iMac Pro Again Available for $3,999 From Micro Center Stores
Micro Center retail stores are once again offering the entry-level iMac Pro for $3,999, an impressive discount of $1,000 off of the regular $4,999 price tag for the newly released machine.
The same deal was offered earlier in the month, and iMac Pro models available at Micro Center stores were snapped up quickly. Based on the online stock checking tool, most Micro Center locations have at least one iMac Pro in stock, with some, such as the Westmont Micro Center in Illinois, listing 10+ machines available for purchase.
The $1,000 discount on the iMac Pro is for Micro Center retail stores only, with the $3,999 iMac Pro not available from the Micro Center website.
Apple’s base configuration 27-inch 5K iMac Pro, which Micro Center is discounting, comes equipped with a 3.2GHz 8-core Intel Xeon W processor, Thunderbolt 3 support, 32GB ECC 2,666MHz RAM, a 1TB SSD, and a Radeon Pro Vega 56 graphics card with 8GB HMB2 memory.
No other retailer is offering the iMac Pro at such a significant discount at this time. Micro Center is limiting purchases to one per household, and available supply could go quick.
Micro Center stores are located primarily in the midwest and south, with 25 stores nationwide.
Related Roundups: iMac, Apple DealsTag: Micro CenterBuyer’s Guide: iMac (Neutral)
Discuss this article in our forums
Don’t be fooled by dystopian sci-fi stories: A.I. is becoming a force for good
One of the most famous sayings about technology is the “law” laid out by the late American historian Melvin Kranzberg: “Technology is neither good nor bad; nor is it neutral.”
It’s a great saying: brief, but packed with instruction, like a beautifully poetic line of code. If I understand it correctly, it means that technology isn’t inherently good or bad, but that it will certainly impact upon us in some way — which means that its effects are not neutral. A similarly brilliant quote came from the French cultural theorist Paul Virilio: “the invention of the ship was also the invention of the shipwreck.”
“Technology is neither good nor bad; nor is it neutral.”
To adopt that last image, artificial intelligence (A.I.) is the mother of all ships. It promises to be as significant a transformation for the world as the arrival of electricity was in the nineteenth and twentieth century. But while many of us will coo excitedly over the latest demonstration of DeepMind’s astonishing neural networks, a lot of the discussion surrounding A.I. is decidedly negative. We fret about robots stealing jobs, autonomous weapons threatening the world’s wellbeing, and the creeping privacy issues of data-munching giants. Heck, once the dream of achieving artificial general intelligence arrives, some pessimists seem to think the only debate is whether we’re obliterated by Terminator-style robots or turned into grey goo by nanobots.
While some of this technophobia is arguably misplaced, it’s not hard to see critics’ point. Tech giants like Google and Facebook have hired some of the greatest minds of our generation, and put them to work not curing disease or rethinking the economy, but coming up with better ways to target us with ads. The Human Genome Project, this ain’t! Shouldn’t a world-changing technology like A.I. be doing a bit more… world changing?
A course in moral A.I.?
2018 may be the year when things start to change. While they’re still small seeds just beginning to sprout green shoots, there’s more evidence that the subject of making A.I. into a true force for good is starting to gain momentum. For example, starting this semester, the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) will be teaching a new class, titled “Artificial Intelligence for Social Good.” It touches on many of the topics you’d expect from a graduate and undergraduate class — optimization, game theory, machine learning, and sequential decision making — and will look at these through the lens of how each will impact society. The course will also challenge students to build their own ethical A.I. projects, giving them real world experience with creating potentially life-changing A.I.
ITU/R.Farrell
“A.I. is the blooming field with tremendous commercial success, and most people benefit from the advances of A.I. in their daily lives,” Professor Fei Fang told Digital Trends. “At the same time, people also have various concerns, ranging from potential job loss to privacy and safety issues to ethical issues and biases. However, not enough awareness has been raised regarding how A.I. can help address societal challenges.”
Fang describes this new course as “one of the pioneering courses focusing on this topic,” but CMU isn’t the only institution to offer one. It joins a similar “A.I. for Social Good” course offered at the University of Southern California, which started last year. At CMU, Fang’s course is listed as a core course for a Societal Computing Ph.D. program.
“Not enough awareness has been raised regarding how A.I. can help address societal challenges.”
During the new CMU course, Fang and a variety of guest lecturers will discuss a number of ways A.I. can help solve big social questions: machine learning and game theory used to help protect wildlife from poaching, A.I. being used to design efficient matching algorithms for kidney exchange, and using A.I. to help prevent HIV among homeless young people by selecting a set of peer leaders to spread health-related information.
“The most important takeaway is that A.I. can be used to address pressing societal challenges, and can benefit society now and in the near future,” Fang said. “And it relies on the students to identify these challenges, to formulate them into clearly defined problems, and to develop A.I. methods to help address them.”
Challenges with modern A.I.
Professor Fang’s class isn’t the first time that the ethics of A.I. has been discussed, but it does represent (and, certainly, coincide with) a renewed interest in the field. A.I. ethics are going mainstream.
