19GB is available out of the box. You can add up to an additional 2TB of storage with a microSD card.

The Helio A22 is an entry level smartphone chipset that can most closely be compared with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 429 processor. Both are 12nm process semiconductors, and both have 4 CPU cores. The Helio A22 is technically a little faster than its Qualcomm competition, running at 2GHz per core versus 1.95GHz. The Helio A22's 1,600Mz RAM is also an improvement over the 933MHz RAM supported on the Snapdragon 429 but, to be perfectly honest, you're not going to see much difference in performance between the two chipsets.

It's hard to compare the Blade A3 Prime to other similarly spec'd smartphones simply because there aren't a lot of phones sold in the US with the Helio A22 or Snapdragon 429 chipsets. For the most part, these processors are shipped on budget phones sold in China and in emerging markets like Africa and India.

For the price, performance is adequate. The Blade A3 Prime does well with basic tasks like web browsing and checking emails, but stutters when given more difficult tasks. There's a noticeable lag when opening apps or searching for apps, but it's not unbearable.

The Blade A3 Prime is not a phone for gamers—end of story. Basic games such as Candy Crush work fine, but anything that requires more resources is a no go. We attempted to load Asphalt 9: Legends and the app continuously crashed.

The 2,660mAh capacity battery is underwhelming. While using the phone, we noticed the battery drained quickly; over an eight-hour idle period, the battery depleted by nearly 20%. In our battery drain test, which streams HD video over Wi-Fi, the Blade A3 Prime eked out just 6 hours and 3 minutes before dying. That's a far cry from the Motorola Moto e's battery life of 10 hours and 2 minutes. If you're planning to use this phone for a full day, you'll want to pick up a spare battery or power bank.

The phone comes with a 10W charger and a USB-A–to–USB-C charging cable. Wireless charging is missing—which isn't unexpected for a phone at this price—and there's no fast charging option either. It takes about two and a half hours to recharge the phone from empty to full.

Stock Android 10, Missing Security Patches

The stock version of Android 10 that ships with the Blade A3 Prime is blissfully free of bloatware, usually a given on budget phones. Visible is one of the few carriers that doesn't add preloaded software on any of its phones.

Neither ZTE nor Visible has announced plans for software updates, and we don't believe the phone will get an Android 11 update. It also looks like the phone will not get frequent security patches, since the last update on our phone was from April 2020.

Good for Ultra-Tight Budgets

If you're on a tight budget, the ZTE A3 Prime is a decent choice. For $99, you get a phone that handles simple tasks well, offers good call quality, and gets a reliable, albeit slow, network connection. That said, mediocre battery life and infrequent Android security patch updates are significant concessions to make in the name of saving money.

The Motorola Moto e, though slightly more expensive, addresses both of these pain points and is a better value for your money. If you're looking for a relatively inexpensive phone that will last several years, the Google Pixel 4a is your best bet.

[abangtech]

Moto G8 review

Motorola has been a top player in the budget smartphone market for a long time, but can it still compete with some fresh rivalry from the likes of Realme? Things aren’t quite as assured these days so the Moto G8 has a lot of work to do.

For a while, we got used to Motorola’s strategy of phone families – a regular model straddled by an even cheaper Play option with a Plus model for those wanting a bigger screen. Then the Power came in for anyone wanting a big battery.

The G8 range for 2020 is even more complex with the introduction of a Power Lite option. There’s a lot to get your head round and to make matters worse, these were all announced individually and have launched at various times in different markets.

What we’re dealing with here is the regular Moto G8, which should be an improvement on the excellent five-star Moto G7, offering a well-rounded smartphone at a surprisingly low price.

However, I’m not so sure that Motorola has pulled it off this year.

Design & Build – One step forward, two steps back

I’ve been a big fan of the Moto G range since the early days and I’ve reviewed a large percentage of them over the years. The G7 was a particular favourite, being one of the most un-budget like phones in this area ever.

I’m not saying the G8 is bad, but it somehow doesn’t feel like the new model. It might seem like a small difference but at 9mm, it’s an extra 1mm thicker than the G7 and just doesn’t feel sleek and as premium.

It’s also, like so many phones now, really big. In fact, it’s bigger than the G7 Plus and therefore also heavier, too, at almost 190g.

Perhaps I’m being too nostalgic, because despite this, the G8 is very similar to rivals such as the Realme 6. And the size and weight of the G8 does relate to some benefits such as battery life.

The Realme also has a plastic back, but it’s a shame that Motorola has dropped the glass rear cover seen on the G7 with its gorgeous curved edges. This year, the Moto G8 just feels more plain and less exciting.

Motorola has moved the camera module to the corner while keeping the fingerprint scanner on the rear (which still works well). At the front, a teardrop notch has now been replaced by a punch-hole camera which is nestled in the top corner.

The G8 still looks pretty premium and stylish is its Neon Blue option, with Pearl White also available if it takes your fancy. A silicone case is included in the box.

An advantage to the size, compared to a lot of rivals, is that you get a headphone jack. Motorola still doesn’t offer full waterproofing with an IP rating but the G8 has a water repellent coating.

Specs & Performance – So so

Like the Moto G8 Power, this phone comes with a mid-range Snapdragon 665 and a pretty standard 4GB of RAM.

It’s nothing to write home about, despite the affordable price here, and this translates into real-world usage. Largely, the G8 is ok to use but nothing more. It can handle the basics fine but can easily get overwhelmed when more is asked of it, leading to noticeable lag.

There’s nothing particular, either; the G8 will be motoring along just fine then essentially hit a wall and have a mini break down for a bit. Oddly enough, the G7 was driving more pixels on the older 632 chip, still with 4GB of RAM and we didn’t have any issues.

It hits a lower price point this year, and is therefore cheaper than rivals such as the Realme 6 but as our benchmarks indicate, you can get better performance if you don’t mind spending a little more.

Diving a little deeper into the specs and jumping to Bluetooth 5.0 and including a headphone jack is good to see. However, Motorola doesn’t offer NFC here which is an odd choice.

Contactless payments are becoming all the more popular but the Moto G8 won’t allow you to use services like Google Pay. It also doesn’t even have dual-band Wi-Fi.

Display – Full screen ahead

This will come down to personal preference, but Motorola has swapped the central teardrop notch to house the cameras to an in-screen punch hole option. So now the selfie camera is surrounded by the screen instead.

I’d personally rather have a pop-up camera but that’s not an option at this price. As it stands, the M8 tucks the camera away in the corner and even if you’re new to punch hole cameras, you’ll quickly get used to it and on the whole you won’t notice it being there.

The display itself is a huge 6.4in – 0.2in bigger than the G7 Plus – and this isn’t with a considerably better screen-to-body ratio. So you have really got to consider whether this is a manageable size.

Sadly, for those like me that prefer a smaller display, it’s becoming very hard to find.

The resolution might be lower than the G7, but at HD+ is still fairly crisp. Colours are good and there’s a decent amount of brightness on offer too. It’s fine, but that’s all and I’d rather have the G7’s display when it comes to Motorola phones.

In terms of current competition, the Realme 6 is a lot more exciting for not much more money. It’s got a higher resolution and is the cheapest phone around to offer a smooth 90Hz refresh rate.

Battery Life – Days and days

That HD+ resolution, combined with the components and a huge 4000mAh battery means the G8 does perform extremely well in one area.

It’s got one of the longest battery lives I’ve tested in a long time. So much so that I struggled to get the phone to die so I could test the fast charging.

I am a fairly light phone user the majority of the time, but even with increased usage over the weekend I found the Moto G8 would last multiple days. And we’re not just talking about a couple of days here, it can last me four or even five days at a stretch.

For most users, it will probably last three, but that’s still amazing. It seems to just keep going and going.

Fast charging is a big deal these days but the G8 is lagging behind here. At just 10W, it’s a long way off rivals (with the Realme 6 at 30W) and is a drop down from the G7 which has 15W. It can only top up 28% in our usual 30 minute test.

That’s almost half off the G7, which managed 54%.

Cameras – Mixed bag

When it comes to smartphone cameras, it seems some brands are going for all the megapixels or the biggest zoom, while others are packing as many different lenses onto the back as possible. Sometimes a combination of them all, but rarely in the budget market.

Here, Motorola has gone down the more lenses route and really, I wish there were fewer and they did a better job. Sadly, that’s not as easy to use in marketing. Here’s a rundown of the cameras on the Moto G8.

16Mp Main – f/1.7, dual autofocus

8Mp Ultrawide – f/2.2, 118°

2Mp Macro – f/2.2

8Mp Selfie – f/2.0

The main camera does a pretty good job in general, producing detailed and colourful photos that would be unimaginable for a cheap phone not even that long ago. This, though is typically outdoors in good light, but quality drops when indoors or low light despite the impressive aperture.

The Moto G8 has various camera modes available including portrait (with blur slider) which is good most of the time but lacks any kind of night mode. Despite having PDAF and laser autofocus, I didn’t find the G8 overly quick to lock on.

Moving on and I find it very useful to have an ultrawide option and the Moto G8’s is about on par with others I’ve tested. In other words, not as good as the main camera but you sacrifice a little bit of quality to fit more in the frame.

Oddly, my ultrawide samples have come out at 16Mp, not the advertised 8Mp so I will be contacting Motorola to see what the deal is with that – not that I’m complaining.

Like others, Motorola has fallen into the trap of adding a macro lens and I’m really not sure where this trend has come from beyond a cheap way of increasing the lens count. It’s only 2Mp but unlike rivals, this one actually comes in useful because when you switch to the main lens at the same distance and it simply can’t focus.

Lastly, the selfie camera embedded into the screen is able to give you reasonable pictures and does offer a portrait mode, although it’s a bit hit and miss as to how well it copes. It’s certainly not as good as the G8 Power’s 16Mp shooter.

