Month: September 2019

Earlier today, a regional vice president for OnePlus tweeted out details regarding the hotly anticipated OnePlus TV, revealing that it will come in a 55″ size (among others, most likely), and the 55″ version will sport a QLED panel. Also, although we were pretty sure that the OnePlus TV would be “smart” thanks to Android TV based on prior leaks, @androidtv_rumor confirms that Google has just certified a new device named “Dosa.”

Previous leaks via the Bluetooth Launch Studio (which enumerates product listings approved for use with the tech) have included model numbers that indicate that we should see up to four distinct sizes: 43″, 55″, 65″, and 75″, though only the 55″ size has been explicitly confirmed by OnePlus in today’s teaser. We didn’t know what kind of display the television might feature, but if it’s QLED, that should ease at least a few concerns when it comes to quality.

While QLED displays don’t have the crazy contrast that OLED displays do, they also don’t suffer from burn-in, and they still have better color and contrast compared to older, non-“Q” LCD/LED displays. QLED displays have historically supported HDR standards, get super bright, and can show wider color gamuts than older LED/LCD displays. For more details, check out this comparison of OLED and QLED by our friends at How-To Geek— it’s a bit old, but it explains the differences.

We were also confident that the OnePlus TV would be running Android TV, as the same Bluetooth listings described an upcoming OnePlus Product as a “unique android TV.” Today’s news that a “Oneplus_Dosa_IN” device has been certified by Google would also seem to corroborate that. Previous OnePlus hardware has gone by food-related names including “bacon,” “cheeseburger,” “dumpling,” and “enchilada.” In that vein, “Dosa” would be a perfect fit for a OnePlus device meant to land in India first, as the leaked schedule and Amazon India Twitter account imply will happen with the new TV.

More specs have been uncovered by @androidtv_rumor. They showed up on the Google Play Developer Console and mention a yet-unknown Mediatek MT5670 processor and the Mali G51 GPU. The resolution is said to be 1080p, but that’s only for ATV’s menus. Compatible content should play in 4K.

As expected, the 55″ model will be QLED with a 4K resolution and support Dolby Vision for HDR playback. When it comes to audio, the TV will pack an impressive eight speakers with a combined 50W of output, compatible with Dolby Atmos.

Interested Indian parties can sign up to be notified by Amazon on the same page, presumably for product availability or additional details.

Today is the official stable launch day for Android 10. On the same day as that launch, the OnePlus 7 and OnePlus 7 Pro Android 10 open betas are available.

While an open beta of Android 10 is certainly not the same as a stable version, OnePlus’ open betas usually are quite reliable. This means that a large chunk of OnePlus 7 Pro owners will have access to a fairly-stable version of Android 10 on the same day as Pixel owners get the official release.

Below, you’ll find the official changelog for this Open Beta 1 for the two OnePlus 7 devices. This changelog shows the differences between this first beta and the stable release of Android 9 Pie:

System Upgraded to Android 10

Brand new UI design

Enhanced location permissions for privacy

New customization feature in the Settings allowing you to choose icon shapes to be displayed in the Quick Settings

Full Screen Gestures Added inward swipes from the left or right edge of the screen to go back

Added a bottom navigation bar to allow switching left or right for recent apps

Game Space New Game Space feature now joins all your favorite games in one place for easier access and better gaming experience

Smart display Supported intelligent info based on specific times, locations and events for Ambient Display (Settings – Display – Ambient Display – Smart Display)

Message Now possible to block spam by keywords for Message (Messages – Spam – Settings -Blocking settings)

This open beta now supersedes the developer previews OnePlus has been releasing for the OnePlus 7 and OnePlus 7 Pro over the past few months, the most recent of which landed just yesterday.

It looks like Apple is playing with the idea of making the Apple Watch’s band a bit smarter.

As spotted by PatentlyApple, the company was granted a handful of patents this morning, all focused on bringing new tricks to the Watch by way of the band.

The first patent describes a sensor built into the Watch or the watch’s band that could use infrared to build a thermal image of your wrist and its identifying traits (like skin texture/arm hair) to identify who is wearing it — sort of like a fingerprint, but from your wrist.

