Seth and I both got our hands on a couple new Android Wear devices today, and while you should definitely keep an eye out for our full reviews shortly, we thought we would post a couple quick unboxings. We have both the new Moto 360 (2nd generation) as well as the long-awaited Huawei Watch in-hand, and you can check out our videos below…
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When Twitter launched Periscope earlier this year, the live broadcasting app embraced the natural way to hold smartphones: it portrait mode. But video wants to be shot in landscape as it looks best on TVs and computer displays, and Periscope doesn’t want to be trapped in your phone.
Paving the way for expanding to smart TVs and immediately creating a better viewing experience on the web, Periscope is adding support for broadcasting in landscape for the first time in its latest update for Android. The update lets broadcasters shoot in either landscape or portrait mode and viewers can continue to view new landscape streams in portrait orientation.
There’s also a new Android-only enhancement called Mutual Follow:
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Now that Android Wear is officially compatible with iOS devices there’s a lot more smartwatch love to go around, at least for Apple fans. Android users have had a taste of the first generation, but Motorola’s new Moto 360 is one of the many new options available for both sides for the fence. The question is, should you give Motorola your money?
Today we’re taking a look at Sony’s new and very ambitious Xperia Z5 Premium. This is the world’s first 4K smartphone, but do all of those pixels really make a difference? Every smartphone maker is constantly trying to one-up the next, but we may have gotten to a point where it doesn’t matter anymore…
Samsung’s latest Gear S2 smartwatch is about to go up against one of the top tier smartwatches in the game. Today we’re doing a brief comparison between the Gear S2 and Apple Watch to find out which one you should buy…
Today we’re taking a look at Samsung’s new Gear S2 and S2 Classic. If you’ve been in the market for a new Android Wear smartwatch, you may want to hold out for one of these instead. The Gear S2 is standard model that looks a little sporty, but definitely feels great in the build department, while the S2 Classic will give you more of, well, a classic watch style…
Android Wear finally has iOS support after Google pushed its iPhone-compatible software to the App Store. This means that Android has beaten Apple Watch to the cross-platform game. Or, at least it would, if iOS didn’t restrict it to a state of almost uselessness. The only device officially supported is the LG Watch Urbane although — as we previously revealed — the older generation Android Wear watches do work. I got it set up with my Moto 360, and have been mostly disappointed by my experience so far.
There’s no denying the beauty of Samsung’s latest Note iteration. The Note 5 is simply amazing when it comes to its form, but how does that affect function, if at all? Today, we’re going to find out. The Galaxy Note 5 was unveiled and released within about a week and it seems to be the talk of the town in the mobile tech space, both good and bad.
Samsung’s previous iterations of the Note’s design have been more evolutionary than revolutionary, but this year that all changed. We now have a device that’s built from metal and glass, much like its smaller brother the Galaxy S6. It may prove to be quite fragile if you drop it, but damn it feels good in your hand…
ASUS announced the brand new Chromebook Flip just a couple of months ago, and we’ve been able to get our hands on it. It comes shipped with the usual essentials in a rather unremarkable brown cardboard box. But it’s the notebook itself that’s more important here. It’s an all-metal affair with a 360-degree flip-able 10.1-inch touchscreen. On first impressions, it seems fantastic.
Motorola announced a handful of new devices at an event just last month. The now Lenovo-owned company unveiled the new Moto G and two versions of the Moto X: Play and Style (or Pure). The Moto X Play is Motorola’s attempt at bringing a competitively-priced phone to the market with near-flagship specifications. For just under £280 in the UK you get a device with a full HD (1080 x 1920) 5.5-inch display, an octa-core processor and a gigantic 3,630mAh battery. It’s water-repellent, has a 21MP camera and — best of all — runs an almost vanilla version of Android 5.1.1 Lollipop.
