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Mobile Syrup

Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra images and specs leak online

The Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra might be revealed alongside Samsung’s S22 series on February 8th during an ‘Unpacked’ event.

WinFuture has gotten its hands on the Tab S8 Ultra’s specs, showing off the tablet’s rumoured key flagship features. The Ultra features a 14.6-inch 2,960 x 1,848 pixel resolution AMOLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate, 16GB of RAM, 512GB of storage and S-Pen stylus support.

The tablet also reportedly sports a display notch and features two 12-megapixel selfie cameras.

Additionally, it features Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, two rear cameras (13-megapixel, 6-megapixel ultrawide), Dolby Atmos quad speakers and 5G.

The other Tab S8 variants offer less-than-stellar specs, however. The Tab S8+ features a 120Hz, 2,800 x 1,752 AMOLED panel with a 12-megapixel front shooter, 8GB of RAM, 256GB of expandable storage and lastly, the smallest S8 tablet sports an 11-inch LCD screen with 120Hz refresh rate and 2,560 x 1,600-pixel resolution.

It’s unclear when Samsung will unveil its Galaxy Tab S8 series, we’ll likely catch our first glimpse of it alongside the company’s Galaxy S22 series.

Source: WinFuture

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Mobile Syrup

The fastest ways to open the camera on Android and iOS

It doesn’t matter if you shoot photos on iOS or Android, nearly every modern smartphone features a stellar camera packed into its rear, but half of the battle is getting the device out of your pocket and opening the shooter fast enough to catch that special moment.

Both mobile operating systems are rife with quick access toggles and gestures to launch their respective camera apps without tapping on the main camera app. These are some of the more common ways we use to snap pictures in a flash:

Android

On Android, the situation varies depending on what device you own, but there are still a few constants that prevail across nearly all modern Android smartphones.

My favourite way to open the camera on Android is to double-tap the power button. This is easily the fastest way to open a camera and has allowed me to snap pictures and videos that I would have likely missed if I was using an iPhone.

Some Android phones also allow you to add a camera button to your quick toggles in the notifications shade, but this isn’t the case with all devices. Another thing that’s pretty random and misaligned across Android is gestures to open the camera. For instance, OnePlus devices can be set up so if you draw an ‘O’ on your lock screen, the camera opens. However, I’ve never found this feature to be particularly useful.

I’d recommend just using the double tap on the power button for most people since it’s the fastest route.

iPhone

Beyond tapping on the classic camera app, there are a few other ways to launch the mobile camera with an iPhone and iOS 15.

With the first method, you’re greeted with is a small camera icon at the bottom right of your lock screen. If you tap and hold on this icon, it quickly opens up the camera. This is the fastest way to take a picture if your iPhone is off. Opening the camera this way also prevents others from going through your camera roll if you have a password.

The other abstract way to open the camera is from the ‘Control Centre.’ On iPhone X and newer devices that don’t feature a physical Touch ID button, you can access this by swiping down from the top right-hand side of your screen. Then, you should see a camera icon at the bottom of the screen. Tap that, and the app will launch. With older iPhones that still have a Home Button, you’ll need to swipe up from the bottom of the screen to open Control Centre.

If you don’t see the camera icon, you can add it to Control Centre by navigating to your device’s settings app, selecting Control Centre and adding the camera.

Sometimes I’ll also pull down to use the iPhone search function to pull up the camera, but I get by between these two methods and the default app.

I’ll also mention that if you take a ‘Live photo’ with your iPhone (the ones that move a bit like a gif), you can readjust the images in the Apple Photos app to choose a slightly earlier frame as the main photo.

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Mobile Syrup

Motorola Edge 30 Ultra might be paired with a ‘Smart stylus’ and folio case

Motorola might be working on a flagship that features a stylus similar to Samsung’s Note series and the rumoured S22 Ultra. 

According to XDA Developers, the company plans to launch two accessories with the Edge 30 Ultra: a folio case and a ‘Smart Stylus.’

