Amazon Prime Day 2016: UK deals you need to know about
It’s July 12th. For many, it’s just another Tuesday, but for Amazon, it’s another chance to sell millions of customers gadgets, homeware and lots of other stuff they don’t need. Yes, it’s “Prime Day,” a marketing gimmick where Amazon discounts thousands of products for Prime subscribers. To keep on top of things, you’d normally have to track shopping websites or keep an eye on social media, but we want to help. We’ve listed a number of all-day deals that we think are worth keeping an eye on, but act quick, other deals on the site will only be available for a couple of hours at the most.
- Fire Tablet – £35 (normally £50): We’ve put Amazon’s diminutive tablet through its paces and even at £50 we’d consider taking the plunge. You’ll save £15 if you decide to buy today.
- Fire TV Stick – £20 (normally £35): Amazon’s high-definition streaming stick supports Prime Video, Netflix and a whole host of other apps. If you need a streamer for your spare TV, you can’t go wrong with this.
- Amazon Fire TV 4K – £55 (normally £80): If you’ve already got a 4K TV and are looking for Ultra HD content to watch, the 4K Fire TV can help. It also supports voice search and play games with its smart remote.
- Kindle Paperwhite – £80 (normally £110): With its improved high-resolution 300ppi display, the Paperwhite is the Rolls Royce of Kindles. With a bigger discount than Black Friday, now might be the time to pick one up.
- Lenovo N22 11.6-Inch Chromebook – £100 (normally £160): It’s not an Amazon sale without a cheap laptop, and this year it’s a Chromebook that is getting the discount treatment. The Lenovo N22 comes with an HD display, Intel Celeron N3060 processor, 2 GB RAM and 32GB of internal storage.
- Surface Pro 4 Bundle – £750 (normally £944): Microsoft’s 2-in-1 is also seeing some decent discounts today. The Pro 4 bundles with a 2.2 GHz Intel Core i5 processor, 4 GB RAM, 128 GB SSD and a range of coloured Type keyboards have been reduced by almost £200 today.
- Xbox One 500GB Bundle: Amazon has a number of Xbox One deals on today. First is the standard Kinect bundle for £210, then there’s the Kinect Bundle plus Overwatch for £230. However, if you want Guitar Hero, that’ll cost you £235. Finally, there’s the Kinect Bundle, Forza 6 and a extra controller deal for £246.
- PlayStation 4 500GB Bundle: There aren’t as many deals for the PS4, but Amazon is putting on an Uncharted 4 bundle that costs £240 and will save you quite a bit of cash. If you want Uncharted 4 on its own, that too is discounted and will set you back £32 for today only.
- Microsoft Band 2 – £129 (normally £200): Microsoft’s fitness tracker is enjoying another big sale.
- Nvidia Shield 16GB – £100 / 500GB – £170: Both boxes are £50 off today (and still come with a free controller).
- 12 Months of Xbox Live plus £10 credit – £31.49 (normally £40): To get the most out of your Xbox One, you’ll need a subscription to Xbox Live. This deal will see you right for a full year and give you some extra cash to spend on games or DLC.
- SanDisk SDSSDHII-480G-G25 Ultra II SSD – £77 (normally £95): If you’re looking for a way to speed up your PC (or even Mac), Sandisk’s Ultra II SSDs will definitely help things zip along.
- Beoplay H2 On-Ear Headphones – £79 (normally £150): Bang & Olufsen’s on-ear headphones are almost half off today and are available in green or silver.
- Anker PowerCore+ 26800 portable charger – £35 (normally £50): Anker markets the PowerCore+ 26800 as the world’s highest capacity portable charger with Quick Charge 2.0 technology. It’ll juice your iPhone 6 over 10 times and a MacBook over three.
