Microsoft plans mobile games app store to rival Apple and Google

Whether you’re lucky enough to own a brand new Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra, a snazzy flip phone like the Z Flip 4, or just one of the other best Samsung phones around, there are plenty of hacks, tips and tricks buried in Galaxy devices that you might now be aware of.

From lifting subjects out of images, to customizing your side buttons and even taking a screenshot with a palm-swipe gesture, you’ll be amazed at how many secret features there are packed into your Galaxy phone or tablet.

And okay, while we acknowledge some of the features below aren’t exactly "hidden" and that power users will already know some, we’d certainly say these were all little-known or underrated, and you may not have been aware of their existence. Even if you know your Galaxy inside and out, we’d think there's probably at least one of these tricks you didn't know about.

So, without further ado, here’s our pick of the 21 hidden Samsung features that you really should be using. 

21 hidden Samsung features that will change the way you use your phone

1. TAKE SELFIES USING VOICE OR HAND GESTURES

Like them or not, selfies are a part of everyday life now. And whether you take 50 of them a day or, like me, one per year at Christmas, Samsung phones have a cool way to make snapping selfies a lot more versatile.

To activate selfie gestures on your Galaxy, open the Camera app then tap the settings cog in the top-left corner. Scroll to the bottom and tap "Shooting methods." Next, tap the toggles next to "Voice commands" and "Show palm."

Now, you can activate the shutter by saying "smile," "cheese," capture," or "shoot"  — this works with both the front and rear-facing cameras. To take a selfie or record a video using gestures, simply hold up your palm to the front-facing camera, or say "record video."

2. CUSTOMIZE GESTURES EXACTLY AS YOU WANT THEM

Samsung already allows you to swap the traditional three-button navigation option at the bottom of the display in favor of the more modern swipe-gesture system. But if you find those gestures too limiting, the One Hand Operation +(opens in new tab) app from Samsung lets you completely customize how gestures work on your phone.

I personally use this to put my gestures on the each side of the display —  you can swipe inward to go back, down and diagonal to go to the Home screen, and up and diagonal to see recent apps. I find it so much easier to simply swipe from the sides of the gigantic display on my Z Fold 3, instead of having to contort my hand toward the bottom of it.

However, this app is so versatile, that it lets you trigger practically any action with a gesture. For example, a diagonal swipe from the top of the screen could launch the torch, skip to the next music track, or even open a virtual touchpad.

3. CREATE A SECURE FOLDER TO KEEP STUFF PRIVATE

Did you know that Samsung phones have their own secret vault, known as the Secure Folder? It's a sort of second space where you can either move files or apps from your "main" phone space, or just use as its own private area.

To set up the Secure Folder, go to Settings and scroll down to Biometrics and security, then scroll down again to find Secure Folder. Simply tap Agree, sign in with your Google or Samsung account and then set up how you want your Secure Folder to be secured. The Secure Folder app will then appear in your app drawer. Once it's set up, you can download apps exclusively to the Secure Folder, since it is treated as a separate space.

It may be a good idea to shift all of your banking apps to the Secure Folder, as this would add an extra layer of security in case your phone were left unattended. You could also use it to store those secret things you'd be embarrassed for others to see — such as a copy of Candy Crush, in my case.

4. SPEED THINGS UP BY REMOVING ANIMATIONS

Though there's another way to speed up your Android phone or tablet by tweaking the options in Android's developer menu, Samsung has something similar built right into the OS. You can turn off the animations on your device, such as when you open or close apps, which make it seem more snappy in daily use.

It's worth checking out this option if you're looking for a speed boost, as it does make a huge difference. However, it may affect how some apps operate, so luckily it's easy to revert back if you notice any issues.

To activate this feature, open Settings and scroll down to Accessibility, then tap Visibility enhancements. Next, tap the toggle by Remove animations to turn the feature on. If you notice this causes issues, you can easily turn it off again in the same way.

5. LIFT SUBJECTS OUT OF PHOTOS

 

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

 

If you're using One UI 5.1, you can lift a subject straight out of a photo. This is a super handy feature for quickly copying image elements onto your clipboard, or even saving them as a new image. This trick works in a similar way to the iPhone's Visual Lookup, which was one of out favorite iOS 16 features, so it's great to see it now on Samsung too.

To lift a subject out of an image, open an image, then tap and hold on an element to cut out. A short animation will show you that the subject has been cut out. Release your finger and you'll be given options of what you want to do with the cut out, such as copy it to clipboard or save it as a new image.

6. FIT MORE APPS ONTO YOUR HOME SCREEN OR APP DRAWER

If you find that you need a bit more space on your Home screen or app drawer, you can easily increase the amount of apps you can squeeze on there. Just open the Home screen settings menu by pinching in with two fingers on the Home screen then tap Settings. Next, tap Home screen grid or Apps screen grid and resize them as you see fit.

7. LOCK YOUR HOME SCREEN LAYOUT

If you're forever accidentally shifting the carefully arranged icons on your Home screen around, there's an easy way to put a stop to this. You can lock the Home screen, meaning you can't remove or move any of the apps until you unlock it again.

To do this, open the Home screen settings menu by pinching in with two fingers on the Home screen and then tapping Settings. Now, tap the toggle by Lock Home screen layout to activate this feature. If you want to unlock it again, simply tag the toggle.

8. SWIPE TO CALL OR MESSAGE CONTACTS

 (Image credit: Samsung)

Though this feature has been a part of One UI for years now, it's surprising how many people I meet don't know about it. What's more, it's one of those things that you don't realize how useful it is until you don't have it — something I discovered during my time using a Pixel 6 Pro.

You can swipe left on a contact in your address book or recent list to message them, or swipe right to call them. This is something so simple yet so intuitive, that every smartphone should have it.

9. GET THE CAMERA OR DISPLAY TO FLASH FOR NOTIFICATIONS

Tucked away in the Settings menu is the ability to get your camera's flash or display to illuminate whenever you receive a notification or your alarm sounds. This feature is perfect if you're unable to hear your phone or don't want it to vibrate, for whatever reason.

To enable it, head to Settings, Accessibility, then Advanced settings. Next, tap Flash notification. You can tap the toggle by each setting to turn it on or off, and even choose which apps it applies and what color you'd like the screen to flash.

10. CUSTOMIZE YOUR SIDE KEY SETTINGS TO MAKE SHORTCUTS

Did you think your phone’s side button was just for locking? Think again. By customizing your Samsung device’s side button, you can set up new functions and shortcuts besides just the standard controls.

This is a great way to make your phone easier and quicker to use, as you can assign a commonly used function to the button for rapid access. You can set the button to quick launch the camera on a double press, for example. It’s also possible to have this feature open an app of your choice, meaning you can get to your most used app with just a couple of presses. 

To enable this feature, open Settings and select Advanced features, then tap Side key and toggle on Double press before choosing the key assignment. 

We’ve covered this in full with our guide on how to change side key settings on a Samsung Galaxy device.

11. DOUBLE TAP THE DISPLAY TO TURN IT ON AND OFF

If you want to open or close your phone quickly without having to press the power key, you can simply double tap on the screen to wake it up or turn it off. This is particularly handy if your hands are wet, or if you're like me and are too lazy to lift your phone up from the nightstand to check your notifications in the morning.

To activate this, head to Settings, Advanced features, then Motions and gestures. Tap the toggles by Double tap to turn on screen and Double tap to turn off screen to switch them on. You can also toggle Lift to wake, which turns your screen on when you raise your phone.

12. MUTE INCOMING CALLS OR ALARMS BY FLIPPING YOUR PHONE OVER

 (Image credit: Future)

Sick of your alarm having the audacity to try and wake you up as requested? If you don't want to fumble around in the dark to try and silence it, you can just flip your phone over or put your hand over the screen to mute the alarm. This also works with incoming calls, silencing them instead of canceling them.

To turn this feature on, head to Settings, Advanced features, then Motions and gestures. Now, tap the toggle by Mute with gestures to activate it.

13. ENHANCE VIDEO CALLS WITH BACKGROUND EFFECTS

 (Image credit: Samsung)

It's not just Zoom that lets you blur your surroundings or choose an exotic backdrop. Samsung's video call effects feature lets you natively do the things that were previously the reserve of dedicated video call apps, applying background effects to calls on Duo, Messenger, Meet, WhatsApp, and more.

To activate this feature, go to Settings, Advanced features, then tap the toggle by Video call effects. Now, if you tap on the words Video call effects, you'll see a bunch of options, including the ability to choose your default background color or choose an image for your backdrop.

Once you make a video call, you'll notice a new icon in the top-right. Tap the icon to view your in-call background options, as well as the ability to enhance the microphone for improved clarity.

14. USE YOUR PALM TO TAKE A SCREENSHOT

This is another one of those features that's been part of Galaxy phones forever now, but which many people don't know about. While it's easy to take a screenshot on a Samsung phone by using the usual volume down+power button combo, there's a much more intuitive way to do it — by swiping the screen with your palm.

To switch this feature on, go to Settings, Advanced features, then Motions and gestures. Now, tap the toggle by Palm swipe to capture.

