Which one is suitable for you? ROG Flow X13 vs. ROG Flow X16

The ROG Flow X series of laptops. When the Flow X13 was first announced, I was skeptical. Then, I got my hands on it and I immediately fell in love with it. I love the form factor, the performance, and everything that it has to offer. Then a few months ago, we have the ROG Flow X16 – a beefier version of the X13 in terms of both performance and size. I immediately fell in love with the X16 as well. But then I was presented with an interesting dilemma as I was given the choice to pick either the X13 or X16.
I highly recommend you watch the video to know what’s going on.

I shortlisted a total of 4 crucial key differences between these two laptops. Hopefully, this will be able to help you make your choice.

ROG isn’t making this easy for us either as there are few variants for both models. I’m going to pick one variant from each laptop model to make things simpler – and that is because I think that no matter how many variants there are, there is only one good deal.
Screen
Let’s start with the most obvious difference – the screen size. This ties in with the aforementioned point because X13 obviously has a smaller screen whereby the X16 has a larger screen.

If you’re thinking of the We’ll start with the Flow X13 first. It’s a pretty basic IPS LCD screen but I think it’s good enough. The resolution is also sufficient for a laptop of this size – 1920×1200 with 120Hz refresh rate means that we can enjoy games on this laptop with a relatively high graphical setting without over-stressing the GPU.

Then for the Flow X16, it’s a completely different story. If you watched our review at the top right corner there, then you’ll know that I absolutely love the ROG Nebula HDR Display. It’s supremely color accurate, supremely bright, and also has supremely thin bezels.
Both of these laptops are convertibles, they are also touchscreens, by the way.
Performance
Performance is where things get a bit funky. Usually, the size (and sometimes weight) of the laptop correlates to the cooling capabilities of that laptop, hence affecting the performance and specs of that particular laptop.
Since the Flow X13 is thin and light, the specs are limited by its cooling capabilities. You’ll get an AMD Ryzen 7 6800HS CPU with 16GB LPDDR5 RAM with an RTX 3050 Laptop GPU. Honestly, that’s perfectly for this laptop – especially since the RTX 3050 Laptop GPU only has 4GB VRAM. Imagine gaming.

You might say – hey, the XG Mobile external GPU exists. Yeah, I hear you. That XG Mobile can definitely elevate your gaming and user experience since it doubles as a dock for you to use with your external keyboard, mouse, and monitor.
However, you need to know the issues and annoyances of the XG Mobile. Personally, I don’t want to deal with the XG Mobile – and you can watch this video to know why.

As for the ROG Flow X16, you don’t even need to get the XG Mobile because it also comes with an RTX 3070 Ti alongside the same AMD Ryzen 7 6800HS CPU and 16GB DDR5 RAM. That’s really powerful and sufficient for that resolution screen and/or refresh rate.
Portability
And we’ll now talk about the 3rd point – portability. The Flow X13 is considerably smaller, hence lighter in weight as well. The ROG Flow X13 is only at 1.3kg and also really thin at only 1.58cm.

The Flow X16, is much bulkier and heavier in general, weighing in at 2.1kg for the highest-end spec version and measuring 1.94cm in thickness. While the difference in thickness might seem like it’s not a big deal, it actually makes a huge difference.

Actually, because of the thickness of the Flow X16 and its weight, it’s quite difficult to grab. It tends to slip off easily since there is nothing much to grab on.

And that’s not all – to make full use of both these laptops, you’ll need to carry their respective power bricks too. The Flow X13 has a much smaller power brick since it only needs 100W. Unfortunately, it seems that the X13 won’t get the full performance when connected to our Ugreen 100W GaN charger. Seems like it has something to do with USB-PD.

Upgradability
And I think this is another big point that many of you need to know – especially for “futureproofing” in certain aspects. They both open up the same way – just a few screws at the bottom and we can pop off the back panel. However, the insides are completely different.

The Flow X13 is very limited in terms of upgradability. The only things we can do is to swap out the WiFi chip and also the SSD – yet it is not using a standard M.2 2280 SSD, it’s the tiny M.2 2230. These SSDs are not easy to find and they are also more expensive per gigabyte.
I think the biggest issue is the soldered RAM since that means we cannot upgrade to let’s say 32GB of RAM down the line. What we buy is what we’re stuck with – unless we buy the 4K 60Hz version because that comes with 32GB.

Then for the Flow X16. I said in our review that this laptop has the best layout motherboard for a gaming laptop so far. It has double M.2 2280 slots – one of them is in use for the bundled SSD and another one is available for us. Then, both the SO-DIMM RAM slots are also accessible so we can slot in 64GB RAM in the future if we want to.
And of course, the WiFi chip can also be swapped.
Few more things to mention
There are a few more things to mention. We do have more ports on the Flow X16 because of its bigger size, but the port positions are also the same. This is not good because the USB-A port at the right side is at where the external mouse is supposed to be.