As with the Moto G8 Power, you can shoot video at HD at 60fps, or 4K at 30fps, along with slow motion at up to 240fps. I tested at 4K and the quality is very good with lots of detail and rich colours. It’s also surprisingly smooth considering the lack of stabilisation.

Software – Simples

Software has always been a strong area for Motorola and still is. If you’re not so sure about Chinese rivals such as Realme and Xiaomi due to software then getting a Moto G8 could be a good choice.

Motorola keeps things nice and simple with essentially stock Android 10, the latest version for Google. It means you’re getting a clean interface like the Pixel phones without Motorola messing around with things.

What the firm does add is the Moto app which contains a number of useful features including Moto Actions (eg quickly loading the camera app by twisting the phone), Moto Display and Moto Gametime.

One tweak to navigation to be aware of is that you can swipe in from either edge of the display to go back. That’s pretty handy apart from things like swiping through photos in the gallery when it’s oh so easy to trigger the navigation instead of fetching the next picture.

If you have troubles then you can head into the settings menu to adjust the sensitivity of this feature, or simply choose the older three button navigation bar.

Something else I’ve found is a glitch that occurs when opening the recent apps menu. Swiping up from the bottom sometimes simple overlays the row of app icons instead of loading the interface properly.

Price – Dip and dive

Ok so I prefer what Motorola did with the G7, but the G8 is considerably cheaper which is an impressive feat.

It’s just £179 in the UK when the G7 was £219, so it’s great if you’re looking for something under the £200 mark.

The G8 Power now sits at the £219 mark which is also how much the Realme 6 is. If you can afford the jump, you’re getting a lot of benefits but the G8 still represents good value for money if you’re simply looking for the cheapest phone you can.

Otherwise, there are some strong rivals at the same price such as the Xiaomi Redmi Note 9S and Oppo A5 2020.

As it stands, the US doesn’t get the Moto G8 with the G Power and G Stylus (no 8) being the latest models.

Check out chart of the best budget phones to see our top 10.

Verdict

The Moto G8 might be cheaper than its predecessor, but I’d rather the price stayed the same and the quality retained.

Various things have gone missing including a glass rear cover, faster charging and a higher resolution screen. Furthermore, you might not even realise that the Wi-Fi has got worse and there’s no NFC either,

Now, the Moto G8 is bigger, thicker and heavier. It doesn’t have the finesse of the G7 and changes like a punch-hole camera and macro lens are neither here nor there. The other cameras are nothing special, either.

It might be more in line with rivals in some ways – namely design – but Motorola is now being outclassed by devices such as the Realme 6 and it’s 90Hz display.

It’s saving grace is the extremely long battery life and, compared to Chinese rivals, that software is more user friendly.

Specs

Moto G8: Specs

Operating system: Android 10

Display: 6.4in, HD+ 1560×720, 19:9 IPS LCD screen

Processor: Octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 665

Memory: 4GB RAM

Storage: 64GB w/ microSD support up to 512GB

Cameras: 16Mp main, 8Mp ultra-wide angle, 2Mp macro, 8Mp front

Connectivity: Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.0, USB-C

Audio: 3.5mm headphone jack, mono speaker, FM radio

Security: Rear fingerprint sensor

Battery: 4000mAh w/ 10W TurboPower charging

Dimensions: 161. × 75.8 × 8.95mm

Weight: 188g

Colours: Neon Blue, Pearl White

Source

The post Moto G8 review appeared first on abangtech.

from abangtech https://abangtech.com/moto-g8-review/

[infradapt]

2020’s Smartphones, in Review

There is no question that smartphones have assimilated into our daily communications, both on a personal level and in the professional sense. Apps allow us to be social, to accomplish work-related tasks, and yes, kill some time with the latest silly trending game. Of course, as time passes, these devices only grow more advanced. If you’re due for a replacement, you may want to examine some of your options before pulling the trigger. ________________________________________ Now, the phones we are reviewing might seem like overkill – and, in fairness, there are many more budget-friendly options that can handle most of what you’re likely to task them with. However, the lure of a new device can be tempting, so we decided to indulge that temptation and go over some of the best smartphones available today. Samsung Galaxy s10 Plus If you’re looking for a quality Android device, you’re probably leaning toward the Samsung Galaxy s10 Plus. The newest addition to the line of flagships, the s10 Plus comfortably ranks at the top of many “best phone of the year” reviews.

With an aluminum frame housing the 6.17 oz phone and its Dynamic AMOLED display, the Galaxy s10 Plus is finished in Gorilla Glass 5, and has sharper edges that previous models did, intended to improve the grip of the device.

Looking inside, the phone has some just as appealing specifications. Driven by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 processor and between 8-to-12 gigabytes of RAM, this phone makes improvements to the rest of its features as well. There are five onboard cameras, with wide angle, ultra-wide angle, and telephoto lenses. The onboard fingerprint reader for authentication purposes is now cunningly hidden under the display, and the s10 Plus is likely to be the last flagship phone that Samsung produces with a 3.5mm headphone jack.

The Galaxy s10 is now the standard for an Android phone to beat (at least until the s11 comes out) and can be purchased in the following colors for somewhere between $599 and $1,200:

● Prism White ● Prism Black ● Prism Green ● Prism Blue ● Canary Yellow ● Flamingo Pink ● Ceramic Black ● Ceramic White ● Cardinal Red ● Smoke Blue

Samsung Galaxy s10 Plus Body: Aluminum frame with Gorilla Glass 6 front, Gorilla Glass/Ceramic back Display: 6.4-inch Dynamic AMOLED (~522 ppi) OS: Android 9.0 with Samsung One UI skin Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 Memory: 128 GB/8 GB RAM; 512 GB/8GB RAM; 1 TB/12GB RAM Expandable Memory: microSD up to 1 TB Cameras: Three back-facing (12 MP, 26mm wide angle; 12 MP, 52mm telephoto; 16 MP, 12mm ultrawide); Two front-facing (10 MP, 26mm; 8 MP, 22mm) Sounds: Stereo speakers, 3.5mm headphone jack Battery (battery endurance rating): 4,100 mAh battery (91 hours) Security: Ultrasonic, under display fingerprint reader; IP 68 resistant Miscellaneous: Nano-SIM, Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.0, 15W fast charging, wireless charging, reverse wireless charging, NFC, FM Radio Other versions: Samsung Galaxy s10, Samsung Galaxy s10e Samsung Galaxy Note 10 Plus You probably remember the dramatic news a few years ago that the battery’s tendency to explode had led to a million-device-plus recall on their Galaxy Note phones, ultimately costing Samsung more than $5 billion. The issues have long since been resolved, and so the Note 10 Plus might just be the best large-factor phone for the business professional on the market today.

Again, enclosed in an aluminum frame with a coat of Gorilla Glass 6, the Note 10 Plus comes with a 6.8-inch Dynamic AMOLED display and an on-board s-pen stylus. Also featuring a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 processor and up to 12 gigabytes of RAM, it is powered by a fast-charging 4,300 mAh battery. This battery is also QI wireless charging-compatible, and supports reverse-QI charging, which allows you to use it as a wireless charger in a pinch. It has Android 9.0 installed at first, but can now be updated to Android 10 with certain carriers.

Most major carriers stock this phone for between $849 and $1,200, in Aura Glow, Aura White, Aura Black, and Aura Blue.

Samsung Galaxy Note 10 Plus Body: Aluminum frame with Gorilla Glass 6 front and back Display: 6.8-inch Dynamic AMOLED, 1,440 x 3,040 (~498 ppi) OS: Android 9.0 with One UI skin Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 Memory: 256 GB/12 GB RAM; 512 GB/12 GB RAM Expandable Memory: microSD up to 1 TB Cameras: Four Back-Facing (12 MP, 27mm wide angle; 12 MP, 52mm telephoto; 16 MP, 12mm ultra wide angle; TOF 3D VGA camera); Front-Facing 10 MP, 26mm wide angle Sounds: Stereo speakers Battery (battery life): 4,300 mAh (~107 hours) Security: Ultrasonic in-display fingerprint, IP68 resistant Miscellaneous: Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.0, 45W fast charging, wireless charging, reverse wireless charging, NFC, S-Pen functionality Other versions: Samsung Galaxy Note 10 Apple iPhone 11 Pro Max Apple is surging back into prominence with the iPhone 11 Pro Max, which consistently ranks in the top three of phones developed in 2019. A stainless-steel frame holds its 6.5-inch Super Retina OLED display, as well as an advanced neural engine-improved A13 Bionic processor to boost the iPhone’s trademark features – namely, Siri’s performance as well as the functionality of its camera and AI. Along with the A13 chip, the inside holds 64 or 512 gigabytes of onboard storage space and four gigabytes of RAM.

Speaking of the camera, the iPhone 11 Pro Max houses three distinct 12-megapixel cameras, featuring a telephoto lens, a wide-angle lens, and an ultra-wide-angle lens. Most major carriers offer it for about $1,100, and it comes in SpaceGray, Gold, Silver, and Midnight Green.

Apple iPhone 11 Pro Max Body: Stainless steel frame with glass front/back Display: 6.5-inch Super Retina XDR OLED; 1,242 x 2,688 (~458 ppi) OS: iOS 13 Chipset: Apple A13 Bionic Memory: 64 GB/4 GB RAM; 256 GB/4 GB RAM; 512 GB/4GB RAM Expandable Memory: None Cameras: Three back-facing (12 MP, 26mm wide angle; 12 MP, 52mm telephoto; 12 MP, 13mm ultrawide); Two front-facing (12 MP, 23mm; SL 3D camera) Sounds: Stereo speakers Battery (battery life): 3,969 mAh (102 hours) Security: Face ID, IP 68 resistant Miscellaneous: Nano-SIM, Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.0, 18W fast charging, wireless charging, NFC Other versions: Apple iPhone 11, Apple iPhone 11 Pro Google Pixel 4 XL This phone marks Google’s latest effort to carve out a portion of the smartphone market. Again, powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 processor, the Pixel 4 XL really shines where its visual features are concerned. With 537 pixels crammed into every inch, it features a 6.3-inch P-OLED display, as well as one of the best camera setups available today – including a 122 megapixel wide-angle lens and a 16 megapixel telephoto lens with impressive low-light capabilities.

