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Rabu, 16 Oktober 2019

Can the Pixel 4 win back Google’s camera crown? - The Verge

After Apple’s iPhone 11 event, I noted that while the company was catching up on features like ultrawide and night mode, it was unclear whether it’d be able to get on the Pixel’s level in terms of basic image quality. Over the course of our review process, it became clear that Apple had indeed achieved that. Apple says it has a class-leading camera every year, but this time it actually does.

The next question, then, is how big a leap will come with Google’s new Pixel 4. We still can’t answer that yet, just as we didn’t know how good the iPhone 11 was the day after its announcement. (You can see some quick comparisons here, but stay tuned for the full review.) We can, however, take a lot from what Google did — and didn’t — have to say on stage yesterday.

“We didn’t forget about the camera,” Google’s Sabrina Ellis said near the end of the presentation. “With Pixel 4 we’re raising the bar yet again, and it all starts with this little square.” “Little” is perhaps a charitable description of the Pixel 4’s conspicuous camera bump, but that bump does of course house what should amount to the biggest change to the Pixel camera.

Let’s just get this out of the way: it’s weird that Google went for a telephoto lens as its second option. “Wide angle can be fun, but we think telephoto is more important,” computational photography lead Marc Levoy said on stage. That’s not an unreasonable position — Apple certainly agreed during the last three years it put out dual-camera phones before switching to ultrawide with the iPhone 11. But Google spent a lot of time last year touting its Super Res Zoom feature that uses multi-frame algorithms to improve the quality of traditional digital zoom. It wasn’t better than an optical telephoto lens, of course, but it was better than nothing, and Google is continuing to use it for the Pixel 4’s extended zoom range.

An ultrawide lens, on the other hand, can’t be faked in software. The reason to include one is because it’s the only way to achieve that perspective. Why, when finally deciding to add a second lens after years of insisting it wasn’t necessary, would Google choose glass that solves a problem it already had a passable solution for, instead of something that makes entirely new types of photos possible?

Or, and hear me out here, why not just add an ultrawide and a telephoto? These are expensive phones. That is a big camera bump. Every single one of Google’s competitors in the premium market now sells phones with triple-camera setups — it’s not that exotic a feature any more. I’m sure we’ll see it on the Pixel 5.

Overall, Google had almost nothing to say about the Pixel 4’s camera hardware on stage beyond the acknowledgement of the second lens. It turns out the main lens has received a slight aperture increase, going to f/1.7 from f/1.8, while the sensor remains 12 megapixels and is presumably the same size as before.

“But the hardware isn’t what makes our camera so much better,” Ellis went on. “The special sauce that makes our pixel camera unique is computational photography.” That is certainly true, and what followed was an engaging presentation from Levoy on how the Pixel works its magic. Or, as he described it in a wry swipe at Apple: “It’s not mad science, it’s just simple physics.”

After explaining the basic principles of HDR+, Levoy detailed four new computational additions to the Pixel 4 camera. The first was Live HDR+, which uses machine learning to calculate HDR+ in real time so you can see it in the viewfinder. This also allows you to control the camera’s exposure with sliders for brightness and shadows, which could make it a lot easier to lock in the results you want.

Elsewhere, the Pixel 4 now uses machine learning for white balance in all modes, instead of just Night Sight — the examples Levoy used included a snow scene, which trips up traditional cameras all the time. The Pixel 4 portrait mode uses the telephoto lens to create a better depth map and work with a wider range of subjects. And Night Sight now has an astrophotography function that merges images across four-minute exposures to produce pin-sharp photos of stars.

All of these features sound cool, and I could watch Marc Levoy talk about HDR algorithms for hours. But it’s hard to know whether the announcements will add up to meaningful, noticeable improvements in pure image quality for the types of photos we take every day. I’m looking forward to taking pictures of stars on my phone, but I don’t know if it’s a selling point. What matters is the extent to which Google has managed to push its core photographic results forward.

This is basically what I thought about the iPhone 11 after its launch, of course, and it turned out to be the biggest leap for Apple in several years despite what appeared to be near-identical hardware. We won’t know how good the Pixel 4 camera really is until we’ve spent more time with it. But the Pixel 3 camera is still one of the best in the world, so there’s no reason to expect anything short of greatness.

