Deal: Get $75 off Moto X4 when activated on Project Fi

If you use Project Fi, the Moto X4 can be yours for just $324.

The Moto X4 is one of the best ways you can spend $400 on a smartphone this year, and if you’ve been thinking about picking one up, Project Fi now has an offer that’s awfully hard to ignore.

If you purchase a Moto X4 between now and January 4, you’ll be able to get a $75 discount on it – bringing the final price down to just $324.

This is the Android One version of the X4, and as such, you’ll get a stock build of Android with a handful of useful add-ons from Motorola and snappy software updates.

You’ll need to activate the X4 on Project Fi in order to take advantage of these savings, but we wouldn’t necessarily call that a catch. Project Fi is still one of the better MVNOs around for folks that are connected to Wi-Fi most of the time, and even if you don’t have any interest in it, you can still buy the X4, pay for a month of Fi for $20, cancel it, and still come out with a $55 discount.

See at Project Fi

Joe’s Favorite Things of 2017

Joe’s Favorite Things

Wait, how are we already at the end of 2017? Didn’t it just start a few days ago? Oh well. This past year has been a great one for phones, games, accessories, and more, and although the holiday season shouldn’t be focused solely on material things, spending money on tech that’s not even worth the time of day isn’t fun for anyone. Here are the gadgets and gizmos released in 2017 that are my personal favorites.

Google Pixel 2

Last year’s Pixel was easily one of my all-time favorite phones, and somehow Google made it even better with the Pixel 2. The camera is out of this world good, little features like Now Playing and Active Edge are way more useful than I could have ever imagined, and the look of the phone is much more attractive compared to its predecessor. Combine this with all of Google’s wonderful software tweaks here and there, and you end up with the absolute best Android phone money can buy.

From $649 Buy Now

Bose QC35 II

I’m about as far from an audiophile as they come, and as such, was pretty reluctant to throw down $350 on a pair of headphones. However, after finally picking up the Bose QC35 following endless recommendations from friends and colleagues, I don’t know how I survived without these things. The fit is extremely comfortable, Bose’s active-noise canceling is scary good, and the inclusion of Google Assistant on Series II is a must if you’re like me and use Google’s AI on a daily basis.

$349 Buy Now

Samsung Gear Sport

If you’re in the market for a new smartwatch this year, one of the few that’s actually worth considering is the Samsung Gear Sport. The Gear Sport comes equipped with nearly every feature found on the Gear S3 released last year, but the more compact body is a godsend if you’re like me and have smaller wrists. There’s no option for LTE connectivity on the Gear Sport, but the watch does offer a fantastic fitness-tracking feature-set, support for NFC payments with Samsung Pay, and a design that looks good both in the gym and at the office.

$299 Buy Now

Google Home Mini

The Google Assistant is currently my favorite AI of choice, and for most people, the Google Home Mini is the best smart speaker that has it built-in. The Home Mini’s circular, fabric design is fun and welcoming, and its sound quality absolutely blows the Echo Dot’s out of the water. The regular $50 price is already a great deal, but the insta-buy price of $30 that’s going on right now at so many retailers makes it one of those things that you can’t not get.

$50 Buy Now

TCL 55P607 Roku TV

After months of trying to hold off, I finally broke down and picked up my first 4K TV. There are more than a few options to choose from these days, but the one I ended up going with is the TCL 55P607. Priced between $600 and $650 depending on where you look, the picture quality is downright awesome and way better than I would have expected at this price point. Support for HDR10 and Dolby Vision makes the TV even better, and the built-in Roku operating system means you don’t have to worry about picking up a streaming box or stick to watch all of your favorite shows.

$649 Buy Now

Nintendo Switch

What is there to say about the Nintendo Switch that hasn’t already been said a million times before? It’s a gaming console that’s just fun to use, and I haven’t been able to get enough of it even after months of first buying the thing. The ability to play console-quality games wherever you want to go is an awesome feeling that never gets old, and titles like Breath of the Wild, Splatoon 2, and Super Mario Odyssey and reason enough to pick up the Switch on their own.

$299 Buy Now

First update for Fitbit Ionic brings 100 new watch faces and 60 apps

Highlights include apps for Uber, Philips Hue, Yelp, and Flipboard.

The Fitbit Ionic is Fitbit’s first true smartwatch, and although not perfect, it’s a great step in the right direction for the company. The first software for the Ionic was announced on Fitbit’s blog on December 5, and there’s a lot included with it.