The Google Assistant can be summoned by simply squeezing the Clearly White, Just Black, or Oh So Orange phone.

Most major carriers will sell the Google Pixel 4 XL for between $899 and $999.

Google Pixel 4 XL Body: Aluminum Frame with Gorilla Glass 5 front/back Display: 6.3-inch P-OLED, 1,440 x 3,040 (~537 ppi) OS: Android 10 Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 Memory: 64 GB/6 GB RAM; 128 GB/6 GB RAM Expandable Memory: No Cameras: Two back-facing (12.2 MP, 28mm wide angle; 16 MP, 45mm telephoto) Two front-facing (8 MP; 22mm Sounds: Stereo speakers Battery (battery life): 3,700 mAh (~73 hours) Security: Face ID Miscellaneous: Bluetooth 5.0, 18W fast charging, wireless charging, NFC, Squeeze for Google Assistant Other versions: Google Pixel 4 OnePlus 7T Pro Of course, not all of this year’s “flagship-level” devices are necessarily produced by the biggest companies, as dozens of smaller manufacturers are also developing high-performance smartphones. For instance, the OnePlus 7T Pro. This device is all about the speed of the user’s experience, which is why they augmented its flagship-level specifications with a 90 hz refresh rate, making it seem even faster.

The 7T Pro doesn’t exactly underperform in other considerations, either. With a 6.7-inch fluid AMOLED display that houses a fingerprint reader, it actually runs on Qualcomm’s creme de la creme processor, the Snapdragon 855+. With three rear-facing cameras and a front-facing selfie camera that pops out of the chassis when used, the camera notch has been eliminated. Finally, because price is always a consideration to some degree, this phone does the least damage to your bank account of the ones we reviewed here with the 8 gigabyte RAM model totalling around $699.

OnePlus 7T Pro Body: Aluminum frame with Gorilla Glass 5 front/back Display: 6.67-inch Fluid AMOLED, 1,440 x 3,120 (~516 ppi) OS: Android 10 with OxygenOS 10.0.4 skin Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 855+ Memory: 256 GB/8 GB RAM; 256 GB/12 GB RAM Expandable Memory: No Cameras: Three back-facing (48 MP wide angle; 8 MP, 78mm telephoto; 16 MP, 13mm ultra wide angle); Motorized pop-up 16 MP, 25mm wide angle Sounds: Stereo speakers Battery (battery life): 4,085 mAh (~100 hours) Security: Optical in-display fingerprint reader, pop-up facial recognition Miscellaneous: Bluetooth 5.0, 30W “Warp” charge, NFC Other versions: OnePlus 7T

Finally, there are other phones that, while not included in our list, are definitely ones to consider under the right circumstances. These include the Huawei Mate 30 Pro and P30 Pro, the Sony Xperia 1, the LG v50 ThinQ, and the Samsung Galaxy Fold.

We included the “right circumstances” caveat because there is currently a ban on Huawei devices in the United States. Despite their superior hardware, government sanctions have put the kibosh on Huawei products for the time being.

Other devices are also just starting to rise in popularity, like those featuring foldable displays – including the Samsung Galaxy Fold, the Huawei Mate X, and the nostalgia-pumping Motorola Razr. We’ll likely soon see how these foldable devices are received on a wide scale.

Finally, there is also the advent of 5G to consider. A few cities have started to implement the necessary technology for 5G, and so manufacturers will likely start developing 5G-compatible devices before long. While it will likely take years for 5G to become the standard, if you happen to spend time in one of these cities, it may be to your benefit to upgrade.

What device do you currently use? Do any of these interest you, or did we miss one that you’ve had your eye on? Let us know in the comments!

https://www.infradapt.com/news/2020s-smartphones-in-review/

[technologicalsanbustech-blog]

i phone x

                                                           iPhone X review: face the future    

 After months of hype, endless speculation, and a wave of last-minute rumors about production delays, the iPhone X is finally here. Apple says it’s a complete reimagining of what the iPhone should be, 10 years after the original revolutionized the world. That means some fundamental aspects of the iPhone are totally different here — most notably, the home button and fingerprint sensor are gone, replaced by a new system of navigation gestures and Apple’s new Face ID unlocking system. These are major changes.

New iPhones and major changes usually command a ton of hype, and Apple’s pushing the hype level around the iPhone X even higher than usual, especially given the new thousand-dollar starting price point. For the last few years, we've said some variation of "it's a new iPhone" when we’ve reviewed these devices. But Apple wants this to be the beginning of the next 10 years. It wants the iPhone 10 to be more than just the new iPhone. It wants it to be the beginning of a new generation of iPhones. That's a lot to live up to.

This review is going to be a little different, at least initially: Apple gave most reviewers less than 24 hours with the iPhone X before allowing us to talk about it. So consider this a working draft. These are my opening thoughts after a long, intense day of testing the phone, but I’ll be updating everything in a few days after we’re able to test performance and battery life, do an in-depth camera comparison, and generally live with the iPhone X in a more realistic way. Most importantly: please ask questions in the comments! I’ll try to answer as many of them as I can in the final, updated review.

But for now — here it goes.

Design

At a glance, the iPhone X looks so good one of our video editors kept saying it looked fake. It’s polished and tight and clean. My new favorite Apple thing is that the company managed to move all the regulatory text to software, leaving just the word “iPhone” on the back. The screen is bright and colorful and appears to be laminated tighter than previous iPhones, so it looks like the pixels are right on top. Honestly, it does kind of look like a live 3D render instead of an actual working phone.

The iPhone X basically looks like a living 3D render

But it is a real phone, and it’s clear it was just as challenging to actually build as all the rumors suggested. It’s gorgeous, but it’s not flawless. There’s a tiny sharp ridge between the glass back and the chrome frame that I feel every time I pick up the phone. That chrome frame seems destined to get scratched and dinged, as every chrome Apple product tends to do. The camera bump on the back is huge; a larger housing than the iPhone 8 Plus fitted onto a much smaller body and designed to draw attention to itself, especially on my white review unit. There are definitely going to be people who think it’s ugly, but it’s growing on me.

There’s no headphone jack, which continues to suck on every phone that omits it, but that’s the price you pay for a bezel-less screen with a notch at the top. Around the sides, you’ll find the volume buttons, the mute switch, and the sleep / wake button. The removal of the home button means there are a few new button combinations to remember: pressing the top volume button and the sleep / wake button together takes a screenshot; holding the sleep button opens Siri; and you turn the phone off by holding either of the volume buttons and the sleep button for several seconds and then sliding to power down.

And, of course, there’s the notch in the display — what Apple calls the “sensor housing.” It’s ugly, but it tends to fade away after a while in portrait mode. It’s definitely intrusive in landscape, though. It makes landscape in general pretty messy. Less ignorable are the bezels around the sides and bottom of the screen, which are actually quite large. Getting rid of almost everything tends to draw attention to what remains, and what remains here is basically a thick black border all the way around the screen, with that notch set into the top.

I personally think the iPhone 4 is the most beautiful phone of all time, and I’d say the iPhone X is in third place in the iPhone rankings after that phone and the original model. It’s a huge step up from the surfboard design we’ve been living with since the iPhone 6, but it definitely lacks the character of Apple’s finest work. And… it has that notch.

Display

The iPhone X is Apple’s first phone to use an OLED display, after years of Apple LCDs setting the standard for the industry. OLED displays allow for thinner phones, but getting them to be accurate is a challenge: Samsung phones tend to be oversaturated to the point of neon, Google’s Pixel 2 XL has a raft of issues with viewing angles and muted colors, and the new LG V30 has problems with uneven backlighting.

Apple’s using a Samsung-manufactured OLED panel with a PenTile pixel layout on the iPhone X, but it’s insistent that it was custom-engineered and designed in-house. Whatever the case, the results are excellent: the iPhone X OLED is bright, sharp, vibrant without verging into parody, and generally a constant pleasure to look at. Apple’s True Tone system automatically adjusts color temperature to ambient light, photos are displayed in a wider color gamut, and there’s even Dolby Vision HDR support, so iTunes movies mastered in HDR play with higher brightness and dynamic range.

It’s just a terrific display

I did notice some slight color shifting off-axis, but never so much that it bothered me; I generally had to go looking for it. And compared to the iPhone 8 Plus LCD, it seems like a slightly cooler display over all, but only when I held the two side by side. Overall, it’s just a terrific display.

Unfortunately, the top of the display is marred by that notch, and until a lot of developers do a lot of work to design around it, it’s going to be hard to get the most out of this screen. I mean that literally: a lot of apps don’t use most of the screen right now.

Apps that haven’t been updated for the iPhone X run in what you might call “software bezel” mode: huge black borders at the top and bottom that basically mimic the iPhone 8. And a lot of apps aren’t updated yet: Google Maps and Calendar, Slack, the Delta app, Spotify, and more all run with software bezels. Games like CSR Racing and Sonic the Hedgehog looked particularly silly. It’s fine, but it’s ugly, especially since the home bar at the bottom of the screen glows white in this mode.

Some apps almost look right, but then you realize they’re actually just broken

Apps that haven’t been specifically updated for the iPhone X, but use Apple’s iOS autolayout system will fill the screen, but wacky things happen: Dark Sky blocks out half the status bar with a hardcoded black bar of its own, Uber puts your account icon over the battery indicator, and the settings in the Halide camera app get obscured by the notch and partially tucked into the display’s bunny ears. It almost looks right, but then you realize it’s actually just broken.