To test it out, simply place your hand sideways on either side of the display and swipe inwards. If you never knew about this feature, you'll wonder what you ever did without it.

15. ACCESS ALL YOUR QUICK SETTINGS WITH ONE SWIPE

Samsung phones contain a load of handy toggles in the Quick Settings panel , such as the ability to quickly turn Wi-Fi or Bluetooth on or off, or activate flight mode. And while you can organize this section to put your five favorite ones up top, there are so many in there that it's usually easier to just expand the entire panel. 

Usually, this involves swiping down from the top of the screen twice in succession. However, you can instantly access the full Quick Settings menu by swiping down once with two digits. This is actually a feature that's been part of Android for a long time now, though one that's not widely known.

16. ENABLE RAW PHOTOS

RAW photo files take up much more space than uncompressed JPEGs. For this reason, it's pretty common for phones to only save images as JPEG by default. If you've got a Samsung phone like the S23 Ultra with a 50MP sensor, it makes sense to make the most out of the high resolution images by saving them in RAW to capture as much detail as possible and give you flexibility when editing.

To enable RAW photos, open the Camera app and tap the Settings cog, then tap Advanced picture options. Tap Pro mode picture format and then select RAW & JPEG or just RAW. Now, switch to Pro mode in the camera app and you'll be able to shoot in raw.

17. RUN TWO COPIES OF WHATSAPP, MESSENGER OR TELEGRAM

With many Samsung phones coming with dual-SIM capabilities these days, Samsung's Dual Messenger feature really comes in handy if you don't want to carry two phones with you anymore. This feature basically makes a clone of the most popular messaging apps, putting a separate copy on your phone that allows you to log into it with a different account from your main one.

To use Dual Messenger, open Settings and scroll down to Advanced features. Then scroll to the bottom and tap Dual Messenger. You can select which app you'd like to clone, then the copy will appear in your app drawer. Cool, hey?

18. CUSTOMIZE PRACTICALLY ANYTHING WITH THE GOOD LOCK APP

(Image credit: Tom's Guide)

If you're the type of person who likes to tinker, the Good Lock app is made for you. This first-party app from Samsung lets you change practically anything on your device, from the icons on your taskbar to the appearance of your always-on display clock. Think of it like your very own custom ROM maker —  except one that won't void your warranty.

You can download Good Lock from the Galaxy Store(opens in new tab), though it's not available in all regions, unfortunately. We like this app so much, that we recommended it as the first app you should install on your Samsung Galaxy phone.

19. ENABLE DEVELOPER OPTIONS TO BECOME A POWER USER

Perhaps the most powerful of your Samsung device’s hidden features is the Developer options menu. Accessible on all Android devices, the Developer options menu allows software developers access to a range of features which general users won't usually need, for the purposes of developing new software and applications.

However, while most people won't need the hardcore features within Android's developer options, that isn't to say there aren't some cool settings that might improve your experience using the device. Learning how to enable Developer options on Android allows you to do things like speed up your Android device using animation scaling, force your display's maximum refresh rate, always keep your screen awake while charging and show visual feedback to your finger taps.

To access the Developer options menu, open Settings and tap About phone. Then tap Software information and tap Build number 7 times. When prompted, enter your device passcode. Now, go back to the main Settings menu, scroll down and tap Develop options.

20. SET UP EASY MODE FOR NEW USERS

If you or someone you known has just picked up one of the best Samsung phones as their first smartphone, you'll definitely want to know how to set up Easy Mode on Samsung smartphones. 

Easy Mode on Samsung smartphones replaces the default home screen with a simpler one with larger text, which is perfect for smartphone newcomers, as well as young or elderly users.

Easy Mode also adds a delay to the touch-and-hold response time, helping avoid mistaken touches. And it makes the keyboard easier to see by applying a high contrast theme to it, though this only applies if you're using the default Samsung keyboard.

To set up Easy Mode, open Settings and tap Display, then scroll down and tap Easy mode. Finally, toggle on Easy mode. Open your home screen and you will now see it is more simplified, with just a handful of apps listed. Like the regular home screen launcher, you can add more apps to the home screen by tapping and holding on an app in the main app list and dragging it to the home screen.

21. USE THE BUILT IN DOCUMENT SCANNER

 (Image credit: Tom's Guide)

If you need to scan something quickly on the go, or if you have no traditional scanner at home, you can use the Samsung built-in document scanner.

In fact, scanning documents with a Samsung phone or tablet is perhaps more effortless than using an actual scanner, since it simply involves using the camera app built in to the device.

It isn't perfect, of course, and won't produce high quality scans like one of the best printers, but it's definitely usable in a pinch.

To use the document scanner, open the Camera app and point your camera at the document you want to scan. Tap the yellow 'T' icon and drag to choose the area you want to scan, then tap Save.

Source

There are several new features and improvements announced with DP2, including selected photo access, credential manager, safer implicit intents, and improvements to background work.

Just like on iOS 14, Android 14 users can now grant apps access to only selected photos and videos, instead of the full library of all on-device media. When an app requests for media access, the new popup dialog will give users three permission choices: Allow access to all photos, Select photos, and Don’t allow.

Android 14 will also add Credential Manager as a platform API that will allow developers to retrieve and store credentials with user-configured credentials providers. The API will not only support passwords but also allow apps to sign in using passkeys, which is the industry standard for passwordless sign-in.

In terms of optimizations, the new preview includes improvements to Android's memory management system to improve resource usage when the applications are running in the background. Background work will be disallowed outside of conventional Android app lifecycle APIs such as foreground services, JobScheduler, or WorkManager. Google is pushing hard on making Android 14 a perfect operating system for foldables, building on the work done in Android 12L and 13. There's a new large screen gallery that contains design inspiration for social and communications, media, productivity, shopping, and reading app experiences.

Android 14 also introduces various new PackageInstaller APIs that will allow app stores to improve their user experience, including the requestUserPreapproval() method that allows the download of APKs to be deferred until after the installation has been approved, the setRequestUpdateOwnership() method that allows an installer to indicate that it is responsible for future updates to an app it is installing, and the setDontKillApp() method that can seamlessly install optional features of an app.

Android 14 brings new app compatibility features that are intended to make Android updates a less tedious process for developers. Devs now have more time to make necessary app changes as most app-facing changes are now on an opt-in basis. Google is expecting Android 14 to reach platform stability in June 2023 that will give developers several weeks before the official release for performing final testing.

Developers can test the developer Preview 2 with their apps on the Android Studio SDK Manager to make them ready for the next Android update, Developers can also flash a system image on supported Pixel devices starting today, that include the Pixel 7 Pro, Pixel 7, Pixel 6a, Pixel 6 Pro, Pixel 6, Pixel 5a 5G, Pixel 5, or Pixel 4a (5G).

You can learn more about Android 14 Developer Preview 2 on the official blog.

Android 14 Developer Preview 2 is now available to download

Here is his description:

Im on the A train in NYC and I got a glimpse of a Google employee with the pixel fold. The phone is very nice. The bezels on the outside are super thin. The guy is doing everything he can to cover up. He has a dark blue, black colour phone. I am surprised at how thin the phone is.

The images he uploaded are very blurry, reportedly because the subway train was moving and the leaker didn't want the Google employee to see him taking photos. There's really just one image that shows the reported Pixel Fold in something close to a full view. However, you can still see what looks like the outside screen used in the folded landscape mode.

Of course, all of this could be a very elaborate prank, so take this with a grain of salt. However, it would not be the first time that someone spotted an unannounced new mobile device being used in the wild.

With Google I/O coming up on May 10, 2023, that would seem to be the best place and time to debut the Pixel Fold. Previous alleged leaks claim the phone will be heavier compared to other foldable phones, and that it might cost as much as $1,799.

Someone claims to have seen the Google Pixel Fold on a New York City subway train

What Do Experts Say on the 6G network?

One of the initiators of the 6G network is Xavier Lobao, Head of Future Telecom Projects Division, ESA. Even though 6G isn’t defined yet, they’re working on an experimental satellite that will be placed in orbit. They want to test how extraterrestrial satellites will work with terrestrial satellites.

Nicolas Kourtellis, Principal Research Scientist and Co-Director at Telefónica Research, stated that the data transfer will be 500 times faster with the 6G mobile network. He also stated that we’re entering an era in which most things will be automated, i.e., not attended by humans. So, it’s not surprising that 6G was the focus of the Mobile World Congress 2023 in Barcelona.

6G Is More Than Communications

‘’6G is more than communications’’ proclaimed Tony Yong Jin, Huawei Vice President of the European Region, at the MWC. Experts are aware that 6G isn’t still defined in the terms of architecture and other features, but it will be more than a network for improved communications. However, experts say that 6G won’t be available until 2030.

Moreover, Yue Wang, 6G research head at Samsung Research UK, claimed that 5G mobile networks won’t be sufficient soon for this rapid increase of technology and devices. This specially refers to VR and AR since telecom companies are working on providing new  Not just that, it will be environmentally acceptable. 

What are the potential risks with the 6G network?