This month, Microsoft published a book called “The Future Computed: Artificial intelligence and its role in society.” Like Fang’s class, it runs through some of the scenarios in which A.I. can help people today: letting those with limited vision hear the world described to them by a wearable device, and using smart sensors to let farmers increase their yield and be more productive.
Ekso Bionics
There are plenty more examples of this kind. Here at Digital Trends, we’ve covered A.I. that can help develop new pharmaceutical drugs, A.I. that can help people avoid shelling out for a high priced lawyer, A.I. to diagnose disease, and A.I. and robotics projects which can help reduce backbreaking work — either by teaching humans how to perform it more safely or even taking them out of the loop altogether.
All of these are positive examples of how A.I. can be used for social good. But for it to really become a force for positive change in the world, artificial intelligence needs to go beyond simply good applications. It also needs to be created in a way that is considered positive by society. As Fang says, the possibility of algorithms reflecting bias is a significant problem, and one that’s still not well understood.
The possibility of algorithms reflecting bias is a significant problem, and one that’s still not well understood.
Several years ago, African-American Harvard University PhD Latanya Sweeney “exposed” Google’s search algorithms as being inadvertently racist, by linking names more commonly given to black people with ads relating to arrest records. Sweeney, who had never been arrested, found that she was nonetheless shown ads asking “Have you been arrested?” that her white colleagues were not. Similar case studies have noticed how image recognition systems will be more likely to associate a picture of a kitchen with women and one of sports coaching with men. In this case, the bias wasn’t necessarily the fault of one programmer, but rather discriminatory patterns hidden in the large sets of data Google’s algorithms are trained on.
The same is true for the “black boxing” of algorithms, which can make them inscrutable to even their own creators. In Microsoft’s new book, its authors suggest that A.I. should be built around an ethical framework, a bit like science fiction writer Isaac Asimov’s “Three Laws of Robotics” for the “woke” generation. These six principles include the fact that AI systems should be fair, reliable and safe; that they should be private and secure; that they should be inclusive; that they should be transparent, and that they they should be accountable.
“If designed properly, A.I. can help make decisions that are fairer because computers are purely logical and, in theory, are not subject to the conscious and unconscious biases that inevitably influence human decision-making,” Microsoft’s authors write.
More work to be done
Ultimately, this is going to be easier said than done. From most people’s perspective, A.I. research done in the private sector far outstrips work done in the public sector. The problem with this is accountability in a world where algorithms are guarded as secretly as missile launch codes. There is also no cause for companies to solve big societal problems if it will not immediately benefit their bottom line. (Or score them some brownie points to possibly avoid regulation.) It would be naive to think that all of the concerns raised by profit-driven companies are going to be altruistic, no matter how much they might suggest otherwise.
For broader discussions about the use of A.I. for public good, something is going to have to change. Is it recognizing the power of artificial intelligence and putting into place more regulations allowing for scrutiny? Does it mean companies forming ethics boards, as was the case with Google DeepMind, as part of their research into cutting edge A.I.? Is it awaiting a market-driven change, or backlash, that will demand that tech giants offer more information about the system’s that govern our lives? Is it, as Bill Gates has suggested, implementing a robot tax that will curtail the use of A.I. or robotics in some situations by taxing companies for replacing its workers? None of these solutions are perfect.
And the biggest question of all remains: Who exactly defines ‘good’? Debates about how A.I. can be a force for good in our society will involve a significant number of users, policy makers, activists, technologists, and other interested parties working out what kind of world it is that we want to create, and how to use technology to best achieve that.
As DeepMind co-founder Mustafa Suleyman told Wired: “Getting these things right is not purely a matter of having good intentions. We need to do the hard, practical and messy work of finding out what ethical A.I. really means. If we manage to get A.I. to work for people and the planet, then the effects could be transformational. Right now, there’s everything to play for.”
Courses like Professor Fang’s aren’t the final destination, by any means. But they are a very good start.
Editors’ Recommendations
- IBM and MIT are working together to make sure A.I. isn’t our downfall
- Everything you need to know about Neuralink: Elon Musk’s brainy new venture
- Could this $10,000 scooter from Ujet be the mobility solution of the future?
- Somnox is a robotic pillow that lulls you to sleep by ‘breathing’
- Email spam is about to get way worse, and you can blame MailChimp
Don’t be fooled by dystopian sci-fi stories: A.I. is becoming a force for good
One of the most famous sayings about technology is the “law” laid out by the late American historian Melvin Kranzberg: “Technology is neither good nor bad; nor is it neutral.”
It’s a great saying: brief, but packed with instruction, like a beautifully poetic line of code. If I understand it correctly, it means that technology isn’t inherently good or bad, but that it will certainly impact upon us in some way — which means that its effects are not neutral. A similarly brilliant quote came from the French cultural theorist Paul Virilio: “the invention of the ship was also the invention of the shipwreck.”
“Technology is neither good nor bad; nor is it neutral.”
