Today’s best deals you won’t want to miss
Whether you’re looking for new tech gear or household items, we’ve got you covered.
Right now there are great discounts on Joby’s GripTight GorillaPod, Vizio’s 50-inch 4K TV, the Hyperkin RetroN 2 gaming console and so much more!
View the rest of the deals
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Grab a Samsung Galaxy S9 for $595 from Boost Mobile right now
Great deal for prepaid customers.
Using the coupon code LUCKY, you can score a sweet discount on Samsung’s Galaxy S9 from Boost Mobile. You will need to be a customer to take advantage of this deal, and the device is locked to the carrier. Right now, Boost has single line plans starting at $35 a month or family plans starting at $25 a line, and porting your existing line over is pretty simple.
Not sure if Boost Mobile will work for you? Be sure to check out the carriers coverage map and then find the closest store so that once you receive your order you can get it activated with ease.
This is the lowest outright price we’ve seen so far on the Samsung Galaxy S9 and no trade-in is required to take advantage of this deal.
See at Boost Mobile
From the Editor’s Desk: Manual focus
When everything is automatic, sometimes you have to spend extra time doing it yourself.
I learned to drive in an old Volkswagen Golf with a manual transmission. Instead of racing around the city of Toronto like the racecar driver I imagined myself to be, I spent the afternoon in an empty parking lot trying to figure out how to smoothly change gears. As the late summer sun set in the west, I gingerly drove the car up a slight hill toward a not-too-busy street, confident that I could navigate —physically and intellectually — the mortal task of living with other vehicles on unforgiving roads. I turned into traffic without issue, but as I approached my first red light, everything I’d learned over the last four hours escaped me, and as I slowed I forgot to depress the clutch, causing the engine to stall just as I was ready to proceed. Every inch of road was filled with cars seemingly bigger and more intimidating than mine, and inside them were people ready to murder me for delaying their dinners. I panicked, pressed my leaden foot on the gas pedal and, when the car did nothing, felt like I was going to die.
Photography is beautiful because it forces you to humble before the tool itself even as your goal is to let the result speak for itself.
I made it out of there unscathed and, years later, remember that moment fondly. The tool I was using betrayed me, not because it was poorly made, but because I didn’t know how to use it. That’s how we learn; no one starts out a prodigy. The more difficult something is to master, and the longer it takes to get there, the more satisfying it is to reach. I no longer drive a manual car, and by extension, I don’t try to improve my driving. The activity is, to me, an occasionally pleasant and often frustrating necessity. But were I to begin driving manual again — who knows, maybe I’d begin to love it.
The memory of my failed first driving attempt came back to me earlier this month as I woke up at 4 am to take photos of animals in a small game park northeast of Johannesburg in South Africa. I’ve always enjoyed the technical aspects of photography, the relationship between sensor size, aperture, focal length, light sensitivity, metering, shutter speed, and physical proximity to an object. I’ve long derived tremendous pleasure from taking photos of my friends and family, balancing the needs of left and right brain to extract a beautiful photo that is also timeless. But as I built up the institutional knowledge to balance a subject as both emotionally and technically significant, it became quickly apparent that I would need to override the camera’s preset rules. I’d need to learn how to shoot in manual mode.
Of course, performing poorly holding a camera has few consequences, especially when compared a novice driver navigating aggressive peers. Nevertheless, I take it seriously: I’ve now spent many years trying to understand the relationship between camera and shooter, and how many individual factors need to line up to produce a great photo.
In South Africa, I introduced a new challenge to the foundation I’d already built: manual focus. A few weeks earlier, I’d bought a new camera, an Olympus OM-D EM-1 Mark II, based on the popular Micro 4/3 platform. It’s a beautiful piece of engineering, compact and substantial at the same time, with a variety of lenses that, as of writing, I’ve yet to explore. But I knew that I wanted to use this versatile camera to capture the elephants, lions, rhinos, giraffes, and whatever else I saw out there, so I needed to improvise. I inherited a 70-210mm telephoto lens from my father’s old Pentax camera, which on a Micro 4/3 sensor would be doubled to 140-420mm, a focal length perfect for gleaning the details of a sedentary killer a quarter mile away. And while lens adapters are cheap and capable, they break autofocus, a feature I will never again take for granted. I would spend my bumpy morning and afternoon rides making minor focus adjustments to ensure that a rhino’s horn would be perfectly in focus, else the pictures would be unusable.