Unlike most of Apple’s other devices, the Apple Watch doesn’t currently have any sort of built-in biometrics for unlocking — there’s no thumbprint sensor for Touch ID, or camera for Face ID. Unlocking your Apple Watch means poking at the screen to punch in a PIN (or, if you’ve configured it to unlock when you unlock your phone, doing that). A sensor setup like this could make the unlocking process automatic without the need to unlock your phone.

The second granted patent describes a Watch band that can adjust itself on the fly — think Nike’s self-tightening shoes, but on your wrist. If the Watch detects that it’s sliding while you’re running (or if the aforementioned thermal sensors need a closer look at your wrist skin) tensioners in the device could tighten or loosen the band on command.

Finally, a third granted patent tinkers with the idea of a Watch band with built-in light-up indicators — like, say, a notification light for incoming texts, or a meter that fills up to tell you at-a-glance how much distance you’ve got left on your run, or a stripe that glows yellow when you’ve got something on your calendar in the next hour. All of this can already be done on the Watch’s screen, of course — this would just allow for it without having to power up the entire display.

As always, it’s worth noting that patents being granted doesn’t guarantee that any such features will make it to the final product — just that Apple found something cool in its R&D labs, and decided to lock it down.

Apple has kept its bands relatively simple so far for the sake of keeping them swappable; they come in all sorts of materials and colors, but the electronic bits are contained within the Watch itself. Adding sensors and indicators to the band complicates that. As the user you’d have to decide: do you want the band you like the most on your wrist, or the one with the fancy notification lights?

When the first Galaxy Note launched at IFA 2011, it was quite a head-turner. Samsung wasn’t the first company to manufacture a smartphone with a huge display, but the original Note turned out to be the best concept of its kind. Moreover, the phone had an additional signature feature, the built-in stylus, which was not available on any other device. Fast-forward to 2019, and the Note line still lives, in spite of that massive Note 7 battery disaster, with the Note 10 representing the best possible smartphone Samsung can mass-produce right now.

One thing did change over the years; the Note’s most iconic feature was no longer unique. As bezels kept shrinking, smartphone vendors were able to increase the screen size on all of their devices, matching and even surpassing the size of the most recent Note. That’s why it’s not all that surprising to see Samsung launch two different Note 10 models this year. With all that in mind, Note fans might appreciate the following LG smartphone design, which is easily the best answer to a phone like the Galaxy Note 10.

The handset in the following illustrations doesn’t exist in real life. But LG is certainly studying this possibility, as it filed yet another design patent for a foldable handset. Found by Dutch-language website LetsGoDigital, the patent shows a three-sided foldable device that comes with a built-in stylus.

In other words, this LG foldable would deliver the signature features of the first Note models, including a huge display and a built-in smart pen to rival Samsung’s S Pen.

When unfolded, the LG smartphone would look a lot more like a tablet than the first foldable handsets of 2019. Neither the Galaxy Fold nor the Huawei Mate X look like regular Android tablets, featuring displays with unusual aspect ratios that require software optimizations. The LG smartphone, meanwhile, would look more like a traditional tablet.

Also interesting is the fact that the tablet features no ports or buttons, aside from the charging port, of course. This would allow LG to create a relatively thin device that would look great both in smartphone and tablet mode. The handset features two distinct hinges, including a larger one on the right side which folds around an opening that ends up housing the stylus.

Finally, the device has relatively small and uniform bezels, although there is a more prominent “chin” on the right side. That’s where the triple-lens camera is placed, and that’s a design choice reminiscent of what Huawei did with the Mate X camera. The same camera module acts both as the primary shooter and as the selfie cam, depending on how you hold the device.

That said, there’s no telling when, or if, LG will go forward with such a design. The company has not announced any plans to launch a foldable phone of its own, but it did launch a handset a few months ago that comes with a secondary screen accessory. It’s a compromise that’s doesn’t seem necessary now that technology allows vendors to make foldable handsets. But the phone proves LG wants to offer more screen real estate to its customers.