The Smart Stylus will reportedly connect to the smartphone via Bluetooth, and supports air gestures and wireless charging. Further, leaked details indicate that the stylus can be used as an air mouse with an external display and that its buttons can be utilized to control media. XDA‘s sources describe this stylus as “next-gen.”

When the user connects the stylus to the phone, a bubble displays the state of the stylus and indicates whether it’s charging. Tapping the bubble launches the apps that support the stylus. Additionally, the Edge 30 Ultra reportedly features a Folio Case that offers additional features when connected to the Smart Stylus.

When you’re not using the stylus, the Ultra Folio Case features a holder on the back. Moreover, the case features software triggers when the user removes the stylus. It also can warn the user when it detects the stylus isn’t in use. Additionally, you can make an app open when you remove the stylus and automatically enable Bluetooth, and the stylus will wirelessly charge when in the case.

The case also includes a strip down the middle where the always-on display is visible, allowing you to view when you receive phone calls and decline or accept from this part of the display.

It’s unclear when Motorola will launch the case and stylus, but XDA believes that they’ll release at the same time as the smartphone.

Overall, this sounds like a pretty cool case and stylus pairing, and I hope Samsung adopts a similar strategy for its rumoured Galaxy S22 Ultra.

It’s unclear when Motorola will unveil the Edge 30 Pro Ultra, but it may launch in July if it’s like the last year’s model.

Source: XDA Developers

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Mobile Syrup

Canadian tennis star Leylah Fernandez is Google’s latest Pixel 6 series ambassador

Canadian tennis star Leylah Fernandez has been named the latest ambassador for Google’s Pixel 6 and 6 Pro. 

Fernandez was the top-ranked Canadian in the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) and received international recognition after appearing in the 2021 U.S. Open.

The Montreal native is part of a national English and French-speaking ad campaign, which she revealed on Instagram today. 

Fernandez, who’s trilingual, will be utilizing the Pixel 6’s Live Translate feature as she’s a WTA pro who travels often. In addition to the ad, Leylah will also share her experience with the Pixel 6 on her social media accounts.

“After her incredible year on the women’s tennis circuit, and how she won the hearts of the Canadians with her grit and grace, it was an easy decision to partner Leylah as a spokesperson for the Pixel 6,” said Laura Pearce, head of marketing, at Google Canada in a press release.

“The Pixel provides all the helpfulness of Google for consumers to see, experience and do more — and that’s exactly what we expect Leylah to do as she takes the tennis world by storm.”

Source: Google Blog 

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Mobile Syrup

Forza Street mobile game shutting down in Spring 2022

Xbox is shutting down its Forza Street game on Android and iOS, under two years after it first released.

Developer Turn 10 confirmed the news in a Q&A post on the official Forza support site, adding that the racing game will remain playable until Spring 2022. A specific closure date was not provided.

“We’re proud and grateful for the community of players we were able to build with Forza Street, and we want to use what we learned on building new and exciting Forza products,” Turn 10 wrote in response to why the game is closing.

Ahead of this, Turn 10 has also rolled out the final update for the game, which includes:

  • A new unreleased car
  • 12 weeks of Spotlight++ featuring Rare & Epic cars, starting on January 17th, 2022
  • Faster Energy recharge and increased Energy storage
  • Reduced wait times on car shows
  • Reduced prices on the vast majority of items purchased with in-game currency

This is the latest Microsoft mobile game to shut down, following the closure of both Minecraft Earth and Gears Pop last year. That said, the company seems to be focused more on Xbox Cloud Gaming on mobile. Available through a $16.99 CAD/month Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription, Xbox Cloud Gaming allows you to stream dozens of games to mobile devices, including Forza Horizon 5, Halo Infinite and Minecraft Earth. 

While it’s unclear how many people use Cloud Gaming overall, the company revealed in December that 20 percent of the service’s overall player base uses touch controls.

Source: Xbox

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Mobile Syrup

Honor announces new 7.9-inch foldable Magic V flagship

Honor’s latest flagship device, the Magic V was announced today, and what makes it unique is that it’s the first foldable device to feature Qualcomm’s latest 4nm Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset.