 The first important concern when we talk about 6G is any potential security risk. Since the experts are working on interconnection and trying to enable connectivity for almost everything, without a precise definition of 6G, it would be hard to test all potential security threats.

In addition to this, we mustn’t ignore the possible effect of 6G mobile networks on our environment as well as on our health. According to recent studies at the University of Massachusetts, training of AI emits the same amount of carbon dioxide as five cars during their whole lifetime. Postdoctoral researcher at ETH Zurich, Samizadeh Nikoo, claims that 6G won’t have serious effects on our health due to the fact that terahertz penetrates into the surface of our skin by around 0.1 mm.

6G Sounds Promising 

After reading all this about the 6G mobile network, I’m sure that it’ll change the way we perceive the internet, technology as well as our ways of communication and work. Who won’t try holographic communication and pretend that they’re the crew of Star Trek? The only thing that we can do is wait until 2030 and see whether their promises will become true.

How Will 6G Change the World?

iOS Shortcuts Automation takes this functionality to the next level, making it even more enjoyable to trigger a shortcut. Although there is a bit of a learning curve to creating your own shortcuts, there are plenty of premade shortcuts available that have been created by others. In this article, we'll explore a few of the most useful shortcuts that can help streamline your daily routine.

How to use shortcuts

When you first open the Shortcuts app, you'll notice that there are no shortcuts available. To find premade shortcuts, you can tap on the Gallery tab located at the bottom right of the app, which provides access to Apple Team's pre-built shortcuts. However, this post will focus on adding shortcuts from sources outside the Gallery.

It's worth noting that Apple deems these shared shortcuts "untrusted," and you must enable the allowance of untrusted shortcuts in your Settings to import them. If you've never run a shortcut before, you may find that the option to allow untrusted shortcuts is greyed out. In this case, you can follow the steps below to import shortcuts:

Step 1: Open the Shortcuts app and create a new shortcut by adding any action to it.

Step 2: Run any existing shortcut.

Step 3: Navigate to Settings > Shortcuts and turn on the option to allow untrusted shortcuts.

The 10 best iOS shortcuts of 2023

Loader

If you find yourself frequently downloading media files from social media sites, there is a helpful shortcut available for iOS users. This shortcut allows you to easily download videos, photos, and audio from a wide range of social media platforms, including YouTube, Snapchat, Dailymotion, Flickr, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and more.

Apple Frames

The Apple Frames shortcut is a convenient tool for adding a variety of frames to your screenshots. Initially, you will be presented with a small set of frames to download, including all the sizes and colours of iPhone 14 and the iPad Pro 12.9". What's more, you can easily add your own custom frames without having to edit the shortcut itself. Simply copy your desired frames to the Shortcuts/Screenshot Frames/ folder in your iCloud Drive and select the Scan Frames folder option in the Configuration menu when running the shortcut. The shortcut can even rotate frames to accommodate both portrait and landscape images.

YouTube PIP

If you're an iPhone user who is unable to watch YouTube videos in Picture in Picture mode despite having YouTube premium, don't worry - the YouTube PIP shortcut is here to help. This shortcut allows you to open YouTube videos directly in Picture in Picture mode from either the YouTube app or Safari, even without a YouTube Red subscription. You can also control the video playback speed and quickly jump forward or backward in the video. To use this shortcut, simply install the free Scriptable app from the App Store. No additional setup is required.

Reverse Image Search

The Reverse Image Search shortcut is a useful tool for easily searching for anything related to an image, without the need for specific keywords. Simply run the shortcut to select the image you want to search for, or go to the Photos app to select a photo and run the shortcut from the Share Sheet. This shortcut is a great option for anyone looking to perform a reverse image search quickly and efficiently.

Icon Themer

If you've ever wanted to create custom home screen icons, you may have previously resorted to creating a shortcut to launch the app and adding the shortcut to your home screen. However, the downside to this approach is that themed icons would first open the Shortcuts app before launching the actual app.

Thankfully, iOS 14 introduced a new feature that allows you to create profiles that launch apps without any redirects (except for system apps). This is where the Icon Themer shortcut comes in handy. By using this shortcut, you can create a single profile for all of your icons instead of having to create multiple shortcuts. Additionally, you can import themes instead of manually choosing an icon for each app, and even share your created profiles with others. This is a great way to customize your home screen while streamlining the process.

Seamless Clipboard History

The Seamless Clipboard History shortcut is an excellent tool to help you manage your clipboard more efficiently. Consisting of two shortcuts, "Save to Clips" and "Get Clips," this shortcut is easy to use and highly effective. You can run the "Get Clips" shortcut to copy multiple items to your clipboard, which you can then paste later as needed. Overall, this is an incredibly useful shortcut that can help you streamline your workflow and boost your productivity.

Meme Generator

If you enjoy creating memes, this shortcut is the perfect tool for you. It allows you to create amazing memes by either uploading your own images or using the templates provided. It's important to note, however, that this shortcut will temporarily add your custom image to your Dropbox and send a public link to that image to https://memegen.link. Once the image is uploaded, it will be removed from your Dropbox. Overall, this is a fun and easy-to-use shortcut that can help you unleash your creativity and share your memes with the world.

Ultimate Spotify Shortcut

This shortcut offers a range of features for Spotify users beyond just playing music, including utilizing Spotify's API for a more comprehensive experience. With this shortcut, tasks related to Spotify are made much simpler and efficient, offering users greater flexibility and control. Additionally, the implementation of Spotify API allows for expanded functionality and customization options.

Combine Images

This shortcut offers a simple yet useful function for combining multiple images into one. It can be launched directly to select photos or via Share Sheet when choosing selected images. The shortcut offers the option to arrange the images vertically, horizontally, or in a grid, and provides a preview of the combined image before giving the user the option to save it or start over.

Image Recognition

This shortcut can be particularly helpful for individuals who are visually impaired. It allows you to take a picture or use an existing image and identifies objects within the picture. While it may not be perfect in identifying every object, it can still be a useful tool for those who are blind or have low vision.

10 Useful iOS Shortcuts to Simplify Your Life

Dashlane

Passkeys are used to authenticate or authorize access to a system or device. They are phishing-resistant credentials based on FIDO standards and are called "the future of online authentication." Big companies like Google, Apple, and Microsoft have implemented the technology to protect their users against malicious activities.  Last month, Google introduced the new Android 14 Developer preview. One of its most exciting new features is allowing third-party applications to manage passkeys on devices.

Android users could only benefit from the built-in app before, but the latest news state that this will change with Android 14.

Dashlane recently released a blog post revealing that it will offer passwordless logins without needing Google's built-in password manager. The company says, "this is the first Android iteration that enables password managers to manage passkeys, and we anticipate the public release later this year." Dashlane already has a passkey extension on Chrome, but Google and Apple only allowed passkey synchronization to platform vendor ecosystems such as iCloud Keychain and the Google Password Manager, which kept Dashlane out of the mobile platform. If you want to know how it works, Dashlane posted a short video on Twitter showing the process.

How does passkey support work?

Dashlane mentions that there are two flows that it needs to implement. First, you create a password and save it in the encrypted Dashlane vault. Then you sign in with an existing passkey. It is considered one of the safest practices against online data and information theft. Creating a passkey helps you protect your account with a generated asymmetric pair. The company includes, "when signing in with a passkey, the relying party will send a challenge that Dashlane will sign with the private key, sending the response back to authenticate the user."

According to Google's announcement, Android 14 will go live later this year, and the public release is set for August 2023. Since it is a new feature, it will take time for other applications to adopt the new system, but in the near future, third-party passkeys will be more popular as more apps and users start using it.

Source

Commenting, Nabila Popal, a research director for IDC’s Mobility and Consumer Device Trackers, said:

“With increasing costs and ongoing challenges in consumer demand, OEMs are quite cautious about 2023. While there is finally some good news coming out of China with the recent reopening, there is still a lot of uncertainty and lack of trust, which results in a cautious outlook. However, we remain convinced the global market will return to growth in 2024 once we are past these short-term challenges as there is a significant pent up refresh cycle in developed markets as well as room for smartphone penetration in emerging markets to fuel stable long-term growth.”

Android devices are expected to see a larger decline in shipments as a percentage this year than iOS devices. IDC says that Android shipments will fall by 1.2% while iOS device shipments will fall by 0.5%. This could be accredited to the fact that many Android devices are bought due to their lower price tag and people interested in these low to mid-range devices simply do not have money to buy a phone this year given the rampant inflation that is raising the cost of living in countries across the world.

While this is bad news for phone manufacturers, IDC did manage to find some positive things to report. It said that this year 5G devices will account for 62% of smartphones shipped and that the foldable phone market is continuing to grow. It also noted that the average selling price of smartphones has risen from $334 to $415 in 2022, however, this figure will begin to decline this year and reach $376 – this is great for people on tight budgets who will be searching for a device to buy at an affordable price in the near future.

Global smartphone shipments expected to see decline this year to 1.19 billion units

Mobile World Congress, the annual trade show dedicated primarily to the mobile communications industry, has returned to Barcelona. While not the first year of MWC since the pandemic started (it is now officially called MWC, maybe because Mobile World Congress sounds about as exciting as a legislative body), 2023 was the first with the truly bustling halls we remember from 2019 and before. 