The Galaxy Fold proved that it’s one thing to manufacture a phone that behaves as expected in a controlled environment like a launch event, and quite another to have real people use the handset. This LG creation would have to be durable, above all else, before actually competing against the Note 10.

The amount of fun you can get out of Google Maps Street View is endless. Between the frequent Buzzfeed articles detailing the same funny/creepy locations to check out, the searching for your own house, and the attempts to find funny place names, Maps is more than just a navigation service. With that being said, though, most of the funny stuff has been done on a PC, as the desktop implementation of Street View is a little more feature-rich. That is until now. The Google Maps Android app was just updated to fall more in line with the browser implementation of Street View.

Previously, Street View in Google Maps on Android was triggered by opening a location’s listing or dropping a pin. Now, as spotted by 9to5Google, nestled underneath the “Map Type” and “Map Stacks” categories is a new category: “Explore,” of which Street View is the only inhabitant. Tapping this option will highlight all observable streets in blue. Once there, all you have to do is tap on the desired location in the street and you’ll be instantly shown the associated street view. For areas that don’t have Street View available, they’ll just appear in the default color, depending on which map type you’re using.

It’s a quality-of-life improvement for Android users, though I doubt that too many of us asked for it. Nonetheless, it’s nice to see Google paying attention to the finer details and bringing all mediums via which Google Maps can be accessed up to standard.

This latest feature is enabled on version 10.23.4 and above of Google Maps for Android. You can download the latest release from the Google Play Store. For iOS users, it has not yet been rolled out, so we will have to wait and see if Google brings it there as well.

All eyes will be on Apple’s headquarters in Cupertino, Calif., next week when the tech giant unveils its latest iPhones.

The tech giant is expected to launch three new iPhones at the event next Tuesday. It’ll be held at the Steve Jobs Theater on the company’s campus, according to reports.

“The main event of next week’s launch will be the flagship iPhone 11 Pro and the iPhone 11 Pro Max, as these smartphones represent the crux of improvements coming in this year’s releases,” Wedbush Securities analysts Daniel Ives and Strecker Backe wrote in a research note. “The new triple camera lens technology in iPhone 11 Pro that will work in unison for users taking pictures, along with some next-generation AI capabilities built into this year’s iPhones will be the key specs showcased, in our opinion.”

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The iPhone 11 Pro will also get a video upgrade involving real-time re-cropping technology, the analysts predict.

Wedbush expects that the base iPhone 11 will be priced at $749, with the iPhone 11 Pro priced at $999 and the iPhone 11 Pro Max priced at $1,099.

Angelo Zino of CFRA Research thinks that the three phones, which are successors to Apple’s iPhone XR, XS and XS Max, will be priced at $749, $999 and $1,199. The triple-lens camera on the iPhone 11 Pro and iPhone Pro Max could provide better 3D sensing for augmented reality (AR), better optical zoom and improved performance in low-light conditions, according to Zino.

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“All phones will come with a more powerful A13 processor from Taiwan Semiconductor, which will of course bring about better performance and efficiency,” he wrote in a research note.

In addition to three new iPhones, Zino thinks that Apple will reveal an upgrade to the Apple Watch and additional details on new service offerings. “The Apple Watch Series 5 will look like the Series 4,” he wrote. “It is believed that [Apple] will look to unveil a new ceramic casing design as well as a titanium Apple Watch for the Series 5 models.”

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Earlier this month, Apple rival Samsung unveiled its new Galaxy Note 10 phones, which use Google’s Android operating system and come with a stylus.

The organizations behind the widely used USB standard have released some new info on the latest iteration of the interface, and it’s nothing but good news for consumers. It’ll be faster and bring improved compatibility, with no need to pay close attention to which cable or port you’re using. And pedants take note: there’s no longer a space after “USB” and the number.

USB4, as it’s now styled (versus USB 4), was announced in March with a few promises regarding features, but now the actual technical specifications have been released to anyone who cares to inspect them. It’s another step in the process of bringing a major standard from idea to reality.

There are three main improvements in USB4 over USB 3 (or 3.2, or 3.1 gen2v2… the naming system is a mess):

Better speed. USB4 tops out at 40 gigabits per second, twice the speed of the latest version of USB 3 and 8 times the speed of the original USB 3 standard, which was of course itself way faster than what it was replacing. It’ll also support the max speed of previous cables and interfaces.

Universal Thunderbolt 3 compatibility. Thunderbolt 3 is Intel’s proprietary implementation of USB 3, which you’d find on Intel boards and those of any company that had licensed the tech. But Intel has come to realize that it was counterproductive to split things off like this, so they’re providing the Thunderbolt 3 spec for free. Anyone making a USB4 device or cable can make it compatible with Intel’s standard; it’s possible, but unlikely, that some will choose not to. There’s no reason for it, but who knows?

Improved display/data splitting. USB 3 introduced the ability to use a single cable to send power, data and a video signal (basically just more but specialized data) over a single cable. Great! But sometimes, depending on how you set it up, it could only send one or the other, or speeds were greatly reduced. USB4 does this much better, so if you have a monitor that uses 8 Gbps for its video bandwidth, the full 32 Gbps will be available for other purposes. It’s just one of those behind the scenes changes that will make things better and easier for everyone.

The other good news about USB4 is that it doesn’t use a new connector. We’re still in the transition period from the big rectangular port, the small trapezoidal one, the big trapezoidal one and so on, to the sleek USB-C plugs that you can’t do wrong even if you try. Changing that again would be disastrous — so the connector will be the same.

Two not-so-good pieces of news, though: It won’t be here for a while and it might be a little more expensive. These ports are complicated things and the ability to send more data, power and so on means it’s a little harder to make. And despite the spec being published today, it’ll almost certainly be at least a year before any products come out that use it.

Lastly is the name. The computing hardware industry is notoriously bad at naming stuff, and USB 3 was no exception to the rule. It was always annoying trying to figure out which version of USB was supported, what that meant and so on. So from now on, USB4 is the name until they come up with USB5.

Speaking to Tom’s Hardware, USB Promoter Group CEO Brad Saunders said they just wanted to simplify things, and prevent the profusion of products sporting version number badges that could confuse consumers.

“We don’t plan to get into a 4.0, 4.1, 4.2 kind of iterative path,” he explained. “We want to keep it as simple as possible. When and if it goes faster, we’ll simply have the faster version of the certification and the brand.”

Google today added a new setting to the iOS version of its Gmail app that will let you more easily block unwanted email tracking. The setting in question, the ability to prevent Gmail from automatically loading attached images, used to be found only on the web version of Gmail. Toggling that setting on allows Gmail to block incoming images, including invisible email trackers hiding in the body of email messages that, in most cases, will tell senders when and sometimes even where you opened the message.

This is a pretty clear response to the Superhuman controversy that erupted back in July, when former Twitter executive and designer Mike Davidson penned a blog post about the popular subscription email service that let its users track the location of a recipient and the time of day he or she opened a message. After Davidson’s blog post when viral, shedding light on an age-old and sadly pervasiveness form of privacy violation, Superhuman decided to turn its read receipt feature off by default and removed the location tracking aspect of its service entirely.

Google has built protections against non-consensual tracking into Gmail, by disabling an email sender’s ability to precisely locate a recipient via an IP address. (Google first routes incoming email messages through its own proxy servers, rendering any location tracking useless.) It has also for quite some time allowed you to disable automatic image loading to prevent any of these trackers from gathering data about you unless you deliberately decide to load an image.

But the image loading setting was previously restricted to the web version of Gmail, and that means it may have gone unnoticed by heavy mobile email users of the iOS app. Now, at the very least, you’ll be able to access this setting on your iPhone or iPad if you so choose.

As of Tuesday evening, the setting appears to be live for personal Gmail accounts, but not for enterprise ones managed through G Suite. It’s unclear if that’s because a system administrator has to enable it, or if Google is simply not supporting image blocking right now for users of G Suite. We’ve reached out to Google for further clarification.