The Magic V folds inwards like a book, similar to Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 3 and features a huge 7.9-inch primary OLED display (120Hz) and a 6.45-inch curved OLED cover panel (90Hz). The foldable features a unique waterdrop hinge mechanism which the company says is the slimmest among similar devices on the market.

On paper, the foldable sports an impressive triple camera setup, including a 50-megapixel main sensor, a 50-megapixel ultra-wide shooter, and a 50-megapixel colour spectrum lens. On the front, the device features two 42-megapixel selfie cameras, one hole-punched on the primary screen and one over the cover panel. How these cameras work is yet to be seen, but as mentioned, the Magic V’s specs seem decent.

Diving deep into the internals, all Magic V models feature 12GB of RAM as standard, with storage options ranging from 256GB to 512GB. The device has a chunky 4,750mAh battery — which is bigger than the Fold 3’s 4,400mAh battery — and supports 66W charging. It also runs Honor’s in-house Magic UI 6 built on top of Android 12 with support for split-screen and multi-window.

According to Honor, the Magic V will be available for purchase in China starting January 18th for CNY 9,999 (CAD $1,987.60) and CNY 10,999 (CAD $2,187.03) for the 12GB+ 256GB and 12GB+512GB models, respectively. The device will be available in Titanium Silver, Black and Burnt Orange colourways.

As always, we don’t know when and if the foldable will release for the international market.

Image credit: Honor

Source: Honor

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Mobile Syrup

Samsung might unveil the Galaxy S22 series on February 8

Samsung could launch its upcoming Galaxy S22 series at an Unpacked event on February 8th, according to South Korea’s Digital Daily.

A Samsung representation reportedly told the publication that “we have confirmed that the event will be held on February 8, and we are discussing the timing of invitations to be sent out at the end of January.”

In Canada, the S22 series will likely sport the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 processor, feature have up to 12GB of RAM, and offer a substantial battery. The S22 Ultra will reportedly feature four cameras, with a top-of-the-line 108-megapixel primary shooter and what Samsung calls a “Super Clear Lens,” which is rumoured to improve low-light videos.

Additionally, the S22 Ultra will work with the company’s S Pen stylus and sport a design that looks like a combination of Samsung’s Note 20 Ultra and the S21 Ultra.

Samsung hasn’t officially announced the S22 event, but if the rumour above is correct the smartphone series will likely be formally revealed during roughly the same time frame as MWC 2022 in Barcelona, Spain.

Image credit: @heyitsyogesh

Source: Digital Daily Via: Engadget

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Mobile Syrup

OnePlus shares specs for 2nd-gen Hasselblad camera system in OnePlus 10 Pro

With the Chinese launch date for the OnePlus 10 Pro fast approaching, the manufacturer has shared all of the camera specs for the upcoming flagship.

I’m most excited that all three of the new cameras on the phone’s back will support 10-bit colour. OnePlus also claims that the smartphone’s shooters display 25 percent more colour than the OnePlus 9 Pro.

On top of that, OnePlus says it’s building in a movie mode this year, giving mobile videographers control over ISO, shutter speed and other settings while filming. The company is also adding a LOG format to the camera to be slightly more easily colour matched to different cameras and more colour processing headroom when you’re editing.

As much as I praised the 14mm flatness of the OnePlus 9 Pro, as I predicted, the company is moving back to a more fisheye wide-angle lens this year. The ultra-wide-angle has a 150-degree field of view with a fisheye effect, but you can crop it into 110-degrees to get a flatter image that’s more like the OnePlus 9 Pro.

Unlike last year when OnePlus was hyping up all of its cameras by talking about their full-frame lens equivalents, that feature seems to have been ditched.

Much like Apple’s ProRaw file type, OnePlus will be using a new system called RAW+ that allows users to snap RAW images that still have computational photography advancements tucked within them. This is nice to have since computational photography is great for quickly snapping photos. If David Imel’s latest video is any indication, it’s the way to shoot on mobile phones until manufacturers start developing software for larger camera sensors.

