Google has shown off some wildly futuristic technologies at its annual I/O gathering, but most of them have faded into obscurity without ever appearing in a consumer product. The Project Soli gesture control system has been pie-in-the-sky since its debut in 2015, but a report several months back confirmed …
Read More »The Snapdragon 215 Could Make Cheap Phones Less Terrible
You’d never expect a sub-$100 phone to be as fast as a flagship device like the Pixel 3 or Galaxy S10, but they can still be unreasonably slow sometimes. The bargain-priced Qualcomm Snapdragon 200-series chips have offered bare minimum performance in the past, but the company’s new Snapdragon 215 …
Read More »New Ookla Speedtest Data: AT&T Wins Performance, Verizon Holds Reliability
New speed test data from Ookla shows that both Verizon and ATT have boosted mobile network performance in the past 12 months, though our absolute world ranking compared with other nations remains mired in the middle of the pack. In Q1 2019, the United States ranked 40th in the …
Read More »App revenue tops $39 billion in first half of 2019, up 15% from first half of last year
App store spending is continuing to grow, although not as quickly as in years past. According to a new report from Sensor Tower, the iOS App Store and Google Play combined brought in $39.7 billion in worldwide app revenue in the first half of 2019 — that’s up 15.4% …
Read More »Samsung Will Announce the Galaxy Note 10 on August 7th
The wait is almost over for phone buyers who look at the Galaxy S10 and wish it had more features. Samsung will unveil the Galaxy Note 10 on August 7th. As usual, the teaser invitation doesn’t provide all the details, but we can confirm it’s a Note phone with …
Read More »Low-cost TV streaming service Philo comes to Android
Despite a slight price increase in April, Philo’s live TV streaming service is still one of the more affordable options on the market because of its strategic decision to not stream sports. That helps keep its costs down while providing an option for cord cutters who mainly want access …
Read More »Oppo Promises a Phone with In-Display Camera Soon
The last few years of smartphone design have been centered around minimizing bezels to get as much screen as possible in a roughly hand-sized form factor. That’s led to some… interesting approaches to squeezing in the front-facing camera. Apple, Google, LG, and others use a notch, but Samsung is …
Read More »Meteorologists Worry 5G Could Interfere with Weather Satellites
The era of 5G could offer massively increased data speeds, more real-time services, and the proliferation of “internet of things” hardware. According to several groups representing meteorologists, 5G could also mean major disruptions to weather forecasting. They’ve submitted an official complaint to the Federal Communications Commission asking that certain …
Read More »FCC Says Verizon Can SIM Lock Phones Again
Most phone carriers in the US lock the phones they sell to the network, ensuring you have to remain a customer for some length of time. Verizon hasn’t been able to lock any of its LTE devices because of commitments it made years back. Now, the FCC has agreed …
Read More »T-Mobile Will Launch Its 5G network, Galaxy S10 5G on June 28
T-Mobile has been talking about 5G for as long as the other US carriers, but it hasn’t had any official 5G launch plans until now. The carrier will launch its 5G network in a handful of cities on June 28, and there will be a single 5G device available …
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