To adopt that last image, artificial intelligence (A.I.) is the mother of all ships. It promises to be as significant a transformation for the world as the arrival of electricity was in the nineteenth and twentieth century. But while many of us will coo excitedly over the latest demonstration of DeepMind’s astonishing neural networks, a lot of the discussion surrounding A.I. is decidedly negative. We fret about robots stealing jobs, autonomous weapons threatening the world’s wellbeing, and the creeping privacy issues of data-munching giants. Heck, once the dream of achieving artificial general intelligence arrives, some pessimists seem to think the only debate is whether we’re obliterated by Terminator-style robots or turned into grey goo by nanobots.
While some of this technophobia is arguably misplaced, it’s not hard to see critics’ point. Tech giants like Google and Facebook have hired some of the greatest minds of our generation, and put them to work not curing disease or rethinking the economy, but coming up with better ways to target us with ads. The Human Genome Project, this ain’t! Shouldn’t a world-changing technology like A.I. be doing a bit more… world changing?
A course in moral A.I.?
2018 may be the year when things start to change. While they’re still small seeds just beginning to sprout green shoots, there’s more evidence that the subject of making A.I. into a true force for good is starting to gain momentum. For example, starting this semester, the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) will be teaching a new class, titled “Artificial Intelligence for Social Good.” It touches on many of the topics you’d expect from a graduate and undergraduate class — optimization, game theory, machine learning, and sequential decision making — and will look at these through the lens of how each will impact society. The course will also challenge students to build their own ethical A.I. projects, giving them real world experience with creating potentially life-changing A.I.
ITU/R.Farrell
“A.I. is the blooming field with tremendous commercial success, and most people benefit from the advances of A.I. in their daily lives,” Professor Fei Fang told Digital Trends. “At the same time, people also have various concerns, ranging from potential job loss to privacy and safety issues to ethical issues and biases. However, not enough awareness has been raised regarding how A.I. can help address societal challenges.”
Fang describes this new course as “one of the pioneering courses focusing on this topic,” but CMU isn’t the only institution to offer one. It joins a similar “A.I. for Social Good” course offered at the University of Southern California, which started last year. At CMU, Fang’s course is listed as a core course for a Societal Computing Ph.D. program.
“Not enough awareness has been raised regarding how A.I. can help address societal challenges.”
During the new CMU course, Fang and a variety of guest lecturers will discuss a number of ways A.I. can help solve big social questions: machine learning and game theory used to help protect wildlife from poaching, A.I. being used to design efficient matching algorithms for kidney exchange, and using A.I. to help prevent HIV among homeless young people by selecting a set of peer leaders to spread health-related information.
“The most important takeaway is that A.I. can be used to address pressing societal challenges, and can benefit society now and in the near future,” Fang said. “And it relies on the students to identify these challenges, to formulate them into clearly defined problems, and to develop A.I. methods to help address them.”
Challenges with modern A.I.
Professor Fang’s class isn’t the first time that the ethics of A.I. has been discussed, but it does represent (and, certainly, coincide with) a renewed interest in the field. A.I. ethics are going mainstream.
This month, Microsoft published a book called “The Future Computed: Artificial intelligence and its role in society.” Like Fang’s class, it runs through some of the scenarios in which A.I. can help people today: letting those with limited vision hear the world described to them by a wearable device, and using smart sensors to let farmers increase their yield and be more productive.
Ekso Bionics
There are plenty more examples of this kind. Here at Digital Trends, we’ve covered A.I. that can help develop new pharmaceutical drugs, A.I. that can help people avoid shelling out for a high priced lawyer, A.I. to diagnose disease, and A.I. and robotics projects which can help reduce backbreaking work — either by teaching humans how to perform it more safely or even taking them out of the loop altogether.
All of these are positive examples of how A.I. can be used for social good. But for it to really become a force for positive change in the world, artificial intelligence needs to go beyond simply good applications. It also needs to be created in a way that is considered positive by society. As Fang says, the possibility of algorithms reflecting bias is a significant problem, and one that’s still not well understood.
The possibility of algorithms reflecting bias is a significant problem, and one that’s still not well understood.
Several years ago, African-American Harvard University PhD Latanya Sweeney “exposed” Google’s search algorithms as being inadvertently racist, by linking names more commonly given to black people with ads relating to arrest records. Sweeney, who had never been arrested, found that she was nonetheless shown ads asking “Have you been arrested?” that her white colleagues were not. Similar case studies have noticed how image recognition systems will be more likely to associate a picture of a kitchen with women and one of sports coaching with men. In this case, the bias wasn’t necessarily the fault of one programmer, but rather discriminatory patterns hidden in the large sets of data Google’s algorithms are trained on.
The same is true for the “black boxing” of algorithms, which can make them inscrutable to even their own creators. In Microsoft’s new book, its authors suggest that A.I. should be built around an ethical framework, a bit like science fiction writer Isaac Asimov’s “Three Laws of Robotics” for the “woke” generation. These six principles include the fact that AI systems should be fair, reliable and safe; that they should be private and secure; that they should be inclusive; that they should be transparent, and that they they should be accountable.
“If designed properly, A.I. can help make decisions that are fairer because computers are purely logical and, in theory, are not subject to the conscious and unconscious biases that inevitably influence human decision-making,” Microsoft’s authors write.