Apps that have been updated for the iPhone X all have different ways of dealing with the notch that sometimes lead to strange results, especially in apps that play video. Instagram Stories don’t fill the screen; they have large gray borders on the top and bottom. YouTube only has two full-screen zoom options, so playing the Last Jedi trailer resulted in either a small video window surrounded by letter- and pillar-boxing or a full-screen view with the notch obscuring the left side of the video. Netflix is slightly better, but you’re still stuck choosing between giant black borders around your video or the notch.

Landscape mode on the iPhone X is generally pretty messy: the notch goes from being a somewhat forgettable element in the top status bar to a giant interruption on the side of the screen, and I haven’t seen any apps really solve for it yet. And the home bar at the bottom of the screen often sits over the top of content, forever reminding you that you can swipe to go home and exit the chaos of landscape mode forever.

I’m sure all of this will get solved over time, but recent history suggests it might take longer than Apple or anyone would like; I still encounter apps that aren’t updated for the larger iPhone 6 screen sizes. 3D Touch has been around for years, but I can’t think of any app that makes particularly good use of it. Apple’s rolled out a lot of screen design changes over the years, and they take a while to settle in. We’ll just have to see how it goes with the iPhone X.

Cameras

I haven’t had a lot of time to play with the cameras on the iPhone X, but the short answer is that they look almost exactly like the cameras on the iPhone 8. Both the telephoto and wide angle lenses have optical image stabilization (compared to just the wide angle on the 8 Plus), and the TrueDepth system on the front means the front camera can take portrait mode selfies. It’s nice.

iPhone X rear camera (left) / Pixel 2 XL rear camera (right)

Of course, the main thing the front camera can do is take Animoji, which are Apple’s animated emoji characters. It’s basically built-in machinima, and probably the single best feature on the iPhone X. Most importantly, they just work, and they work incredibly well, tracking your eyes and expressions and capturing your voice in perfect sync with the animation. Apple’s rolled out a lot of weird additions to iMessage over the years, but Animoji feel much stickier than sending a note with lasers or adding stickers or whatever other gimmicks have been layered on. And while iMessage remains a golden palace of platform lock-in, Animoji are notably cross-platform: they work in iMessage, can be sent as videos over MMS, or exported as MOV files. Nice.

Face ID: it works, mostly

The single most important feature of the iPhone X is Face ID, the system that unlocks the phone by recognizing your face. Even that’s an understatement: the entire design and user experience of the iPhone X is built around Face ID. Face ID is what let Apple ditch the home button and Touch ID fingerprint sensor. The Face ID sensor system is housed in the notch. The Apple Pay user flow has been reworked around Face ID. Apple’s Animoji animated emoji work using the Face ID sensors.

If Face ID doesn’t work, the entire promise of the iPhone X falls apart.

The good news is that Face ID mostly works great. The bad news is that sometimes it doesn’t, and you will definitely have to adjust the way you think about using your phone to get it to a place where it mostly works great.

Face ID is cutting-edge tech, but the fundamental concept is pretty simple: it’s basically a tiny Xbox Kinect. An infrared projector flashes out thousands of tiny dots that cover your face, and the front camera clicks on, captures that image, and turns it into a depth map. That map — not an actual image of your face — is stored locally on the iPhone X’s Secure Enclave, which is the same place Apple stored Touch ID fingerprint data.

Setting up Face ID is ridiculously simple — much simpler than setting up Touch ID on previous iPhones. The phone displays a circular border around your face, and you simply move until a series of lines around that circle turn green. (Apple suggests you move your nose around in a circle, which is adorable.) Do that twice, and you’re done: Face ID will theoretically get better and better at recognizing you over time, and track slow changes like growing a beard so you don’t have to re-enroll. Drastic changes, like shaving that beard off, might require you to enter your passcode, however.

Face ID should also work through most sunglasses that pass infrared light, although some don’t. And you can definitely make it fail if you put on disguises, but I’d rather have it fail than let someone else through.

In my early tests, Face ID worked well indoors: sitting at my desk, standing in our video studio, and waiting in line to get coffee. You have to look at it head-on, though: if it’s sitting on your desk you have to pick up the phone and look at it, which is a little annoying if you’re used to just putting your finger on the Touch ID sensor to check a notification.

You also can’t be too casual about it: I had a lot of problems pulling the iPhone X out of my pocket and having it fail to unlock until Apple clarified that Face ID works best at a distance of 25 to 50 centimeters away from your face, or about 10 to 20 inches. That’s closer than I usually hold my phone when I pull it out of my pocket to check something, which means I had to actively think about holding the iPhone X closer to my face than every other phone I’ve ever used. “You’re holding it wrong” is a joke until it isn’t, and you can definitely hold the iPhone X wrong.

You can definitely hold the iPhone X wrong

That’s a small problem, though, and I think it’ll be easy to get used to. The other problem is actually much more interesting: almost all of the early questions about Face ID centered around how it would work in the dark, but it turns out that was exactly backwards. Face ID works great in the dark, because the IR projector is basically a flashlight, and flashlights are easy to see in the dark. But go outside in bright sunlight, which contains a lot of infrared light, or under crappy florescent lights, which interfere with IR, and Face ID starts to get a little inconsistent.

I took a walk outside our NYC office in bright sunlight, and Face ID definitely had issues recognizing my face consistently while I was moving until I went into shade or brought the phone much closer to my face than usual. I also went to the deli across the street, which has a wide variety of lights inside, including a bunch of overhead florescent strips, and Face ID also got significantly more inconsistent.

I’ve asked Apple about this, and I’ll update this review with their answers along with more detailed test results, but for now I’d say Face ID definitely works well enough to replace Touch ID, but not so well that you won’t run into the occasional need to try again.

Recent Apple products have tended to demand people adapt to them instead of being adapted to people, and it was hard not to think about that as I stood in the sunlight, waving a thousand-dollar phone ever closer to my face.

Software

There’s a lot of new hardware in the iPhone X, but it’s still running iOS 11 — albeit with some tweaks to navigation to accommodate the lack of a home button. You swipe up from the bottom to go home, swipe down from the right to bring up (down?) Control Center, and swipe down from the left to open the Notifications pane. That pane also has buttons for the flashlight and camera; in a twist, they require 3D Touch to work, so they feel like real buttons. It’s neat, but also breaks the 3D Touch paradigm. It’s the only place the entire system where 3D Touch acts like a left click instead of a right click. It’s emblematic of how generally fuzzy iOS has become with basic interface concepts, I think.

Switching apps is fun and simple: you can either swipe up and hold to bring up all your apps in a card-like deck, or just quickly swipe left and right on the home bar to bounce through them one at a time.

And… those are basically the changes to iOS 11 on the iPhone X, apart from the various notch-related kerfuffles. If you’ve been using iOS for a while and iOS 11 for the past month, nothing here will surprise you. Apple might have completely rethought how you unlock the iPhone X, but it’s still not giving up on that grid of app icons or making notifications more powerful or even allowing the weather app icon to display a live temperature. Siri is still Siri. If you’re buying an iPhone X expecting a radical change to your iPhone experience, well, you probably won’t get it. Unless you really hate unlocking your phone.

The iPhone X is clearly the best iPhone ever made. It’s thin, it’s powerful, it has ambitious ideas about what cameras on phones can be used for, and it pushes the design language of phones into a strange new place. It is a huge step forward in terms of phone hardware, and it has the notch to show for it. If you’re one of the many people who preordered this thing, I think you’ll be happy, although you’ll be going on the journey of figuring out when and how Face ID works best with everyone else.

It’s a new iPhone

But if you didn’t preorder, I suspect you might not feel that left out for a while. The iPhone X might be a huge step forward in terms of hardware, but it runs iOS 11 just the same as other recent iPhones, and you won’t really be missing out on anything except Animoji. Face ID seems like it’s off to a good start, but it’s definitely inconsistent in certain lighting conditions. And until your favorite apps are updated, you won’t be able to make use of that entire beautiful display.

All that adds up to the thing you already know: the iPhone X is a very expensive iPhone. For a lot of people, it’ll be worth it. For a lot of people, it’ll seem ridiculous. But fundamentally, it’s a new iPhone, and that means you probably already know if you want to spend a thousand dollars on one.

Because this review isn’t final, we’re not scoring the iPhone X yet. Leave your questions and comments below, and we’ll try to address as many of them in our final review as we can. We’ll add the score at that time as.

                                 ............sanket         

[un-enfant-immature]

iFixit gives Fairphone 3 a perfect 10 for repairability

Here’s something the hermetically sealed iPhone can’t do: Score a perfect 10 for repairability.

Smartphone startup and social enterprise Fairphone’s latest repairable-by-design smartphone has done just that, getting 10/10 in an iFixit Teardown vs scores of just 6/10 for recent iPhone models.

The Fairphone 3, which was released in Europe last week with an RRP of €450, gets thumbs up across the board in iFixit’s hardware Teardown. It found all the internal modules to be easily accessible and replaceable — with only basic tools required to get at them (Fairphone includes a teeny screwdriver in the box). iFixit also lauds visual cues that help with disassembly and reassembly, and notes that repair guides and spare parts are available on Fairphone’s website.

iFixit’s sole quibble is that while most of the components inside the Fairphone 3’s modules are individually replaceable “some” are soldered on. A tiny blip that doesn’t detract from the 10/10 repairability score

Safe to say, such a score is the smartphone exception. The industry continues to encourage buyers to replace an entire device, via yearly upgrade, instead of enabling them to carry out minor repairs themselves — so they can extend the lifespan of their device and thereby shrink environmental impact.

Dutch startup Fairphone was set up to respond to the abject lack of sustainability in the electronics industry. The tiny company has been pioneering modularity for repairability for several years now, flying in the face of smartphone giants that are still routinely pumping out sealed tablets of metal and glass which often don’t even let buyers get at the battery to replace it themselves.

