Mobile Devices - Page 74

Google debuted its new Google Home Hub last week alongside the new Pixel 3 and Pixel XL 3 smartphones, with Google Home Hub coming in at $149... and yet less than a week later Home Depot has it for $99 with free shipping.

The new Google Home Hub is a small smart display with a 7-inch touchscreen panel that is perfect for videos or social media at the kitchen bench, or in bed. It rocks all of the latest Google Home features, with Home View, the new dashboard from Google that lets you control and manage smart devices in your house.

Buy the new Google Home Hub from Home Depot for $99 right here.

Razer has just made its next-gen Razer Phone 2 smartphone official, a new phone that has a bunch of tweaks and adjustments made to it in the pursuit of making the best gaming smartphone ever.

The new Razer Phone 2 features the same 5.7-inch 2560x1440 120Hz IGZO-based LCD, a beefed up Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor, 8GB of RAM, and it starts with 64GB of storage. Razer Phone 2 also has expandable storage, so you can throw in a large microSD card - or you could wait for the 128GB version which is coming at a later date.

A big change to the new Razer Phone 2 is that the company redesigned the entire camera system from the ground up, using Sony sensors compared to the Samsung sensors in the first-gen Razer Phone. The new 12-megapixel dual-lens camera on the back are massively improved over the first-gen Razer Phone, with optical image stabilization included.

Google has just unveiled its next-gen Pixel 3 and Pixel XL 3 smartphones, as well as their new Chrome OS-based Pixel Slate tablet. The new Pixel Slate competes with the iPad Pro and Surface Pro, with some neat tricks underneath the hood.

The new Pixel Slate can be configured with five different combinations of CPUs, RAM, and storage. Google is making all models of the Pixel Slate with 8th gen Intel CPUs in Celeron, Core m3, Core i5, and Core i7 models.

Pixel Slate rocks 8-megapixels on both the front and back with the front-facing 12MP camera sporting a wide angle lens for video chat/conferences. There's front-firing stereo speakers, and a large 12.3-inch display with a native resolution of 3000x2000.

Google has formally unveiled the Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL phones today at their Made By Google event.

The Google Pixel 3 sports a 5.5-inch 2280x1080 OLED display. The Pixel 3 XL is a larger 6.3-inche 2960x1440 OLED display. A Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 chipset with the Adreno 630 GPU power both phones along with 4GB of RAM, and 64GB/128GB storage. The phones will be running Google's Android 9.0 Pie.

The phones have dual speakers and dual cameras (8-megapixel sensor, an f/1.8 lens, auto-focus, one is wide-angle) on the front. A single-lens camera (12.2-megapixel sensor, with f/1.8 lens) and a fingerprint sensor can be found on the back of the devices. Unfortunately, neither model has a 3.5mm headphone jack, but Google includes a pair of USB-C Pixel earphones. The physical composition of of the phone is made from an aluminum body, and glass casing, which will support wireless charging.

ASUS and Razer might have a stranglehold on the gaming smartphone market, but Chinese smartphone giant Huawei is rumored to enter the market with the new Mate 20, Mate 20 Pro, and the huge Mate 20X.

Huawei's purported Mate 20X is expected to be absolutely huge with a 7.21-inch OLED display and a native resolution of 2240x1080. Inside, it should be powered with the Kirin 980 SoC, 8GB of RAM, and Huawei's own GPU Turbo technology.

The company is teasing that it is hosting an event in London on October 16 for the new Mate 20X smartphone with a tease of #HigherIntelligence (so expect AI technology of course) and the #UltimatePerformance. The tweet from the official Huawei page on Twitter shows someone holding the Mate 20X and its in ice.

Apple is making some serious coin with its new iPhone XS Max, with TechInsights breaking down the new smartphone and seeing how much the components inside cost. The estimates come to $443 for the 256GB version of the iPhone XS Max, which is on shelves for $1099.

The previous-gen iPhone X in 64GB cost $395.44 in components, so the larger NAND on the iPhone XS coming in 256GB is costing more, but so are some of the other chips on the phone. The display on the new iPhone XS Max is the most expensive part of the smartphone costing $80.50 while the A12 processor and modems come in at $72 while storage is the third most expensive part of the new iPhone XS Max coming in at $64.