It’s no surprise that the OnePlus One was a huge hit. Flagship specs at a mid-range price wasn’t something normal for the mobile industry. OnePlus made waves with this “flagship killer’s” announcement more than 15 months ago, and now its much-anticipated successor is available for purchase (if you can get your hands on an invite), but does the OnePlus 2 live up to the hype? Let’s go ahead and find out…
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Samsung’s Galaxy Note 5 is officially official, but what makes it such a great upgrade over its predecessor? Some may argue there’s not much, but Samsung has made improvements in some areas and compromises in others that you may want to know about before buying one. These are the top 5 features on the Galaxy Note 5…
Today we’re taking a look at the Axon phone. This thing kind of came out of nowhere: a top-spec flagship smartphone from a company you may or may not have heard of… ZTE. So what’s this Axon Pro all about? Well, let’s go ahead and find out…
When you’re taking a picture, it’s not rare for obstructions like fences and reflections to make the resulting image less than ideal. Given a few frames, though, shouldn’t it be possible to do some post-processing and eliminate these problems? That’s what Google and MIT have demonstrated in a paper entitled “A Computational Approach for Obstruction-Free Photography”. It’s fascinating stuff.
If you’re taking a picture in a window, it’s pretty common that a reflection of inside the room or car could obstruct what would otherwise be a really nice looking photo. And that’s what this algorithm seems to focus on most. The team demoes several examples of taking several frames, and actually separating the obstructing reflection, leaving a clear image of the background.
It seems to work well with photos taken through fences and other situations too, the end result providing an image of the background as well as a fairly accurate representation of what the obstruction looks like by itself. This could have plenty of applications for everyday smartphone photography, but perhaps for forensic research as well. You’ll just have to watch it for yourself. Hopefully, this tech isn’t far from being added to the Camera app.
Viber has updated its Android app to add a range of improvements based on user requests, says the company. Version 5.5 allows you to start a video call directly from your recent calls list, rich links now display content previews when links are posted into text chats – and Viber says more efficient data compression has allowed it to improve the quality of both audio and video calls while reducing data usage.
Users can also now share contacts within both one-to-one and group chats, and invite an entire group to follow a public chat.
Viber is a free download from Google Play.
Today we’re comparing Apples to Oranges. Well not really, but instead Apple’s iPhone 6 to OnePlus’s new flagship killer on the block. Question is, does the OnePlus 2 bring enough to the table in order to take on one of the most popular smartphones on the planet?
The OnePlus 2 is now official and while it features some new bells and whistles, how does it compare to the original flagship killer? Let’s go ahead and find out in our OnePlus 2 vs OnePlus One hands-on comparison…
Today we’re taking a look at something you’ve been waiting for… This is the OnePlus 2. We’re going to be unboxing it, taking a look at the hardware, features, and some camera samples, and I’ll give you what I like to call a “mini review” based on my initial time with the device…
A new video has surfaced that claims to showcase the upcoming 3rd generation Moto G. The clip, which appears to be a promo video straight from Motorola, shows the device in all of its glory and reveals several specifications.
Google today announced in a blog post on its AdWords blog that it is rolling out new 360-degree video advertisements to help advertisers “engage their audience in an entirely new way.” The feature is currently supported in Chrome and on Android and iOS. Users can navigate through the 360-degree video by either dragging their mouse or tilting their phone up, down, left, and right. Google originally unveiled 360 video support earlier this year.
Microsoft recently released its Cortana digital assistant as a beta app, and we’ve been able to get our hands on the preview. Apart from its Material-like design, the app looks, performs, and acts just like the Cortana on Windows Phone. You can ask it to set reminders, give you directions and weather information, or do simple arithmetic. It has its limitations and doesn’t feel quite as intuitive or in-depth as Google Now or Siri, but it has its uses.
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With the latest installment in the Mission Impossible series set for a theatrical release later this month on July 31st, an official Android game for the movie has just launched on Google Play.
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Googlers use their 20% in many different ways, and usually that means building a product or service they hope will someday see some amount of wider adoption. Gmail and AdSense were both built in 20% time, and now they’re two of Google’s biggest services.
Nat & Lo are going to do something a bit different. Since most people don’t ever get a chance to really see how Google ticks behind the scenes, Nat & Lo thought they would use their 20% time to show us — and they’re doing so via a newly-launched YouTube channel.
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Twitch has an interesting new update out that lets anyone on Android view live streams from anywhere on their device (pictured above). The common term for this is “picture-in-picture” – Twitch calls it “Pop Out” – or displaying one thing on the whole screen and another, completely separate feed of content or video inside a smaller viewer simultaneously, still within the main screen. Users of the app have for some time had the ability to continue watching streams while browsing the rest of the app, and this is a continuation of that.