They’re both convertible laptops, meaning the screen can be turned 360° and be used as a tablet. Both laptops are also using touch screens.
Decision – which one is better?
So – decision time. To get the Flow X13 or Flow X16? That ultimately depends on what size of laptop you want to use.

The size is the biggest double-edged sword. ROG told us – and also from our personal experience – that many people said they want a larger version of the Flow X13 – and that is why the Flow X16 exists. With a larger size also comes beefier specs, a magnificent display, and fantastic upgradability – but making it less portable since it is heavier and also has a larger power brick. At least you don’t have to carry the XG Mobile around with you.

The X13 is definitely more portable and it is more like a souped-up ultrabook. With portability comes the price of performance and upgradability, though.
So it ultimately depends on your personal preference. There are more variants of the X13 and X16 but I think they are just not that good of a deal.
By the way, here’s a table summarizing everything that we’ve talked about today.

Where to buy? (Affiliate links)

ROG Flow X13

Amazon
Lazada
Shopee

ROG Flow X16

Amazon
Lazada
Shopee

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MWC2017: Huawei Wins Multiple Awards

We’ve talked about the MWC2017 and Huawei not too long ago. You know, about the Huawei P10, Huawei P10+, Huawei Watch 2, and Huawei Watch Classic? Yeah, these devices. As MWC2017 is coming to an end, awards are given out. Huawei is one of them that won multiple awards this time.
Android Authority, T3, Pocket-lint, PhoneArena, TechAdvisor, Trusted Reviews, and Recombu has given the Huawei P10 and P10+ for being the best of Android this MWC2017. Other sites like HDblog and FoneArena has given the P10/P10+ the “Editor’s Pick of MWC2017”. These are no small awards since they are global sites after all.

As for the Huawei Watch 2, T3, HDblog, Pocket-lint, ExpertReviews, TechRadar, Recombu, and PC Mag has given it the best wearable awards.
Personally, I’ll give the Huawei P10 and P10+ the most beautiful award first – just because of that green color. That smartphone is really beautiful, by the way. There’s blue color too if that’s not your taste. Either way, there is a total of 8 different colors to choose from.

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Review – Xiaomi Mi A3: Trade-offs galore

For Xiaomi’s third iteration of their Android One smartphone, the Mi A3 is an interesting one to boot. Right from the specs itself, it was pretty divisive, to say the least. We have a unit of the Mi A3 here for review, and we took it for a spin. We do have a lot to say about the Mi A3.
In this review, we took the Mi A3 and compared it with the Mi A2 (review), since we have the phone at hand.

Unboxing
The overall box design is pretty fancy this time around. It shows both the white and blue color schemes and also part of the screen on the box itself. A bold move considering that the Mi A3’s screen has the most controversy this time around.

Digging out everything from within the box itself you get the usual documentation, a standard 5V 2A charger, a USB-C cable, a TPU case, and the Mi A3 itself.

Design
I have to say, Xiaomi somehow overdid themselves this time as the Mi A3 is available in three different and distinct color options – all of them with the Pixel’s play on words. The colors are “Not just Blue”, “Kind of Grey”, and the one that we have here for review is in the “More than White” color option.

We’ve seen the other two colors before here, and I personally prefer the “Not just Blue” the most. The “More than White” here is literally more than white because of its shimmer diffractions on its curved edges, giving it a rainbow color gradient around its sides.

I also realized that the phone is overall thicker than the Mi A2 from last year, but is also nice to hold thanks to its curves. With a thicker body, the Mi A3 also has a smaller camera bump on the rear.

As for the included TPU case, I have no idea why there is an integrated dust plug. Look, the Mi A3 doesn’t support wireless charging and this integrated dust plug gets in the way, making it difficult to plug in the USB cable for charging. This would make better sense if the Mi A3 has wireless charging.
Connectivity & Ports
The Mi A3 did a bold move this time around. Xiaomi heard the numerous complaints on the Mi A2 for not having the 3.5mm audio jack, so they brought it back. If removing the headphone jack is an act of courage, then reinstating the headphone jack after its removal is an act of bravery – and I commend Xiaomi for doing that.

Other than that, it’s a pretty standard affair with 5GHz AC-WiFi support and whatnot. One more feature that made a return to the Mi A3 is the microSD card slot – which is fantastic as being locked down to only the internal storage can be annoying sometimes.

You have all the buttons on the right side of the phone this time around which – depending on your personal preference – it’s okay.

Display
By far the most controversial point of the Mi A3 is, of course, the display. While the Mi A2 has a 1080p IPS LCD display with a rather big notch, the brand new Mi A3 now comes with 720p Super AMOLED display. As per mentioned – the Super AMOLED display is indeed better than IPS LCD screens – but the resolution here is the biggest problem.