The cameras on the iPhone XS Max cost $44 while the housing and mechanical components cost $55, with all prices for all components being higher than the iPhone X because the iPhone XS Max is a larger phone with a 6.5-inch display.

The foldable smartphone race will begin later this year, with both Samsung and Huawei fighting to be the first to market with the world's first foldable smartphone. Huawei is now back in the news with Huawei deputy chairman Ken Hu confirming that a new foldable smartphone with 5G connectivty will be in consumers' hands in 1H 2019.

During the World Economic Forum panel, Hu said: "In our first [5G] smartphone we're going to introduce a foldable screen".

5G will usher in a new world of connectivity that isn't just blistering speed, but it will be 4K and beyond video streaming, more smartphones used during dense events without speed loses (think concerts, sports matches, etc), cloud-based AI with low latency, streaming 4K and beyond games, 10x increased cloud usage thanks to super-low latency and super-high speeds, and so much more.

The rumor mill is starting early on Samsung's next big thing with the purported Galaxy Note 10 sporting a codename of 'Da Vinci'. Samsung's just-released Galaxy Note 9 was codenamed 'Crown' and is already a feature-packed handset... but Samsung could dial things up to 10 with the new Galaxy Note.

SamMobile ponders whether Samsung will usher in a huge design change with the new Galaxy Note 10, with the site explaining the 'Da Vinci' codename "could also simply be a hint at a major design upgrade for the Galaxy Note 10 (and the Galaxy S10), given how Leonardo da Vinci's most famous work is the painting of the Mona Lisa".

Other than the new codename, we know nothing concrete on the purported Galaxy Note 10. Hell, Samsung might not even name it the Galaxy Note 10. In between now and then we are to expect Samsung to unveil the world's first foldable smartphone in the Galaxy F, which could be unveiled as soon as the next couple of months, if not we should see it unfold at CES 2019 in January.

NVIDIA has unleashed a new update to its super-popular Shield TV, which is the 20th update for the Shield TV and it is jam packed full of improvements and new features that include 120Hz monitor/TV support.

The new update to the Shield TV brings GeForce NOW upgrades in the form of in-game voice chat support for huge games like Fortnite and PUBG, where you can connect your headset and mic directly to your Shield controller and its 3.5mm jack. There are now "smoother, more accurate" mouse movements and keyboard shortcuts available to GeForce NOW that improve the gaming experience for titles like Dota 2 and CS:GO.

NVIDIA has also released a new Shield TV app that is now available for Android and iOS, something that sports a virtual keyboard and mouse that will finally reduce log-in times and typing. Awesome to see. The biggest change would have to be the 120Hz support for TVs and monitors, as well as NVIDIA providing new ways of powering off, restarting, and making your Shield TV go to sleep.

I think we all knew it was just a matter of time before the 'ZOMG the first smartphone with RGBs is here' was going to happen, and most thought it would be Razer. Well, the first-gen Razer Phone didn't push RGBs into our mobile lives, but the second-gen Razer Phone 2 looks like it will.

According to Roland Quandt of WinFuture, the new Razer Phone 2 "will (highly likely) finally have Chroma LED effects built in. They're working to use an LED controller from Texas Instruments to make this happen so the phone lights up when notifications come in". Quandt says that Razer is working with Texas Instruments on an LED controller that has been specifically designed for smartphones.

It'll be interesting to see where Razer would use the Chroma RGB effects, but it would be cool to see them used like the edge notifications on Samsung's larger Galaxy Note range of smartphones. I don't want to see RGB bling from the front of the phone, but along the edges or the back would be a nice touch that would make the new Razer Phone 2 really stand out from the crowd.

Samsung was expected to unveil the world's first foldable smartphone sometime in early 2019, but according to the new rumors it could be unveiled very soon.

Not only are we being told to expect the foldable smartphone this year, but it will be called the Galaxy F, and not the Galaxy X like the previous rumors stated. The new Galaxy F could be released sooner rather than later as Samsung wants to beat Huawei to the punch, as the Chinese giant is preparing its own foldable smartphone.