Source: Amazon Prime Day
ASUS ZenFone 3 Deluxe gets first dibs on Snapdragon 821 chip
We knew it wouldn’t be long before ASUS rolls out its latest smartphones after the Computex unveiling, but it turns out the company has saved a little surprise for us. At the Taiwan and Hong Kong launch event today, ASUS revealed that its flagship 5.7-inch ZenFone 3 Deluxe has been given a chipset upgrade — from Snapdragon 820 to the speedier Snapdragon 821 announced yesterday. And yes, it’s officially the world’s first device to feature this 2.4GHz processor, while still benefiting from the same old Cat 13 LTE radio, a slightly faster Adreno 530 GPU, dual-SIM support (Micro SIM plus Nano SIM) and Quick Charge 3.0.
The metallic ZenFone 3 Deluxe comes in three flavors, with its top model offering pretty much all the best possible specs to date: 6GB of DDR4 RAM plus 256GB of UFS 2.0 internal storage (expandable by up to 128GB via microSD using the second SIM slot). But this will cost you NT$24,990 or about US$780. The remaining two variants are still based on the 2.15GHz Snapdragon 820, and you get either 4GB RAM with 32GB storage (NT$15,990 or about US$500) or 6GB RAM with 64GB storage (NT$17,990 or about US$560). It’s worth mentioning that these are certified for Google’s Daydream VR platform.
The rest of the features are identical, including their 1080p Super AMOLED touchscreen (with glove mode), Gorilla Glass 4, a 3,000 mAh battery, NFC, 23-megapixel f/2.0 main camera (with OIS, laser AF and dual-tone flash). 8-megapixel f/2.0 front camera and fingerprint reader on the back. The series will become available in Taiwan and Hong Kong as early as August, though we’re also told to expect the Snapdragon 821 variant to arrive later.
Also announced today is the ZenPad 3S 10 (Z500M). This is a mid-range 9.7-inch tablet featuring a 2,048 x 1,536 LCD, 4GB of RAM, 32GB of storage (with microSD expansion), an 8-megapixel main camera, a 5-megapixel front imager and Android 6.0. It runs on a hexa-core MediaTek chip (MT8176; dual 2.1GHz Cortex-A72 and quad 1.7GHz Cortex-A53) so it should be more than enough for general usage, plus it has a fingerprint reader, 802.11ac WiFi, DTS Headphone:X audio, a 5,900 mAh battery, USB Type-C port and Quick Charge 3.0 (but charger sold separately). The tablet will be available in Taiwan for NT$10,990 or about US$340 in August.
Grindr successfully convinced gay men to test for HIV infection
Grindr, the popular gay social networking app, recently ended a study in which a subsection of users were targeted to receive and utilize HIV self-testing kits for a quick diagnosis. Of the 56 men who were tested and answered survey questions, two learned via the kit of their infections.
The study targeted gay black and Hispanic men in Los Angeles, utilizing banner ads that offered access to HIV testing kits by mail or via pharmacy or vending machine in the parking lot of the L.A. LGBT Center. These groups were chosen as they are the most likely to become infected for HIV and least likely to seek out or receive testing for it, according to the study.
The research produced a whopping 69% of men who responded to survey questions who hadn’t been tested for the infection within the last six months.
Given that Grindr is utilized by over five million men across 192 countries, this could be a very effective way going forward to combat the spread of HIV infection in the gay community.
Via: The New York Times
Source: CSIRO Publishing
NFL starts working on a Snapchat Discover channel
Big-name sports leagues have briefly teamed up with Snapchat before (mainly for Live Stories), but the NFL appears to be in it for the long haul. The football league is hiring a managing editor that would produce content for a Snapchat Discover channel full of animations, articles and videos. The exact nature of the content is under wraps, to no one’s surprise. However, it’s reasonable to suspect that the NFL would offer the sort of bite-sized content that it does on its website, such as news and game highlights.
The league wouldn’t comment to Mashable on the findings, which isn’t surprising when work on the channel hasn’t really started yet — assuming it goes forward at all, that is. If the NFL does get to Discover, though, it’ll claim a highly coveted spot. Only a handful of companies have any presence on Discover, and they’re almost exclusively mainstream media outlets and brands. The NFL would both bring sports to Discover in a big way and beat other leagues (such as the NBA and NHL) that have been jockeying for their own channels.