To wit: An iFixit Teardown of the Google Pixel rates battery replacement as “difficult” with a full 20 steps and between 1-2 hours required. (Whereas the Fairphone 3 battery can be accessed in seconds, by putting a fingernail under the plastic back plate to pop it off and lifting the battery out.)

The Fairphone 3 goes much further than offering a removable backplate for getting at the battery, though. The entire device has been designed so that its components are accessible and repairable.

So it’s not surprising to see it score a perfect 10 (the startup’s first modular device, Fairphone 2, was also scored 10/10 by iFixit). But it is strong, continued external validation for the Fairphone’s designed-for-repairability claim.

It’s an odd situation in many respects. In years past replacement batteries were the norm for smartphones, before the cult of slimming touchscreen slabs arrived to glue phone innards together. Largely a consequence of hardware business models geared towards profiting from pushing for clockwork yearly upgrades cycle — and slimmer hardware is one way to get buyers coveting your next device.

But it’s getting harder and harder to flog the same old hardware horse because smartphones have got so similarly powerful and capable there’s precious little room for substantial annual enhancements.

Hence iPhone maker Apple’s increasing focus on services. A shift that’s sadly not been accompanied by a rethink of Cupertino’s baked in hostility towards hardware repairability. (It still prefers, for example, to encourage iPhone owners to trade in their device for a full upgrade.)

At Apple’s 2019 new product announcement event yesterday — where the company took the wraps off another clutch of user-sealed smartphones (aka: iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro) — there was even a new financing offer to encourage iPhone users to trade in their old models and grab the new ones. ‘Look, we’re making it more affordable to upgrade!’ was the message.

Meanwhile, the only attention paid to sustainability — during some 1.5 hours of keynotes — was a slide which passed briefly behind marketing chief Phil Schiller towards the end of his turn on stage puffing up the iPhone updates, encouraging him to pause for thought.

“iPhone 11 Pro and iPhone 11 are made to be designed free from these harmful materials and of course to reduce their impact on the environment,” he said in front of a list of some toxic materials that are definitely not in the iPhones.

Stuck at the bottom of this list were a couple of detail-free claims that the iPhones are produced via a “low-carbon process” and are “highly recyclable”. (The latter presumably a reference to how Apple handles full device trade-ins. But as anyone who knows about sustainability will tell you, sustained use is far preferable to premature recycling…)

“This is so important to us. That’s why I bring it up every time. I want to keep pushing the boundaries of this,” Schiller added, before pressing the clicker to move on to the next piece of marketing fodder. Blink and you’d have missed it.

If Apple truly wants to push the boundaries on sustainability — and not just pay glossy lip-service to reducing environmental impact for marketing purposes while simultaneously encouraging annual upgrades — it has a very long way to go indeed.

As for repairability, the latest and greatest iPhones clearly won’t hold a candle to the Fairphone.

[josephlrushing]

Invisible Shield Glass Elite VisionGuard+ for the Google Pixel 4 XL: Protect and Filter

I know that most premium smartphones come with Gorilla Glass displays which are less likely to shatter or scratch than a plastic or lesser glass display, but guess what? I can still manage to scratch Gorilla Glass without even trying. That’s why I am a huge advocate for glass screen protectors like the Invisible Shield Glass Elite VisionGuard+ for the Google Pixel 4 XL.

Just like most other glass screen protectors, the Invisible Shield Glass Elite VisionGuard+ is easily installed without bubbles, and it will keep your screen from cracking in a serious drop. Unlike other screen protectors, the Invisible Shield Glass Elite VisionGuard+ screen protector also has anti-microbial properties, reinforced corners, an oleophilic coating that makes fingerprints virtually invisible, and VisionGuard — which helps protect your eyes from digital eye strain that comes “from prolonged exposure to device screens” which may cause “premature eye aging, dry and irritated eyes, sleep disruption, and blurred vision.” Furthermore, the “protective Eyesafe layer in Glass Elite VisionGuard+ filters harmful high-energy visible (HEV) light from your phone’s screen.” All righty then; let’s dig in!

Included in the box are the screen protector, a black mat, a microfiber cloth, an EZ Apply Tray, a screen cleaning wipe, a dust removal sticker, and a quick start guide. I’ll save you some time reading the directions with my quick walkthrough …

To get started, you’ll lay your naked Pixel 4 XL on the included black mat. I guess some people will be glad for the mats inclusion, but after using it mine went straight into the trash. Next, you’ll wipe down your screen with the cleaning wipe and then dry it off with the microfiber cloth. I’ve seen guys at the AT&T store use the dust removal sticker by pressing it all over the screen at this point, but there really is no need. If you keep a can of compressed air nearby, that can come in handy in dustier locations.

Next, you’ll lay the EZ Apply Tray on top of your 4 XL’s screen; the Top of the tray is noted with an upward-facing arrow, so you won’t have to worry about putting it on the wrong way.

Next, you’ll peel the thick protective backing off of the glass screen protector; I’m always afraid I might bend the glass in two at this point, but that’s never happened. Be sure to keep the screen protector facing down as much as possible so it doesn’t pick up any floaty fuzz before it gets placed onto your display; this is especially important if you have pets, as their hair is usually floating around looking for something to stick to.

Before you place the protector into the EZ Apply Tray, check your screen again to make sure there are no bits of fuzz, pet hair, or dust collected there — use compressed air to blow them away if any has collected.

I liketo use a credit card to smooth the screen protector down from bottom to top. Those bubbles in the next photo are between the top protective cover and the screen protector, not the protector and my display.

The last step is to peel off the thin protective layer on the top of the screen protector … done!

The Invisible Shield Glass Elite VisionGuard+ for the Google Pixel 4 XL is not an edge-to-edge screen protector, so you will notice a bit of a drop-off if you don’t use a case. As you can see, the protector is bubble-free, and I didn’t accidentally get any dust or lint under it — so it’s perfectly clear and ready for use.

Once your 4 XL is in a case, the edges are less noticeable. The screen protector is very clear, and it won’t distort the display underneath; because the protector is glass, it feels just like the display would under your fingers — unless you hit an edge.

The case shown is the Gear4 Crystal Palace (review coming soon).

The VisionGuard blue light filter is helpful for those who like to read before falling asleep; with it, you may be able to get away without using Pixel’s Night Light (which tints your display more amber than white between sunset and sunrise). I don’t notice a lot of smudges on my screen, so the ClearPrint technology is likely doing its thing — don’t expect it to work miracles, however; if you spill or something drips on your screen, it’s not going to slide right off without leaving a mark.

If you ever crack or chip your screen protector, Invisible Shield offers a lifetime replacement program. After you’ve applied your protector, don’t forget to log into your Zagg account and register there for the future — just in case. Should you ever need to replace the protector, you can get a new one sent to you for the cost of shipping — about $6.

The Invisible Shield Glass Elite VisionGuard+ for the Google Pixel 4 XL retails for $49.99, and it is available directly from the manufacturer and from other retailers.

Source: Manufacturer supplied review sample

What I Like: All over protection for your Pixel 4 XL’s screen; Easy to apply; Bubble-free; VisionGuard blue light filter; Fewer fingerprint smudges; Replacement program should your protector ever get cracked

What Needs Improvement: Nothing

from Joseph Rushing https://geardiary.com/2019/11/07/invisible-shield-glass-elite-visionguard-for-the-google-pixel-4-xl-protect-and-filter/

[appinsta]

Xiaomi Mi 9 hands-on: Flashy, not fussy

Just 10 months after the Mi 8 launch, Xiaomi has announced its successor: the Xiaomi Mi 9. While no one could ever say Xiaomi doesn’t put out enough phones, a few things make the Mi 9 stand out: it adds a third camera to the back, has some impressive new charging tech, and it’s among the first phones to launch with the Snapdragon 855 mobile platform. This is the Xiaomi Mi 9 hands-on.

See also: Oppo K1 hands-on  |  Vivo V15 Pro review

Xiaomi Mi 9 design

Like many recent phones from China, the Xiaomi Mi 9 has an attractive and colorful glass body. There are no gradients here, but the curved Gorilla Glass 5 back panel gives off a holographic vibe and displays lovely color shifts, depending on the way the light hits it. The phone comes in blue, black, or purple and there’s also a special Transparent Edition (replacing last year’s Mi 8 Pro or Explorer Edition), which once again shows purely decorative “components” under a frosted glass back.

The front of the Mi 9 is pretty unassuming, with a small teardrop notch at the top of the Gorilla Glass 6 screen. Like the Mi Mix 3, there’s a tiny earpiece speaker along the top edge of the display. Twin speaker grilles appear on the bottom edge on either side of the USB-C port, although only one emits sound. On the top edge, you’ll still find a trusty IR blaster, something Xiaomi seems loathe to remove. If only we could say the same about the headphone jack, which is once again absent. There is a USB-C-to-3.5mm adapter included in the box.

The Mi 9 has a dedicated voice assistant button. In China it will call up XiaoAI, but in global markets it will default to Google Assistant. If Assistant isn’t your preferred assistant you can easily remap it to whatever you want. Xiaomi also lets you assign some additional shortcuts to this key.

All Mi 9 versions have a Goodix in-display fingerprint scanner.

There’s no fingerprint scanner on the back this year because all Mi 9 versions now use a Goodix in-display fingerprint scanner. Xiaomi has also added three shortcuts when you long-press the scanner. For now, these shortcuts are locked to scanning a QR code, performing a web search, and adding a calendar event, but Xiaomi says a future update will allow you to remap them.

Xiaomi Mi 9 display

The Xiaomi Mi 9 display is a 6.39-inch AMOLED panel with Full HD+ (2,340 x 1,080) resolution and 19.5:9 aspect ratio. Xiaomi says to expect 430 nits of peak brightness which should be enough for decent outdoor brightness, even if it’s far from best-in-class. There’s also support for an always-on display and AI face unlocking. The Mi 9 we saw ran a stable MIUI 10 global ROM and Android 9 Pie.

Related Articles

7 best AMOLED-friendly dark mode apps on Android

Display showdown: AMOLED vs LCD vs Retina vs Infinity Display

Xiaomi Mi 9 camera

The Xiaomi Mi 9 camera is perhaps the biggest deal here, with three cameras on the back in a vertical array. The top one, with the decorative halo surrounding it, is a 12MP 2x optical zoom lens with f/2.2 aperture and 1-micron pixels. The bottom one is a 16MP sensor with an f/2.2 ultra-wide angle lens with 117-degree field of view and 1-micron pixels.

Of the three cameras, the new Sony IMX586 48MP sensor with f/1.75 aperture lens is where the action is.

Related: Xiaomi Mi 9 vs Honor View 20, OnePlus 6T, and Nokia 8.1

The middle one is where the action is: the exciting new Sony IMX586 48MP sensor with f/1.75 aperture lens. You can manually switch to 48MP shots in the settings for when you want large, detailed shots in good lighting, but by default, it will pixel bin to 12MP using 4-in-1 Super Pixels at 1.6 microns. All three rear cameras are covered by Sapphire Glass.

Up front, you’ve got a 20MP f/2.0 aperture camera with 0.9-micron pixels. As usual, you can expect some AI bokeh effects with the front-facing camera and slightly more realistic-looking bokeh using the triple camera on the back. If the Mi 9’s AI scene recognition detects you’re about to snap a photo and lose part of your subject, it’ll suggest you switch to the ultra-wide angle lens to get everything in frame.

Xiaomi Mi 9 battery

The other most exciting part of the Mi 9 comes in the battery department. The 3,300mAh cell won’t get anyone too excited, but as we all know it’s not the size that counts, it’s how fast you can charge it. On the Mi 9, Xiaomi is introducing a new battery charging tech called Charge Turbo.

Charge Turbo supports up to 27W wired charging and 20W wireless charging.

Charge Turbo supports up to 27W wired charging and 20W wireless charging with optional extra chargers. That means you can go from zero to 100 percent in an hour and four minutes when wired, or an hour and forty minutes wirelessly using the optional Charge Turbo wireless pad. You’ll get a standard 18W wired charger in the box, but the 20W wireless charging pad includes the 27W brick, so it’s definitely worth picking up.

Related Articles

How fast charging really works

Here are the best phones with fast charging batteries

Xiaomi says the new Charge Turbo wireless charger will cost around $25 in China, so expect to add a couple of extra dollars to that when you include local taxes if you’re buying one internationally. The Mi 9 is also compatible with standard Qi chargers but they’ll only recharge it at 10W.

Xiaomi also has a couple new accessories including a Charge Turbo car charger and a 10,000mAh portable battery that is also a 10W wireless charger. No prices on those yet, but they’re pretty nice pieces of kit.

Xiaomi Mi 9 specs

  Xiaomi Mi 9 Display 6.39-inch AMOLED panel 2,340 x 1,080 resolution 403ppi 19.5:9 aspect ratio Processor 7nm octa-core Snapdragon 855 Up to 2.84GHz clock speed Adreno 640 GPU RAM 6GB/8GB/12GB (China only) Storage 128GB/256GB (China only) MicroSD No Cameras Rear: 48MP f/1.75, 0.8/1.6μm, PDAF, 4:1 pixel binning, Sony IMX586 + 16MP f/2.2, 1.0μm ultrawide + 12MP f/2.2, 1.0μm telephoto Front: 20MP f/2.0, 0.9μm Battery 3,300mAh Non-removable 18W standard wired charging 27W wired charging with optional charger (bundled with 20W wireless charger) Wireless charging 20W wireless charging (with optional charger), 10W charging on Qi chargers Water resistance No IP rating Connectivity Bluetooth 5.0 NFC USB OTG Included USB-C to 3.5mm adapter GSM: B2/3/5/8 CDMA: BC0 WCDMA: B1/2/4/5/8 TD-SCDMA: B34/39 FDD LTE: B1/2/3/4/5/7/8/12/17/20/28 TDD LTE: 38/39/40 SIM Dual-SIM (dual 4G) Software Android 9 Pie MIUI 10 Dimensions and weight 157.5 x 74.67 x 7.61mm 173g Colors Piano Black, Lavender Violet, Ocean Blue, Transparent Edition

The only real surprise on the Xiaomi Mi 9 specs sheet is the absence of a variant with 12GB, 10GB, or even 8GB of RAM for the global market. The Xiaomi Mi 9 Transparent Edition, codenamed Battle Angel, will be a China exclusive at launch, packing 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. Xiaomi said it might release the Transparent Edition outside China if there’s sufficient demand, but there is no guarantee on that.

Don’t miss: The full list of Xiaomi Mi 9 specs

The blue, purple, and black versions destined for global markets only come in two versions: a base model with 6GB of RAM and 64GB of storage and another with 6GB of RAM and 128GB. You’ve also got NFC, Bluetooth 5, and dual 4G support, but sadly no microSD expansion or IP rating.

All Mi 9 units come with the Snapdragon 855 mobile platform, so expect all the usual improvements over the 845 you’d expect: 45 percent faster CPU, 20 percent increase in GPU performance and three-fold increase in AI performance. We weren’t allowed to run any benchmarks on the unit we saw, but stay tuned for our full Xiaomi Mi 9 review to see how it performs against the competition.

Xiaomi Mi 9 gallery

Final thoughts

What the Xiaomi Mi 9 lacks in superfluous “gimmicks” it makes up for in functional features we can all appreciate. Adding a third camera and introducing faster charging tech is a great addition to the Mi family. While it may not be the most attention-seeking choice among some aggressive competition, the Mi 9’s unassuming list of attributes is sure to still win over plenty of fans.

The Xiaomi Mi 9 price starts at 2,999 yuan (~$446) for the 6GB/128GB variant. The version with 128GB of storage costs 3,299 yuan (~$491).and the Transparent Edition Mi 9 with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage will set you back 3,999 yuan (~$595). Also, stay tuned for MWC 2019, when Xiaomi will announce global markets for the Mi 9 and local pricing, as well as some 5G news you will want to know about.

Hit the comments and let us know your thoughts on the Xiaomi Mi 9. Would you buy the Transparent Edition if it came to your local market?

Next: Xiaomi Mi 9 pricing, availability, and release date

from Android Authority https://ift.tt/2ScqIEQ via app promotion from Blogger https://ift.tt/2BI3zEG https://ift.tt/2tqFzl4

[ifixdallas]

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[beacon-of-joy]

the smell of space

When I was 6 and on holiday in Zanzibar, I told my parents I couldn't smell. They were perplexed, thought I was lying. Once they learned I wasn't, they moved on with their life. They had different worries at the time. After all, this was at the time where my downy six-year-old hair was tangling in thick, blond dreadlocks because I refused to brush it, and at the time where I was obsessed with digging tourist traps in the beach in front of our bungalow.

It didn't really come up much. After all, smelling doesn't figure much into your life if you can't do it. It's not as if I ever looked up from drowning my sisters barbies in a mud puddle, or from feeding imaginary horses buckets of sand, or from climbing up my garden wall to pick the shards of glass from between the coils of barbed wire at the top, just to say "wow, I wonder what the world smells like today."

There are five senses, and I always thought it would be a waste to mourn the loss of one of them when I have four of them left to enjoy. I may not know what my mother's perfume smells like, but I know the touch of her dry hand and the texture of her fingernails. I may not know what my own room smells like but I know the exact way the sunlight falls at 5:43 on the longest day of the year. I may not know how home smells, but I know its sounds and the way it fogs up my glasses when I come back home in the winter, I know the boxes of discarded cleaning materials stacked underneath the sink, I know the way my sister shouts at me when I shower too late.

Just because I can't smell it, doesn't mean it's not my home.

I spent a smell-less childhood, like growing up in a sluggish underwater world of only motion and sound. I laughed at people who pulled faces at farts and forgot to flush the toilet because I failed to recognize the foul smell, until my father, pulling out brochures of the Austrian Development Agency's Department of Hygiene, showed me the effect in shocking scientific detail.

At times, my sister would sit down next to me and try to describe the world to me, as one would describe it to a blind man. She would tell me what grass smells like, and the bread that my mother pulled out of the oven everyday in a frantic attempt to instill in us some of the Austrian love of real bread instead of letting us sink into the endless amounts of toast that passed for bread in Uganda. I would listen with the vacant curiosity of someone who has been asked to visualize an imaginary colour. I grasped at the threads that my sister handed to me and felt them snap under my fingers as I failed to understand the concept of air filling my nose instead of my lungs.

I didn't mind. At times where I got to fend off snakes with a stick and drive a car through a national park with my father's hands safely hovering by the steering wheel beside mine, what the savannah smelled like was not an immediate concern.

With the move to Austria came a sudden realization of the existence of the internet. What had until now been an entirely too unwieldy tool, a platform of pages upon pages of technology made for a world that was not mine, a world of faster and colder and less filled with beautiful distractions, became accessible overnight, faced a sudden revolution that catapulted it from the realm of "occasional" to the world of "necessary".

The snakes were replaced with online games, the avocado tree in the garden turned into pages of 0s and 1s, the sandbox dissolved into pixels and smudged screens.

My sister told me how the Danube smelled.

At 13, still not smelling the pizzeria beneath my flat or the chocolate factory beside my school, still not feeling at home in a new apartment that smelled no different from the old apartment that smelled no different from the old apartment that smelled no different from the crisp hospital bed I was first laid out in one winter night, I googled.