More work to be done
Ultimately, this is going to be easier said than done. From most people’s perspective, A.I. research done in the private sector far outstrips work done in the public sector. The problem with this is accountability in a world where algorithms are guarded as secretly as missile launch codes. There is also no cause for companies to solve big societal problems if it will not immediately benefit their bottom line. (Or score them some brownie points to possibly avoid regulation.) It would be naive to think that all of the concerns raised by profit-driven companies are going to be altruistic, no matter how much they might suggest otherwise.
For broader discussions about the use of A.I. for public good, something is going to have to change. Is it recognizing the power of artificial intelligence and putting into place more regulations allowing for scrutiny? Does it mean companies forming ethics boards, as was the case with Google DeepMind, as part of their research into cutting edge A.I.? Is it awaiting a market-driven change, or backlash, that will demand that tech giants offer more information about the system’s that govern our lives? Is it, as Bill Gates has suggested, implementing a robot tax that will curtail the use of A.I. or robotics in some situations by taxing companies for replacing its workers? None of these solutions are perfect.
And the biggest question of all remains: Who exactly defines ‘good’? Debates about how A.I. can be a force for good in our society will involve a significant number of users, policy makers, activists, technologists, and other interested parties working out what kind of world it is that we want to create, and how to use technology to best achieve that.
As DeepMind co-founder Mustafa Suleyman told Wired: “Getting these things right is not purely a matter of having good intentions. We need to do the hard, practical and messy work of finding out what ethical A.I. really means. If we manage to get A.I. to work for people and the planet, then the effects could be transformational. Right now, there’s everything to play for.”
Courses like Professor Fang’s aren’t the final destination, by any means. But they are a very good start.
Editors’ Recommendations
- IBM and MIT are working together to make sure A.I. isn’t our downfall
- Everything you need to know about Neuralink: Elon Musk’s brainy new venture
- Could this $10,000 scooter from Ujet be the mobility solution of the future?
- Somnox is a robotic pillow that lulls you to sleep by ‘breathing’
- Email spam is about to get way worse, and you can blame MailChimp
Save time and get healthy with the best meal-planning apps
Planning out meals is one of the best ways to eat healthier, cut calories, lose weight, and feed the whole family fast. It’s also pretty hard to do — but the right app can make your modern meals a whole lot easier to create, shop for, and prepare. Take a look at the best meal-planning apps, all totally free and ready to help out.
Mealime (Free)
Mealime (forgive the play on words) is designed around planning family or meals for guests the easy way. You can create profiles of everyone you are cooking for, which can list likes, dislikes, general eating habits, allergies, and so on. You can also create profiles for couples, whole families, and so on to make planning a little easier.
You can then look for recipes that match all your requirements. Pick one, and it gives you full instructions and can automatically add the necessary ingredients to your grocery list. Most recipes are focused on fast prep times around 30 minutes, so you may be able to save even more time in the kitchen.
Download now from:
iTunes Google
FoodPlanner (Free)
FoodPlanner is based around recipes. It allows you to browse the web for healthy recipes and download them onto the app. It gives you the nutritional data for the meal and allows you to automatically generate a shopping list. An extra inventory-management system for the truly serious allows you to keep track of your current ingredients, and you can also make recipes from scratch if you wish. There are sharing features, but they are Android-focused.
Download now from:
iTunes Google Amazon
Mealplan ($4)
Mealplan presents you with meal tags that you can drag and drop into a weekly schedule to quickly form your meal plans (and even email them to other people). The tags make it easy to search for specific meals, and can automatically generate grocery lists for you. You can also tweak meals to add snacks, put in links to specific recipes, or remove certain meals entirely if you have other plans. You can search for new meals and generate a tag for them, too. There’s a learning curve, but it’s a fun system, particularly if you have an iPad.
Download now from:
iTunes
MealBoard ($4)
Do you love to customize every little detail? Then MealBoard may be the app for you. It acts like many of the other apps on our list, with a search function for meals pulled from the internet, the ability to plan out meals on a calendar, and the option to generate a grocery list. But a couple of features make it unique: The interface is particularly pleasant to use and easy to customize, and there’s a pantry mode that allows you to move ingredients to your pantry when you buy them and remove them when you run out.
Download now from:
iTunes
Eat This Much (Free)
Here’s a different approach: If your primary goal is to lose weight, then Eat This Much encourages you to put in your food preferences, how much money you want to spend, your schedule, and how many calories the meals will contain. It will then generate meal plans for you and provide grocery lists for the ingredients. If you like cooking (as opposed to meal delivery) but want to develop healthier eating habits, this app could help you do just that.
Download now from:
iTunes Google
Lose It! (Free)
Lose It! is also a weight-loss app, but instead of putting in the number of calories you want per meal, you just set general goals and a body weight target that you want to reach. Then you track what you are eating (remember to be accurate) and what sort of exercise you are getting. The app includes a food database with millions of options to choose from, a scanning function so you can instantly add purchased foods, and even some photo recognition for basic foods. It’s ideal if you like to combine planning with tracking.