Via: Mashable
Source: LinkedIn
‘Pokémon Go’ on iOS is digging deep into linked Google accounts
If you spent your weekend wandering around capturing cartoon monsters on your phone, you’re likely one of millions addicted to Pokémon Go, the latest mobile game sensation. But if you played the game on an iPhone and signed in with your Google account, you also just handed the keys to your entire Google account to Niantic, the developer behind the game. As pointed out by Adam Reeve, a principal architect at Red Owl analytics, nothing in the sign up process indicates that you’re giving the app full access to your account.
Indeed, according to the Google help page, this means that the application will now be able to “see and modify nearly all information in your Google account.” That means that Niantic — and, more importantly, anyone who has access to Niantic’s servers — will be able to read and access all your email, your Google drive docs, your search history, your private Google Photos and a lot more. To be clear, this wouldn’t be a problem if you signed up for the game using Pokemon’s own “Trainer Club” account, but Pokemon’s servers appear to be down. Also, while this full access issue appears to happen predominantly on iOS, a few Android users have reported the same as well.
We’ve reached out to Niantic and to Google to get more information about what happened here. Right now, we hear they’re still trying to clarify what’s going on and we’ll update you on their response if any. For now, however, we recommend revoking Pokemon Go’s full account access by heading to this link and clicking “Remove.” The game should still function if you have it open, but you’ll probably have to reauthorize (and re-revoke) on future sign-ins.
Source: Adam Reeve
‘Pokémon Go’ adds billions to Nintendo’s market value
Pokémon Go is the latest hotness in mobile gaming and Nintendo is basking in its glow — to the tune of $7.5 billion in additional market value. Nintendo stock closed up 25 percent on Monday, and by the end of last week, when Pokémon Go hit mobile devices across the US, Australia and New Zealand, the company’s stock was already up 9 percent. Nintendo added $7.5 billion to its market value on Friday and Monday alone, Reuters reports.
Nintendo didn’t directly develop or publish Pokémon Go, but it holds a large stake in the series’ licensor, The Pokémon Company. Pokémon Go was developed and published by Niantic Labs, Google’s former AR division that was responsible for the Ingress mobile game. Nintendo and Google invested an estimated $30 million in Niantic while it was working on Pokémon Go.
The stock boost is great news for Nintendo, which has been struggling to save face and money since 2011. Its living room console, the Wii U, hit shelves in November 2012 and it didn’t sell nearly as well as the company expected or needed it to. Nintendo executives predicted they would move nearly 100 million Wii U consoles, but they’ve sold just 13 million since 2012. Nintendo lost money annually between fiscal years 2011 and 2014, largely banking on legacy titles like Mario, Animal Crossing and Super Smash Bros.
Of course, market value doesn’t translate directly to profit for Nintendo, but rising stock is a sign that investors still believe in the house that Mario built. Nintendo will need all the support it can get ahead of its next console launch, which we expect in March 2017.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Pokémon Go will hit Europe, Japan and other Asian nations within a few days, citing people with knowledge of internal plans.
Source: Reuters, CNBC
Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 821 is its fastest processor yet
Qualcomm has revealed the Snapdragon 821, a mobile processor that’s around 10 percent faster than its current performance champ, the Snapdragon 820. However, it’s not a replacement for that chip, which is used in high-end phones like the Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge, HTC 10 and Sony Xperia X Performance. Rather, “the 821 is designed to complement and extend the competitive strengths” of its current tech, Qualcomm says. In other words, it’ll function as an interim chip for high-end devices until the next-gen processor comes along.
To achieve the higher speeds, Qualcomm says it bumped the clock rates of the 14-nanometer chip from 2.1 to 2.4 GHz. Otherwise, it’s borrowing the Snapdragon 820’s tech, including the 600 Mbps X12 LTE modem, Ultra HD Voice tech for improved call quality, and Upload+ for faster downloads. At the same time, it’ll deliver greater speeds, battery life and app performance.
Will Google’s Daydream VR use the Snapdragon 821?
