Galaxy Watch 5 leak suggests a slight price hike and a costly Pro model
WinFuture journalist Roland Quandt claims to know how much the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 will cost. And compared to the Galaxy Watch 4, the newer model may not be quite as affordable as its bargain-priced predecessor.
According to Quandt, the 40mm, 44mm, and 45mm Bluetooth models will cost about 300 euros, 350 euros, and 490 euros, respectively. That converts to about $320, $370, and $520 — though Samsung likely won’t follow an exact conversion rate when deciding international prices.
For comparison, the Galaxy Watch 4 costs about $250/€270 and $280/€300 in those same sizes, with some variation based on the country. This suggests Samsung sees the Galaxy Watch 5 as enough of an upgrade to demand a higher price tag.
We’ve heard rumors that the Galaxy Watch 5 could receive a slight battery bump and a new temperature sensor; but no other leaks have revealed any major spec or design improvements.
Quandt’s tweet also suggests an LTE upgrade will cost about 50 euros extra, and confirms a previous Galaxy Watch 5 colors leak that it’ll ship in six different colors: Gray or Silver for 40mm/44mm, Pink Gold for 40mm, Blue for 44mm, and Black or Gray Titanium for the 45mm Pro watch.
From Android Central
Nothing Phone 1 to be sold via invite system, just like the first OnePlus phones
Anyone who has followed OnePlus from the beginning knows that the company has changed a lot over the years. It sold its early phones exclusively via an invite system. While this made it hard to get the phone, it allowed OnePlus to slowly ramp up stock and artificially keep OnePlus in the news for even longer. It looks like Nothing is taking a page from early OnePlus. The Nothing company, founded by OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei, will also have its own invite system to sell the Nothing Phone 1.
In a video posted by the company, Pei says, “When you’re making a very complicated product like a smartphone, It takes some time to ramp up. We could either wait until we’ve accumulated a lot of phones and start the sales then, or we can start selling as soon as possible. We chose the latter.”
Pei goes on to explain that Nothing wanted to have “at least some” phones in the hands of people. This is why the company decided that the Nothing Phone 1 would initially sell through an invite system “so that people who deserve it the most will be able to buy it in the beginning.”
From Android Authority
iQOO U5e goes official with Dimensity 700 SoC and 5,000 mAh battery
iQOO announced the U5 last December and followed up with the U5x in March. Now the company has added a new member to its U5 series, dubbed iQOO U5e. Spoiler – it is just a rebranded vivo Y33e, which is also headed to the Chinese market.
The iQOO U5e is powered by the Dimensity 700 SoC and runs Android 12-based OriginOS Ocean out of the box. It comes with up to 6GB RAM and has 128GB of storage onboard, which is expandable up to 1TB via a microSD card.
The iQOO U5e is built around a 6.51″ 60Hz HD+ LCD with a notch for the 8MP selfie camera. It has a 13MP primary camera on the rear, joined by a 2MP macro unit and LED flash.
From Gsmarena
Samsung brings ISOCELL HP3 200MP sensor with smallest ever pixels
Samsung announced a new 200 MP sensor, called ISOCELL HP3. It has the “industry’s smallest pixel” at just 0.56 μm, which is 12% smaller than the predecessor. It promises quicker auto-focusing and even clearer HDR thanks to a new algorithm for stacking images.
The new sensor arrived nine months after the ISOCELL HP1, which is technically the first 200MP camera sensor for smartphones, even if we haven’t seen an actual phone with it yet. Since then, Samsung managed to decrease the pixel size from 0.64 μm, making the the new sensor 1/1.4” type – about 20% smaller than the predecessor.
The 4-to-1 binning adds up to 1.12μm pixels for 50MP photos. For ultra-dark photos, the new sensor also supports 16-to-1 binning for huge 2.24μm pixels and 12.5 MP photos.
From Gsmarena
Asus ROG Phone 6 visits TENAA: same dimensions, lower weight
One of the upcoming Asus ROG Phone 6 models, ASUS_AI2201_B, has been certified by TENAA. This confirmed some of the key specs, though we’re not sure if this is the vanilla phone or the Pro. Given the memory configuration, it is probably the Pro model.
The phone measures 172.8 x 77.3 x 10.4mm, basically the same dimensions as the ROG Phone 5/5 Pro. Only a White colorway is listed, but unfortunately there are not photos attached yet. Despite remaining the same size, the new mode has managed to shave some weight and is now down to 229g (all 5-series models weighed 238g).
From Gsmarena
Galaxy S22 Ultra became a best-seller thanks to the Note series’ death
The Galaxy S22 Ultra was the most popular Android smartphone in April. The flagship phone was followed by Samsung’s much cheaper Galaxy A13. And interestingly enough, both devices had a similar global market share.
The Galaxy S22 Ultra had a share of 1.5% in April, whereas Samsung’s second-most popular phone, the Galaxy A13, covered 1.4% of the market. The low-end Galaxy A03 Core was also able to capture a 1.4% share.
The fourth and last Samsung phone in the Top 10 list was the Galaxy A53 5G, which had a global market share of 1.3%. It was followed by rival Redmi Note 11 LTE, which held an equally-sized chunk of the global smartphone market. (via Counterpoint Research)
But despite the apparent success of the Galaxy S22 Ultra 5G, it was far from the most popular smartphone available for purchase in April 2022.
From Sammobile
Poco X4 GT arrives with Dimensity 8100, Poco F4 brings an SD870
The Poco family is growing with two new members today. One has a passion for gaming and brings the first 144Hz display to the series, the other tries to be an all-rounder with its own “first” – the first OIS camera on a Poco phone. Poco X4 GT Poco F4
From Gsmarena
Twitter is officially testing Notes, its long-form blogging feature
It’s been called Twitter Article before, but now the bird app’s long-form posts feature goes by Notes, and it’s officially being tested with a few users now.
On Wednesday, Twitter announced via a tweet that it was now testing its Notes feature and introduced it as “a way to write longer on Twitter.”
From Digital Trends
Instagram is testing an AI face-scanning tool that can verify your age
Instagram is testing new age verification methods including asking followers to vouch for your age and even using AI that can estimate your age via a video selfie. It’s part of a push to ensure users are at least the minimum 13 years old and “to make sure that teens and adults are in the right experience for their age group,” it announced.
For the “social vouching” system, Instagram asks three mutual followers of the user to confirm their age. Those followers must be at least 18 and have three days to respond to the request. Users can still verify their age with pictures of ID cards as well.
The AI part requires you to take a video selfie, which Meta-owned Instagram then shares with a company called Yoti (it doesn’t provide any other information to Yoti, only the image, it says). “Yoti’s technology estimates your age based on your facial features and shares that estimate with us. Meta and Yoti then delete the image. The technology cannot recognize your identity — only your age,” Instagram says in the blog post.
From Engadget
Samsung agrees to pay $14m penalty over misleading Galaxy ads
Samsung has agreed to pay a $14m penalty for misleading claims that seven of its Galaxy phones were water-resistant when the devices could stop working after being used in swimming pools or ocean water.
Justice Michael Murphy approved the settlement between the tech company and the Australian competition and consumer commission (ACCC) in the longrunning case launched in 2019, over ads related to seven Galaxy phone models.
The competition watchdog had alleged Samsung misled and deceived customers with its claims about phones across more than 300 advertisements since February 2016. In court on Thursday, the barrister for Samsung, Nicholas De Young, said the full calculation of advertisements affected came to 684.
The ads online, TV, and on billboards showed the phones being water-resistant and being used at pools and beaches, despite the phones not being suitable for use in pool water or salt water.
From The Guardian
