MediaTek’s revenue up 33% thanks to strong sales of Dimensity 8000/9000
Taiwanese chipmaker MediaTek has shown significant growth in the last year. With the release of its Dimensity 8000 and 9000 series, MediaTek has seen positive response from OEMs wishing to include MediaTek’s higher-tier Dimensity chips on their flagships. Thanks in part to this, the company’s revenue has increased by 33%. Oppo, Realme, OnePlus, vivo, Xiaomi, and Honor have all recently released smartphones that equip these chipsets.
From Gsmarena
Sony is reportedly working on its first 100MP sensor for phones
Sony is yet to release a 100+ megapixel sensor designed for smartphones, but one is reportedly on the way. The company will take an interesting approach – instead of going for the flagship market, its first 100MP sensor will be aimed at premium mid-rangers, according to leakster Digital Chat Station.
The sensor will allegedly be part of the Sony IMX8 series. The series recently made its debut with the IMX800, a 54MP 1/1.49” sensor that was used in the Honor 70 series. DCS does not share details about the 100MP sensor, so we can only speculate. Given that it is aimed at mid-rangers, it will not be the largest or most capable in Sony’s line-up.
The company is also working on an IMX9 series, writes the leakster, which will be more capable and will go up against some impressive sensors coming from competitor Samsung. Samsung is already hyping up the 200MP HP1 sensor, which is expected to feature on phones like the Motorola Edge 30 Ultra (expected to be unveiled next month) and potentially the Galaxy S23 Ultra (coming next year). That’s not all, Samsung is also allegedly working on a sensor that is larger than even the GN2, an already massive 1/1.12” sensor.
From Gsmarena
Poco F4 and Poco X4 GT prices and specs leak through Polish retailer
The Poco F4 and X4 GT will be unveiled this Thursday. However, an official Xiaomi distributor in Poland has jumped the gun and listed both phones. This includes full spec sheets, which confirm what we already knew.
More importantly, the site didn’t scrub the metadata properly, so we have prices too. The Poco F4 will cost PLN 2,200 for the 6/128GB configuration and PLN 2,400 for an 8/256GB unit. That converts to $500/€475/₹39,000 and $545/€520/₹42,500, respectively. Here is a direct link to Mi-Home.pl if you want a closer look. For comparison, the Poco F3 (6/128GB) started at PLN 1,700, but is now down to PLN 1,300.
The Poco X4 GT will have a smaller gap between the two memory configurations – PLN 1,900 the 8/128GB and PLN 2,000 for 8/256GB (no sign of a 12GB RAM option). Looking at the currency converter again, those prices work out to $430/€410/₹33,500 and $455/€430/₹35,500, respectively. You can have a look at the three colorways over at Mi-Home.pl.
With that covered, let’s have a quick look at the specs. The Poco F4 is a Snapdragon 870 phone with a 6.67” AMOLED display (120Hz refresh rate, 360Hz touch sampling, GG5). It has a 64MP main, 8MP ultra wide and 2MP macro cameras, plus a 20MP selfie cam. The 4,500mAh battery charges at 67W.
From Gsmarena
ZTE Axon 40 Ultra launches globally
ZTE announced its Axon 40 Ultra flagship to the global audience two weeks ago, and the phone is finally available for sale. It brings a Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset, a big 6.8” Full HD+ AMOLED with a high refresh rate and mighty cameras on the back, as well as an under-display shooter at the front.
From Gsmarena
Xiaomi launches the Book S 12.4, an Arm-powered Windows 11 tablet
Xiaomi has announced a new Windows 11 tablet, the Book S 12.4, for European markets. The Xiaomi Book S 12.4 is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx Gen 2, making it a relatively high-end Arm tablet, though Qualcomm has already announced the 8cx Gen 3 chip. Devices with that processor haven’t launched yet, so this is still one of the most high-end options if you want a Windows 11 Arm device.
Aside from the processor, which includes eight Kryo 495 CPU cores clocked at up to 2.84GHz and a Qualcomm Adreno 680 GPU, the tablet also comes with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage, which seems to be the only configuration available. It’s not the most high-end configuration, but it’s certainly serviceable for a good chunk of users. The battery is a relatively small 38Whr unit, but considering the Arm processor, that should still last up to 13 hours and 24 minutes, according to Xiaomi.
The Xiaomi Book S 12.4 comes with a 12.35-inch display, and that’s in a 16:10 aspect ratio, slightly taller than a typical 16:9 panel. The resolution is 2560 x 1600 with up to 500 nits of brightness, and it covers 100% of DCI-P3. Of course, since it’s a tablet, the screen supports touch, but it also supports the Xiaomi Smart Pen (sold separately), which comes with 4,096 levels of pressure for a more natural drawing and writing experience. The pen also supports Bluetooth and has two buttons for quick actions.