CNBC reports that Samsung mobile boss DJ Koh said: "it's time to deliver" on a foldable smartphone, after the company teased the market with the possibilities of a foldable smartphone. Koh said during IFA 2018 in Berlin last week: "You can use most of the uses ... on foldable status. But when you need to browse or see something, then you may need to unfold it. But even unfolded, what kind of benefit does that give compared to the tablet? If the unfolded experience is the same as the tablet, why would they (consumers) buy it?".

Apple is hosting its annual media event on September 12, where we should see the company announce not one, but three new iPhones. 9to5Mac reports exclusively that we'll be introduced to the new 5.8-inch and 6.5-inch OLED iPhones which will be branded as the iPhone XS.

9to5Mac is the source behind the new iPhone XS name, with the outlet reporting: "We also believe iPhone XS will come in a new gold color option not previously offered on the new design. Apple leaked its own gold version of the iPhone X through the FCC, but it has not been available to purchase".

The new iPhone XS in its 6.5-inch form will be the largest iPhone ever released, and will reportedly come in gold for the first time. The new OLED screens should bump Apple up to near, or at the very top of the mobile display game. 9to5Mac is also expecting Apple to unveil the new Apple Watch Series 4 on the same day, and I'm sure we'll see other surprises on September 12, too.

Samsung has finally made its Galaxy Note 9 smartphone official during its annual Unpacked event in New York City, confirming some of the things we already knew, some of the rumors, and a bunch of new exciting things for the Note 9.

First off: let's tackle the Fortnite exclusivity rumors - yes, the Galaxy devices have Fortnite for Android as an exclusive for "a few days" but by the time the Galaxy Note 9 actually hits users hands, that exclusive will be finished. The biggest change with the new Note 9 is that it features a much larger 4000mAh battery (Note 8 rocks a 3300mAh battery) that Samsung promises all-day battery life with, and is the largest battery to be used in a Note smartphone ever.

The display has been upgraded slightly from the Note 8, with the new Note 9 featuring a 6.4-inch Super AMOLED display with a native resolution of 2960x1440. If you pre-order the Note 9 now you'll receive a set of AKG N60 over-ear, noise-canceling headphones that are worth $299. You'll also get a Fortnite Galaxy skin and 15,000 V Bucks ($150 worth of value) - or both that you'll get for $99, a saving of $350 if you purchased them separately.

Samsung has a whole lot of hype around its upcoming Galaxy Note 9 smartphone and for good reason - it's the last flagship smartphone the company will unveil until at least CES 2019 which is when we should begin to see or hear official things about the Galaxy X, the world's first foldable smartphone.

For now, we'll deal with the latest rumor on the Galaxy Note 9 that sees it packing a huge 1TB of storage. Not only that, but Samsung will be pushing a larger battery into the Galaxy Note 9 where 'all-day battery' is being offered. We're expecting a 4000mAh battery inside of the Galaxy Note 9, up from the smaller 3300mAh battery which should provide the 'powerful all-day battery' that Samsung is teasing.

Samsung should offer up a Galaxy Note 9 with 512GB of storage and the option of upgrading to 1TB of internal storage with the expandable microSD card slot taking up to 512GB. There aren't 512GB microSD cards available in all countries, but Samsung will still be able to market the Galaxy Note 9 as having 'up to 1TB' off storage.

We all know Samsung is about to officially announce its bigger and better Galaxy Note 9 smartphone, so it should come as no surprise to see yet another leak that brings us closer to the official announcement.

Evan "evleaks" Blass is at it again, with Samsung itself publishing a pre-order announcemnet for the Galaxy Note 9 on their own website which reads: "Say hello to super power" and that first-in-best-dressed customers can pre-order the Note 9 so they can be "one of the first to experience it".

We know that the Galaxy Note 9 will feature a USB-C charging port, keeps the 3.5mm headphone jack, dual rear-facing cameras and a fingerprint sensor on the back. The newly-styled yellow stylus looks awesome, too.

Motorola held a press event at its HQ in Chicago, where the company announced the new Moto Z3 smartphone that has some world exclusive features and even a huge upgrade path.