What was announced there? True, manufacturers have got into the habit of revealing their top devices at their own events—but there was still plenty of new tech to tout at MWC 2023. Here are some of the highlights.

Lenovo ThinkPads Get a Rethink

Photographs: ANDREW WILLIAMS

Proving that “mobile” doesn’t have to mean mobile phone, Lenovo announced a bunch of refreshes of its brilliant, if reassuringly expensive, ThinkPad lines at MWC 2023. 

The ThinkPad X13 Gen 4 gets new-generation Intel Core I-series processors and, as senior product manager Matej Misturik explained, one of the heats vents has been moved to the rear. This stops the laptop from overheating if the underside is blocked. 

Lighter weight and an OLED panel bring a little 2023 gloss to one of the most respected business laptop lines. 

Want more obvious gloss? Lenovo Thinkpad Z13 Gen 2 line flips the order of priorities, as a high-end ultraportable with ThinkPad elements. At first glance, not much has changed here bar the use of 7000-series AMD processors. 

However, Sensel tells us its haptic touchpads replace those of the rather vague-feeling Thinkpad Z13 Gen 1. “Lenovo wasn’t happy with their solution, for a variety of reasons, so we were able to slot in for Gen 2,” says Sensel’s Mark Rosenberg. “You want a crisp click feel that fires and then dampens very quickly, to more closely emulate a mechanical button—otherwise it feels and sounds buzzy, which isn’t pleasant.”

From a quick play I had, the Thinkpad Z13 seems to have a much more substantial, better-grounded touchpad feel than its predecessor. However, it still doesn’t have quite the keyboard key travel as the more traditional Thinkpad X13.

Motorola’s Rolling Phone

Photographs: ANDREW WILLIAMS

Laptop refreshes are conventional, but Lenovo-owned Motorola had something potentially tastier to show: new kind of flexible phone. Instead of being foldable, it’s rollable. 

In its standard orientation the rollable concept phone has a 5-inch screen. This becomes a 6.5-inch screen when you double-press a button on the side. With a brief motor whir, the extra display appears as if from a scroll, having before formed a second screen on the back.   

The Motorola rollable concept bears the name Rizr, evoking memories of the Motorola Razr series, but the maker actually had a Rizr slide-up phone way back in 2006. Its screen can also shift down a touch to reveal the front selfie camera. And if you’d rather use the rear one for selfies, you have the excess screen to use as a preview window if you like. 

Instead of a fat phone that turns into a mini tablet, the Motorola Rizr concept is a small-screen phone that turns into one with a more normal-size display (with extra benefits).

Motorola also showed off a rollable laptop, with a screen that retreats behind, or into, the screen hinge. Neither of these will go on sale as they are, but may be a sign of gadgets to come.

OnePlus Keeps Its Cool

Photographs: ANDREW WILLIAMS

OnePlus continues the show's concept trend with another phone you won’t be able to buy, but perhaps should pay attention to. It’s a demo of a new liquid cooling solution called Active CryoFlux that OnePlus says can reduce device temperatures by up to two degrees when gaming. 

This demo device itself doesn’t feature this cooling, and is instead intended as a visual demo of the kind of liquid channels such a system will use in the future. In action it looks wild, as if an OLED screen under the surface were displaying little oxygen bubbles heading through a maze of tiny tubes. 

This is, we are assured by OnePlus, actually a mix of water and oil, with some mica power for good measure. LEDs light up the liquid inside, which moves heat away from the core components. 

Cooling is the theme of the show for OnePlus, as it also demo’d an even more unusual active cooling device for phones. A pads clamps onto the pack of the phone, and this connects to a box similar in size to a larger external hard-drive enclosure.

Within a few seconds it had made the back of a OnePlus 11 downright cold, and it uses thermoelectric cooling interface to make this happen. Heat is then transferred from this plate interface to cooling fluid that runs through the system’s cabling, pushed around by a motor in the base unit.

OnePlus claims it can reduce temperature by 20 degrees Celsius (68 degrees Fahrenheit), and it uses up to 45W of power doing so. It’s not the most practical solution to thermal throttling in most situations, particularly as it need to be plugged in, but is is a novel one. There’s no word on when this device will be out or how much it will cost just yet.

Lastly, the brand announced that it's got its first foldable phone coming later this year. "We want to launch a device that aims to be at the pinnacle experience of today’s foldable market,” said Kinder Liu, president and COO of OnePlus at the show without offering any other information.

Huawei’s Cyber Watch

Huawei has also been playing around with odd forms of mobile tech, and showed off what comes across as a companion piece to the Huawei Watch Buds—the smartwatch whose face flips open to reveal a pair of true wireless earphones. 

This is the Huawei Watch GT Cyber, a watch where the strap forms a complete casing for the core, including the bezel. Its entire outer can be replaced, and is indeed  replaced when you switch straps. The actual brains, which Huawei bafflingly calls a “stainless steel movement” despite the whole thing being free of any analog watch moving parts, pops out and looks rather like a pocket watch. 

Two of the strap casings come in the box, and the feature set here is similar to that of a Huawei Watch GT 3, leaning more on the sports and fitness side than smarts. It’s also water resistant to 50 meters. The Huawei Watch GT Cyber is only available in China and SE Asia at the moment, and costs around £180 ($218).

Honor Vs Xiaomi: High-End Phone Face-Off

Photographs: ANDREW WILLIAMS

More interested in tech you can actually buy? MWC also saw the launch of a pair of true big-hitter phones. 

Honor unveiled the Magic 5 Pro, a high-price model for the Magic series that costs €899 ($954) in Europe. It has a Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 processor and sparkly textured glass back. But the cameras stay the spotlight here, not least because they are arranged so drastically across its rear. 

These are a trio of 50-MP sensors, an ultrawide, a 1/1.22-inch sensor primary camera, and a 3.5x optical zoom that can be stretched to 100x magnification. And it debuts some new AI software from Honor that claims to be able to capture crisp shots of fast motion. 

The Honor Magic 5 Pro was shown off alongside the company’s Magic Vs foldable phone, which was announced in China back in November. 

Photographs: ANDREW WILLIAMS

Xiaomi one-ups Honor with a phone that, at arm’s length, looks more conservative: the £1,099 ($1,329) 13 Pro. It joins the still-small cohort of phones with 1-inch camera sensors. Once again it’s part of a trio of 50-MP rear cameras, including a 3.2x zoom lens that bears the Leica name. However, it will also need top-tier processing software if the Xiaomi 13 Pro is to challenge the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra and iPhone 14 Pro.

Xiaomi's AR Glasses With Near 'Retina-Level' Display

Photographs: ANDREW WILLIAMS

Phones a little too pedestrian for your tastes? Xiaomi’s prototype AR glasses might appeal. The Xiaomi Wireless AR Glass Discovery Edition were only shown off behind a wall of plastic, but the hardware inside sounds promising.

The lenses are made of electrochromic glass, able to black out the outside world if necessary, if not with the absolute occlusion of a Sony PSVR 2. A mini LED display sits in front of each eye, capable of 1200-nit brightness and sharpness almost at the level where the individual pixels themselves are not perceptible—58 pixels per degree.

It uses the Qualcomm Snapdragon XR 2 Gen 1 processor, the same found in the Meta Quest Pro. While we were not able to get a first-hand preview at what the headset is like to use, it’s a preview of what the next wave of AR hardware might look like.

Nokia's Repairable Budget Phone

In most respects the Nokia G22 is unremarkable. It’s a plastic phone with humble specs that doesn’t cost much, just £169 ($205). However, the way it is put together is highly unusual. This is a phone you are meant to be able to repair, and Nokia has teamed-up with iFixit to offer kits to replace the battery and the screen.

Having once spent the equivalent of a full day of work attempting the latter on a “normal” smartphone—with only partial success—I can tell you this is a handy feature. I took apart the Nokia G22 at the company’s MWC 2023 stand to replace the battery. And I timed it. Even with some tutorials from the iFixit rep thrown in, I managed to take apart the G22 and put it back together in under six minutes.

Sure, you have to disconnect the fingerprint scanner ribbon cable, which feels (like all these cables) extremely fragile. And, sure, there are a couple of fiddly little mounting plates that could ping themselves under a couch. However, the process is an order of magnitude easier than it is in a standard smartphone, where the core parts of the phone are glued together.

Here, though, the outer case and inner parts are clipped together. As a result, the Nokia G22 has a pretty dismal water-resistance rating of IPX2. Still, alongside the Fairphone series, repairablility is rarely made such an active concern. iFixit told me replacement batteries will cost €25 ($27), and kits with tools included are €30. For the battery replacement, I only needed a small crosshead screwdriver, a guitar plectrum-like lever and a little poker to help shimmy out a couple of components.

All the Best Gadgets We Saw at MWC 2023

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Take a look at the notch, for instance. The iPhone got it, then the others simply had to. It’s almost like children pestering their parents about the other kid having the latest new toy, and parents giving in. 