The biggest focus of this update is on watch faces and apps, and this is quite obvious with the fact that users will now be able to download and access over 100 new watch faces and more than 60 additional apps. On the apps side of things, some of the big names include Walgreens, Nest, Philips Hue, Yelp, Flipboard, The New York Times, TripAdvisor, Uber, United Airlines, British Airways, and Lyft.

Fitbit’s included some official watch faces of its own, but the majority of them have been created by third-party developers using the Fitbit OS SDK.

A few other things to keep an eye out for:

• Fitbit Labs – A way for Ionic users to test out experimental apps and watch faces that are “designed to motivate you to make healthy behavior changes.”
• Fitbit Leaderboard – View your step goals and other activity against friends and family members.
• Support for multiple cards – You can now choose which card you want to use for Fitbit Pay directly on the Ionic; supported banks are up to 25 in 13 different markets.
• Improved performance – Fitbit’s updated touchscreen performance of the Ionic so it’s faster and more fluid to use.
• Deezer coming in 2018 – Starting next year, subscribers to Deezer Premium+ will be able to access all of their music right on their wrist.

This update is rolling out to the Ionic now, and instructions on how to get it can be found here.

Samsung’s Gear Sport is currently the best alternative to Android Wear

This is the Qualcomm Snapdragon 845

Qualcomm sort of unveiled the Snapdragon 845 today at its annual summit.

While day one of Qualcomm’s annual Snapdragon Summit was largely dedicated to the chipmaker’s collaboration with Microsoft, and the proliferation of the Always Connected PC, Cristiano Amon, executive vice president of Qualcomm Technologies, teased tomorrow’s unveiling of the Snapdragon 845.

We’ve been expecting this announcement for some time. The Snapdragon 835 was in practically every high-end Android phone this year, and brought a bunch of performance and efficiency improvements over 2016’s well-received Snapdragon 820 and 821. While the Snapdragon 845 isn’t supposed to change the game too much in terms of performance — expect a 10-20% boost in CPU specs and a 20-25% bump in GPU — Qualcomm is doubling down on the support of wide-gamut OLED displays, and artificial intelligence, which we’ve seen from competitors like Apple and Huawei in recent months.

While we’ll learn more about the specifics of the product tomorrow, we learned a few interesting tidbits on day one:

• Samsung Foundry will be once again working with Qualcomm to build the flagship Snapdragon chip, with improvements to the existing 10nm manufacturing process.
• Xiaomi CEO, Lei Jun, came on stage to confirm that the company’s 2018 Mi flagship will have the Snapdragon 845 platform in it — which isn’t a surprise.

For now, stay tuned for more information on the Snapdragon 845.

Samsung starts mass-producing first ever 512GB chips for mobile devices

Because 256GB is so 2017.

When looking at most flagship phones these days, it’s no trouble to find one with 64GB, 128GB, or even 256GB of internal storage. This is particularly nice as apps get larger and photos/videos get crispier, but soon you’ll be able to pick up a phone (at least from Samsung) with a whopping 512GB of storage out of the box.

Samsung announced on December 5 that it had officially begun mass production on a 512GB embedded Universal Flash Storage chip – a first for the mobile industry. The entire package consists of eight 64-layer 512GB V-NAND chips and single controller chip, and although it’s packing twice the storage capacity as Samsung’s 48-layer 256GB chip, it’s physically the same size.

With 512GB of storage, Samsung says you’ll be able to store around 130 4K videos (3840 x 2160) that are each 10-minutes long on a smartphone. Compared to a 64GB chip that could only hold 13 of these videos, that’s a massive increase.

On the performance side of things, the 512GB chip has read speeds that max out at 860MB/s and write speeds of 255MB/s. To transfer a 5GB Full HD video clip to an SSD, it’d take just six seconds (eight times faster than what most microSD cards are capable of).

Samsung’s 512GB chip.

When talking about this new chip, Samsung’s Executive Vice President of Memory Sales & Marketing, Jaesoo Han, said:

The new Samsung 512GB eUFS provides the best embedded storage solution for next-generation premium smartphones by overcoming potential limitations in system performance that can occur with the use of micro SD cards.

Samsung’s been one of the few companies that’s continued to offer microSD card support with its phones, but are Han’s words a hint that this might change with the Galaxy S9? We don’t want to read into anything this early on, but it is something to think about.

With that said, you won’t find me complaining about 512GB phones anytime soon.