I googled and I googled and I found a name. Anosmia.

My parents didn't know what I was talking about, thought it had been a 6-year-old phase that had passed long ago, and realized only as I pulled up webpage after webpage of relief that I was not alone, that I simply wasn't a "phases" kid.

I waited 14 years to be dragged to the doctor, and by that time, looking at the patients in the waiting room, I preferred to be numb to their perfume.

My sister told me what hospitals smelled like.

I researched and watched documentaries, scoffed and laughed at tearful teenagers declaring on youtube how anosmia ruined them, scared them, cast them out from a crowd of able-bodied people. My friend said it was technically a disability. I laughed and denied it even the title of "illness", forcing it into the tight constraints of "thing" and allowing it as much impact on my life as a scented candle would have.

I didn't understand those who preferred tragedy and sympathy over seizing life by all its four senses and forcing it to bend into the most beautiful shape you could find.

I would scare my parents by telling them that anosmiacs are more likely to die of gas leaks or food poisoning. More likely to be depressed. More likely to fall into eating disorders. More likely to be lonely.

At 15, a doctor suggested surgery. I asked if I could think about it and lay awake all night wondering what my pillow smelled like. What my home smelled like. What my family's love smelled like.

After two days of thinking about it, I politely declined.

In the end, I was scared. I was scared of losing a part of myself by inviting something new in, I was scared of too many sensations, I was scared of the overflow, scared of being able to love people by smell, scared of tasting food, scared of digging my face into a pillow that told a story.

I realized that my father's sadness would smell of cigarettes.

At 16, I lost my appetite. Smell is 50% of taste and over 80% of appetite. In order to be able to encourage myself to eat, I need to know it's worth it. Moving out, I was suddenly stripped of a key survival mechanism. I skipped lunches, and breakfasts, and dinners, I didn't eat for four days before I forced myself to swallow down a few spoonfuls of mashed potatoes.

I looked at that checklist from three years ago, and slowly ticked the boxes. Food poisoning. Lack of appetite. Difficulties forming relationships. Sudden weight loss. Weakened emotional memory. A long list of ticks that I refused to feel upset about.

At 17, I learned that space has a smell. Despite everything, it might have been the only time I was willing to call it a "disability."

After all, there's four senses left. And I have grabbed each one and forced life into the best, most beautiful shape I have been able to find.

[billyagogo]

Samsung Galaxy Fold review

New Post has been published on https://newsprofixpro.com/moxie/2019/10/03/samsung-galaxy-fold-review/

Samsung Galaxy Fold review

Our Verdict The Galaxy Fold delivers a ‘wow’ factor that no other phone offers today, and yet we’d only recommend it to early adopters with a penchant for impressing their peers, and who have money to burn. It’s a technical marvel, with technical limitations, and it makes us hopeful for a more fully rounded sequel.