Download now from:
iTunes Google
Paprika ($5)
The Paprika Recipe Manager is a very interactive kind of meal planner. In addition to the usual features like finding recipes online, building automatic grocery lists, and planning meals for the week or month, there are also tools that you can use to go deeper. Automatically scale ingredients, cross them off as you add them, add photos to your recipes, and customize your grocery categories based on how you like to shop — there are tons of ways to make sure everything is just the way you like it.
Download now from:
iTunes Google Amazon
Yummly (Free)
Yummly is a general food-sharing and recipe-finding app that features plenty of vivid photos and a rating system to help you find the most popular (or at least the most talked-about) recipes online. If you have your meal routine pretty well down but need some help finding the right recipes, Yummly is a great, albeit more casual, app. We particularly suggest the Yummly Recipes and Shopping List version to help you plan out your meals.
Download now from:
iTunes Google
Editors’ Recommendations
- The eMeals vegan meal kit uses your local grocery stores for ingredients
- Take a deep breath, a sip of wine, and ace Thanksgiving with these apps
- Give Rachael Ray a run for her money with these 11 best cooking apps
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Honor 7X vs. Moto G5 Plus: Which phone under $250 should you buy?
Budget phones are better than ever.
Everybody loves a good deal. These days, it’s easier than ever to get a great phone at a low price, and no two phones better represent that than the Moto G5 Plus and the Honor 7X. Both phones retail for less than $250 and deliver enormous value, bringing many of their respective brands’ best features to an affordable range.
In our reviews, we called each of these phones the best new device at the time of their release, but which of them is best for you?
What the Honor 7X does better
The Honor 7X is nearly a year newer than the Moto G5 Plus, and as you might expect, it features a significantly more modern design. In stark contrast to the Moto G5 Plus’s massive bezels, the Honor 7X has a large, 5.93-inch 18:9 display that occupies over 77% of its face. The 7X also features a rear-mounted fingerprint sensor, which some may find more ergonomic than the Moto G5 Plus’s placement under the display — this also allows for fingerprint sensor gestures to call down the notification shade and swipe through gallery photos.
The Honor 7X looks substantially more modern than the Moto G5 Plus.
In addition, the Honor 7X is the only phone to feature dual cameras on the back. The secondary sensor measures depth to aid in portrait mode and wide aperture photography, allowing the 7X to take impressive artistic shots.
While the EMUI 5.1 software included on the Honor 7X may not be everyone’s cup of tea, it’s full of useful features like lock screen shortcuts and a wide variety of shooting modes in the camera app. Unfortunately, despite its recent release, the 7X isn’t yet on Android Oreo, nor Huawei’s newer EMUI 8 firmware.
See at Amazon
What the Moto G5 Plus does better
Fans of stock Android will feel much more at home with the Moto G5 Plus. Motorola has added some minor tweaks to the Nougat software, namely the Moto app for gestures like the popular double-twist to launch the camera, but for the most part this is as clean as Android gets. If you don’t mind a bit of bloat, you can even save some money and buy the Prime Exclusive version, which comes pre-loaded with Amazon lock screen ads.
The Moto G5 Plus is still the best option for fans of stock Android and Moto Actions.
While neither phone claims a true IP rating for water and dust resistance, the Moto G5 Plus at least offers a water-repellent nano-coating. It probably won’t save your phone in the event of full-on submersion — say, a dunk in the pool or toilet — but it’s at least enough to give some peace of mind when you’re caught out in the rain.
See at Amazon
Where both are evenly matched
The Honor 7X and Moto G5 Plus both run the older Android 7.0 Nougat software (albeit very different iterations), and share similar internal specs; each features a fairly powerful mid-range processor (Kirin 659 and Snapdragon 625, respectively), up to 4GB of RAM, and up to 64GB of internal storage, expandable via microSD.
Both phones are also similar in what they lack; given the metal bodies, you won’t find wireless charging on either device, and for whatever reason NFC is missing as well. Further, both phones still adhere to the dated Micro-USB standard, rather than the increasingly commonplace USB-C.
Which one’s right for you?
This one really comes down to the software. EMUI 5.1 is significantly and fundamentally different from stock Android, but that doesn’t make it bad — some even prefer it. If you’re okay with EMUI, the Honor 7X is the clear choice; it’s newer, the design is vastly superior, and the dual cameras allow for more artistic photography.
If, on the other hand, you prefer the look and feel of stock Android, or you simply don’t like 18:9 displays, the Moto G5 Plus is still a fantastic value — though you may want to keep an eye out for its upcoming successor.
Do you own either phone, or have any plans of owning one in the near future? Let us know in the comments below!
Pixel 2 XL vs. OnePlus 5T — Which is the better buy?
The $350 difference.
If you’re shopping around for a large Android smartphone right now, two devices that deserve to be on your shortlist are the Google Pixel 2 XL and OnePlus 5T. Google’s latest entry into the Pixel series is one of the most impressive phones available, but the 5T offers a tremendous amount of features and tech for $350 less.
Google Pixel 2 XL (left) and OnePlus 5T (right).