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Google is blocking YouTube on Amazon’s Echo Show and Fire TV

Google and Amazon have been battling a bit lately around the implementation of YouTube on the Echo Show. As of today, though, Google is putting its foot down and officially pulling support for YouTube on both the Echo Show and Amazon’s Fire TV devices.

“We’ve been trying to reach agreement with Amazon to give consumers access to each other’s products and services,” a Google spokesperson said in a statement. “But Amazon doesn’t carry Google products like Chromecast and Google Home, doesn’t make Prime Video available for Google Cast users, and last month stopped selling some of Nest’s latest products. Given this lack of reciprocity, we are no longer supporting YouTube on Echo Show and FireTV. We hope we can reach an agreement to resolve these issues soon.”

A person familiar with Google’s thinking on the matter told Engadget that a big point of contention had been the fact that Amazon implemented what was essentially a hacked version of YouTube on both the Echo Show and Fire TV. Rather than work with Google to build versions of its apps that work on Amazon’s devices, Amazon has been trying to do it itself — a move that cuts out features and also likely affects Google’s ability to collect on some of the ad revenue that comes from its videos.

We’ve learned that Google is pulling support for YouTube from the Echo Show as of today; the version of YouTube that exists on Fire TV will work until January 1st.

Google and Amazon have been in discussions for a long time to try and have a more mutually beneficial relationship, but it sounds like it hasn’t been going well. Our source says that Google would like to have more of its hardware products like Chromecast and Google Home available through Amazon, but the company has long avoided selling products that compete with its own hardware initiatives — that’s why you can’t get an Apple TV on Amazon, for example. Similarly, Amazon Prime Video doesn’t support Google’s Cast feature, making it difficult to get video to a big screen for Android users.

Between those difficulties and the fact that Amazon pulled some of Nest’s recent products (including the new Thermostat E, Camera IQ and Nest Secure alarm system), Google doesn’t seem inclined to let Amazon continue to run its “hacked” versions of YouTube on its devices, though our source says that Google would be much happier working directly with Amazon than forcing consumers to pick sides.

That’s not an unreasonable position to take, as the company surely wants more control over the YouTube experience on Amazon’s products, but unfortunately the only people getting hurt in this feud are customers. Google seems to be betting that Amazon will want to get YouTube back up and running on its flagship video products before long, so it can afford to take a hard line here. Whether or not things get resolved by the end of the year remains to be seen, though.

GM thinks you’ll buy stuff through your car’s dashboard

As more cars roll off production lines with WiFi and LTE capabilities as standard, brands are falling over themselves to find ways to monetize this connectivity. Jaguar and Shell have partnered for in-car fuel payments, while BMW and Ford are bringing Alexa to your dashboard. Now, General Motors (GM) has unveiled a new on-board marketplace where drivers can buy coffee and gas, and make restaurant and hotel reservations, without getting out of their car.

The GM Marketplace will be automatically uploaded to around 1.9 million 2017-and-later models immediately, with four million vehicles across the Chevrolet, Buick, GMC and Cadillac brands getting it by the end of 2018. GM stands to get an “undisclosed” amount of revenue from merchants on the marketplace, which include the likes of Starbucks, TGI Fridays, ExxonMobil, Parkopedia and Priceline.com.

GM’s vision, presumably, is that people will use their car dashboards, rather than their smartphones, for “on the road” transactions. But commuters still need to wait in a drive-thru to pick up their morning coffee, whether they purchase it with their phone, car or by shouting their request into a speaker. Ditto gas. You’ll still have to line up and pump the gas yourself, however it’s been purchased.

And while the company says the platform has been designed with driving safety guidelines in mind, your eyes are still off the road whether you’re putting your coffee order into your phone (which you’re probably more familiar with and offers access to more apps) or your car’s infotainment system. So it’s hard to see what value the marketplace brings to the table at this stage. But in-car connectivity like this represents a fledgling — and potentially hugely lucrative — market, so we can expect similar efforts from other manufacturers looking to get in on the action too, even if it’s not yet clear exactly what that action is.

Via: The Verge

Source: Reuters

HP and ASUS unveil Snapdragon-powered laptops

Since teasing us with a preview of what Windows on Snapdragon will look like at Computex this year, Qualcomm and its partners are ready to reveal actual devices. Today, at Qualcomm’s second annual tech summit, we saw the HP Envy x2 and the ASUS NovaGo — two of the “Always Connected PCs” that Microsoft has talked about since last year. In fact, the ASUS is calling the NovaGo the first Gigabit LTE laptop, since it uses the Snapdragon chipset that enables those speeds.