One of the latest occurrences is the “Dynamic Island” in 2022. What is it, you might wonder? It’s just a small part of your screen that lets you see notifications, and can be expanded or contracted accordingly. Visually, it looks like an on-screen notch in its normal size, so to speak. This island item is like so hot that you can even download it for Android.

Of course, all the other big phone crybabies just had to have it, and speculation abounds. The most certain news is that Xiaomi decided to incorporate this design into its Xiaomi 13 Lite phone.

In reality, Xiaomi had done this before with its Xiaomi Civi 2. However, the Xiaomi 13 Lite will be the first phone from the company to offer this feature worldwide. It’s still unknown what extra features the “island” will have. What is known is that the phone will have a centered pill-shaped cutout with a 32 MP selfie shooter and an 8 MP depth sensor.

In the tech department, the Xiaomi 13 Lite is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Gen 1. This is a mid-range chipset with better performance than the Snapdragon 778G. It’ll be available with 8 GB of RAM and either 128GB or 256GB of internal storage.

On the back, the Xiaomi Lite has a triple-camera setup with the Sony IMX766 being the highlight, with 50 MP. The set gets complete with an 8 MP ultrawide camera and a 2 MP macro one. The ultrawide has 119 degrees of field-of-view, which is, well, ultrawide. Besides, the sensor offers natural bokeh effects.

The screen is a 6.55-inch AMOLED with HDR10+ and Dolby Vision for all you phone-movie enthusiasts out there. What’s more, it has Full HD+ resolution and a refresh rate of 120 Hz. The back of the phone is made of glass, and the screen comes with Gorilla Glass 5.

Its IP53 rating makes it able to withstand water spray and dust, so no underwater photo shooting with this one. 

The Xiaomi 13 Lite has a 4,500 mAh battery with fast charging, which is almost like its bigger brother the Xiaomi 13. The main difference in this department is that the latter offers wireless charging too. It supports WiFi 6, Bluetooth 5.2, and NFC depending on the region. The operating system is MIUI 14, based on Android 12.

It’s very lightweight at only 171 grams and 7.23 mm thick. It comes in three colours, lite blue, lite pink, and black. You in? The 128GB model will set you back about $500 and it’ll be available from March 8.

iPhone clone or iPhone killer? Who knows, but it sure looks like a very capable device.

Xiaomi 13 Lite: The iPhone clone has been released at MWC 2023

ShrimpApplePro claims that Apple is working to expand its MFi program for USB-C. They added that Foxconn is already mass-producing accessories like EarPods and cables. This further strengthens previous rumors of Apple working to restrict the iPhone's USB-C port. For the uninitiated, MFi (Made for iPhone) is Apple's hardware certification program for original iPhone accessories. Buying MFi-branded accessories prevents users from purchasing counterfeit products while also bringing in profits for Apple.

The program is currently available for accessories based on the Lightning interface. MFi-certified Lightning ports and connectors come with a custom chip that's used to prove they're Apple-approved. If the said rumor turns out to be true, iPhone's USB-C accessories would get the same treatment.

It's yet to be known exactly how much difference the software limitations would create if Apple chooses to go with it. An already existing twist in iPhone's USB-C story was added by Apple analyst Ming Chi-Kuo last year. They predicted that the lower-end iPhone 15/15 Plus would retain the current Lightning/USB 2.0 speeds while the higher-end iPhone 15 Pro/Pro Max "will support at least USB 3.2 or Thunderbolt 3."

Governments and organizations, like the EU, have picturized a common charger for mobile devices to curb e-waste and are working to make the required laws. While a majority of Android manufacturers have switched to USB-C, Apple is yet to play its part and ditch the Lightning connector once and for all.

Source: ShrimpApplePro via MacRumors

Here's how Apple might profit off of iPhone's upcoming USB-C port

Xiaomi doesn't seem to waste a second when it comes to flexing its fast-charging tech front of the world. Its latest feat is the new 300W wired fast charging demo where it charged a Redmi Note 12 Pro+ smartphone in just 5 minutes. It's faster than Xiaomi's own 210W charging on the Redmi Note 12 Discovery Edition.

Surprisingly, the news comes not long after realme showcased 240W fast charging on the realme GT Neo 5 smartphone. But now, Xiaomi seems to take the lead. As per the company's data, the power meter managed to display a peak input power of 290W during the demo.

The Redmi Note 12 Pro+ (fitted with a 4,100 mAh battery) used in the demo reached zero to 50% charge in around 2.2 minutes and got 100% charged in 5 minutes. That's a three-minute gain in comparison to Xiaomi's previous fast-charging demos.

Back in 2021, it took around 8 minutes to fuel up a 4,000 mAh battery using the company's 200W fast charging tech. However, while the five-minute charging time looks impressive on paper, there is no word on other important factors like how it would affect the battery's charging cycles. Also, Xiaomi is yet to reveal when (or if) its new 300W fast-charging tech would be mass-produced and launched in the market.

Via Engadget

Xiaomi raises the bar with 300W fast charging demo, charges phone in 5 minutes

The latest update does not contain new features nor integrate the mighty AI-powered Bing. Still, the new UI is a welcome change for the app that looked significantly outdated compared to modern applications and other Microsoft products on iOS.

Here is the official changelog for version 23.2.1:

Introduction to our new and improved Microsoft Translator user interface!

This major update includes a new and revised UX that allows you to start translating quickly. Select your language pair, and the app will give you access to available actions such as language translation, image translation, and text translation.

The new image translation feature has an updated backend and enhanced language support.

The new conversation feature has an updated backend, enhanced language support, and allows you to transcribe/translate real-time conversations. At the end, you will have access to the transcription and chapters to simplify navigation within transcripts.

Bug fixes and general improvements.

Microsoft Translator is available on iPhone and iPad, and you can download the service from the App Store.

Microsoft revamps its Translator for iOS with new UI and improved backend

These days Martin Cooper frets like everybody else about his invention’s impacts on society — from the loss of privacy to the risk of internet addiction to the rapid spread of harmful content, especially among kids.

“My most negative opinion is we don’t have any privacy anymore because everything about us is now recorded someplace and accessible to somebody who has enough intense desire to get it,” said Cooper, who spoke with The Associated Press at the telecom industry’s biggest trade show in Barcelona, where he was receiving a lifetime award.

Yet the 94-year-old self-described dreamer also marvels at how far cellphone design and capabilities have advanced, and he believes the technology’s best days may still be ahead of it in areas such as education and health care.

“Between the cellphone and medical technology and the Internet, we are going to conquer disease,” he said Monday at MWC, or Mobile World Congress.

Cooper, whose invention was inspired by Dick Tracy’s radio wristwatch, said he also envisions a future in which cellphones are charged by human bodies.

It’s a long way from where he started.

Cooper made the first public call from a handheld portable telephone on a New York City street on April 3, 1973, using a prototype that his team at Motorola had started designing only five months earlier.

To needle the competition, Cooper used the Dyna-TAC prototype — which weighed 2.5 pounds and was 11 inches long — to call to his rival at Bell Labs, owned by AT&T.

“The only thing that I was worried about: ‘Is this thing going to work?’ And it did,” he said.

The call helped kick-start the cellphone revolution, but looking back on that day Cooper acknowledges, “we had no way of knowing this was the historic moment.”

He spent the better part of the next decade working to bring a commercial version of the device to market, helping to launch the wireless communications industry and, with it, a global revolution in how we communicate, shop and learn about the world.

Still, Cooper said he’s “not crazy” about the shape of modern smartphones, blocks of plastic, metal and glass. He thinks phones will evolve so that they will be “distributed on your body,” perhaps as sensors “measuring your health at all times.”

Batteries could even be replaced by human energy.

“You ingest food, you create energy. Why not have this receiver for your ear embedded under your skin, powered by your body?” he imagined.

While he dreams about what the future might look like, Cooper is attuned to the industry’s current challenges, particularly around privacy.

In Europe, where there are strict data privacy rules, regulators are concerned about apps and digital ads that track user activity, allowing technology and other companies to build up rich profiles of users.

“It’s going to get resolved, but not easily,” Cooper said. “There are people now that can justify measuring where you are, where you’re making your phone calls, who you’re calling, what you access on the Internet.”

Smartphone use by children is another area that needs limits, Cooper said. One idea is to have “various internets curated for different audiences.”

Five-year-olds should be able to use the internet to help them learn, but “we don’t want them to have access to pornography and to things that they don’t understand,” he said.

As for his own phone use, Cooper says he checks email and does online searches for information to settle dinner table arguments.

However, “there are many things that I have not yet learned,” he said. “I still don’t know what TikTok is.”

Source

Android users can now manage their notes and to-do lists with a new Google Keep widget. The widget can be added to both the Home screen and the watch face. The next feature is support for annotations on PDFs in the Google Drive app, which can be done with a stylus or simply your fingers on the touch screen.

Google Meet app on Android now offers noise cancelation during calls on more Android mobile devices. For those who are into the Androidverse, Fast Pair will allow you to connect your Bluetooth headphones to your Chromebook with a single tap. Bonus if you already have set them up with your Android phone, then the headphones will connect to the Chromebook automatically (just like on iOS, finally!)