We just wonder about that missing ultrawide.

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https://www.theverge.com/2019/10/16/20916938/pixel-4-camera-vs-iphone-11-pro

2019-10-16 12:00:00Z
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'League of Legends: Wild Rift' will land on mobile and consoles in 2020 - Engadget

Selasa, 15 Oktober 2019

Facebook Portal 10-inch 2019 review: better design, familiar limitations - The Verge

Last year, Facebook released the Portal, a smart display that you put in your home and use to make video calls over Facebook Messenger. Unsurprisingly, the thought of having an always-connected camera and microphone that’s linked to Facebook gave many people pause, including me.

Despite those pervasive reservations — and undisclosed sales figures — Facebook is back with a new range of Portal devices for this year. A redesigned 10-inch model is joined by a new 8-inch version and a Portal camera that clips on top of your TV to use the biggest screen in your home for video calling. The 15-inch Portal Plus is unchanged and remains in the lineup as well.

Aside from the new design, the new $179.99 10-inch Portal has a lower price than last year’s model and comes with a few new software features that were missing the first time around. It’s available to order from Facebook and other retailers starting today. But if the reason you didn’t want a Portal in your home was because it’s a dedicated Facebook calling machine, then you’re not going to want this one either.

The most obvious change with this year’s Portal is its new design. The mini-TV look of the original has been replaced with something that looks more like a picture frame. It’s still obviously a screen, but it can blend in better with your home’s decor, and it has a smaller footprint while maintaining the same size screen.

The display is a 10-inch, 1280 x 800 pixel touchscreen, which seems like a low resolution, but it’s perfectly fine for the distances from which you’ll be using the Portal. It’s bright and colorful, with good viewing angles, and it has a Night Mode that cuts down on blue light in the evening, much like your phone’s night mode. It also has automatic brightness, but it doesn’t have the same kind of impressive color balancing you’ll find in Google’s Nest Hub smart displays.

Cleverly, the Portal can be rotated to either landscape or portrait orientations, thanks to the kickstand on the back that also provides some cable management for the power cord. You can switch orientations at any time, including in the middle of a call, and the software will rotate and adapt to fit the screen properly. It’s not quite as fancy as the larger Portal Plus’ rotating screen, but it takes up far less space and doesn’t look like a McDonald’s kiosk sitting on your counter.

Facebook also redesigned the speakers in the Portal with a 2.1 system using a rear-firing woofer and stereo front speakers that emit sound through the gap between the screen and the frame. The speakers sound fine for voice calls, but they’re disappointing for music, which has an echoey, hollow sound. It’s clear Facebook tuned these speakers for voices at the expense of music, and they don’t compare to the sound from Amazon’s 10-inch Echo Show.

The most important new hardware detail is the three-position sliding switch on the top of the Portal that lets you block the camera and mute the always-listening microphone. You can opt to block just the camera, which gets hidden behind a physical shutter, or both the mic and the camera for the full privacy treatment. It’s a much better solution than the little plastic camera cap the original Portal had, which felt like an afterthought.

I called the original Portal the best smart display for making video calls, so it’s no surprise that the new model is just as competent in that front. All of the features from last year, including the wide-angle camera that automatically frames subjects, the beam-forming microphones that home in on a speaker’s voice, and the integrations with Spotify and storybooks carry over here. Facebook has also expanded the AR masks to support multiple faces simultaneously and even change voices depending on the mask used. There are also new AR-based games you can play between two Portal devices.

Calls made through the Portal have clear video and audio and don’t require me to raise my voice unnaturally. The automatic framing feature, which Google has also adopted for video calls on its Nest Hub Max, makes it easy to casually make a call without having to stay in a rigid spot the entire time. I still don’t think that Portal calls feel the same as an in-person interaction, as Facebook would like you to believe, but they are still better than video calls on the smart displays from Amazon or Google.

Unfortunately, the Story Time mode, which lets you narrate stories with AR effects, is still limited to Portal devices and isn’t very practical for parents who are traveling and want to call home to read a story to their children. I’d have loved to see Facebook add the ability to host a Story Time session from a phone or tablet using the Facebook Messenger app.