A few of the photos the author captured. Copyright Daniel Bader.
Thanks to a number of built-in camera features like focus peaking, manually centering on my unwitting subjects was relatively easy, but it still took me a few hours to get the hang of it. By the third ride out, I no longer had to think about my actions: my brain and hand were in perfect, balletic unison. I didn’t realize it until later, but there were enormous differences in quality — focus accuracy, yes, but also framing — between the first hundred and last hundred photos I took over my three days there. It was hard and frustrating and satisfying and exhilarating, and that’s exactly the point. It was manual.
I’m not sure I would do the same thing again, though: how important is the process in relation to the finished product? If a tailor-made autofocus lens produces better photos, would I love them less because I exerted less effort to achieve them? Would I actually enjoy driving more if I was more engaged in the mechanics of the vehicle itself? I’m not sure, but I can definitely say this: there’s nothing like an elephant deciding that it doesn’t like you and forcing your driver to reverse down a dirt road in the kind of all-enveloping darkness you can’t even imagine until you’re in the middle of South Africa with an elephant chasing you in the middle of the night.
Happy to be back after a few weeks away. Mobile World Congress, slow as it was this year, was a great way for the team to get together and catch up in person. We only get to do that a few times a year and I really enjoy it.
Next one is Google I/O, which is coming up in just about seven weeks. Given that Google just dropped Android P, renamed its smartwatch operating system, and is doubling down on Assistant, it’s a good time to be in the ecosystem.
Have a great week, and we’ll talk again soon.
-Daniel
US Navy launches submarine with gamepad-guided periscope
The Navy’s fourth USS Colorado attack submarine has recently gone into service with an Xbox controller onboard. No, not so sailors can play Overwatch: they’ll actually be using the gaming device to steer the vehicle’s two photonics masts, which you can think of as high-tech replacements for typical periscopes. The masts don’t require periscope tubes to work and rely on high-res cameras to capture images to display on a big screen instead. When the military first announced that it’s using an Xbox controller on the Colorado, it said the device was replacing the joystick and control panel Lockheed Martin originally designed for the sensors.
The original controls would’ve cost the Navy around $38,000, which is a ton of money to spend on a system that sailors found clunky and difficult to use. So, Lockheed Martin subbed them with controllers during the trial phase and found that operators were able to figure out how to maneuver the high-tech periscopes using the devices within just a few minutes. The Navy now doesn’t have to spend extra for training — and controllers only cost $30 a pop.
Now that the Colorado is an official naval asset, the US Navy will be using the 377-foot-long sub to conduct surveillance and to fight off enemy submarines and surface ships. It’s the only attack submarine that uses an Xbox controller right now, but it won’t be the last: the Navy plans to equip all modernized Virginia-class subs with one in the future.
Via: CNET
Source: AP
Facebook may have broken FTC deal in Cambridge Analytica incident
Facebook may face more legal trouble than you might think in the wake of Cambridge Analytica’s large-scale data harvesting. Former US officials David Vladeck and Jessica Rich have told the Washington Post that Facebook’s data sharing may violate the FTC consent decree requiring that it both ask for permission before sharing data and report any authorized access. The “Thisisyourdigitallife” app at the heart of the affair asked for permission from those who directly used it, but not the millions of Facebook friends whose data was taken in the process.
Facebook, for its part, said that it “reject[s] any suggestion” that it violated the consent decree. It maintained that it “respected” users’ privacy settings.
If the FTC did find violations, Facebook could be on the hook for some very hefty fines — albeit fines that aren’t likely to be as hefty as possible. The decree asks for fines as large as $40,000 per person, but that would amount to roughly $2 trillion. Regulators like the FTC historically push for fines they know companies can pay, which would suggest fines that are ‘just’ in the billion-dollar range. Given that there are already multiple American and European investigations underway, any financial penalty would be just one piece of a larger puzzle.
The possibility of FTC action comes right as there are complaints about Facebook’s response to Christopher Wylie, the whistleblower who blew open the data sharing scandal. His attorney, Tamsin Allen, has stated that Facebook took a two-faced approach to Wylie’s revelations. It “privately welcomed” Wylie’s help, Allen said, but publicly suspended his account and criticized him. That was indicative of a company focused more on “damage limitation” than sincerely addressing the problem at hand, according to the attorney. We’ve asked Facebook for its response, but the accusations certainly don’t help its case.
Cambridge Analytica has tried to distance itself from the incident, claiming that Wylie was a contractor rather than a founder and that it was a partner, Global Science Research, that had harvested users’ data. The company said it purged the data when it had learned that GSR sold data to outside parties.
Source: Washington Post
This $78 AmazonBasics wall mount allows you to move your monitor where you want
Put your monitor in the perfect position.
This AmazonBasics wall mount monitor stand is down to $77.79 on Amazon. That price is a discount from its $100 street price, and it is only one of two discounts we’ve ever seen for this mount.
If you work in a semi-permanent office space and don’t mind attaching this to the wall behind your desk, you could really free up a lot of real estate for yourself. Just make sure your monitors have standard VESA mounts on the back (and they most likely will). The arm extends and contracts, tilts for different reading angles, and rotates from landscape to portrait mode. Mounting your monitor to the wall creates desktop space, and it’s easy to set up.
The mount has a one-year warranty from AmazonBasics. More than 1,000 users give it 4.4 stars on Amazon.
See on Amazon
Should you buy physical or digital PlayStation 4 games?
Can’t decide on physical or digital? Let us help!
Digital or physical? It’s an age-old question that only started being asked just recently. Once all of our consoles were constantly connected to the internet, we entered a world where it was no longer necessary to trudge out to your local game store to acquire the newest game. You can now sit in the comfort of your own home and the games come to you. If you have a PlayStation 4 and you’re having trouble deciding what format to buy games in, read on and we will go over the benefits of each format in order to help you choose
All in on Digital
Saving space- If you are a gamer with an unending thirst for new games but a finite amount of space, then digital may be the way to go. You can build a massive library of games which only consumes space on your hard drive but none in meatspace.
Get games sooner- If you want to start playing a game the very second that release day starts, then you probably want to go digital. Often, with digital releases you can pre-install the game and the moment midnight strikes, you can start playing. Your friends that play physical games will have to wait until the store opens in the morning. And even if there is a midnight release at a local retailer, physical gamers will almost always have to download some updates before they get started.
Savings– If you’re looking to save some bucks, you may want to look to the PSN Store. In what seems to be an obvious attempt to compete with Steam, PSN has offered some pretty incredible sales and discounts in the last few years. Brick and mortar retailers are often unable to offer such deep discounts. If savings is job one, then digital may be your solution.
Only Physical for me!
Taking up space– Some of us absolutely love seeing all of our games stacked up in neat little rows. This is an itch that a digital library simply cannot scratch. If you like having a visible library of games to look at and show off to your friends, then physical games are definitely going to be the choice for you.
Resale value- One thing that digital games simply cannot offer is the ability to resell your games. If you’re the sort of person that finishes a game and never picks it up again, then it might make sense to take it back to your brick and mortar in order to make a dent in the cost of your next purchase. In addition, loaning a digital game to a friend is pretty much a non-starter.
Buy local- another upside to buying physical games is that it offers you the opportunity to support local gaming shops in your area. If the ability to go into a store and browse games is a thing that’s important to you, then it’s important to remember to spend some money there. If you want to ensure that game shops don’t go the way of the video store then this is something to keep in mind.
Ultimately, the choice between digital and physical formats is a matter of preference. Figure out what is most important to you and your game library and make your descion based on those needs. There is no right or wrong answer, just the one that fits your lifestyle best.
How do you buy your games?
Do you prefer digital or physical video games? Let us know your reasoning below!
