Technology - Google News

Samsung's most advanced phone, the Galaxy Note 10, is almost here: what to expect - Fox News
Huawei says HongMeng OS is not for phones (so what is it for?) - Android Authority
Google's first Stadia AMA provides details on free games, voice chat, controller support, and much more - Android Police

Samsung's most advanced phone, the Galaxy Note 10, is almost here: what to expect - Fox News

Posted: 19 Jul 2019 05:57 AM PDT

Samsung's newest high-end phone series, packed with its latest technology, is coming in August. Here's what to expect.

Not surprisingly the Samsung leak machine has already given us a pretty clear picture of the Galaxy Note 10 – or whatever Samsung ends up officially calling it. The Galaxy Note series is typically a more advanced phone than the S series phones that come out earlier in the year.

We could see two phones, according to reports. The Galaxy Note 10 and Note 10 Plus, not unlike the naming scheme for the Galaxy S10 and S10 Plus.

Here are the Note 10 highlights but remember that, however credible the reports, the final product or products that Samsung announces could be different.

Display: The display size is expected to be in the neighborhood of 6.3 inches for the Note 10 and a jumbo-sized 6.7-class display on the Note 10 Plus, according to reports. By comparison, the current Galaxy S10 Plus has a 6.4-inch display and the Galaxy S10 5G has a 6.7-inch display.

Samsung Galaxy Note 10 ((Image via @ONLEAKS))

Other expected features include a punch-hole selfie camera in the center of display and an in-display fingerprint reader like the Galaxy S10.

4G and 5G: There will be 4G and 5G flavors, according to a recent leak from Ice Universe, which cites a "Note10 4G" with a specification of 8GB RAM and 256GB of storage and a "Note10+ 5G," with specs of 12GB RAM and 512GB storage.

Camera: the rear camera will be a vertical triple camera, according to 91 mobiles and @onleaks.

Other features, says Ice Universe, should include Universal Flash Storage (UFS) 3.0 storage, which means potentially quicker storage access times. And charging will get a boost to 45 watts on the Note 10 Plus. The higher the wattage, typically the faster the charge rate of the battery.

And how will the Note 10 stack up against the Note 9?

"Samsung's Note 10 series will have attributes that appeal to Note fans and gamers," Vincent Thielke, an analyst at Canalys, told Fox News. "A significantly-improved camera and 5G support are also likely to help this series outperform the Note 9, especially in the Note's traditionally strong markets like the US, Korea, and China, which also happen to be leading the way for 5G in 2019," he said.

The Note 10 is expected to be announced August 7. Pricing remains to be seen but the Note series is not cheap so expect a starting price tag at or near the $1,000 mark.

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Huawei says HongMeng OS is not for phones (so what is it for?) - Android Authority

Posted: 19 Jul 2019 04:37 AM PDT

We've heard all about Huawei's HongMeng or Oak OS in recent months, purportedly positioned as a Plan B should the company's access to Android be affected. Now, the Chinese manufacturer has claimed that the in-house platform isn't for smartphones after all.

According to the state-owned Xinhua outlet, Huawei senior vice-president Catherine Chen said HongMeng OS was for industrial use and that it aims to keep using Android for smartphones. This is a marked departure from previous media coverage, which suggested that HongMeng was an alternative to Android.

The executive said the platform had been in development long before recent talks about an Android alternative kicked off. In fact, news of a home-grown operating system by Huawei dates back to 2012.

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Chen added that while a mobile platform usually contains millions of lines of code, HongMeng had "hundreds of thousands" of lines and was more secure. The executive said the in-house platform also had extremely low latency compared to a mobile operating system.

Chen's statement comes after Huawei executives previously confirmed they were working on an alternative mobile operating system. The latest comments suggest that Huawei either changed its mind regarding HongMeng's use in the smartphone arena, or that another plan B mobile platform is in the works.

NEXT: FaceApp privacy concerns have the U.S. government on notice

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Google's first Stadia AMA provides details on free games, voice chat, controller support, and much more - Android Police

Posted: 19 Jul 2019 04:32 AM PDT

Google's upcoming game-streaming service has shown a lot of promise, plus it isn't even priced too badly, but there are still a ton of questions surrounding the platform as we edge closer to the November launch. For that reason, Stadia's Director of Product, Andrey Doronichev, took part in a Reddit AMA to fill in some of the blanks and address some people's concerns.

We've looked through the thread for any morsels that might be of interest. In one response, Doronichev was keen to point out that the paid Stadia Pro tier "is not 'Netflix for Games' like some people have mentioned." He would rather compare it to Xbox Live Gold or PlayStation Plus, as you'll get exclusive discounts and access one free game per month, on average. The first of those will be Destiny 2, in case you were wondering. In what will be music to the ears of many, achievements will be coming to Stadia, and they'll be "similar to other platforms" — unfortunately, this isn't going to be ready until after the official launch.

There's good news about what will happen if you unsubscribe from the Pro tier before resubscribing later, too, as any free games you originally accumulate will be available to you once again when you sign back up. You will miss out on anything that's offered up while you were unsubscribed, though. Unfortunately, there will be no free games offered on the free tier, although that hopefully doesn't include completely free-to-play games like Fornite.

"I certainly hope to have a few free to play games to announce in the next few months. Not ready to share any now, though."

When asked about the social aspect of Stadia, Doronichev said Google is investing heavily in this, so you'll be able to "manage your friends list, create parties and use platform-level voice chat" at launch. Will this count as yet another Google messaging app?

One of the key questions posed about Stadia since its announcement relates to the level of commitment what will happen if Google did pull the plug on it down the road (as the company has been known to do with a number of underperforming products over the years). On this, Doronichev made some thought-provoking parallels with how music, movies, photos, and docs have all been transitioned into the cloud over the course of the past decade or so. The games industry may be a little bit behind in that respect, but the party line is very much that Google is in this for the long haul and sees cloud streaming as the long-term solution that will drive gaming forward. A Takeout feature will also allow users to download their game metadata and save files should they decide to leave the platform.

When Stadia launches, the only way to play on a TV will be with the more expensive Chromecast Ultra that supports the full 4K experience offered on the Pro tier, but Doronichev wouldn't be drawn on whether the cheaper 3rd generation Chromecast would ever be supported. He did say that "more options for all of our TV gamers" would be added in due course, but who knows if that means Android TV boxes like the Nvidia Shield, an upcoming Chromecast product that we've not yet seen, or maybe even dedicated Stadia hardware that's in the works — we'll have to wait and see on that one. Another question pressed the Shield TV point, but that also wasn't answered with any definitive confirmation, although it would seem likely.

On the Stadia controller and the audio setup, Doronichev confirmed that only wired audio via the 3.5mm headphone jack will be supported at launch — no Bluetooth via the controller, but you will obviously be able to connect to whichever device you're playing the game on for that. Doronichev also said that any HID-compliant controller will be supported, and they'll work on adding more and more options as time goes by. He also mentioned the Xbox Adaptive controller as part of the long-term goal of "enabling EVERYONE to play ANYWHERE with WHATEVER controller they want." To begin with, if you want to play on your TV, that will only be possible with a Chromecast Ultra and official Stadia controller together.

While a Parental Dashboard will be available at launch in November, a Family Sharing feature won't come until a little later, but at least it's in the pipeline. Finally, when one Redditor asked about the possibility of a Steam partnership, Doronichev gave an answer that could simply be playful or could offer some real hope: