Awesome NVIDIA SHIELD TV bundle giveaway! Enter at Android Central now!

The Shield TV by NVIDIA was Modern Dad’s pick for best Android TV box you can buy right now. It ticks off nearly every box for specs. Plus it’s one of the smattering of Android TV boxes that has access to Amazon Video, in addition to being one hell of a gaming rig. And it has voice-activated access to Google Assistant. It’s got Ethernet, HDR10, and Dolby Atmos support, plus expandable storage. This one’s also for pretty much everybody!!

So we’ve teamed up with our friends at NVIDIA to bring you a fun giveaway. The winner of this one will get not only the Shield TV, but also an additional SHIELD controller and game codes for Clustertruck, The Final Station, Metal Gear Solid 3 HD, realMyst, and Siegecraft Commander. Wow! Let’s get to the giveaway!

THE GIVEAWAY: Head down to the widget at the bottom of this page. There are multiple ways to enter, each with varying point values. Complete all of the tasks for maximum entries and your best shot at winning! Keep in mind that all winning entries are verified and if the task was not completed or cannot be verified, a new winner will be chosen. Due to sponsor restrictions this contest is only available in the U.S. and Canada.

The giveaway is open until March 12, 2018, and the winner will be announced right here in the widget after the contest ends. Good luck!

Win this crazy SHIELD TV bundle from Android Central!

Samsung will release a premium Bixby speaker in the second half of 2018

Bixby’s strengths (and weaknesses) will soon be put on full display.

Smart speakers are quickly becoming one of the hottest new markets in the consumer tech space, and it’s currently dominated by the likes of Amazon and Google.

Apple just stepped into the ring with its own HomePod speaker, and in the second-half of 2018, Samsung will do the same.

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Samsung’s head of mobile operations, DJ Koh, confirmed this news, saying:

When I introduce the first model, I don’t want to give the impression that Samsung delivered another affordable mass model. I want to focus on more premium.

This sounds a lot like Apple’s approach with the HomePod, and unfortunately, Samsung’s speaker will likely be plagued by one of the HomePod’s worst features — a subpar virtual assistant.

Siri pales in comparison on the HomePod when compared to speakers powered by Amazon Alexa or the Google Assistant, and we’ll likely be faced with a similar (if not worse) scenario with a speaker that relies on Bixby for user interaction and control. Samsung can still pull ahead by not restricting customers to just one music streaming service like Apple does, but it remains to be seen if that’ll be enough to make people interested.

How much will Samsung’s Bixby speaker cost? A report from December suggested that it would sell for around $200, but Koh’s most recent comment suggests it’ll have a price more along the lines of the HomePod or Google Home Max. If that’s the case, Samsung’s going to have to really knock the hardware and sound quality out of the park if it wants to convince people to get its product over something like the Home Max, or even the regular Google Home.

Whether or not you’re a Samsung fan, are you looking forward to a Bixby smart speaker?

Job listings suggest that Spotify is working on its own smart speaker

YouTube Live updated with IFTTT integration and automatic captions

Live chat replays and location tags are also here.

If you’ve ever hosted a livestream, chances are you did so on YouTube Live. YouTube’s feature set for livestreaming is already pretty great, but now it’s getting even better with four new features.

First off, Google’s finally launching something that it announced almost a year ago at Google I/O 2017 — IFTTT integration with Super Chat. Super Chats are paid comments you can make during a live stream to support your favorite creators and make sure your question/comment is seen above everyone else’s, and with them now supporting IFTTT, creators can have them trigger various Internet-connected gadgets, such as lights, switches, and much more. Along with this, Super Chat is also finally coming to the YouTube app on iOS.

Also new is automatically captioned livestreams. YouTube’s using the same captioning system that’s been in place since 2009, and it’ll initially be available in English when it’s launched in the coming weeks.

Alongside these two additions, YouTube Live is also picking up Live chat replays so you can see the entire conversation that took place during a stream after it’s gone off-air and new location tags will allow you to filter livestreams based on where they were recorded.

If you’re a livestreamer, do any of these features draw you to use YouTube Live over a competing service?

YouTube promises better communication and stronger policies in 2018

Bitcoin miners turn Quebec’s cheap energy into cold cash

Bitcoin mining is a weird industry. Vast banks of dedicated computers solve complex equations to generate hashes worth a fraction of a coin, consuming huge amounts of power in the process. For such operations to be economically feasible nowadays, miners need the cheapest electricity possible.

Energy is cheap in certain regions of Asia but many nations there are becoming increasingly hostile to cryptocurrency. China, for instance, is concerned that a sudden Bitcoin collapse could cause economic chaos. More importantly, it wants to cut off cryptocurrency operations near coal-fired energy plants that cause extra pollution in an already-polluted country.

The answer, for many bitcoin miners, is to be found in Quebec. The Canadian province has some of the lowest electricity prices in North America, and produces an energy surplus that amounts to 100 terawatt hours over a decade — enough to supply 6 million homes in a year, according to Global News. As such, rather than turning away miners like China is, the province’s power agency, Hydro Quebec, has been encouraging them to come.

Quebec generates nearly 97 percent of its electricity from hydro projects and produces around 1,245 tonnes of carbon per TWh of power, between 50 and 240 times less than the industry average in North America. Cryptocurrency mining is thus relatively clean and cheap in Quebec, making it interesting for both the province and miners. “Of the world’s top five largest blockchain players, we have at least three or four,” David Vincent of Hydro Quebec told Reuters.

Just because the hydroelectric dams are carbon free, doesn’t mean they’re controversy-free, however. Many projects built between 1970 and 2000 negatively affected the lives of Innu, Cree and Inuit tribes in the province, flooding their traditional trapping and fishing lands.

And while hydroelectric power is plentiful in Quebec, that situation might change in the near future. Experts keep revising EV sales upwards, for one thing, which will soon stress electrical grids around the world. Hydro Quebec might make more money by exporting its excess power to the US, meaning miners won’t see cheap prices forever.

Bitfarms is one of the biggest players in Quebec, and the above photo was snapped by Reuters photographer Christinne Muschi at one of its four Quebec sites. The company plans to open another three sites in Quebec, and many other players are interested in coming to the province, too. It’s even drawing in industries that have nothing to do with Bitcoin, like forestry and paper producers who could rent out space in their factories. “They want space and cheap power,” said Resolute Forest Products CEO Chad Wasilenkoff.

Amazon’s AR shopping tool is now available on Android

Last year, Amazon debuted AR View, its augmented reality shopping tool that lets you see how certain items will look in your home before you buy them. At launch, it was only available on iOS, but as of today, 9to5Google reports, it’s available on Android devices as well. To use it, open the Amazon app and tap the camera icon in the top right corner of the screen. Select AR View and then you can try out all sorts of products like electronics, furniture and toys.

Google released ARCore 1.0 last week, which allowed Amazon to bring the feature to Android devices. But Amazon certainly isn’t the first company to use AR as a sales tool. IKEA also has a feature that lets you virtually try out its products in your home as does Target. Williams-Sonoma announced plans for a similar feature last year while Sephora and Benefit have AR tools that let you try on makeup or find your perfect eyebrow shape.

You can check out a video of Amazon’s AR View in action in the video below.

Via: 9to5Google

Source: Amazon

Samsung says its smart speaker will arrive in the second half of 2018

We’ve known for awhile now that Samsung was working on its own smart speaker, an answer to Apple’s HomePod. It appears that the speaker, which will run Samsung’s voice assistant Bixby, will debut in the second half of 2018 according to The Wall Street Journal.

This differs from what we’ve heard previously. Back in December, Bloomberg reported that Samsung’s smart speaker would release in the first half of 2018. It’s not clear whether this later release date was planned all along or whether it constitutes a delay.

We still don’t know how much the speaker will cost. Samsung’s mobile chief D.J. Koh told The Wall Street Journal that there could be pricing tiers for the device. It’s clear, though, that Samsung is aiming for a premium market with the device. “When I introduce the first model, I don’t want to give the impression that Samsung delivered another affordable mass model,” Mr. Koh said to The Wall Street Journal. “I want to focus on more premium.”

Source: The Wall Street Journal

Huawei made a Porsche slightly autonomous with a smartphone

With no flagship phone to show off to the assembled mass of journalists, bloggers and tech execs, Huawei took a different tack this year at MWC. If it wasn’t slick laptops with pop-up webcams, then it’s this: The “RoadReader.” To showcase the company’s AI push (read: remind everyone it’s really into this neural processing gig), the Huawei used its Mate 10 Pro smartphone as a lightweight autonomous car brain, inside a Porsche, right outside FC Barcelona’s stadium. I was one of the lucky few to experience what it’s like to be driven around by an Android phone.

Let’s not get ahead of ourselves: This isn’t Huawei eyeing a move into the crowded, messy world of self-driving cars. It’s a fluffy showcase of the company’s AI ambitions. As one spokesperson put it, if a phone can “drive” a car, it must be a pretty good phone. And at a time when Huawei needs to maintain a presence on par with the Samsungs of the world, anything that can help make the company even slightly more memorable is a good thing.

Those quote-marks on “drive” are necessary, by the way. The demo involved a short straight track with one of several hazard props (pop-up dog, man with bike, inexplicable giant soccer ball) that the phone picked up on its sensors, logged it, and then proceeded to avoid the obstacle during a second. The Mate 10 Pro was rigged up to control the car — actuators and levers ensured it veered or braked when needed, but we’re not getting into the heady territory of Level 3 autonomy. But given that the team managed to craft this kind of setup in five weeks, I’m not going to rake them over the coals for not crafting the best self-driving car demo ever.

The brain, then, is Huawei’s Kirin 970 chip, which is capable of processing up to 2,000 images per minute. As was teased at its announcement last year it can tap into AI programs like Google’s TensorFlow, which is exactly what’s being used here.

During the learning phase, the car runs at a very slow clip, scanning and picking up the staged obstacles I mentioned earlier. The Porsche then gets manually reversed to the starting line, and the cool part begins. Next, it’s time for a quick app intermission. The same phone that initiated the “phase one” drive with a single tap now asks me to program it to avoid those three hazards. I can swerve to the left, right or simply brake. I program my choices in, shift the gear stick to drive and we’re off.

On the second run, the car now accelerates at a fair clip, and I remember that a mere phone is in charge of what happens. It’s a little unnerving, even when the road is all-but clear and I have a trusty giant red emergency button to hand above the central console between the chairs.

The car identifies the dog moments after we start accelerating, and as programmed, swerves to the right to avoid. It’s all over in ten seconds or so.

You might notice that the setup here at MWC is a little more obvious than Huawei’s own glossy demo, embedded above. In real life, there’s a conspicuous roof rack attached to the top of a car. I thought we wouldn’t get to see what was inside the mystery box, but my skepticism was ameliorated by getting to take a look inside, where there was only a single high-end camera, telephoto lens, and a rig to ensure it stayed in place. The camera was serving as the “eyes” of the car. It kinda ruins the illusion of a car driven by a smartphone AI, doesn’t it?

Mat Smith, Engadget

That said, it’s an impressive headline grab. Samsung might have had its big Galaxy 9 launch just yesterday and is set to dominate MWC, but Huawei’s holding its own 2018 smartphone cards close to its chest for now. This Porsche-branded distraction points to more AI tricks to come when it reveals its flagship P20 in just under a month.

Catch up on the latest news from MWC 2018 right here.

The Galaxy S9 vs. the competition: Under the hood

On the outside the Galaxy S9 looks pretty familiar: not only does it maintain the same basic shape as the S8, but it’s kept the screen and battery size of its predecessor as well. In fact, other high-end phones like the Pixel 2 and iPhone 8 have also stuck with familiar design language, which means that you have to look at the specs to see what’s been revised or refined. This year it’s mostly about the S9’s cameras, with the rear-facing one boasting a dual aperture and the software adding a slew of new features for better pictures and videos. But what other changes should you look at, and how do they compare to what’s already on the market? We’ve stacked up the Galaxy S9 versus its closest competitors so you can get a better idea which one you might want to pick up this spring — though we also advise checking out our full review of the S9 when it drops next month.

Galaxy S9
Pixel 2
iPhone 8

Pricing
$720 (off contract)
$649, $749 (off contract)
$699, $849 (off contract)

Known dimensions
147.7 x 68.7 x 8.5mm (5.81 x 2.7 x 0.33 inches)
145.7 x 69.7 x 7.8mm (5.7 x 2.7 x 0.3 inches)
138.4 x 67.3 x 7.3mm (5.45 x 2.65 x 0.29 inches)

Weight
163g (5.75 ounces)
143g (5.04 ounces)
148g (5.22 ounces)

Screen size
5.8 inches (147.32mm)
5.0 inches (127mm)
4.7 inches (119.38mm)

Screen resolution
2,960 x 1,440 (570ppi)
1,920 x 1,080 (441ppi)
1,334 x 750 (326ppi)

Screen type
Quad HD+ Super AMOLED
Full HD AMOLED
Retina HD IPS LCD

Battery
3,000mAh
2,700mAh
1821mAh

Internal storage
64GB
64 / 128GB
64 / 256GB

External storage
microSD
None
None

Rear camera
12MP, dual aperture f/1.5 and f/2.4, 1.4μm pixel size
12.2MP, f/1.8, 1.4μm pixel size
12MP, f/1.8

Front-facing cam
8MP, f/1.7
8MP, f/2.4
7MP, f/2.2

Video capture
4K at 30fps
4K at 30fps
4K at 60fps

NFC
Yes
Yes
Yes

Bluetooth
v5.0
v5.0
v5.0

SoC
Qualcomm Snapdragon 845
Qualcomm Snapdragon 835
Apple A11 Bionic

CPU
2.8GHz octa-core
2.35GHz octa-core
2.39GHz hexa-core

GPU
Adreno 630
Adreno 540
Apple three-core

RAM
4GB
4GB
2GB

WiFi
Dual band, 802.11ac
Dual band, 802.11ac
Dual band, 802.11ac

Operating system
Android 8.0
Android 8.0
iOS 11

Other features
Fingerprint sensor, IP68 certified,
USB-C, 3.5mm headphone jack, WPC/PMA wireless charging
Fingerprint sensor, IP67 certified,
USB-C
Fingerprint sensor, IP67 certified, Lightning connector,
Qi wireless charging

Follow all the latest news from MWC 2018 right here.

CBS launches 24/7 sports streaming network for news and analysis

Today, CBS launched CBS Sports HQ, a new sports-focused streaming network meant to be complementary to CBS Sports and CBS Sports Network programming. The 24-hour, free streaming network will feature sports news, game previews, highlights and post-game analysis and is accessible through a number of platforms at launch. Along with being able to jump into live programming, CBS Sports HQ visitors will also be able go back and watch previous segments with the network’s DVR-like functionality.

CBS announced plans for a 24/7 sports streaming channel last year and it now joins the network’s other streaming offerings, including its subscription service CBS All Access and its 24/7 news streaming network CBSN. The company says that CBS Sports HQ is based on CBSN’s model and infrastructure. Today’s launch comes ahead of ESPN’s standalone streaming service, ESPN Plus, which is scheduled to launch this spring.

CBS Sports announcers and reporters will also appear on CBS Sports HQ programming. Anchors for the new network’s sports coverage include Jorge Andres, Dalen Cuff, Jenny Dell, Hakem Dermish, Jamie Erdahl, Chris Hassel, Casey Kiernan and Nick Kostos. Analysts include Raja Bell, Carlos Boozer, Jim Bowden, Rashad Evans, Rip Hamilton, Danny Kanell, Brady Quinn, Thomas Rongen and David Samson. You can see a full list of who will be involved in network coverage here. CBS Sports HQ is currently available on CBSSports.com, the CBS Sports app, CBSN and CBS All Access.