Both laptops use the Snapdragon 835 chipset which you’ll find on this year’s premium smartphones like the Pixel 2, Galaxy Note 8, LG V30, Xperia XZ Premium and Razer Phone. The chip comes with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X16 modem which supports gigabit LTE where available. Although Windows on Snapdragon PCs are meant to support eSIM for easier switching between carriers while traveling, the models announced today will still have a standard nano SIM card slot. It’s currently unclear when the eSIM built into the NovaGo’s wireless modem will be activated for use, but at least it has one — the HP laptop will rely solely on a traditional nano SIM.

At just 1.54 pounds, the HP Envy x2, which is the company’s latest Surface clone, is lighter even than the 12-inch MacBook (2016), which weighs a mere 2 pounds. The Envy has a similarly sized 12-inch display, though its 1,920 x 1,280 resolution isn’t as sharp as the MacBook, and to be fair the Envy is more of a tablet convertible while the Macbook is a more traditional laptop. Still, it’s pretty thin and light. We already had a chance to check the Envy x2 out — check out our hands-on here. Meanwhile, the ASUS NovaGo weighs 1.39 kg (or 3.06 pounds) and packs a slightly larger 13.3-inch full HD LTPS touchscreen with ASUS Pen support (1024-level pressure).

Both the ASUS and HP convertibles offer up to 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage, although the NovaGo uses UFS 2.0 that should allow for faster memory access and lower power consumption. The ASUS laptop also sports a full HDMI socket and a microSD slot, while we don’t yet know for sure if the Envy x2 has those ports.

The main thing to note here is that these are two Snapdragon-powered PCs that can run full Windows 10 while providing smartphone-like connectivity to gigabit LTE networks. Both devices will ship with Windows 10S, but ASUS and HP are offering free upgrades to Windows 10 Pro before Sept. 30, 2018.

The HP Envy x2 will be available in spring next year, while no timeframe has been shared for the ASUS NovaGo yet. ASUS will offer the device for $599 ($799 for 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage) first in the US, UK, Italy, France, Germany, Mainland China and Taiwan, and is working with T-Mobile, Sprint and Verizon to offer the NovaGo. We’ll be checking out the new ASUS laptop later today, so stay tuned for our hands-on impressions to find out if this is a device worth your time.

HP Envy x2 hands-on: A Snapdragon-powered, always-on PC

For its first “Always Connected” PC, HP made a pragmatic choice: It stuffed a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processor into its latest Surface clone, the Envy x2. The result is compelling: A thin and light laptop with 20 hours of battery life, and built-in LTE connectivity. It’s precisely the sort of machine that Microsoft envisioned when it revealed its vision of always connected devices at Computex.

At first glance, the Envy X2 doesn’t seem that different than a typical hybrid PC. It’s slightly thinner than an iPad Pro, at 6.9 millimeters thick, and it weighs just 1.54 pounds. Thanks to its aluminum case, it feels like a premium device. The bundled keyboard case, which wraps around the entire tablet, also houses its kickstand. You won’t notice anything out of the ordinary until you take a look at the “System” menu to see that it’s powered by a Snapdragon process. Which, of course, is exactly what HP wants.

Based on my short time with the x2, it felt a lot like HP’s recent Spectre x2 hybrid. The keyboard was comfortable to use and sturdy enough to handle my heavy typing style. Every key also had a satisfying amount of travel, something we don’t see too often on hybrid machines (aside from the Surface devices). Its case is a bit awkward though — while it offers a decent amount of protection, a built-in kickstand would be more convenient for using the x2 for things like viewing video in bed. Since it runs Windows 10 S out of the box, it can only run apps from the Windows Store. But, just like the Surface Laptop, you can also upgrade to Windows 10 Pro for free down the line.

Performance-wise, the x2 kept up with me as I opened several Office apps, Paint 3D, and Edge windows and tabs. There weren’t any games to play, and I didn’t have a chance to test out extreme multi-tasking scenarios, unfortunately. But, for the most part, it seems like the x2 can handle basic productivity tasks, despite its mobile CPU. Another potential limiting factor is its 4GB of RAM, something that could easily get filled up if you’re addicted to opening dozens of browser tabs at once.

On paper, the Envy x2 sounds like the notebook I’ve always dreamed of. Who wouldn’t want a $599 machine that’s always online, with tons of battery life? Still, I’d expect to see some compromises when I have more time to use the x2. Even though mobile processors like the Snapdragon 835 are capable enough to power high-end smartphones, it’s unclear how they’d handle desktop- multitasking. And it remains to be seen just how well Microsoft translated Windows 10 to ARM processors. At this point, the Envy x2 is just a glimpse at the promise of always connected PCs — but it’s an intriguing one.