Gboard users can rejoice as Google has added new emoji combinations via Emoji Kitchen that lets you remix various emoji, and share them as stickers (or images for apps that don't support stickers). Google Wallet also has some new animations that will confirm that your in-store transactions are successful, with a friendly twist.

Google has also added some important accessibility features. Users can increase the size of content on Chrome by up to 300% to suit their vision preferences while keeping the page layout the same. Wear OS 3+ will be getting a mono-audio mode that will help users limit disorientation. There are also colour-correction and greyscale modes that will help users with visual impairments.

Google will be showing off many of these features and a lot more at the MWC Barcelona, 2023. To learn more about the updates coming to Android, click here.

Google announces a bunch of new Android features ahead of MWC 2023

Announced today, just ahead of Mobile World Congress 2023, HMD Global revealed the Nokia G22. It's been designed to allow owners to replace certain parts, including its 6.52-inch display, 5,050 mAh battery, and charging port.

HMD Global has partnered with phone repair company iFixit with this new initiative for the Nokia G22. Phone owners can buy repair kits and replacement parts from iFixit. Using these kits, parts, and included manuals will give G22 owners tools the ability to remove and replace the selected parts quickly.

HMD Global says that if owners make their own repairs to these parts with the tools and manuals supplied by iFixit, it will be considered an authorized repair. That means it will not affect the Nokia G22's warranty. The repair kits will only be available for now to Nokia G22 owners in Australia, the UK, and European Union countries.

The other hardware specs of the Nokia G22 include a Unisoc T606 processor, 4 GB of RAM, and 64GB of storage, with a micoSD card that will allow up to 2TB of additional storage to be added. It will also have a 50MB main rear camera, a 2MP depth camera, and a 2MP macro camera, along with an 8MP front-facing camera. Unfortunately, the phone will come with the old Android 12 OS out of the box, but HMD Global is promising it will get two years of OS updates and three years of security updates.

Android Authority says the Nokia G22 will launch on March 8 in the UK for £149.99, or around $179. So far, no plans have been announced to release the phone in the US. Hopefully, this will just be the first in a lineup of Nokia phones that will be owner-repair friendly, and if successful, we could see other smartphone companies join this trend.

Source: HMD Global via Android Authority

The latest Nokia phone has a feature most smartphones don't have

Nokia has announced one of the first budget Android smartphones designed to be repaired at home allowing users to swap out the battery in under five minutes in partnership with iFixit.

Launched before Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Saturday, the Nokia G22 has a removable back and internal design that allows components to be easily unscrewed and swapped out including the battery, screen and charging port.

Nokia phones manufacturer HMD Global will make “quick fix” repair guides and genuine parts available for five years via specialists iFixit, in addition to affordable professional repair options.

“People value long-lasting, quality devices and they shouldn’t have to compromise on price to get them. The new Nokia G22 is purposefully built with a repairable design so you can keep it even longer,” said Adam Ferguson, head of product marketing for HMD Global.

Nokia G22 is a fairly standard Android phone with up to 128GB of storage. Photograph: Nokia

The G22 is partially made of recycled plastic and has a 6.53in screen, large-capacity battery, 50-megapixel camera and a fingerprint scanner. It runs Android 12 and will be supported for three years of monthly security updates and two major Android version upgrades.

HMD Global hopes to ride the wave of increasing consumer desire for longer-lasting and more repairable devices. It follows in the footsteps of pioneers such as the Dutch manufacturer Fairphone, but at more affordable prices and with far simpler processes than Apple’s recent DIY repair programmes.

The Nokia G22 will cost from £149.99 shipping on 8 March with replacement parts costing £18.99 for a charging port, £22.99 for a battery and £44.99 for a screen.

Guides will help users safely take apart the phone with a screen replacement taking approximately 20 minutes. Photograph: Nokia

Alongside several other low-end smartphones, HMD also announced it would begin the first steps of manufacturing 5G devices in Europe in 2023. Though light on detail, it aims to reduce the carbon footprint of locally sold devices and to enhance security, starting with a device for security-conscious industry before progressing to consumer devices.

“The Nokia brand has a proud history within the European market, and with this move we are continuing to strengthen our position as the only major European smartphone provider,” said Jean-Francois Baril, co-founder and chief executive of HMD Global.

Source

Also:  The latest Nokia phone has a feature most smartphones don't have.

Very much true. Looking at both S22 Ultra and S23 Ultra, even at a close distance, you could be forgiven for thinking they are the same phone. Samsung has opted to keep the front and back design the same this year, and along with it has ported the aesthetic to the rest of the S23 line-up, which now ditches the chunky camera bump in favour of a baby S23 Ultra design, you can finally tell they are the same family, but with rounded corners.

In the hand is where the S23 Ultra feels different to the S22 Ultra. Thanks to the flatter side frame, and less curved edges of the AMOLED display, I find that the new model feels a bit more comfortable and has a more reassuring grip. The boxier design now reflects more of what the old Note series ended up like before that line was axed.

The other more subtle difference is that the side buttons, whilst still in the same position, are slightly flatter and more satisfying to press. The S22 Ultra's thin buttons always felt a bit sharp in comparison. A nice ergonomic upgrade for sure.

This year, a few new colours are on the table, we have the online exclusive colours, which no longer need an additional four weeks to be delivered. There is Sky Blue, Lime, Graphite and Red, which is the one I opted for. In the flesh, the red looks like burnt orange, or under sunlight, salmon. It has a petrol-like gleam as light plays on the surface. It's a very nice colour to look at and isn't as deep a red as the official marketing images show.

Then there is Green, Lavender, Cream and Phantom Black. Samsung says all of the colours consist of natural dyes embodying "Earth tones", as well as the use of recycled materials. Looking into a bit more detail I found out that this is just a bit of PR speak. here's what Samsung's fine print says about the use of natural dyes and recycled materials:

"The S Pen inner cover located within the S Pen slot contains a minimum of 20% ocean-bound polyamide (PA). The front and back glass contain an average of 22% recycled content. The back glass deco film contains a minimum of 80% recycled content. The above measurements are based on weight. Dyes for anodizing the metal frames are made of 10% natural dye." - Samsung.com

The other change for 2023 is the S-Pen, not the specs of it, but more the aesthetic. While the S22 Ultra came with an S-Pen body colour that matched the online exclusive colour purchased, the S23 Ultra's exclusive colours do not have a matching S-Pen, and instead, you get a black S-Pen body. The clicky top only changes colour to match the middle frame, which is either silver or black. It is nice to see that the frame itself remains matte black, as I am not a fan of the normal colours which have a glossy frame finish which does show fingerprints and smudges.

Specifications

On paper, the specs are closely reminiscent of the S22 Ultra, too, but there are some key differences, especially with the camera specifications. At first glance, you might be fooled into thinking that Samsung has just slapped a 200MP sensor into the new model and called it a day. In practice, this is certainly not the case.

The new sensor has more refined pixel binning. It is not about shooting at 200MP, because just like the S22 Ultra's 108MP sensor, shooting at this maximum resolution you lose some key features that would otherwise be available in normal mode, such as being able to switch lenses.

The S23 Ultra also has a 50MP mode, a middle-ground that still produces excellent results, but at much smaller file sizes and less time to process the final image. You still have some of the restrictions noted above, but on the upside, HDR capture is possible in this mode, so you could benefit from using this for higher-resolution images where you know you will be cropping in on the details.

The 16-to-1 pixel binning is worth talking about in order to understand why this matters. For those who may not be aware, here is how Samsung describes the new pixel binning tech dubbed "Tetra2pixel".

Both S22 Ultra and S23 Ultra output a final 12MP image by default, so the same resolution and similar file sizes, yet the S23 Ultra is able to capture more detail, is sharper across the whole frame and can be edited further in software if desired thanks to the extra dynamic range the new sensor affords; especially in low light which Samsung claims can be as low as 1 lux to focus in, or the equivalent of a single candle in a dark room.

For reference, the S22 Ultra's 108MP sensor does 8-to-1 pixel binning. To better visualise how these numbers translate into real-world images, look at the handheld night-time photo I shot below during a walkabout. The S22 Ultra is on the top, S23 Ultra is on the bottom.

Before

After

High-resolution copies can be viewed of the above for both S22 Ultra and S23 Ultra, as well as in the samples gallery at the end of the review.

Performance

Qualcomm's Gen 2 chipset has the Adreno 740 graphics processor built in. This GPU supports modern technologies like hardware ray tracing. I'm not a mobile gamer at all, but I went on a hunt to see if I could grab a copy of a game using modern engine technologies.

Currently, there are three games in development for Android that support ray tracing, Arena Breakout (Tencent Level Infinite), Justice Mobile (NetEase Thunderfire Studios), War Thunder Edge (Gaijin Entertainment).

I installed Arena Breakout Beta on the Play Store at a whopping 2.1GB+ download and gave it a go. No problems worth mentioning, the game felt like it was running at 60fps. I did however note that the graphical settings, possibly due to being beta, could not be maxed out, it auto-lowers some settings.