Xiaomi not only increased the screen size (albeit just a little) but has cut the resolution by more than half! There’s only about 41% of the number of pixels remain on the Mi A3 when compared to the Mi A2. I would normally argue that 720p pixels don’t really matter – like on the Nintendo Switch – but that is a gaming console with texts that are far and few in between.

From our usage experience, the rounded corners around the corners of the screen are also a little too much, cropping out elements of apps. I also realized because of the low resolution of the screen, I can see jagged edges on the curvatures – which is jarring as the first time I saw this was when I booted up the phone for the first time.
Look at those corners… can you see that red line around the edge?
Cameras
Alright – the cameras. On paper, it got beefier compared to last year. This time around, you get two usable cameras in addition to the depth sensor:

Main: 48MP f/1.8 autofocusing
Ultrawide angle: 8MP f/2.2 fixed focus
Depth sensor

The selfie camera here is 32MP f/2.0 with fixed focus, make it rather potent. The picture quality of the camera isn’t that bad as well.

The overall white balance of the pictures are good, but any pictures taken with the main 48MP camera is a little dull. Switching over to the ultrawide angle camera, the colors are a little more vibrant. You can have a look at our full album of all the pictures taken with the Mi A3 at our Shutterfly album.
Without AI or HDR.
Without AI but with HDR.
Main camera.
Ultrawide angle camera.
Night shots are decent too, as usual.
Without night mode.
With night mode. That amount of HDR is intense!
But my biggest complaint here is not the about the picture quality – but the usage of the camera itself. For some reason, it felt as if Xiaomi did not optimize the camera API and there is a very long delay between pressing the shutter and the phone actually taking the picture. This shutter delay reminds me of what happened back in the days of the Nexus 4 – which was back in 2012.
I suggest you watch the video review at the top of this post to get an idea of what I mean.
Software – Pure Android 9.0 Pie
Being a part of Android One means getting software updates from Google themselves in a timely manner. By starting the phone, I already got a firmware update.
The other highlight here is the lack of any skins of bloatware. This is all the apps that you have when you start the phone for the first time.

While Android One is highly sought-after for some people, I think it’s a little too bare. Your mileage may vary.
Performance & Gaming
Let us first summarize the specs of the Mi A3. For the unit that we have for review, it comes with:

6.088-inch Super AMOLED display with 1560×720 pixels in resolution
Qualcomm Snapdragon 655
4GB RAM
64GB storage (expandable with microSD card)
4,030mAh battery with Qualcomm QuickCharge 3.0 support

Only comes bundled with 5V 2A charger

Let’s not beat around the bush here. I state what I said in the video again – this is a great example of how having a higher number in product naming schemes doesn’t necessarily mean a better product. Compared to the Snapdragon 660 on the Mi A2, the Snapdragon 665 that comes in the Mi A3 is underperforming in both single-core and GPU in benchmarks, and in gaming as well. The Snapdragon 655 only manages to win in multi-core benchmarks.

I am thoroughly disappointed by the performance of the Snapdragon 665, honestly.
Gaming
Gaming? Perhaps Android is still not optimized for the Snapdragon 665 yet but it is just awful. Honkai Impact 3 runs poorly on the Mi A3. Asphalt 9 is buggy and only managed to run smoothly at the lowest graphical settings. PUBG Mobile? Lowest graphical settings as well – but at “high” frame rates only – which is at 30fps.
This is the Asphalt 9 settings that ran smoothly on the Mi A3.
But then again – graphical quality doesn’t matter here, right? The Mi A3 is only using a 720p display after all. 🤷♂
Battery & Charger
The Snapdragon 665 in the Mi A3 is somewhat a weird one. During our battery test, it reinforces the idea of Android is not optimized for the Snapdragon 665 yet since the battery drainage is sometimes high and sometimes low. We redid our battery life test and it varied greatly until we got a larger sample size and picked the most consistent one.

We can say that the Mi A3 can last you throughout the whole day with its 4,030mAh battery but be wary as sometimes you might have more charge left at the end of the day.
Charger
Like a few other Xiaomi phones, the Mi A3 supports QuickCharge 3.0 but only comes with a standard 5V 2A charger. So for those who are always looking for a literal quick charge before setting off for another appointment, then you’ll have to buy your own QuickCharge 3.0 charger.
This is the included charger.
By looking at the charging curve, we can see that the Mi A3 takes around 32 minutes to reach 50% and 54 minutes to reach 75% charge. As for the included 5V 2A charger, it takes around 76 minutes to reach 50% charge and 126 minutes to reach 75% charge. A big discrepancy in the time taken to reach the same charge level.

