Yu Yureka Note with 6-inch Full HD display unveiled in India for ₹13,499

Yu Televentures has launched its latest handset in the Indian market, the Yureka Note. The phone is set to go on sale online as well as retail stores — a first for the brand — for ₹13,499.

Designed to provide the “ultimate multimedia & gaming experience,” the Yureka Note offers a 6-inch Full HD display with a pixel density of 370ppi, 1.5GHz octa-core MediaTek MTK6753T SoC with Mali T720 GPU, 3GB of RAM, 16GB internal memory with microSD slot, 13MP camera with PDAF and f/2.2 lens, 8MP front shooter, LTE, Bluetooth 4.0, and a 4000mAh battery. There’s dual-SIM functionality, dual speakers, a fingerprint sensor at the back, and Cyanogen OS 12.1 atop Android 5.1.1 Lollipop.

Nothing particularly jumps out when it comes to the specs, although with the 6.98-inch Lenovo Phab making its debut earlier this month and the Xiaomi Max rumored with a 6.4-inch display, it looks like we’ll see a bevy of large-screened phones entering the market shortly.

Which HTC 10 colors can you get in the UK?

All three major color choices are coming to the UK market — but your options will depend on where you buy.

The newly announced HTC 10 launches in early May in three major color options. (Well, OK, four if you include the Japan-only “camellia red”.) In the UK, your choices are:

• Glacial Silver: A silver back with a white front.
• Topaz Gold: A gold back with a white front.
• Carbon Gray: A dark grey back with a black front.

(The Glacial Silver variant you may have seen in photos with a black front is exclusive to North America.)

That’s a pretty straightforward selection. However as usual, various network operators and retailers have laid claim to different color options.

Carphone Warehouse

The country’s biggest independent retailer has the HTC 10 in all three colors including gold, which it’s claimed as an exclusive. To sweeten the deal, the retailer is offering £50 cashback on the HTC 10 when you take out a new contract or upgrade.

See HTC 10 at Carphone Warehouse

HTC.com

Notwithstanding Carphone’s exclusivity deal, HTC’s own online store also has all three HTC 10 colors — gold, silver and gray — available for purchase unlocked and SIM-free.

See HTC 10 at HTC.com

EE

Although EE isn’t yet listing the HTC 10, a press release from the operator confirms that it’ll stock the carbon gray version of the phone.

See HTC phones at EE

Three

Three has said that it’ll carry the HTC 10, but hasn’t confirmed color options just yet. The carrier’s sneak peek video shows the glacial silver version of the phone.

See Android phones at Three

Amazon.co.uk

Amazon has the HTC 10 in glacial silver and carbon gray, available to buy SIM-free and unlocked.

See HTC 10 (gray) on Amazon
See HTC 10 (silver) on Amazon

BuyMobiles.net

Carphone’s online-only arm also has the HTC 10 in glacial silver and carbon gray, available to buy on contract with EE, in addition to SIM-free and unlocked.

See HTC 10 (gray) on BuyMobiles
See HTC 10 (silver) on BuyMobiles

Vodafone

Vodafone UK has confirmed that it has no plans to range the HTC 10.

See Android phones at Vodafone

O2

O2 is saying it has nothing to announce on the HTC 10 at present, and is directing customers to its “coming soon” page.

See Android phones at O2

Are you picking up an HTC 10? Let us know which color you’re going for down in the comments!

HTC 10

• HTC 10 preview
• HTC 10 hands-on: a Canadian perspective
• HTC 10 specs
• These are the HTC 10 colors
• Our first photo and video samples
• Meet the Ice View case
• Join our HTC 10 forums

HTC

HBO Canada will stream Game of Thrones season 1 for free through TMN GO

If you live in Canada and want to get hyped again for the upcoming Game of Thrones season, you can now stream the whole first season for free. You’ll be able to watch it through TMN GO, via the on-demand platforms of TV providers across Canada. The free stream of season one begins April 18 and will be available for 30 days.

Season six makes its debut on April 24, so this is a great way to get even more excited for it. Full details of the offer can be found below.

Press release:

GAMES OF THRONES Season 1 Now Streaming For Free on TMN GO

TORONTO (April 18, 2016) – In anticipation of the Season 6 premiere of Emmy® and Golden Globe®-winning HBO Series GAME OF THRONES on Sunday, April 24 at 9 p.m. ET, HBO Canada is offering non-subscribers the opportunity to stream the entire first season, free-of-charge, on TMN GOand via the on-demand platforms of participating television providers across Canada. TV lovers who have missed the series and are wondering what all the fuss is about now have the opportunity to go back to where it all began, for free.

The Season 1 free sampling begins today and is available for 30 days on TMN GO, on demand, and with participating television providers, leading into the series’ Season 6 premiere on Sunday, April 24 on HBO Canada. Existing HBO Canada subscribers have unparalleled access to all HBO programming currently airing, including all five seasons of GAME OF THRONES.