From XDA
Samsung launches its 2022 soundbar lineup in India
Earlier this year, Samsung unveiled its new soundbar models for 2022. Today, on the occasion of World Music Day, the South Korean firm has launched its new soundbar lineup in India. New soundbars include the flagship HW-Q990B with an 11.1.4-channel setup and Wireless Dolby Atmos.
Samsung’s 2022 soundbar lineup for the Indian market includes seven models: HW-Q600B, HW-Q700B, HW-Q800B, HW-Q930B, HW-Q990B, HW-S61B, and HW-S810B. Pricing starts at INR 24,990 for the HW-S61B and goes as high as INR 99,990 for the HW-Q990B.
- Buy HW-Q600B from Samsung India for INR 31,990
- Buy HW-Q700B from Samsung India for INR 34,990
- Buy HW-Q800B from Samsung India for INR 45,990
- Buy HW-Q930B from Samsung India for INR 84,990
- Buy HW-Q990B from Samsung India for INR 99,990
- Buy HW-S61B from Samsung India for INR 24,990
- Buy HW-S810B from Samsung India for INR 42,990
From Sammobile
Xiaomi Smart Band 7 debuts globally
Nearly a month after its debut in China, Xiaomi brought the Smart Band 7 version of its popular Band saeries to the global market.
The new model brings the largest screen yet for a Xiaomi Smart Band at 1.62-inches. The AMOLED panel carries 490x192px resolution and now supports Always-on Display (AOD) which was not available on its predecessor. Another neat new feature is the automatic SpO2 tracking which will notify you if your blood oxygen level drops below 90%.
Smart Band 7 retains the 14-day rated battery life and charges via the same two-pin magnetic charger. Mi Band 7 comes with over 100 watch faces and 110+ sports modes with auto-detection. On the health tracking side, you get 24/7 heart rate measurements as well as sleep and stress tracking alongside female health tracking. The smartband is 5ATM water-resistant and can track your swims without any hassle.
The NFC version of the Smart Band 7 will remain exclusive to China for now though rumors suggest it will eventually make its way to global markets later in collaboration with Mastercard. Xiaomi also revealed it sold over 1 million Smart Band 7 units in China which is a new record.
From Gsmarena
Apple is introducing new tech in iOS 16 to let you skip CAPTCHAs
It’s pretty annoying to go through CAPTCHA verification where you have to identify weird squiggly letters or click on images of the boat till there are none left — just to prove that you’re not a robot. Apple might be getting rid of this problem with a new feature in the upcoming iOS 16 and macOS Ventura.
The company is introducing a new automatic verification setting — which will live under Settings > Apple ID > Password & Security > Automatic Verification — which will verify you as a human to a website or an app without filling out a CAPTCHA.
“Bypass CAPTCHAs in apps and on the web by allowing iCloud to automatically and privately verify your device and account,” Apple’s description of the feature on iOS reads.
In a presentation at the Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC), Apple argued that CAPTCHAs are cumbersome to fill out for users, don’t often follow privacy best practices by tracking a user’s IP address, and they could block out users with disabilities who find it difficult to complete a CAPTCHA challenge.
From Techcrunch
Low demand could leave Samsung with large smartphone stock problem
It’s difficult to be a smartphone shopper, especially as the rising cost of living bites hard. But manufacturers aren’t exempt from the knock-on effects. According to a new report, Samsung may have as many as 50 million smartphones in global distributor stocks just waiting to be sold.
Samsung may have overestimated consumer demand when it set a 2022 production target of 334 million at the end of last year. However, the unexpected slowdown has forced the company to drop targets to 270 million, per The Elec‘s source. With that revision, the company may have nearly 20% of its annual production stocks just sitting at distributors. In this case, a more normalized figure would be around 10% or 27 million devices.
From Android Authority
Cloudflare outage on June 21, 2022
Today, June 21, 2022, Cloudflare suffered an outage that affected traffic in 19 of our data centers. Unfortunately, these 19 locations handle a significant proportion of our global traffic. This outage was caused by a change that was part of a long-running project to increase resilience in our busiest locations. A change to the network configuration in those locations caused an outage which started at 06:27 UTC. At 06:58 UTC the first data center was brought back online and by 07:42 UTC all data centers were online and working correctly.
Depending on your location in the world you may have been unable to access websites and services that rely on Cloudflare. In other locations, Cloudflare continued to operate normally.
We are very sorry for this outage. This was our error and not the result of an attack or malicious activity.
From Cloudfare