For

Supremely cool form factor

Gaming taken to the next level

Samsung’s biggest battery

Against

Outrageously expensive

Vulnerable plastic screen

Two-minute reviewThe Samsung Galaxy Fold is the most forward-thinking smartphone of 2019, finally delivering on the promise of a foldable phone, and instantly proving a real head-turner out on the streets. And yet, it’s still not something we can recommend to most people.Wherever we went with the Fold, people wanted to know what this thing was and how it worked. We demonstrated how it folds down to a 4.6-inch outer screen, and folds out out to become a 7.3-inch mini-tablet display – and it always amazed. But then the second wow-factor kicks: it’s twice the price of today’s best smartphones, and on top of that it has a troubled track record with regard to durability, which could prove a deal-breaker for many potential buyers.Samsung has refined the Galaxy Fold over the course of a five-month delay to its launch, reinforcing the points where it broke in the hands of early reviewers. But we’re still in constant fear of pixel tearing, or damaging the vulnerable plastic screen.Good news: right now the bendable screen of our Galaxy Fold review unit is as pristine as the day we unboxed it a week ago. It comes with a crease down the middle, but this is only visible when it catches glare. A bigger deal is the uneven refresh rate across the larger display: as you scroll pages, one side lags ever so slightly behind the other – it’s barely perceptible, but you can’t unsee it once you realize it’s there.The Galaxy Fold is the best example of why foldable is the future of smartphones. Its 7.3-inch screen is built for productivity. We multi-tasked with three apps open on a phone, as if this were a tablet. Editing photos is easier, gaming takes a gigantic leap, and showing someone a complicated spreadsheet is doable.Its folded size is satisfying for one reason: we loved carrying a small phone again. It’ll go unappreciated in photos, and the extensive bezel around the 4.6-inch screen makes it feel cramped; but hold this tall, chunky, yet narrow phone in your hand and you’ll swear glass phones aren’t slippery after all. We felt confident one-handing it on busy streets.The Galaxy Fold inherits the power and cameras of the Galaxy S10 Plus, which is nice, but we missed some photo and video modes offered by the Note 10 Plus – that five-month delay means Samsung’s latest and most cutting-edge phone isn’t actually its most capable camera-wise. You also won’t find an S Pen stylus tucked inside (which it wouldn’t be wise to use on a plastic screen anyway, but still). Battery life was the toughest to judge. At 4,380mAh, the battery here is Samsung’s biggest, and lasted us a day-and-a-half. But battery life varied wildly based on how long we had that big screen open – we killed it in less than a day when we tried.The Samsung Galaxy Fold feels like the biggest sensation since the original iPhone – and, really, that’s the only reason to take a $2,000 risk on it. This phone is strictly for early adopters with money to burn and a penchant for impressing, and it’ll end up in a drawer with Google Glass and other gadgets ahead of their time. Everyone else should wait for something cheaper, better, and more durable in a few months.(Image credit: Future)Samsung Galaxy Fold release date and priceDouble the price of flagship phones: $1,980 / £1,800 (€2,000)Launched in September in the US, UK and South KoreaIt was originally set to debut on April 26, 2019Two colors: Cosmos Black or Space Silver (Martian Green and Astro Blue have been axed)The Samsung Galaxy Fold release date was staggered throughout September, and getting your hands on it wasn’t easy. It first came out in South Korea September 6, and made its UK debut September 18, when it sold out immediately. There’s no work yet on pricing or availability for Australia, but you can register for updates at Samsung’s website.The Galaxy Fold US release date was Friday, September 27, five months and one day after its original April 26 launch date. During this hiatus, Samsung tweaked the hardware, but the price remained the same: very high.The Fold costs $1,980 / £1,800 (€2,000), twice the price of an iPhone 11 Pro. You can buy it through Samsung, local stores like Best Buy, or exclusive carrier partners: EE in the UK and AT&T in the US (it’s $66 a month for 30 months). Note: the UK has the 5G version, while the US is limited to 4G LTE. Samsung packs in its Samsung Galaxy Buds, giving you a bit more for your money, and offers a Galaxy Premier Service 24/7 dedicated support service by phone, video chat, or in-person visit for the lifetime of the device. Then there’s a one-year limited warranty, and a one-time $150 screen replacement fee if a wrecked display is your fault.The price is our biggest hangup. It’s hard to justify such an exorbitant price for a device that, while supremely cool, clearly isn’t time-tested and feels awfully vulnerable. We’re also kind of disappointed that Cosmos Black and Space Silver are the only two colors – gone are Martian Green and Astro Blue, the two other options from the initial launch lineup.(Image credit: Future)Foldable design and durabilityGalaxy Fold specsWeight: 276gFolded: 62.8 x 160.9 x 17.1mmUnfolded: 117.9 x 160.9 x 7.6mmOS: Android 9Main screen size: 7.3-inchResolution: QXGA+ (2152 x 1536)Cover screen size: 4.6-inchResolution: HD+ (1680 x 720)CPU: Octa-coreRAM: 12GBStorage: 512GBBattery (4G):  4,380mAhBattery (5G):  4,235mAhCover camera: 10MPFront camera: 10MP + 8MPRear camera: 16MP + 12MP + 12MPThe arrival of the Samsung Galaxy Fold gives you the opportunity to own the future of smartphones and tablets, with a 2-in-1 design that just makes sense – if the bendable screen technology holds up.It marries a tall, narrow 4.6-inch ‘cover’ display behind glass on the outside with the foldable, mini-tablet-like 7.3-inch ‘main’ display behind plastic on the inside. Samsung calls this the Infinity Flex Display, and its design really does dazzle.The key to the Galaxy Fold’s book-like foldable design is a 20-part, dual-axis locking hinge that prevents the display from overextending past 180 degrees. Whereas the screen is delicate, the hinge feels like it’s been meticulously engineered to withstand abuse.Opening and closing the Fold feels buttery smooth, and closing it ends with a satisfying magnetic click, like you’ve just closed up a book. Remember what it was like to hang up on people with a flip phone or even an old telephone? That feeling is back – only now, you’ll probably swallow them up in a video call.Also coming back is smartphone heft. In its folded state, the Galaxy Fold is 17.1mm thick and weighs 276g; for comparison, the big-and-heavy Note 10 Plus is just 7.9mm and 196g. However, it’s narrower than you might think, and despite its thickness it isn’t hard to slip into a jeans pocket – it’ll even fit into tight-yet-deep jacket pockets that other phones can’t fit into, although there’s no escaping the fact that it’ll look like you’re packing two phones back-to-back.(Image credit: Future)Unfolded, it’s a reasonable 7.6mm thick. You’ll find a fingerprint sensor, power/Bixby key, and volume rocker on the right (all accessible when the Fold is open or closed), and two speakers at the top and bottom. It’s easy to cover up these powerful Dolby Atmos stereo speakers when you’re playing games or watching videos in landscape orientation. Pro tip: instead of uncomfortably choking up your grip, try rotating the Fold 180 degrees – most apps will rotate just fine.When it’s closed, an all-glass design envelopes the phone’s outside. The glass is slippery, but we found its folded size so easy to grasp that we didn’t feel the need to use the two-piece Aramid Fiber case that came in the box. This ease of handling is one of the things that struck us the most in our testing – while everything else about the Fold has a futuristic vibe, its narrow size took us back to a time when phones were easy to hold in one hand.If you love big screens, but are tired of juggling big phones, this is the biggest phone we’ve tested… and smallest (recent phone) at the same time. It’s an idea that’s been more than 10 years in the making and, as Samsung likes to say, went through 1,000 different prototypes. It’s not a bad start, but there’s surely more innovation to come.Image 1 of 2(Image credit: Future)Image 2 of 2(Image credit: Future)Screen7.3-inch main display inside and 4.6-inch cover display outsideReading, browsing and gaming look great in 4.2:3 aspect ratioMost movies have letterboxing in 16:9 aspect ratioGreat: HDR10+ and brightness; not great: middle crease and uneven refresh rate Beyond the mesmerizing foldable design, the main display is impressive with only a few technical caveats, illustrating the cutting-edge and its obvious downfalls. The 7.3-inch display makes web browsing 1.4 times bigger than the Galaxy Note 10 Plus, and videos and games can appear 2.2 times bigger if they take up the full screen. It’s the reason to own a foldable phone. Alas, most video in the traditional 16:9 aspect ratio will only be 1.3 times bigger, with big black letterboxing at the top and bottom.We found the big screen better for reading, web browsing, and gaming thanks to its 4.2:3 aspect ratio. This mirrors the traditional 4:3 TVs we did away with 15 years ago, but going back makes sense: it offers a broader view and makes way for Muti-Active Window mode. We had three apps open at once, and it was fairly usable. Samsung has outfitted the Galaxy Fold with HDR10+, which bumps up the contrast ratio considerably on supported video content, and made it bright enough to be solidly visibly outdoors. You will find glare literally shines a light on the middle crease, indoors or outdoors, and you can feel the groove. The good news: like a notch, your brain will ignore it in time.Harder to ignore is the uneven refresh rate. Scroll through a text-filled webpage and you’ll notice the words shift unevenly across the 7.3-inch display. Samsung makes the best phone displays, so this is a compromise we didn’t expect. Its bezel-heavy 4.6-inch Cover Display also shouts “first-gen product”. Yes, the foldable future is great, but it has some obvious pain points you should know about.(Image credit: Future)InterfaceApp Continuity allows you to easily transition between screensMulti-Active Window allows you to have 3 apps open at once Samsung’s fold hardware is only half of the story. Its software was made reactive to the transition from the small phone screen to the larger tablet screen, and it does that fairly well with a feature called App Continuity.Apps Continuity allowed us to browse Chrome, Yelp reviews, and Google Maps while walking with the phone folded, and then seamlessly open up to those same apps on the larger screen when we came to a standstill (usually lost in the wilds of Central Park and needing finer directions in Google Maps). The reverse – keeping apps open when you fold the phone – is also possible, but we had to tick off each app in a display settings submenu. Apps we enabled to go from big screen to small screen included Messages, Slack, Chrome and Google Maps – things we’d want to keep using upon exiting a subway in folded mode. Otherwise, Cover Display ends things and shows the always-on screen (time, date, battery life).Samsung’s says “the possibilities are endless with Multi-Active Window”. That’s true if “endless” is defined by up to three active apps open at once. It’s cramped for sure, but we had a Google Sheet open in the biggest window, a Hangouts call going in a smaller box, and Slack in the tiniest windows to at least see the latest message from our TechRadar team. Sadly, not all apps, including Hangouts Meet, work in Multi-Active Window mode, and creating App Pairs is strangely not a thing on the Samsung Galaxy Fold – yet.(Image credit: Future)PerformanceAs fast as the Galaxy Note 10, but the iPhone 11 series is still faster12GB of RAM does even out having three apps open at once512GB of internal storage, but no microSD slot for any more spaceSamsung Galaxy Fold isn’t going to outpace the performance of current phones, as if this were a specced-out gaming desktop at an absurd price. You’re paying for the screen innovation, not the latest chipset. That said, it matches the Galaxy S10 and Note 10 performance numbers thanks to its use of the Snapdragon 855 chipset.Yes, Samsung could have opted to include the higher-end Snapdragon 855 Plus, but it stuck with the configuration announced in April. More importantly, it has 12GB of RAM that gives it a high yield when multiple apps are open.It earned a multi-core score of 2,598, according to our Geekbench 5 benchmarking tests, with only the iPhone 11 Pro earning noticeably better marks (3,420). Without any noticeable lag, your foldable phone should be good to last – internally at least. The Fold can act as an makeshift tripod when half bent(Image credit: Future)Cameras1 Cover Display camera, 2 inner front cameras, 3 rear camerasOverall quality is very similar to the Galaxy S10 PlusGreat photos with fun filters, although not ‘the best cameras’There are six Samsung Galaxy Fold cameras, and they’re all technically the same as the five S10 Plus and four Note 10 cameras. Let us explain and show you the mix.The Cover Display has a single 10MP selfie camera with a f2.2 aperture, a pixel size of 1.22 microns, and a field of view of 80 degrees. It’s the same configuration as the Note 10 front camera, only it can’t shoot Live Focus video, the Live Focus photos are just okay, and we’ve mostly used it for unlocking the phone when device is closed.When unfolded, the dual front cameras on the inside consist of the same 10MP selfie camera and an 8MP RGB camera (f1.9, 1.12 microns, and 85 degree FoV). The latter is meant for depth-sensing and comes from the S10 Plus dual camera hole-punch (the S10 Plus version is only a hair wider with a 90 degree FoV). We used this for Live Focus selfies with fun filters like the selective black-and-white Color Point mode.Image 1 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold telephoto camera lensImage 2 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold regular camera lensImage 3 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold ultra-wide camera lensImage 4 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold telephoto camera lens at night (without night mode)Image 5 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold regular camera lens at night (without night mode)Image 6 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold regular camera lens at night (WITH night mode)Image 7 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold regular camera lens Live Filter Color Point modeImage 8 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold selfie camera (tighter Field of View)Image 9 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold selfie camera (wider Field of View)Image 10 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold telephoto camera lensImage 11 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold regular camera lensImage 12 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold ultra-wide camera lensImage 13 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold telephoto camera lensImage 14 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold regular camera lensImage 15 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold ultra-wide camera lensImage 16 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold regular camera lensImage 17 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold regular camera lens at nightImage 18 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold regular camera lensImage 19 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold regular camera lens in low-lightImage 20 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold Live Focus mode with Color Point filterImage 21 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold Live Focus mode with Blur filterImage 22 of 22(Image credit: Future)Galaxy Fold Live Focus mode with Color Point filterOn the back of the Fold, the three rear cameras come straight from the S10 Plus: a 12MP regular camera (f/1.5 + f/2.4, 1.4 microns, 77 degree FoV), a 12MP telephoto camera (f2.4, 1 micron, 45 degree FoV), and the ultra-wide camera (f/2.2, 1 micron, 123 degree FoV).Samsung has the best ultra-wide camera, even with the iPhone 11 series getting a very similar 120-degree camera. Sadly, the Fold misses the upgrades that came in the Note 10 and Note 10 Plus: a slightly better f/2.2 telephoto lens, Live Focus video (it’s okay, that mode wasn’t great), and new Live Focus photo filter Big Circles.You’re going to be impressed no matter what with these cameras. The app is robust, yet easy-to-use, and launching it is still a cinch – just double press the power button. Side-by-side photo comparisons show some odd coloring and Night Mode isn’t as bright as in the iPhone 11 Pro, but no one is doing ultra-wides as well nor have filters as good as Color Point, and that makes Samsung’s cameras the most fun to use.(Image credit: Future)BatteryTwo batteries combining for a super-sized 4,380mah capacityWe averaged a day-and-a-half on average, but varied wildlyNot Super Fast Charging compatible like the Note 10 seriesRule of thumb: the bigger the smartphone, the larger the battery capacity. That rule also comes with a caveat: the bigger the screen, the more battery life the phone requires.Samsung’s 4,380mah battery capacity is its largest and so is the 7.3-inch display. The combination of big battery and big screen averaged out to a day-and-a-half of battery life with steady use in our tests. We had the main display open two-thirds of the time, and the Cover Display active one third of the time when we actively used the phone.Subsequent testing proved that we could deplete the battery in a single day by gaming a bunch, binge-watching videos, and running multiple apps at once – basically running screen-on time to the max, the way a power user would on a long-haul flight. Fold battery life varies wildly based on which of the two screens you use and for how long. You might come away with more battery life from the Samsung Galaxy Note 10 Plus, which consistently lasted us a slightly more than a day-and-half in our tests.Samsung’s Super Fast Charging is the one thing we’re missing, and that’s important for a phone with such a big battery. It comes with a Galaxy S10-era 15W charger, but the 25W charger included with the Note 10 series and the optional 45W charger aren’t just absent – they aren’t even compatible, and won’t benefit this massive phone.(Image credit: Future)Buy it if…You want to impress the world with your phoneYou can be a show off, too! We love talking technology and there was no better conversation starter than the Fold. The bendable screen provides a ‘wow’ factor like no other phone.You want to game on a great big screenWe’re more convinced than ever that mobile games will be the killer app for foldables. Going back to an iPhone afterward felt like we were playing games on a candybar-style feature phone.Don’t buy it if…You can wait for the next foldable phoneWe’re not even going to tell you ‘don’t buy this because it’s expensive’. That’s obvious. Even if you have the money, waiting until 2020 for an inevitable sequel is like a more logical choice.You just know you’ll break this thingOur Fold has survived, but anything could’ve taken it down – more than the usual suspects like keys, water, and sand, too. We’re talking about credit cards or coins lodged in the middle of the folded screen or even excessive pressure.

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