The big new addition to calling is the ability to place WhatsApp calls in addition to Facebook Messenger. You can link your WhatsApp account to the Portal just like you can with a laptop or desktop and then make end-to-end encrypted calls from the device. (Facebook says end-to-end encryption is coming to Messenger calls next year.) WhatsApp calls don’t support all of the same features as Messenger, such as the AR masks and games, but they provide largely the same experience, which should make the Portal much more useful in places where WhatsApp is the dominant messaging platform.

Every smart device now requires you to agree to a series of terms and conditions before you can use it — contracts that no one actually reads. It’s impossible for us to read and analyze every single one of these agreements. But we started counting exactly how many times you have to hit “agree” to use devices when we review them since these are agreements most people don’t read and definitely can’t negotiate.

In order to use the Facebook Portal, you must have a Facebook account and agree to Facebook’s terms and conditions and data policy. In addition, the Portal has a supplemental terms and conditions and data policy of its own that you must agree to in order to use the product.

While setting up the Portal, you also are presented with the option to store voice interactions for the “Hey Portal” commands. Linking Amazon Alexa, Spotify, and Pandora accounts with the Portal requires providing Facebook with access to those accounts and services.

Final tally: four mandatory agreements and up to four more optional agreements, depending on how many services are linked to the device.

Aside from video calling, Facebook has expanded the Portal’s capabilities on other fronts. (The company says the software updates and improvements will be delivered to all Portal units once the new model is available for purchase.) It’s now using Amazon’s smart display SDK for Alexa, so it provides the same kinds of screens and information from Alexa voice requests as Amazon’s own Echo Show devices. I can view a summary of weather, recent sports scores, or my Alexa shopping list right on the Portal’s display. I can even call up video feeds from security cameras and doorbells that support Alexa integration, such as Ring products.

The Portal now has a full web browser, which you can access from the grid of app shortcuts on one of the home screens. It’s a bit clumsy to use, and it’s not something I’d even use every day. But for pulling up a website in a pinch, it gets the job done. It also supports YouTube and other video streaming sites, but unfortunately, Netflix doesn’t work.

Video streaming services are still very limited on the Portal, though Facebook says that Amazon’s Prime Video will be coming later this year. Still, video services are largely limited to Facebook’s own Watch platform, and you can’t use the Portal for watching Netflix, Hulu, HBO, or most any other streaming video service you might want. And you can’t “cast” video from your smartphone or tablet to the Portal, like you can with Google’s smart displays. A web browser doesn’t really make up for this lack of options, either.

Streaming music is a little easier since you can use Alexa to request songs and there are dedicated Spotify, iHeartRadio, and Pandora apps on the Portal. You can also use Spotify Connect to play music to the Portal from your phone. But as I noted earlier, the sound quality for music isn’t great, and it’s not something I’d recommend if you want to listen to a lot of music with it.

Facebook has also added the ability to send images from your phone to the Portal through a new mobile app, so you can use it as a digital photo frame. It also still can show slideshows of images from your Facebook or Instagram accounts. But compared to the Nest Hub’s Google Photos integration, the Portal’s photo features are far more limited.

Overall, although the new Portal has a much-improved design, costs less, and fits into more places in my home than the prior model, it’s still a Portal and it still has many of the same limitations as before. Unlike other smart displays, which act as information centers, smart home controllers, and video streamers in addition to making video calls, the Portal is primarily a video calling device that’s limited to Facebook’s services. And it’s still a camera connected to Facebook inside your home.

Photography by Dan Seifert / The Verge

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https://www.theverge.com/2019/10/15/20913653/facebook-portal-10-inch-2019-review-price-specs-features-whatsapp-video-calling

2019-10-15 12:00:00Z
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Microsoft Project xCloud hands-on: an early look at game streaming - The Verge

Microsoft has started publicly testing its new Project xCloud game streaming service, allowing Xbox players the US, UK, and Korea to get an early look at Microsoft’s vision for the future of gaming. I’ve spent the past few hours trying out xCloud on my home Wi-Fi network in London over a 1Gbps connection with an average latency of around 10ms to Microsoft’s Azure servers in London. I’m impressed with the early results, but there needs to be a much bigger game selection to really test the limits of xCloud and see what it’s actually capable of.