So which devices can we expect to use the Snapdragon 821? Qualcomm isn’t saying, but possible candidates include HTC’s upcoming Nexus phone and the ASUS ZenFone 3. It also said that it’ll be used for “mobile VR head mounted displays and other new devices,” on top of smartphones and tablets.
That implies we could soon see standalone mobile VR headsets (that don’t require a smartphone like Samsung’s Gear VR), something that Google confirmed at its I/O conference in May. We won’t have to wait long to find out, as Qualcomm says “you can expect commercial devices powered by the 821 in the second half of 2016” with more information coming soon.
Engadget UK giveaway: Win a Moto G4 courtesy of Mobilefun.co.uk
Summer is upon us, and as usual it’s a pretty underwhelming affair. Hopefully a brand new Moto G4 will keep you occupied on some of the many rainy days to come, however. The smartphone is one of a couple of recent additions to Motorola’s highly regarded G range, and thanks to Mobilefun.co.uk, we’ve got two of the things to give away this week. Better yet, the retailer has raided its accessory selection to pair each phone with no less than five different covers and cases. To be in with a chance to win, simply enter via the Rafflecopter widget below, but do us a favour and give the rules a quick scan first, would ya?
a Rafflecopter giveaway
- Entries are handled through the Rafflecopter widget above. Comments are no longer accepted as valid methods of entry. You may enter without any obligation to social media accounts, though we may offer them as opportunities for extra entries. Your email address is required so we can get in touch with you if you win, but it will not be given to third parties.
- Contest is open to all residents of the UK, 18 or older! Sorry, we don’t make this rule (we hate excluding anyone), so direct your anger at our lawyers and contest laws if you have to be mad.
- Winners will be chosen randomly. Two (2) winners will receive one (1) Moto G4 and assorted cases.
- If you are chosen, you will be notified by email. Winners must respond within three days of being contacted. If you do not respond within that period, another winner will be chosen. Make sure that the account you use to enter the contest includes your real name and a contact email or Facebook login. We do not track any of this information for marketing or third-party purposes.
- This unit is purely for promotional giveaway. Motorola, Mobilefun.co.uk and Engadget / AOL are not held liable to honour warranties, exchanges or customer service.
- The full list of rules, in all its legalese glory, can be found here.
- Entries can be submitted until July 15th at 11:59PM BST. Good luck!
Source: Mobilefun.co.uk
iPhone 7 spy shot offers a clearer look at its camera
If you’re wondering what the iPhone 7 should look like when it’s more than just a bare shell covered in watermarks, look no further. NowhereElse.fr has obtained a leaked photo that appears to offer an exceptionally clear, more complete view of Apple’s upcoming handset. The snapshot of the device sample shows that, yes, the standard-sized future iPhone should have a much larger, protruding camera lens (and presumably a larger sensor) along with cleaner antenna lines. While there’s no guarantees that this is exactly what Apple will launch later this year, we believe this photo was taken outside of the offices of Lite-On, a company with expertise optical and power supply technologies. It’s possible that someone brought the iPhone chassis to Lite-On or a nearby firm for testing.
The shot doesn’t verify other rumored details, such as the absence of a 3.5mm headphone jack, dual-SIM support or increased storage. And is the camera higher resolution, or will Apple offer a similar resolution and improve image quality (such as low light performance) instead? We’d add that this doesn’t show the larger iPhone 7 Plus, which is widely rumored to have dual rear cameras that would improve focusing and overall fidelity. This may not be the last leak you see, but we have a hunch that you won’t get all the answers until Apple holds its iPhone launch event sometime in the weeks ahead.
Via: 9to5Mac
Source: NowhereElse.fr
ICYMI: Drunk dogbot and VR music machine
Today on In Case You Missed It: An Osaka University robotics lab produced a dog robot that can run six miles per hour while being the most uncoordinated robot you’ve seen (that works), and the Soundstage app lets users set up a recording studio to rock out with a VR headset on.
The Sunday breakfast machine is worth seeing, as is the winning entry in Amazon’s robot Picking Challenge. As always, please share any interesting tech or science videos you find by using the #ICYMI hashtag on Twitter for @mskerryd.
AIVAnet 