One of our forum users is currently the owner of the OnePlus 3, and they can’t decide which of the above two phones they should upgrade to. Other members of the community were quick to reach out with their own suggestions, and these are a few of the top answers.
drenfree
01-23-2018 05:52 PM“
I would get the pixel 2xl. Due to the pure Android experience. I have owned several Samsung Galaxy models, Nexus 6 and various iPhones. This Android doesn’t make me miss my iPhone 7 plus. Also I might sound bias but I just don’t trust the Chinese phone manufacturers for security concerns.
Reply
Morty2264
01-23-2018 09:42 PM“
I too would recommend the 2 XL. If you do happen to get a model that has a particularly bad blue tint, return it and swap it for another one within your return window. Google’s two-year (within the States) warranty also makes the more-expensive Pixel an easier phone to invest in.
I too enjoy the 5T and would certainly recommend it – and I’ve heard returning it is easy if you decide you are…
Reply
Vega007
01-24-2018 10:48 AM“
I wish I could say I have used a Pixel 2 XL, but I haven’t. What I have used is the smaller Pixel, and I would take the OnePlus 5T over that anyday. The only X factor here would be the camera and how important low light photos are for you, since the Pixel will crush the OnePlus in that regard.
Reply
01-26-2018 11:40 PM“
I have both and they are great. I like oxygenOS better than stock Google (including the launcher) the 5T is a great experience but the camera isn’t a Pixel, it’s good but it’s not the pixels. Other issue for me is lack of VoLTE on ATT with the 5T, the Pixel front speakers with VoLTE is amazing. But overall these two and the samsungs are the best Android phones out right now.
Reply
Now, we’d like to hear from you – Would you purchase the Pixel 2 XL or OnePlus 5T?
Join the conversation in the forums!
Google Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL
- Pixel 2 FAQ: Everything you need to know!
- Google Pixel 2 and 2 XL review: The new standard
- Google Pixel 2 specs
- Google Pixel 2 vs. Pixel 2 XL: What’s the difference?
- Join our Pixel 2 forums
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Huawei’s next P-series phone will be called the P20
Could this updated name hint at a large upgrade over the P10?
Although not perfect, Huawei’s P10 from early 2017 was an excellent phone that featured a great design, awesome camera performance, and superb battery life. We’re expecting Huawei to unveil the phone’s successor in March of this year, but rather than being called the P11, it’ll be branded as the Huawei P20.
We first became suspicious of the name-change back in 2017 when Huawei trademarked the “P20” title, and most recently, we’ve been able to confirm through our own sources that the phone will be called the P20 instead of P11.
As if that wasn’t enough, Roland Quandt (a source that’s offered reliable information in the past) recently took to Twitter to shed some light on the codenames and available colors for the upcoming P20 family:
Huawei P20 family – codenames and colorsHuawei P20 – “Emily” – Ceramic Black / Twilight Huawei P20 Plus – “Charlotte” – Ceramic Black / TwilightHuawei P20 Lite – “Anne” – Midnight Black / Klein Blue / Sakura Pink
— Roland Quandt (@rquandt) January 27, 2018
The reason for the name change? Although we can’t so for certain quite yet, it’s expected that Huawei will be opting for the P20 title as a way to better resemble the sizable upgrades that’ll be found in the P20 over the P10. The P20 may ship with three rear cameras and a notch in its display akin to the iPhone X, and while I’m personally not excited for the latter of those two things, it’ll certainly create for a much different phone compared to the P10.
Huawei joins RCS movement by using Android Messages as default texting app
The Galaxy S9 will be great, but I’m waiting for Google’s Pixel 3
Samsung’s Galaxy S9 is shaping up to be one heck of a phone, but Google’s dedication to the Pixel line has me convinced the Pixel 3 will be even better.
We’re less than a month away from Mobile World Congress, and while the annual tech show in Barcelona is always home to a lot of different announcements, this year’s highlight will be the Samsung Galaxy S9. Months of leaks and rumors have given us a good idea of what to expect from Samsung’s latest and greatest, and based on what we’ve seen so far, the Galaxy S9 will be a minor improvement over last year’s Galaxy S8.
In other words, the Galaxy S9 will have a gorgeous AMOLED display, smaller bezels than ever, Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 845 processor, metal/glass design, and even a rear camera that’ll allow you to adjust its aperture physically. All of this does sound exciting and will likely result in one hell of a phone, but it’s not going to be the Android phone that gets my money this year.
Instead, I’ll be holding out for the Google Pixel 3.
Some of you might agree with me and some of you may not. I’m not necessarily here to sway your mind one way or the other, but the way I look at it, Google is on its way to beat Samsung at its own game.
Let me explain.
Google’s still not perfect at hardware, but it’s making massive improvements
Its time with the Nexus brand notwithstanding, Google’s only been a hardware company for less than two years. The Pixel and Pixel XL from 2016 were the first two phones that were lead entirely by Google and not another manufacturer, and as expected, they had their quirks. I eventually grew not to mind the look of the first-gen Pixel, but when compared side-by-side to the Pixel 2, it’s immediately apparent just how much Google’s improved with its hardware activities.
Google Pixel (left) and Pixel 2 (right).