OnePlus also says it can shoot 12-bit RAW images with this camera even though the sensors only support 10-bit. I’ve reached out to OnePlus for more information regarding how this will work.

I’ll also note that most of the demo images presented are in 4,080 x 3,060 pixels, making them much more square than the average smartphone photo. I don’t necessarily mind this since I’ll most likely crop most of my pictures in post anyway, but this makes me think that OnePlus might not be adding the XPan mode that I loved so much from the OnePlus 9 Pro.

OnePlus has been slowly revealing info about the OnePlus 10 Pro info leading up to the phone’s Chinese release on January 11th. If you want to learn more about the device’s specs, you can read that story here or look at more renders of the device here.

Image credit: OnePlus

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Mobile Syrup

Samsung Galaxy S22 dummy video makes its rounds

Canada’s own Unbox Therapy has leaked a video showcasing Samsung’s upcoming S series flagships, the Galaxy S22 Ultra, S22+ and S22.

While the video has been delisted from YouTube, other channels have reuploaded it and screenshots have emerged, giving us a detailed look at the South Korean company’s upcoming devices.

While not entirely new given we’ve dummy units of the S22 series in the past, Unbox Therapy’s videos corroborate those designs.

The standard Galaxy S22 and S22+ both look like last year’s S21 devices with camera bumps in the top left corner or the rear of the smartphone. On the other hand, the S22 Ultra looks like a combination of the Galaxy Note 20 Ultra and the S21 Ultra.

Alongside the leaked video, a spec sheet has also appeared.

The leaked specs indicate that the regular S21 sports a 6.1-inch display, the plus model will offer a 6.55-inch screen and that the Ultra features a 6.8-inch screen.

While the leaked specs are likely accurate, it’s odd the S21 Ultra offers 8GB/12GB of RAM when the S21 Ultra featured 12GB/16GB of RAM, making the Ultra seem like a bit of a downgrade in a sense.

The spec sheet also states that the 108-megapixel sensor features some sort of “Super Clear Glass,” which is theorized to reduce the small bright dots that sometimes appears when taking videos at night.

WinFuture’s Roland Quandt previously shared an image of a 45W charger for the S22 Ultra, which suggests that Samsung is bringing back the Note 10+’s higher charging speeds.

It’s unclear when Samsung will launch these new S22 smartphones. It’s possible that we’ll see Samsung unveil the Galaxy S22 series as late as February at Mobile World Congress (MWC).

Source: YouTube (several channels), @xeetechcare, @rquandt Via: The Verge

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Mobile Syrup

Samsung Galaxy S2 ROM lets the ancient smartphone run Android 12

Samsung’s Galaxy S2 is almost 12 years old, but back in the day, the android smartphone was considered one of the best devices around. And now, the ancient smartphone seems to be getting reinvigorated with a new ROM of Android 12.

XDA Developer forum user ‘rINanDO‘ has managed to get Android 12 running on a 1.2GHz processor and only 1GB of RAM. Typically unofficial ROMs are buggy, but this one is reportedly pretty good based on several forum users’ posts.

The following features are currently working in the ROM:

  • RIL (Phone/SMS)
  • Audio
  • Bluetooth (audio & headset)
  • Wi-Fi
  • IMEI
  • Touchkeys
  • Hardware encode/decoder
  • Display
  • DRM, for e.g. Netflix
  • Selinux enforced
  • BitGapps
  • Magisk v23.0
  • FM Radio (using Spirit2)

The functionality below isn’t working:

  • AGPS
  • Camera Video recording
  • PowerHAL
  • Live Display
  • MicroG support

Keep in mind that the Galaxy S2 is still a device that’s well over a decade old, so don’t expect the ROM actually to improve the handset’s performance in a significant way. Still, it’s fascinating to see someone put the effort into creating a ROM like this simply because they could.

Typically, I’d advise against modding your device as it would void your warranty, but given how old the Galaxy S2 is, you likely don’t have much to lose. Here are the steps to install this ROM on Samsung’s Galaxy S2.

Source: XDA Developers forums, XDA Developers