Microsoft has limited the xCloud preview to just four games initially, and they’re all Microsoft Studios titles. Gears 5, Halo 5: Guardians, Killer Instinct, and Sea of Thieves are all available, and I spent the most time in Sea of Thieves. The preview requires an Android phone or tablet, a Bluetooth Xbox One controller, and Microsoft’s new game streaming app. This particular application will be used both for xCloud streaming from Microsoft’s servers, and to stream your own content and games from your Xbox One console to anywhere.

The xCloud interface is extremely basic right now, with tiles to launch the games available. It takes around a minute or so to fully load each game, which feels like a long time on a mobile phone where you’re used to apps loading instantly. Once a game is loaded, you can navigate away to other apps and quickly resume. There’s an option to quit the game, but when you do it’ll still keep the instance running on Microsoft’s servers for a few minutes just in case you want to jump back in.

As you’re running games on Microsoft’s cloud servers, it’s basically like having a remote Xbox One console. Microsoft has a stripped down version of its Xbox One dashboard running on these xCloud servers, and you can use it to access a friends list, join Xbox Live party chat, or even view achievements for the game you’re playing. You can’t jump into other apps, or play around with settings here, it’s really basic and locked down for now.

I tested out Xbox Live party chat and it worked well, although microphones are muted by default so you have to toggle that setting if you want to use a mic in games like Sea of Thieves or party chat. That’s pretty much it when it comes to customizability or settings, though.

I had a mixed experience streaming games via xCloud. I loaded Sea of Thieves and the intro video stuttered, broke up, and the audio dipped in and out. xCloud doesn’t appear to play well with my 2.4GHz Wi-Fi network, and my router automatically handles either 2.4GHz or a 5GHz connection over the same SSID. I forced it over to the 5GHz option as a separate SSID, and this greatly improved things, but I’ve never experienced similar issues streaming content from Netflix in 4K or via other services.

Sea of Thieves ran really well after the initial connection issues. I was able to complete a mission, voice chat with fellow players, and roam around freely just like I would on a regular Xbox One console. Sea of Thieves isn’t a twitchy action game that requires a lot of movement and control, though. For a multiplayer gaming experiment, I decided to try Halo 5’s player-vs-player (PvP) mode. It’s not as fast paced as games like Overwatch or Fortnite, but it was a chance to test a first-person shooter.

I played a few rounds of quick play, and I definitely noticed input lag from time to time. It wasn’t extreme, but you could certainly tell there was a slight delay in movement speed or responses. I would be interested to test xCloud with something like Overwatch, but the testing is rather limited right now.

The biggest drawback to the xCloud experience right now is simply load times for games. Microsoft is using Xbox One S hardware on its servers, so it’s only as fast as a Xbox One would load the game via its regular hard drive. This is great for game compatibility, but I’d expect Microsoft will upgrade its xCloud servers to the new Xbox Project Scarlett specs once that console launches next year. Scarlett will dramatically improve load speeds thanks to SSD storage and a more capable CPU.

Another drawback is that this is limited to Android during this initial preview period. Microsoft has not mentioned or even demonstrated iOS compatibility yet, despite Apple providing PS4 and Xbox One controller support in iOS 13 recently. This support has already turned the iPad into a portable game console for titles like Fortnite, and with the addition of xCloud it would really open up the amount of games you could play on the go.

You also can’t use xCloud if you’re signed into an Xbox One console and it’s in use. So if your family is watching Netflix using your Microsoft Account on a physical console then xCloud will require you to log out of the console or turn it off to be able to stream games from Microsoft’s cloud. It’s a bizarre requirement, and hopefully it’s just a limitation of this early preview.

If you’re interested in trying xCloud for yourself, I’d highly recommend some type of mount for the phone and Xbox One controller combo. Trying to prop up a slippery phone isn’t ideal, and a clip or mount system removes that headache. You’ll definitely need an Xbox One controller, too, as Microsoft hasn’t implemented any touch controls for games just yet.

Project xCloud invites are rolling out in waves, and you can sign up to test Microsoft’s cloud gaming service right here.