The new Moto Z3 smartphone will be an exclusive to Verizon in the United States, with the smartphone itself rocking a 6-inch Super AMOLED display with dual 12-megapixel rear-facing cameras. Inside, Qualcomm takes care of the horsepower with its Snapdragon 835, 4GB of RAM, and 64GB of flash storage.

Motorola has something impressive when it comes to Moto Mods with the new Moto Z3, with the company announcing the new 5G Moto Mod that will be a snap-on accessory for the Z3 that will add 5G connectivity in the future. Motorola didn't discuss price, but it's an impressive thing to see - upgradeable 5G tech on a smartphone really is a next level upgrade.

A report from Sensor Tower has revealed that Fire Emblem Heroes on mobile has reached yet another milestone, coming in with a massive $400 million in revenue since it's release back in February of 2017.

Fire Emblem Heroes released on the 2nd of February last year, and when the title moved passed it's 1 year mark it had already successfully made $300 million in revenue. The recent report from Sensor Tower Store Intelligence has shown that the game has added on another $100 million to that total, which has now brought the title to the level of the most successful Nintendo game released on mobile. Fire Emblem Heroes has beaten other Nintendo mobile titles such as Super Mario Run by six times it's revenue, and Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp by nine and a half times.

According to Sensor Tower, 52% of this spending comes from Google Play and the remaining 48% from Apple's App Store. On a geographical basis, Japan holds most of the games revenue with 56%, looking towards Western markets the United States comes in at only 31%. Since Fire Emblem Heroes' release, the game has made $20 million a month for Nintendo, Sensor Tower reports that players have spent $23 million worldwide in just the month of June. For Further information regarding Fire Emblem Heroes, visit the official website here.

Turing Space Industries has teased its new concept smartphone dubbed the HubblePhone, which if it ever makes it to market would be the most elaborate smartphone ever made. We're talking dual CPUs, quad LCDs, and 5G connectivity... just for starters.

HubblePhone will pack four screens (three screens really, as the "main" display wraps aaround the back of the device) but at the end of the day you can only use two of the displays at once. Inside, there's not one but two Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 chips, a huge 60-megapixel rear-facing camera with 15x optical zoom. Connectivity wise, TSI is promising 5G.

Furthermore, HubblePhone will rock a dual OS with Android 9.9 and Sailfish 3, while there'll be dual batteries keeping everything up and working with a 2800mAh main battery in the upper deck, while the main 3300mAh battery takes care of the rest.

I'm a proud owner of Samsung's larger-than-life Galaxy Note 9 smartphone while my wife recently upgraded herself to the Galaxy S9 and I have to say I'm mad jelly at the camera improvements of the latest Galaxy S9... that is, until I read the rumors on the new Galaxy Note 9 camera.

According to SamsungMobile.News on Twitter, the new Galaxy Note 9 "can shoot 960fps for 0.4 seconds. 0.2 seconds more than the #GalaxyS9" which will be impressive. Samsung will reportedly use a dual 12+12-megapixel rear-facing camera rig on the Galaxy Note 9 while a 9-megapixel front-facing camera takes care of those all-important selfies.

Samsung's new Galaxy Note 9 will have one huge selling point according to the rumors: a larger 4000mAh battery that will pack Quick Charge 4.0 support for super-fast charging of the even larger battery. Inside, we should expect a revised and improved S-Pen that will this time, be Bluetooth-enabled.

Sony announced its new IMX586 sensor during the week, the world's first 48-megapixel camera sensor for smartphones that will be powering unknown smartphones in the future, something that could include a future flagship smartphone from Sony themselves.

Well, according to a screenshot on GFXBench spotted on Weibo, the purported Sony Xperia XZ3 smartphone could rock the new 48MP snapper. In the post the purported Xperia XZ3 is listed with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 and teases a '47 MP' camera (of which the specs are most likely misreporting since the new 48MP sensor is so new).

The massive 48-megapixel sensor would be capable of shooting stills at a resolution of 7932 x 5932, which is just incredible. Of course this rumor should be taken with grain of salt as usual, but in a world where Huawei's flagship P20 Pro smartphone has a triple-camera setup, we shouldn't be surprised if Sony uses its own next-gen sensor inside of a new flagship smartphone.