The Pixel 2 may not be as aesthetically pleasing as the Galaxy S8, but it’s a much more mature-looking phone compared to its older brother. Its glass panel on the back is more polished while still giving the phone its own unique identity, the coating over the aluminum body adds a wonderful texture, and it’s just got a sense of fit and finish that I always felt was missing on the OG Pixel.
Google’s quickly getting really good at this whole hardware thing.
Every manufacturer makes improvements to its hardware year after year, but I’m continually impressed with the construction of the Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL. I understand Google’s not a small company and has endless resources for cash and talent, but for a hardware division that’s as young as it is, it’s impressive that the company’s phones look and feel as great as they do.
Samsung’s been dominating the hardware space for Android phones for years, and while I have no doubt the Galaxy S9 will be a gorgeous piece of tech, this is something that’s been expected of Samsung since 2015 when it released the Galaxy S6. It’s no longer a surprise that Samsung makes good hardware, and while bezels have shrunk and things like water resistance have been added, Samsung’s been using the same general phone design for nearly four years. The Pixel 2 XL is a much different-looking and better-constructed phone than the first Pixel XL, and I have no doubt we’ll see Google continue to focus on improving its hardware more and more this year and beyond – primarily because it’s the only thing that the company needs to improve.
Samsung’s software is still … not good
I used the Galaxy S8 for about two weeks while waiting for my Pixel 2 to get delivered, and while I do occasionally miss its bright, vivid, and downright awesome Super AMOLED Infinity Display, never have I once yearned to go back to Samsung’s custom software. I’ll admit that Samsung has made some steps in the right direction since the days of the original Galaxy S (shiver), but there’s still a lot of work still to do.
There’s the issue of duplicate apps and UI tweaks that are there just for the sake of being different, but above all else, my biggest gripe with Samsung’s take on Android is that it still causes its phones to bog down way faster than they should.
Take the Galaxy Note 8 for example. Android Central’s Andrew Martonik revisited the phone after it’d been out in the market for three months, and when talking about the Note 8’s software/performance, he said the following:
The styling and features not jiving with my personal tastes are one thing, but I’ve been seriously underwhelmed once again with how the Note 8’s speed has held up after a few months of installing apps and loading it up with data. Precisely as I experienced after three months with my Galaxy S8, the Note 8’s daily performance has started to slow. Most things I do are quick and smooth, but there are still far too many instances now where apps hang up just a few beats before launching or scrolling, or animations stutter and drop frames.
No matter your personal preference for how Samsung’s UI looks, a phone with top-of-the-line silicon should not run into dropped frames and slowdowns less than six months after use. And yet, Samsung phones still do.
This is something that Samsung’s been trying to correct since 2010, and yet we’re still faced with the same general problem. The software’s been cleaned up and some of the unnecessary features have been removed, but if phones are still showing this much degradation in performance just a few months after use, that’s a problem. More importantly, that’s a problem Google doesn’t have.
Google’s software experience is as good as they come.
As I’m sure you’ve heard from other people in this industry, one of the joys of using the Pixel or Pixel 2 is their software experience. I’ve yet to experience any slow down or jitters on my Pixel 2, and while that might not be as sexy of a selling point as iris scanning or a personal assistant that can post pictures to Instagram for you, it’s one that makes an incredible difference in day-to-day use.
See at Google
What this all means
Samsung is the most prominent name in the mobile industry for a reason. It makes impressive tech, spends a heap of money on marketing, and its phones sell like hotcakes. Google may never sell as many phones as Samsung does, but its Pixel handsets are already able to compete with Samsung’s best after just two generations. Google’s proven to us that it knows how to make meaningful improvements in the hardware department, and its software is already the best you can find on any Android phone. Samsung may have top-of-the-line hardware, but its continued struggle with making a polished UI is getting to the point of embarrassment.
In the meantime, Google’s already perfected its software experience and doesn’t have any glaring problems on the hardware front. The Pixel 2 may not have the slimmest bezels and the LG panel for the Pixel 2 XL’s display isn’t great, but these are both things that Google will likely remedy with generation three. And, when it does, we’ll be in store for something damn special.
This is what the Google Pixel 2 could have looked like
Google Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL
- Pixel 2 FAQ: Everything you need to know!
- Google Pixel 2 and 2 XL review: The new standard
- Google Pixel 2 specs
- Google Pixel 2 vs. Pixel 2 XL: What’s the difference?
- Join our Pixel 2 forums
Best Buy
Verizon
Google Store
Project Fi
Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8+
- Galaxy S8 and S8+ review!
- Galaxy S8 and S8+ specs
- Everything you need to know about the Galaxy S8’s cameras
- Get to know Samsung Bixby
- Join our Galaxy S8 forums
Verizon
AT&T
T-Mobile
Sprint
Unlocked
This is the lowest price we’ve seen on Amazon’s Cloud Cam
Don’t miss out on this limited-time deal.
Since its release (which wasn’t long ago), the Amazon Cloud Cam has sold for $119.99. You could get it for a little less if you bought multiple cameras at the same time, this is a match for the lowest price we’ve seen it hit. Grab one today for just $89.99, or maybe just go for two of them while you’re at it.