The most-watched series in HBO history and a worldwide television phenomenon, GAME OF THRONES remains a huge runaway hit for the network. This year, following the shocking developments of the Season 5 finale, including Jon Snow’s (Kit Harington) bloody fate at the hands of Castle Black mutineers, Daenerys’ (Emilia Clarke) near-demise at the fighting pits of Meereen, and Cersei’s (Lena Headey) public humiliation in the streets of King’s Landing, survivors from all parts of Westeros and Essos regroup to press forward, inexorably, towards their uncertain individual fates. Familiar faces will forge new alliances to bolster their strategic chances at survival, while new characters emerge to challenge the balance of power in the east, west, north, and south.

U.S. Supreme Court won’t take up legal challenge to Google’s book-scanning project

The U.S. Supreme Court has decided not to take on a legal challenge to Google’s book-scanning project by a group of authors. That means a previous ruling by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Google’s favor will stand.

Google first began scanning millions of books in 2004 so that users can search their text for words and phrases. In 2005, a group of writers, along with the Authors Guild filed a lawsuit against Google, stating that Google’s efforts went beyond the fair-use doctrine, depriving them of revenues from their works.

The case was dismissed in 2013, but the authors appealed the decision. According to Reuters:

Google argued that the effort would actually boost book sales by making it easier for readers to find works, while introducing them to books they might not otherwise have seen. The company made digital copies of more than 20 million books, according to court papers. Some publishers agreed to allow Google to copy their works.

In the end, today’s decision by the Supreme Court not to hear the case means that the lower court ruling, made in October 2015, will stand as the final word on the matter:

A unanimous three-judge appeals court panel said the case “tests the boundaries of fair use,” but found Google’s practices were ultimately allowed under the law.

NVIDIA Shield Android TV update brings new games, March security patch and more

NVIDIA has pushed another software update for the Shield Android TV, bumping it to version 3.1. The update brings a number of fixes and additions to the hardware, like support for new games, additional Shield features like mouse navigation and more. In addition, you’ll get the March security patches and some enhancements to some of the Marshmallow features.

NVIDIA’s change log notes the following changes:

• Optimizations for New Games
• New SHIELD Features: Adds mouse navigation using SHIELD controller’s right stick. This feature is supported automatically in apps that don’t use the right stick. Example: Google Chrome browser (install from Google Play store using a PC).
• Enhancements: Marshmallow functionality and stability improvements such as external USB drive detection, FTP write access, HDMI-CEC, idle/sleep stability, SD card formatting, mouse support, and more.
• Monthly Android security updates, including the March 2016 partner security bulletin.

You can grab the update as an over-the-air download from your Shield Android TV now. Be sure to let us know your thoughts after the update in the comments.

See at Amazon

Can a Chromebook replace my MacBook or Windows laptop?

First you have to think about what you really want to do with your next laptop.

Any time there’s a discussion about Chromebooks, you’ll find people saying how they replaced their last laptop with one. You’ll also find people saying they could never replace their laptop with one. Both answers are right, but it always leads to one more question — can I replace my current MacBook or Windows laptop with a Chromebook?

The answer is easy, yet complicated. “What do you want to do with it?”

Chromebooks are really good at a lot of things. In fact, the things they do well they do better at than most any other laptop out there. When it comes to getting online easily, browsing your favorite places to do things like chat with your friends or do some shopping, or even reading your favorite tech blogs, it’s hard to beat a Chromebook. They’re also excellent when it comes to security done simply — your online data is secured by Google, with experts keeping track of it so you don’t have to. When you sign into your Google account, things like usernames and passwords, or credit card numbers and even your photos are stored where only you can have access to them. And Google makes everything easy to understand with a privacy policy that’s in plain English so you don’t have to be a lawyer to figure out exactly what they will do with it all.

Chromebooks are great for getting on the internet easily and safely

Even your applications are tied to your Google account, and any local data they need to store is only accessible when you’re securely signed in. That also means you can pick up any Chromebook, sign in, and things will be exactly the same, with the same online data and the same applications in the same places. To round all this out, when you try to visit a web site that has known security issues, you’re warned before you get there because Google keeps track of them for you through the Chrome browser. For people who want to stay safe online without the hassle of doing it themselves, Chrome is great.

If getting on the internet easily and safely, while still having a great experience is what you’re looking for, chances are a Chromebook is the best way to do it.

Doing more than web surfing

Of course, plenty of us do more than surf the internet with a laptop. The Chrome store has a lot of great applications that can do a lot of things — entertainment, business and productivity are all well covered — but they can’t do everything as well as a MacBook or a good (good being the key word here) Windows laptop. And some things they really can’t do at all.