Samsung's Game Booster utility which is available when you launch a game was quite useful at displaying remaining battery life estimates and you can increase or decrease this by setting the game priority.

Next up, Geekbench achieved some nice results, even in the Light performance profile which adds a few more hours of battery life/screen on time (more on this later).

Standard performance mode:

Light performance mode:

The GPU performance is essentially the only thing that differs between both performance modes. I noticed no difference in usage when in Light mode. The Galaxy S22 Ultra did not provide a Light mode, only "Optimised" and "High" modes, so it is nice to see that focus on efficiency has been implemented with the new series without sacrificing the user experience.

As we are talking performance, the fingerprint sensor remains the same Qualcomm 3D Sonic Gen 2 from last year. This sensor boasts very quick reads and reliable accuracy. Samsung did not need to change anyhing here because the S22 Ultra already had a solid reputation in this area. I have yet to have an issue with scanning accuracy, regardless of whether my hands were hot, cold, dry or wet.

The Battery

The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 SoC is a much more efficient chipset than previous versions. Not only that, but it is also more powerful as it is, and Samsung's custom version comes slightly overclocked out of the box. When this news broke, many online feared that this would result in worse battery life, some claimed that Samsung was chasing performance numbers once again, but this could not be any further from the truth.

The fact is that this new chipset, combined with the LTPO2 AMOLED display and software refinements, has resulted in battery life that puts the Galaxy S22 Ultra to shame. Keep in mind that both phones have the same 5000mAh battery. Take a look at my direct comparison, with both the Light and Standard performance modes against the S22 Ultra's first full charge that I recorded last year.

Not only has the screen on time dramatically increased but the background and active app power usage has decreased. I have installed the exact same apps and use the phones the exact same way on the same mobile and Wi-Fi networks for reference. This sort of battery life takes me back to the Sony Xperia Z3, a phone that could consistently get 2 days from a full charge, although not quite catch the 9 hours screen-on time of the S23 Ultra when pushed hard.

I no longer need to take day trips out with battery anxiety. I use the camera a lot when travelling and only carry a slim power bank capable of charging 3500mAh, not a full charge but merely a top-up when needed on the S22 Ultra. For me, the S23 Ultra is a game changer.

I also noticed that using Wireless Android Auto is less power-hungry than on the S22 Ultra. The phone gets less hot, and even in my pocket for quick drives, the phone does not heat up to the point where it closes apps down to stop the heat generation as I discovered once when driving with wireless Android Auto on the S22 Ultra.

I have yet to mention charging, and for good reason. It remains unchanged from the S22 Ultra. We still see 15W wireless charging, and 45W wired using a PPS-compatible wall charger. Those who don't want to buy the expensive Samsung charger can buy something like an Anker 313 on Amazon. The only slight refinement in charging worth mentioning is that charging to 70% takes just 30 minutes from empty, which is exactly the same as the Galaxy S22 Ultra. Only the 10 and 20-minute charge times see a slight improvement in percentage, but nothing to write home about.

With all this in mind, then, I see no reason the average user could not achieve a 2-day battery life when in the Light performance profile mode. Best of all, nothing is sacrificed either, which is a bonus!

Camera

Let's get the 200MP elephant in the room out of the way first. Yes you can shoot in 200MP, but as a photographer myself who has used the S22 Ultra since launch for all styles of photography, I would recommend not using these high-resolution modes in most instances. The exception with the S23 Ultra is that the 50MP mode has HDR capture to some degree, as well as detail retention when viewed 100%.

Below I will now show an example of the default 4:3 mode which is 12MP, 50MP and 200MP in a low-light desktop setting with only overcast window light coming in from the right, typical of what the vast majority of people will experience on a day-to-day basis. Notice that the 12MP example has the best exposure balance due to using the 200MP sensor's binning capabilities to best effect, and as a result, the HDR is just more balanced.

The first thing I wanted to try out was the Samsung Expert RAW app which is available from the Galaxy Store, this has been out for some time now, but with the increased dynamic range of the S23 Ultra's main sensor, I knew that RAW files would be much easier to reclaim lost detail in both highlight and shadows, and in a way feel more like how I process my DSLR RAW files.

These were processed in Lightroom Mobile, which on the S23 series is a special edition designed for Galaxy it seems. It integrates with the Expert RAW app by offering a button in the image preview that imports and loads a captured shot directly into Lightroom Mobile.

I also wanted to make sure that a similar dynamic range was possible on the ultra-wide camera (left image) as well, and I am happy to report that both ultra-wide and main cameras offer a similar dynamic range. Both examples are available to view in high resolution in the gallery at the end of this review.

Zoom quality at 4K 30fps is also very good. There is a lot of detail retained, especially in the highlight areas that the S22 Ultra would often overexposure, even in low light shadow areas we see plenty of detail. Below is an example of a night clip I shot down at the local waterfront as a large cruise liner sailed past. Notice the detail retention as the camera zooms in, and how clean in general the image is (ignoring some YouTube compression!).

New to the S23 Ultra is HDR in 4K video up to 60fps, but sadly at the time of writing, 4K 60fps does not support changing lenses whilst recording, you must pick a lens and then hit record, but not during. Once a lens is picked and recording has started, you have limited digital-only zoom. This could be fixed with a software update as Samsung has done similar in the past. Nevertheless, 4K 30fps is perfectly usable in low light and is very clean and detailed as shown in the clip above.

Closing thoughts

Other reviews said that if you already have an S22 Ultra, then the S23 Ultra may not be a worthwhile upgrade. This might be true for some people, but as an owner of both, I have seen the big benefit of doing the upgrade, and that is battery life. It just so happens that the camera is much better too, especially in low light.

For many people, then, an S23 (not just the Ultra) is a no-brainer. We finally have a Snapdragon Galaxy flagship available in all markets - And it's a good one. The Ultra sees a genuine 2-day battery life for moderate users, whilst heavy users can easily get through a whole day without having to enable the additional power savings modes. The new Light performance mode does not sacrifice performance in any area I could notice, and with that comes a boost in battery life as well.

It feels like all the complaints we had for the S22 Ultra have been refined to be better on the S23 Ultra, and if history repeats itself, then the camera will just get better and better with updates over the coming months as this is what happened with the previous Galaxy S flagships as well.

The software experience remains like before, although now at One UI version 5.1, which was recently rolled out to the S22 series as well. The same baked-in Samsung apps from last year make a return to the S23 series. And just like before, I had to disable Game Launcher, Chrome, and Microsoft OneDrive, as I do not use these and they cannot be uninstalled, only disabled.

Some features of One UI 5.1 are exclusive to the S23 series, however, such as long pressing on an image, video or GIF in the gallery and being able to cut out people, animals and objects using AI:

The only real sticking point for a lot of people will be the price of these new phones. A starting price of £1249/$1199 is a huge sum of money for a phone. I remember when the top tier model of any given flagship used to be around £850, this wasn't that long ago... Thankfully various interest-free payment plans exist and Samsung has a trade-in scheme that offsets the cash outlay, along with the usual discount codes available online as well. So maybe the eye-watering cost isn't as high when these are factored into a purchase.

To conclude then, the S23 Ultra is a superb phone with a battery life that has exceeded expectations, plenty of camera improvements, especially in low light, and subtle ergonomic changes that improve usability. Yes, the design is the same as last year, but it is unobtrusive, inoffensive, and fits the phrase 'form and function' nicely. For once, all the models in this generation of Galaxy S line look like they are from the same family, and that is a good thing.

Review: Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra, making 2-day battery life a genuine possibility

The Defy Satellite link gives any Android or iPhone an instant upgrade with the ability to send and receive text messages via satellite, solving the problem of mobile dead zones for emergencies and wilderness adventures.

Announced ahead of the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona and produced by the British phone manufacturer Bullitt under the Motorola brand, the Satellite link connects to a normal smartphone via Bluetooth and uses an app to send not only SOS messages but general two-way chat via texts.

The lightweight, credit card-sized puck will ship from about April, costing £99 on its own or £149 when bundled with 30 messages a month and an SOS assistance service from FocusPoint for the first year. It connects to geostationary satellites via a new MediaTek chip to send SMS to regular phones with replies sent using the cross-platform Bullitt Satellite Messenger app. A button on the side can also send an SOS alert with location without needing to connect to a smartphone.

The Satellite link is water- and dust-resistant, lasting several days for each charge. Photograph: Motorola/Bullitt

Satellite phones have been available since the 1990s, typically at high cost for purchase and use. Now advancements in radio technologies have allowed integration of some basic satellite functions into traditional smartphones. Apple’s iPhone 14 can send SOS messages via satellite, while the chipmaker Qualcomm recently announced a similar service would be available for high-end Android phones in the second half of 2023.

But both options require buying new phones at high cost and cannot be shared within a family – a market Bullitt hopes to capture with its cutting-edge device that brings down the cost of satellite services, making them more widely available.

“The Motorola Defy Satellite link, combined with the Bullitt Satellite Messenger service, brings accessible and affordable satellite messaging to everybody’s current smartphone,” said Bullitt co-founder Dave Floyd. “This is the definition of democratising satellite communications.”