AMD and Qualcomm join forces to power higher-end connected PCs

Qualcomm may have found a worthy ally in its quest to take on the PC market. After unveiling a new stable of Snapdragon 835-powered “Always Connected” PCs from HP and ASUS, the chip-maker revealed a surprise partner: AMD. The two companies are teaming up to make Always Connected PCs on AMD’s “Ryzen” mobile platform while using Snapdragon LTE modems to enable gigabit connection speeds. On gigabit LTE, you could potentially download a feature-length movie over cellular data in less than 30 seconds.

AMD unveiled its Ryzen mobile chips, which feature integrated Radeon Vega graphics, in October. Ryzen CPUs were designed to provide desktop-class performance while still allowing for a small enough footprint for thin-and-lights. The company has revealed two Ryzen mobile processors so far, both of them quad-core chips with eight threads — a similar architecture to Intel’s eighth-generation laptop chipsets.

The higher-end Ryzen has 10 Vega graphics cores, helping it blow away Intel’s integrated graphics on benchmarks that AMD ran. For gamers on the go, the Ryzen chipsets can provide decent frame rates for midrange games like League of Legends or Overwatch. Intel’s chipsets can go up to 4.2GHz, though, while the higher-end model can only reach 3.8GHz, so AMD’s chips may not be as fast in bursts.

Marrying this performance with Snapdragon’s X16 LTE modems means that laptops borne from this union could be powerful enough for online gaming over cellular connections. AMD’s director of product management, David McAfee, described some of the “unprecedented” possibilities to Engadget. You could, for instance, play an esports game or an MMO title while you’re on the road over LTE, thanks to low latency and high bandwidth over today’s LTE connections.

McAfee also expects AMD and Qualcomm’s collaboration to facilitate “fundamentally transformational user experiences” for business travelers, thanks also to technologies like eSIM, and the ability to switch between carriers or buy packs of data around the world. These are all concepts that were discussed when Microsoft and Qualcomm announced Always Connected PCs at WinHEC last year.

Today, we finally saw actual devices designed for Windows on Snapdragon. ASUS’s NovaGo and HP’s Envy x2 are laptops that pack Snapdragon 835 processors and can run full Windows 10 (although they’ll ship with Windows 10S), complete with x86 app compatibility and support for Windows Ink, Hello and Cortana. They both tout 20-hour battery lives, far more than traditional notebooks, and support Gigabit LTE where available.

But even though the Snapdragon 835 chipset is a capable processor for smartphones, it’s not going to help Qualcomm compete with Intel, the other chip maker working on Always Connected PCs. In May, Intel announced it would support eSIM in all its existing and upcoming modems, making itself compatible with the Always Connected PC ecosystem.

A 14nm chip (left) versus the 10nm Snapdragon 835 (right)

With AMD’s participation, Qualcomm now has the means to provide more power for laptops that can handle more intensive multitasking beyond the limits of a chip designed for smartphones.

But because no actual product has been unveiled, it’s hard to know exactly what to expect. McAfee said AMD’s part in this collaboration “is to engineer the experience with Qualcomm so all the parts about stability and software stacks are second to none.” That means it’ll spend days in labs, testing the mainboards it created with Qualcomm’s radios to make sure the parts play nice with each other and work well with the Windows software.

It’s been an interesting year for AMD, which seems to be emerging from Intel’s shadow. Its Ryzen desktop and mobile processors launched in February and October to positive reception in the industry. Even Intel, AMD’s archrival, is now asking for occasional help. A few weeks ago, Intel unveiled a series of enthusiast chipsets that combine its CPU with semi-custom AMD GPUs for stronger graphics performance.

Neither AMD nor Qualcomm has revealed many details beyond confirming their partnership. They’ve been working together for years. Since 2011, Qualcomm has provided the wireless WAN components for AMD’s platform. McAfee said this is meant to be an evolving collaboration that will “play out over generations.” In other words, in years to come we might even see them make a chip together. “Maybe that’s in the cards in the future,” McAfee said.

Still, as it stands, this is intriguing news for the Always Connected PC ecosystem, since it means that future laptops built with Qualcomm radios won’t be restricted to smartphone-level performance. At the very least, this gives Intel some competition in this space, and that’s good news for consumers.