Business users have free or paid access to Google Docs — a web-based platform that includes a word processor, spreadsheet application and presentation app among other things, included as much secure online storage as you’re willing to pay for if the free 15GB per user isn’t enough. And these services are done well — Google Docs powers Mobile Nations as well as plenty of other companies both big and small. It’s easy to create, share and collaborate with any size team, and Chromebooks are able to work with Docs while you’re offline and synchronize things when you get a connection. But there are often compatibility issues with the proprietary document formats used with Microsoft Office. You can import a Microsoft Office document into Google Docs and chances are everything will work just fine, but when you’re collaborating with other users of a shared file and they’re using Office, things usually don’t work nearly as well. Google Docs are a great way for any size team to get some work done, as is Microsoft Office — but they don’t play together perfectly.

Microsoft sees the value of bringing Office applications to Chromebooks. For now, you’ll either need to only work online or have another computer with Microsoft Office installed to use them, but it’s a great start. This is an area where we see plenty of support from the folks in Redmond, and we hope to see a version of Office apps that you can buy and use on your Chromebook that does away with the current requirements.

Media production is another place where Chromebooks can be lacking. There are plenty of tools available for editing photos, video and audio, but nothing suitable for people who need to produce content that they expect to be paid for. You can import a good image — one that requires just a little adjustment to make it “pretty” — and won’t have any issues, but if you need to process a big batch of pictures or do a lot of touch-up with RAW files you’ll find there’s no real offline substitute for Photoshop or Lightroom in the Chrome store, though Adobe has a program where Creative Cloud applications are streamed to qualified educators and students.

The same goes for video and audio files. There are applications to do basic minor editing, but creating music or a broadcast track or building a video from multiple clips with “proper” cuts and edits is difficult to say the least. There are Chromebooks out there with the processing power to do all of this, but as of right now, there is no software available that’s robust enough. Editing something to share with your friends using apps from the Chrome Store or online services is easy enough, but none of them compare to expensive and powerful applications built for other platforms. This is something I hope Google is thinking about.

Software developers might also find that a Chromebook doesn’t fit their needs. WebDev is great on a Chromebook. There are editors in the Chrome Store that are set up for writing HTML or Ruby or JavaScript and most every other language a web developer needs. You can sync files with Google Drive, and open the local copy in Chrome for debugging. Of course, you’ll need to have a look at things in other browsers on a different machine to test against IE or Firefox, but the bulk of the work is easy to do from most any Chromebook.

But if you want to write code and compile it, your options are pretty slim. There are web-based services that allows you to do this, but it’s not the same. Again, it’s a matter of software. There are Chromebooks capable of software compilation (though most don’t quite have the horsepower to do it well) but nobody is building an IDE that lets you manage, write and build files filled with code.

Kingdom Rush Frontiers is really fun, but it’s not BattleBorn.

The biggest issue for many is when it comes to gaming. Now I’m not saying that any laptop — even the new models built specifically for gaming — are great at playing all the latest AAA titles. Especially if that laptop has an glowing apple on the back. But any high-end laptop is going to be better at gaming than even the best Chromebook is.

This includes VR support, too. There are rumors that HP is building a monster of a Chromebook with gaming and VR support, and I’ll be excited if it happens, but plenty of software changes will need to be made to support the advanced graphical instructions and functions that you need for a great gaming experience. And the people making games would need to get on board, too — ask any Linux gamer about that.

You can get a lot of really fun games from the Chrome Store, and there are a lot of cool browser based games out there. But the experience falls short of what you’ll get when you install Steam on a Windows or Apple laptop. Old titles that play great on a laptop — think Diablo II or the Age of Empires series — won’t play on your Chromebook. While casual games can be a lot of fun to play, gamers should look elsewhere.

Linux fans

I didn’t forget you. Most mid-range Chromebooks will fill your needs once you visit the Crouton Git and start installing . You can have a “real” Linux environment beside Chrome OS, and do everything you already do provided your hardware is up to snuff.

In fact, the Pixel makes one of the nicest Linux Ultrabooks you’ll ever use.

They’re not for everyone

As you can see, a Chromebook isn’t the one machine that can suit everyone. Even Google doesn’t try to make that claim, because for power-users — even part time power-users — they can’t do it all.

I love my Chromebook. I use it any time I can while I’m away from my desk, and that includes work-related stuff. I wrote this blog post with it, edited the images I needed to edit with it, and went through our system of building the blog page and the virtual paperwork needed to keep track of it all. But I can’t do that all of the time. Sometimes I have to use my MacBook.

I still think a Chromebook is the best computer for most of us, because most of us aren’t doing the things it doesn’t do well. But most doesn’t mean all, and there are some really valid reasons why a Chromebook might not work for you.