The Cat S75 is designed to survive 1.8m falls onto steel plates, high pressure water to depths of 5m and extremes of temperature. Photograph: Cat/Bullitt

Alongside the puck, Bullitt also announced the Cat S75 rugged smartphone, which has the same satellite communications system built into it, costing £549. The Android is the continuation of Bullitt’s long-running rugged phone business aimed at first responders, rural workers and off-grid hobbyists.

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Defy Satellite Link can connect with a smartphone over Bluetooth and provides two-way texting functionality using the Bullitt Satellite Messenger app. Bullitt said the messages sent using the device are routed via geostationary satellites that are 22,300 miles away from the earth. That means, it can easily provide much-needed communication in areas with limited or no cellular connectivity.

The universal Bluetooth accessory weighing just 70g also allows users to share their location and contact emergency services when in need. It offers a physical SOS button and a location 'Check IN' button, and these functions can work even when the paired smartphone is not nearby.

Under the hood, Motorola Defy Satellite Link is powered by a Mediatek chip for satellite communication and comes with a 600 mAh battery that can survive for multiple days. The list of connectivity features also includes eSIM, GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, Bluetooth 5.1, and more.

It's a rugged waterproof and dustproof device that comes with an IP68 rating. It has also passed the Mil-Spec 810H testing which considers factors like how the device performs during steep temperature changes and resistance to vibration and humidity.

Now, speaking of the price and availability, Motorola Defy Satellite Link will go on sale in April this year with a price tag of $99. There will also be a bundle option (starting at $149) providing access to an annual subscription where users will get up to 30 two-way messages per month and SOS Assist.

Bullitt said that the cost of both sending and receiving satellite messages is charged from the subscription plan and the recipient doesn't have to pay anything. In addition to the Defy texting dongle, Motorola and Bullitt have also added satellite communication to their Android smartphones.

They also showcased Motorola Defy 2 which comes with built-in satellite communication tech. The same device with some visual differences will be marketed as Bullitt Cat S75 in various markets.

Motorola's latest gadget enables satellite messaging on any smartphone

It looks like trusting developers to just tell the truth about data collection on Google Play isn't working out. Just like on iOS, Android launched app privacy "nutrition labels" in the Play Store last year, with the idea being that users could quickly get a look at how much data each app collects. The obvious problem with this system is that the developers fill out the data-collection forms, and there's nothing to stop them from lying or omitting certain data-collection policies. It's no surprise, then, that when Mozilla recently audited the top apps on Google Play, it found that "most top apps" have "false or misleading" app privacy labels.

Mozilla says it surveyed 40 of the Play Store's most popular apps by global downloads and found that "in nearly 80% of the apps we reviewed, we found some discrepancies between the apps’ privacy policies and the information they reported on Google’s Data Safety Form." Each app received a grade of “Poor,” “Needs Improvement,” or “OK,” with 16 out of 40 apps getting the lowest rating.

Mozilla did not need to dig very deep to find flaws, saying that many apps' privacy labels openly contradict their public privacy policies. Snapchat, TikTok, and Twitter all claim "No data shared with third parties" on the Play Store but detail third-party sharing in their privacy policies. For free apps, the list of recipients earning a "poor" grade isn't very surprising: Facebook, Facebook Messenger, Facebook Lite, Snapchat, Twitter, and, the one surprise, Samsung Push Services. A lot of paid games like Minecraft make the "poor" list, too.

Mozilla says: "There’s little evidence that Google works diligently to ensure the accuracy of the submissions, and this lack of enforcement renders the quality of the information very poor in a great many cases." Mozilla came up with several recommendations for Google, should it want to improve the situation, like having an actual punishment for lying on the form and clearly disclosing to users that Google doesn't vet any of these answers. Mozilla also wants to see Google and Apple work together to standardize the design of app privacy labels across ecosystems. Just as a single food nutrition label has a standard design across products, Mozilla says a privacy label should have one design, too.

Mozilla rates a few Google apps like Gmail as "needs improvement," but that's missing the forest for the trees. The report doesn't dive into this, but for Android, Google likes to do privacy sleight-of-hand and center the discussion around the idea of "app privacy," when "OS privacy"—privacy from Google—should probably be more of a concern. Google and your device manufacturer both have system-level access to the OS that exists outside the app security model, so they can basically do whatever they want on your phone, including collecting all your data.

Even if the app privacy labels were accurate, Android is a class of company that doesn't need the apps to vacuum up your data; it could just use a million various system-level services instead. One such service, Google Play Services, has a blank app privacy screen! If it were accurate, it would be a mile long, but Google would apparently rather you not look behind the curtain. The same "privileged permissions" model also applies to preinstalled apps, which is part of the reason Facebook works so hard to be preinstalled on most Android phones—more permissions means better spying. It would be nice if the Play Store labels were accurate, too, but nobody wants to talk about the entire OS.

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Microsoft says about 64% of search requests nowadays happen on mobile devices, so it is critical for the company to ensure its brand-new search engine is available on your Android or iOS smartphone. Today, you can access AI-powered Bing from a mobile device inside the Bing app and Microsoft Edge browser.

In addition to landing on mobile devices, Bing has received a frequently requested feature: voice input. Users can tap a microphone button next to the input box and dictate their questions. Voice input is available on smartphones and desktops. Note that Bing will keep replying to you with text messages.

Microsoft also wants you to make its AI-powered Bing part of your Skype conversations. You can tag Bing in your chats and get answers in different forms: bullet points, text, or a simplified response. The service supports more than 100 languages and Skype's built-in translator.

Bing with integrated ChatGPT is still rolling out to customers, meaning many users must wait in line. Microsoft says it is working as fast as possible to grant access to everyone, and you speed up receiving your entry ticket by signing up for Bing Preview here.

The new Bing comes to mobile Edge and Skype, gets voice input support

According to a report by Etnews, Samsung originally had plans to create a slot for the S Pen in the Galaxy Z Fold5. Those plans have now been scrapped, however, as Samsung reportedly can't make enough space for the pen inside the device. Samsung would need to increase the thickness of the device to make that possible, and that is something that the company supposedly don't want to do at this point.

The company also explored the option of making the S Pen thinner, but this reduces the "pen on paper" feel that Samsung aims to achieve with its stylus. What's more, creating an S Pen slot would reportedly drive up the manufacturing costs of the Galaxy Z Fold5.

An industry insider familiar with the matter added that the Galaxy Z Fold 5 will come with a new hinge system that will change the device's internal structure. This will allegedly make it more difficult to include a slot for the S Pen.

At the moment, it's not yet known when Samsung will launch its next generation of foldable devices. But given how Samsung introduced the past two generations in August, it's safe to say that the new foldables will see the light of day around the same period.

Source: Etnews

The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold5 probably won't come with a slot for the S Pen

European wireless provider Vodafone has revealed a prototype for a portable 5G network. Such a device could be used to help extend the carrier's main 5G network, or it could be used as a private mobile network for businesses.

In Vodafone's press release, the basis for this portable 5G network is the cheap and small Raspberry Pi 4 PC. It's been combined with a small 5G software-defined radio (SDR) from a company called Lime Microsystems. Vodafone stated:

The resulting system can then be used either as part of a dedicated private network, an extension of a larger MPN or connected to Vodafone’s public network like any other base station. The board design is fully compliant to Open Radio Access Network (RAN) standards, which means it can be used with any computing machine capable of running Open RAN compatible software.

The small size of this 5G base station could allow owners to take it with them and use it at a coffee shop, an airport lobby, a park, or any public space in Vodafone's carrier territory. The 5G network would be more secure than using a public Wi-Fi connection.

Vodafone is looking for "interested vendors" to check out its prototype and see if it can mass produce it for the general public. Since this is a prototype, there's no word on when it might become available, nor what it will cost. The device will be demonstrated at Vodafone's booth next week at the Mobile World Congress trade show in Barcelona, Spain.

Vodafone wants to sell a Raspberry Pi-based 5G portable mobile network

Simultaneously, the government will incentivize local companies to produce equipment, parts, and materials for 6G technology in South Korea. It will also develop an open radio access network that is compatible with any device and enables mobile carriers and enterprises to provide flexible services.

To make all of these possible, South Korea is conducting a feasibility study for a research and development project on core 6G technologies. The project is worth 625.3 billion won (~US$482 million).

According to the country's Ministry of Science and ICT, the country is carrying out these efforts in a bid to secure an early dominance of the future wireless frequencies. The plan is also aimed at helping the country retain its position in the global competition for future network infrastructure. A report by IP intelligence company IPlytics found that while 4G technology development was mostly dominated by U.S. and European companies, South Korean companies took the lead in 5G development.

What's more, South Korea accounted for 25.9% of the number of 5G patents last year. It aims to reach 30% or over in the 6G patent competition.

Aside from South Korea, India also aims to launch 6G services before the end of this decade. The South Asian company already has a task force working to achieve the goal.

Source: Yonhap News Agency

South Korea plans to launch the first 6G network in 2028