You have access to the last 24 hours of motion alert clips for free and the free Cloud Cam app will push notifications based on the settings you select. It has night vision, two-way audio and much more. Amazon offers a few different Cloud Cam Plans, starting at $6.99 a month or $69.99 a year and going up to $19.99 a month or $199.99 a year, depending on your needs.
See at Amazon
How to enable HDR for PlayStation 4 on popular 4K TVs
Here’s how to ensure that you are ready to run HDR on your PS4 and your TV
Oh, brave new world! Resolution, clarity, and color depth are increasing all the time on new gaming consoles. If you are a PlayStation 4 owner then that means that you have the ability play games (which support it) in HDR. HDR or high dynamic range is a method of image rendering which can allow for a beautiful and staggering depth of graphics in modern games.
While it is easy to enjoy such gorgeous graphics it is not always entirely clear as to how one might enable such settings. Most modern televisions, while capable of supporting such graphics do not come set up to do so straight out of the box.
Here is how to enable HDR graphics on your PS4 and a bunch of popular televisions.
Configuring your PS4
Before getting into the settings on your TV set you are going to want to make sure that your PS4 is all set to actually output HDR. Here’s how you can ensure that your console is ready to go. The first step is to make sure that your console has the most recent firmware update. HDR is only available through version 4.0 and higher.
From the main menu of your PS4, go to settings.
Select Sound and Screen
Select Video Output Settings
Set HDR to Automatic
Set Deep Color output to Automatic.
Configuring your television to display HDR
Once you have your PS4 properly configured, it’s time to hop over and get everything set up correctly on your TV.
Samsung 4K TVs 2016/2017
With some of the best 4K HDR displays on the market today, Samsung is a great option for those looking for crystal clear images. In order to enable HDR on your Samsung TV you will need to go to the settings menu to enable HDMI UHD Color. It is important to keep in mind that you will have to enable these settings for each port through which you intend to utilize 4K.
Press the Settings button on your TV’s remote
Select Picture.
Scroll all the way down to Expert Settings or Picture Options.
Navigate to the HDMI UHD Color section. Each of the available HDMI ports should now be listed on-screen.
Turn on HDMI UHD Color for the ports of your choosing.
LG TVs 4K TVs 2016/2017
LG has developed quite a few TVs which support HDR in recent years. Nearly all of these sets should come with the same software which should make enabling these settings relatively uniform across most models. In order to turn on HDR for your PS4, you will be looking for “HDMI ULTRA HD Deep Color” in the settings menu of your television.
Press the Settings button.
Scroll down to All Settings.
Navigate to the General tab.
Select HDMI ULTRA HD Deep Color. Each of the available HDMI ports should now be listed on the screen.
Enable the feature on the ports of your choosing.
Vizio 4K TVs 2016/2017
Vizio also offers quite a few models in the P and M-series which will give you crisp, clear HDR images. On most sets, it is important to keep in mind that while ports one through four can all output 4K HDR, port five will not support that content. Within the Vizio SmartCast app, you will be on the lookout for “HDMI Color Subsampling” in order to get the HDR content you love so much.
Open your SmartCast app.
Select Settings.
Select Inputs.
Select HDMI Color Subsampling. Each of the available HDMI ports should now be listed on-screen.
Enable HDR on the ports of your choosing.
Sony Bravia 4K TVs 2016/2017
There are quite a few 4K televisions offered by Sony which will support HDR on your PS4. Most recent sets will need to see “Enhanced format” turned on in the settings in order for you to enjoy HDR on your PlayStation.
Press the Home button to open the menu.
Scroll down to Settings.
Select External Inputs under the TV subsection.
Next, choose HDMI signal format.
Switch your signal format to Enhanced format. By default, this will have been set to Standard Format.
Panasonic 4K TVs 2016/2017
If you have a modern high-end Panasonic TV then there is a good chance that your set also supports HDR. Like many other televisions, you will have to enable HDR on a per-port basis. That can be done by changing the aptly named “HDMI HDR Setting” within your television’s settings.
Press the Menu button on your remote.
Navigate to the Setup tab of the Main Menu.
Select HDMI HDR Setting.
Select the HDMI port your Xbox One X is connected to.
Change to ON for the ports of your choosing.
Philips 4K TVs 2016/2017
Philips Televisions come out of the box running in “Legacy”, mode which offers the highest rate of compatibility with various devices. However, if you want that sweet HDR you will have to enable your chosen port to accept HDR content. The steps to do that are as follows.
Press the Menu button on the remote.
Choose Setup.
Navigate to TV Settings.
Choose Installation.
Select Preferences.
Select HDMI mode.
Choose the HDMI port your PS4 is connected to.
Switch to Normal from Legacy.
What TV are you using for 4K HDR gaming?
If you are using a set that is not mentioned in this article, and you need some guidance with enabling HDR please feel free to mention it in the comments.
Why are we talking PlayStation 4 on Android Central? Let us explain.
PlayStation 4
- PS4 vs. PS4 Slim vs. PS4 Pro: Which should you buy?
- PlayStation VR Review
- Playing PS4 games through your phone is awesome
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