And this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Google produces Chromebooks so that people who want a great experience on the web can get just that without much of a hassle. Open the lid, turn it on, sign in and go — there’s a lot to be said for that simple experience because it works so well. When you start adding anything to it, you have to be very careful that the experience most people want stays great. Maybe one day we can do all this stuff on a Chromebook, or maybe not. The important part is that the things we can do on a Chromebook are done well.

Samsung Pay adds support for TD Bank

TD Bank is the latest financial institution to get support from Samsung Pay. Customers can now add any of their TD credit and debit cards to the payment service on their compatible Samsung phone.

This announcement comes right after Regions Bank gained similar support. Samsung Pay now supports over 130 banks and credit unions in the United States, support which customers can take advantage of using their Galaxy S7, Galaxy S6, or Note 5. The service recently launched in China, and is expected to arrive in Canada later this year.

More: Samsung Pay supported banks

Ola and Uber suspend surge pricing in Delhi after government warning

Ride-sharing services Uber and Ola have announced that they will temporarily suspend surge pricing after receiving a warning from Delhi’s Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. The city is trialling an odd-even rule to combat congestion on its roads, and has set prescribed fares for taxi services at ₹16 per km for air-conditioned cabs and ₹14 for those without air conditioning.

To deal with the increased demand, Uber and Ola have turned to surge pricing to get more drivers on the roads, with the former routinely increasing fares by five times the normal amount, which comes out to ₹35 per kilometer for the entry-level UberGO.

The move drew the government’s ire, with anyone found to be flouting the prescribed fares risking losing their driving license and their car.

Strict action, incl permit cancellation n impounding vehicle, to be taken against taxis which charge rates more than govt prescribed rates

— Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) April 18, 2016

In light of the statement, Uber and Ola have said that they will temporarily suspend surge in the city.

Given the threat to the livelihood of our partners, at the expense of reliability, we are temporarily suspending surge with immediate effect

— Uber Delhi (@Uber_Delhi) April 18, 2016

We’ve temporarily pulled out Peak Pricing in Delhi, in support of Govt’s #OddEven initiative. Travel at 1x fares & make #OddEven a success

— Ola (@Olacabs) April 18, 2016

In a statement to Livemint, Gagan Bhatia, General Manager for Uber North said:

Given the threat of the Delhi government to cancel permits and impound vehicles of our driver partners, we are temporarily suspending surge in Delhi with immediate effect. We hope to work with the government to keep Delhi moving especially during this time when the citizens need us the most.

Not surging is saying we should be just like a taxi and be unreliable when people need us most.

This isn’t the first instance where taxi aggregators have faced off against the government. Last week, Karnataka’s transport division seized more than 20 vehicles belonging to Uber and Ola drivers, saying that they did not conform to the state’s recent ruling where it banned surce pricing.

The ruling, which came into effect on April 2, says that taxi services cannot set fares higher than what’s prescribed by the government, which is ₹19.50 per km for air-conditioned cabs and ₹14.50 for ones without air conditioning. While those fares are far higher than what Uber and Ola charge, a 3X surge on UberBlack would automatically be above the prescribed limit.

With the government looking out for people’s interests and taxi aggregators continuing to say that surge pricing is essential to their businesses, it will be interesting to see how things turn out. What do you guys think of the move by the government to curb surge pricing?

Telus begins VoLTE pilot in British Columbia on select Android phones

Telus, Canada’s second-largest wireless provider, has launched Voice Over LTE, or VoLTE, as a pilot in a small area of the British Columbia Lower Mainland before rolling it out to the rest of the country.

Currently available for the Samsung Galaxy S6 and LG G4, with other devices to come in the “near future,” according to a support page for the service, Telus notes that there are multiple benefits to using VoLTE:

• Increased availability of HD Voice
• Simultaneous use of voice and LTE data
• Reduced delay to dial tone

As with VoLTE on both Rogers and Bell, Telus does not deduct the data consumed for a VoLTE call from a customer’s monthly bandwidth.

Podcasts are now available in Google Play Music

Google has officially started rolling out podcasts as a new feature of Google Play Music. Launching today on both the web and in the Android app, you’ll be able to discover, subscribe, and listen to your favorite podcasts right in the same place you already listen to music. Beyond searching for specific podcasts you already know, Google will also offer you new shows based on your activities, mood, and interests, much like it already does for music.

From Google:

Starting today on the web and rolling out on Android in the U.S. and Canada, we’ll connect you with podcasts based on what you’re doing, how you’re feeling and what you’re interested in. Similar to our contextual playlists for music, we want to make it easy to find the right podcast—whether you’re a podcast aficionado or listening for the first time.

Podcast creators can easily get started with bringing their shows to Google Play through Google’s podcast portal. You can, of course, subscribe to the Android Central Podcast in Google Play right here.