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https://www.theverge.com/2019/10/15/20915220/microsoft-xcloud-game-streaming-preview-hands-on

2019-10-15 11:38:50Z
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Realme’s X2 Pro has a 90Hz screen and Snapdragon 855 Plus for under $400 - Circuit Breaker

Realme has made a major splash in 2019 with a series of impressively low-priced devices, but now the company is releasing its first phone that could seriously be described as high-end. The X2 Pro has Qualcomm’s fastest processor available, a screen with a high refresh rate, and a quad-camera array including a giant 64-megapixel sensor. All of this means it’s Realme’s priciest phone to date, but the spec sheet keeps it extremely competitive.

The X2 Pro’s industrial design is pretty boring, but there’s nothing really wrong with it either. There’s an unobtrusive waterdrop notch in the display, along with a bottom bezel that’s only very slightly larger than the other three. Realme has moved to a glass back panel for the X2 Pro, which feels better to the touch than the previous plastic designs but obviously compromises on durability.

Despite the small bezels, the X2 Pro manages to squeeze in stereo speakers that actually sound quite good; taken together with the above-average haptic feedback system, it’s clear Realme has made a point of including features that more expensive Chinese phones often skimp on. Unfortunately, though, that doesn’t extend to wireless charging.

The screen is a 6.5-inch 1080p OLED panel with an in-display fingerprint sensor and a refresh rate of 90Hz. Higher refresh rates are starting to become more common on flagship phones like the OnePlus 7T and (reportedly) the upcoming Pixel 4, and it really is hard to go back once you’ve been using a screen like this for a while. The Realme X2 Pro feels incredibly smooth in use, especially for basic actions like scrolling through timelines or swiping between home screen pages, where text remains readable in motion.

The speedy feel of the phone is bolstered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 Plus processor, the fastest currently available on any Android phone. The X2 Pro comes with either 6GB, 8GB, or 12GB of RAM and 64GB, 128GB, or 256GB of flash storage.

The camera setup includes that same 64-megapixel sensor from Samsung along with a 13-megapixel telephoto, an 8-megapixel ultrawide, and a 2-megapixel macro lens. There’s also a 16-megapixel selfie camera. You can see how the 64-megapixel camera performed on last month’s Realme XT here:

The X2 Pro can fast-charge at up to 50W with Oppo’s proprietary Super VOOC technology, which Realme says should get you 80 percent of a full charge in half an hour. The phone has a 4,000mAh battery, so that’s not quite as fast as Oppo’s own new Reno Ace — with which it shares both battery size and almost identical industrial design — but it’s still right up there as far as fast-charging solutions go.

If you’re thinking this sounds a lot like the OnePlus 7T, another phone produced under the umbrella of BBK Electronics’ all-encompassing supply chain, you’d be right. The screen, processor, speakers, fingerprint sensor, and other aspects of the phone are all similar, if not identical. But the X2 Pro has an extra camera lens (of dubious value, admittedly), a bigger main camera sensor, and faster fast-charging. OnePlus’ main advantage is in its zippy OxygenOS software built atop Android 10. Realme uses Oppo’s ColorOS, which has quite a bit in common, but it’s more influenced by iOS and is still stuck on Android 9 in its current iteration.

That may not be as much of a concern when you consider this phone’s pricing. In China, the X2 Pro costs 2,699 yuan (~$380) for a 6GB/64GB model, going up to 2,899 yuan (~$410) for 8GB/128GB and 3,299 yuan (~$465) for 12GB/256GB. It probably won’t be quite that cheap when released outside of China, but it’s clear that the X2 Pro will undercut the OnePlus 7T, and will likely be a serious competitor to phones like Xiaomi’s Mi 9T Pro/Redmi K20 Pro.

The Realme X2 Pro is launching in China and Europe first and is set to follow in India in December.

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https://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2019/10/15/20915214/realme-x2-pro-announced-specs-price

2019-10-15 09:30:00Z
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Makan Dua Belas

Rabu, 16 Oktober 2019

Can the Pixel 4 win back Google’s camera crown? - The Verge

'League of Legends: Wild Rift' will land on mobile and consoles in 2020 - Engadget

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'League of Legends: Wild Rift' will land on mobile and consoles in 2020 - Engadget

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Selasa, 15 Oktober 2019

Facebook Portal 10-inch 2019 review: better design, familiar limitations - The Verge

Microsoft Project xCloud hands-on: an early look at game streaming - The Verge

Realme’s X2 Pro has a 90Hz screen and Snapdragon 855 Plus for under $400 - Circuit Breaker