Source: CBS

The Galaxy S9+ vs. the competition: Beyond the dual cameras

This year’s bigger Galaxy handset focuses on its picture-taking capabilities: The S9+ is Samsung’s first flagship with a dual camera, which brings it in line with competing phones like the Pixel 2 XL as well as its sibling Galaxy Note 8. There’s also a plethora of new software tricks to make the most of its new picture taking rig, which you can read all about in our hands-on. However, if you’re all about the number crunching, check out the table below, where we’d laid out the key specs of the S9+ as well as its closest competition, including both flavors of iPhone. Of course, numbers aren’t everything, so you’ll have to stay tuned for our full review of the S9 and S9+ in a few weeks.

Galaxy S9+
Pixel 2 XL
iPhone X
iPhone 8 Plus

Pricing
$840 (off contract)
$849, $949 (off contract)
$999, $1149 (off contract)
$799, $949 (off contract)

Dimensions
158.1 x 68.7 x 8.5mm (6.22 inches)
157.9 x 76.7 x 7.9mm (6.2 x 3.0 x 0.3 inches)
143.6 x 70.9 x 7.7mm (5.65 x 2.79 x 0.30 inches)
158.4 x 78.1 x 7.5mm (6.24 x 3.07 x 0.30 inches)

Weight
189g (6.67 ounces)
175g (6.17 ounces)
174g (6.14 ounces)
202g (7.13 ounces)

Screen size
6.2 inches (157.48mm)
6 inches (152.4mm)
5.8 inches (147.32mm)
5.5 inches (139.7mm)

Screen resolution
2,960 x 1,440 (529ppi)
2,880 x 1,440 (538ppi)
2,436 x 1,125 (458ppi)
1,920 x 1,080 (401 ppi)

Screen type
Quad HD+ Super AMOLED
Quad HD pOLED
Super Retina OLED
Retina HD IPS LCD

Battery
3,500mAh
3,520mAh
2,716mAh
2,691mAh

Internal storage
64GB
64 / 128GB
64 / 256 GB
64 / 256 GB

External storage
microSD
None
None
None

Rear camera
Dual cameras:
Wide-angle, 12MP, dual aperture f/1.5 and f/2.4
Telephoto, 12MP, f/2.4
12.2MP, f/1.8, 1.4μm pixel size
Dual cameras:
Wide-angle, 12MP, f/1.8
Telephoto, 12MP, f/2.4
Dual cameras:
Wide-angle, 12MP, f/1.8
Telephoto, 12MP, f/2.8

Front-facing cam
8MP, f/1.7
8MP, f/2.4
7MP TrueDepth, f/2.2
7MP f/2.2

Video capture
4K at 30fps
4K at 30fps
4K at 60fps
4K at 60fps

NFC
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes

Bluetooth
v5.0
v5.0
v5.0
v5.0

SoC
Qualcomm Snapdragon 845
Qualcomm Snapdragon 835
Apple A11 Bionic
Apple A11 Bionic

CPU
2.8GHz octa-core
2.35GHz octa-core
64-bit hexa-core, speed not available
64-bit hexa-core, speed not available

GPU
Adreno 630
Adreno 540
Not available
Not available

RAM
6GB
4GB
3GB
3GB

WiFi
Dual band, 802.11ac
Dual band, 802.11ac
Dual band, 802.11ac
Dual band, 802.11ac

Operating system
Android 8.0
Android 8.0
iOS 11
iOS 11

Other features
Fingerprint sensor, IP68 certified,
USB-C, 3.5mm headphone jack, WPC/PMA wireless charging
Fingerprint sensor, IP67 certified,
USB-C
Face ID, IP67 certified, Lightning connector,
Qi wireless charging
Fingerprint sensor, IP67 certified, Lightning connector,
Qi wireless charging

Follow all the latest news from MWC 2018 right here.