Why are we talking about 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
Amazon
Coca-Cola and US government use blockchain to curb forced labor
The quest to end forced labor has created some unusual technological allies. Coca-Cola, the US State Department and a trio of crypto organizations (Bitfury Group, Blockchain Trust Accelerator and Emercoin) have launched a pilot project that will use blockchain to enforce worker rights. The initiative would use blockchain’s distributed ledger technology to create a secure, decentralized registry for workers and their contracts. They’d not only have the sort of identification that isn’t always guaranteed, but a trail of evidence in case employers abuse their power or don’t honor their end of a bargain.
Coca-Cola is playing a major role as part of a pledge to conduct 28 national studies on labor and land rights for its sugar supply chains before 2020. Ideally, this tackles complaints that it and similar companies fail to protect workers’ rights at every step. The State Department will offer its experience with labor protection, while Bitfury Group and Emercoin are producing the blockchain platform itself. Blockchain Trust Accelerator is a non-profit aiming to use its namesake tech for social good.
The pilot already has its limits. Blockchain can persuade companies and governments to respect work contracts, but it can’t make them respect those contracts. Also, blockchain’s digital nature raises some implementation questions: how do you ensure that workers can access their info when many of those affected might not even have a smartphone? The project is still young, however, and this could still represent an improvement over a modern employment system that frequently lets companies abuse workers with relatively little consequence.
Source: Reuters
Twitter may be the next to ban cryptocurrency ads
Twitter may soon join Facebook and Google in cracking down on ads for cryptocurrency-related products. Sky sources have claimed the social network will institute worldwide ban against ads for initial coin offerings, cryptocurrency wallets and token sales within the next two weeks. It might also ban ads for cryptocurrency exchanges with “some limited exceptions,” according to the apparent leak.
The company told Engadget it had no comment at the moment.
While the tipsters didn’t provide Twitter’s exact reasoning, it’s likely to be the same as for the site’s peers: it doesn’t want to knowingly put users at risk. Many ICOs and token sales have uncertain prospects, and in the worst cases are take-the-money-and-run scams. Meld that with the threat of hackers and there’s a real chance investors will lose money, with little recourse if things go sour. More regulations are likely coming, but that’s not much comfort to Twitter, Google and others who face pressure to protect their users while the crypto market remains a wild frontier.
Source: Sky
Best Cheap Android Phones in 2018
- Best overall
- Best for all-metal
- Best for software
- Best for even less
- Best for battery life
Best overall
Moto G5 Plus
See at Amazon
Motorola performed yet another pricing miracle with the Moto G5 Plus, the successor to the excellent Moto G4 series and a contender for the best affordable smartphone today.
It starts with the excellent 5.2-inch Full HD display, but the real benefit to the G5 Plus this year is the excellent performance and battery life from the combination of a Snapdragon 625 platform and a 3000mAh battery.
Also of note is the improved low-light performance from the 12MP camera, which boasts the same hardware as (and similar results to) the Galaxy S7.
Bottom line: This is the best sub-$250 phone you can buy today, and it’s still a great device even if price isn’t a factor.
One more thing: Motorola.com is offering the Moto G5 Plus with inexpensive financing if you don’t want to pay up front.
Why the Moto G5 Plus is the best
Motorola has changed up the phone’s design with the Moto G5 Plus, adding a metal back and a more compact, mature look that complements the Moto Z series, and the excellent 5.2-inch IPS display is easily manageable in one hand. Also improved is the improved shape of the front fingerprint sensor, which is turned oblong and considerably easier to activate.
Motorola has also bestowed a fantastic camera on the Moto G5 Plus, giving it the same 12MP sensor and lens combination that’s in the Galaxy S7 — though the results aren’t quite as good. The phone isn’t perfect — there’s no NFC on the U.S. model, and it still uses the older Micro-USB charging port — but it’s close. It also works on all four U.S. carriers, so Verizon and Sprint users are still in the game.
While we’re looking forward to the Moto G6 series — the Moto G5 Plus was announced over a year ago, in February 2017 — this is still the best sub-$250 phone you can buy, especially since the 4GB RAM / 64GB storage variant frequently goes on sale.
Best for T-Mobile and AT&T
Honor 7X
See at Amazon
A big upgrade to the Honor 6X is the Honor 7X, a capable and well-made all-metal budget phone coming in at $199. Launching with Android 7.0-based EMUI 5.1, the device takes everything that made its predecessor good and adds a great new design, an improved dual camera setup, and plenty of power from the Kirin 659 chip and 3GB of RAM. Best of all, the new 5.9-inch 2:1 screen is bright and beautiful, and provides plenty of space for, well, everything!
Bottom-line: A fantastic flagship-like experience at $200 — now with more Android 8.0 Oreo!
One more thing: If you’re looking to save a bit of money, or get it from Amazon, the Honor 6X is a solid pick at $140.
Best for software
Nokia 6 (Prime Exclusive)
See at Amazon
The caretaker of Nokia’s smartphone brand, Finnish upstart HMD Global, has made a name for itself over the past year by releasing phones that are reliably well-made and extremely enjoyable to use. The Nokia 6 is one such phone, and at $199 from Amazon’s excellent Prime Exclusive program, you get a lot for the money here.
While the Snapdragon 430 processor lacks the power of the Moto or Huawei above, the rest of the experience, especially the pared-down Android 7.1-based software (soon to be based on Android One) is the perfect blend of power and simplicity.
Bottom line: If you can stand some Amazon app pre-installs, this phone will not disappoint.
One more thing: Even without Amazon Prime, this phone is relatively inexpensive at just over $230.
Best for even less
Moto E4
See at Amazon
The Moto E line has always been about getting a barebones smartphone experience in order to get a super low price, and that’s where the Moto E4 still lands. The specs aren’t amazing, nor is the physical design, but you get that core Moto DNA that means this is a slick little phone for a great price.
You get a 5-inch HD display, a Snapdragon 425 processor, and 2800mAh battery. But you also get nice-to-haves at this price, like an 8MP auto focus camera and a fingerprint sensor.
It all retails for just $129 brand new, and it’s tough to argue with that. Amazon has a Prime Exclusive version for $99, and Verizon’s prepaid service charges just $70 for this phone — both are a steal of a deal.
Bottom-line: For a bargain basement price, it’s tough to get a phone that performs better or has the features of the Moto E4.
One more thing: Be on the lookout for better deals and sales — this is a phone that will be discounted regularly to entice budget buyers.
Best for battery
Moto E4 Plus
See at Amazon
Whereas you get a lot for your money with the Moto E4, its Plus variant is only slightly more expensive and gives you a bigger screen, slightly more power and, best of all, a massive 5000mAh battery that lasts, well, forever.
Aside from that two (or three) day battery life, you get a decent 13MP rear camera, a nice 5MP front-facing camera with a flash, and Motorola’s excellent Android software. The phone is available for a reasonable $139.99 through Amazon’s Prime Exclusive series, but its $179.99 MSRP isn’t bad, either.
Bottom-line: The Moto E4 Plus is one long-lasting candy handset. Expect two or three days on a single charge.
One more thing: It’s compatible with all four major U.S. carriers, including Verizon and Sprint.
Conclusion
If you don’t want to spend over $250 and still want a great Android phone, the Moto G5 Plus is the best choice. You don’t get the best looking or feeling phone, but it offers a top-notch experience, especially for the price.
Best overall
Moto G5 Plus
See at Amazon
Motorola performed yet another pricing miracle with the Moto G5 Plus, the successor to the excellent Moto G4 series and a contender for the best affordable smartphone today.
It starts with the excellent 5.2-inch Full HD display, but the real benefit to the G5 Plus this year is the excellent performance and battery life from the combination of a Snapdragon 625 platform and a 30000mAh battery.
Also of note is the improved low-light performance from the 12MP camera, which boasts the same hardware as (and similar results to) the Galaxy S7.
Bottom line: This is the best sub-$250 phone you can buy today, and it’s still a great device even if price isn’t a factor.
One more thing: Motorola.com is offering the Moto G5 Plus with inexpensive financing if you don’t want to pay up front.
Updated March 2018: We’ve added the excellent Nokia 6 to this list of the best cheap phones you can buy.