Wrapping up the Xiaomi Mi A3 review
Let’s conclude with the price of the Mi A3. For the 4GB RAM + 64GB storage, the Mi A3 is priced at RM899.
I think calling the Mi A3 expensive is justified, although it is a word that is rarely associated with the brand name of Xiaomi. Compared to the Mi A2, trading for worse performance and a lower resolution screen for a larger battery, headphone jack, and microSD card slot is unacceptable – at least for me.

Why did I say that? Well, because Xiaomi also has another smartphone in their portfolio – the Redmi Note 7 (review). For the same amount of RAM and storage, the Redmi Note 7 is priced at only RM799. That makes the Mi A3 a difficult phone to recommend.

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Shopee offers next-day delivery in Peninsular Malaysia this 3.3 Supermarket Sale

Did you know that there’s a Shopee Mart for you to get all your grocery needs through Shopee? Well, you do now since you’re reading this. And Shopee is now bringing next-day grocery delivery to your footstep too.
For most states in Peninsular Malaysia (excluding Perlis, Kedah, Kelantan, and Terengganu), you’ll get your groceries the next day in conjunction with Shopee’s 3.3 Supermarket Sale that is happening from now until 3rd March 2021.

To qualify for this next-day delivery, you’ll have to place your orders before 12pm and is applicable for purchases on Shopee Mart with the Next-Day Delivery tag. Orders placed after 12PM will be considered as the next day’s orders, and will be delivered the following day.

But what’s Shopee Mart? Again, it’s for groceries and your daily needs. It currently has over 11,000 including Nestlé, Munchy’s, Top, Sunlight, and Drypers.
To know more about 3.3 Supermarket Sale, visit – https://shopee.com.my/m/3-3

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We can now do grocery shopping on Shopee too

Shopee is once again expanding into a new frontier! We can now order fresh groceries from Shopee – ranging in poultry, seafood, and also vegetables. All of these groceries will be delivered directly to our doorstep.
These perishable goods are rather difficult to sell online as it has a short shelf life and needs to be fresh. So, Shopee partnered with other sellers to ensure that these produce will be shipped to us as fresh as possible.

Shopee is kicking off this pilot program for us who are living in major cities and towns in the Klang Valley region. It’ll be a nationwide roll-out later on.
There will be two selllers who will be championing this pilot program – Fish Club and FreshTap. There will be a total of over 60 different varieties of fresh produce offered during this pilot program.
Fish Club will be selling the freshest catch from Pontian fishing village, such as pomfret, sea prawns, fourfinger threadfin as well as imported salmon, eel and scallops. To maintain the freshness, Fish Club vacuum-packs and blast-freezes the seafood immediately after they are scaled, cleaned and cut. Consumers who purchase from the Fish Club official store “fishclubmy” can enjoy a RM20 flat rate for shipping, or spend at least RM300 to enjoy free shipping.

FreshTap offers a few more than just seafood, as they also have poultry, vegetables, and others. All these items will be freshly packed and delivered from Sekinchan and Kuala Selangor directly to you. Shipping rates is a flat fee of RM12 on this store.
Consumers who purchase from Fish Club and FreshTap on Shopee will receive their fresh produce within 1 to 3 days. To kick-start the launch of this new offering on Shopee, shoppers will be in for a treat: items such as salmon, dory fish, shrimp, whole chicken, beef chunks, clams and sardine will be at a 50% off during the Shocking Sale on 3 and 4 March 2020.
Visit Fish Club at https://shopee.com.my/fishclubmy and FreshTap at https://shopee.com.my/freshtap.my to enjoy the convenience of buying fresh produce online.
Shopee’s catalog of fresh produce will continue to grow bigger over the coming months, so stay tuned for that.

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Lazada & Mah Sing Announces Joint Development; Buying Properties Online

Wait… I didn’t see this coming. Mah Sing and Lazada just announced their partnership where Mah Sing will be selling properties online on Lazada. Yes, that means we can actually buy properties online via Lazada.
This came to us as a big surprise as properties are quite a big deal. And the property sale begins this upcoming 12.12 sale – which is only about 2 weeks away. This will also mean that Mah Sing is the first developer in South East Asia to enable buyers to buy a house online. Yes, a literal house.

We were told that this collaboration is in line with the recent government’s efforts to introduce more affordable and accessible homes to today’s buyers. Of course, now it means you can buy them even more conveniently than before.
I wonder how the lawyer fees and documentation signings will proceed as they are tedious. buying a property does not mean paying a lump sum of cash as downpayment only – there are approval for loans from banks and also more documentations.
Another interesting thing that we found is that Mah Sing already has an official LazMall store page in Lazada. That actually raised a few interesting questions – remember when we first took a look at what LazMall meant? One of the clause is that the items are 100% genuine.

When it comes to properties though, it’s quite different. There are many different condominiums for example, that showed a beautiful 3D concept art – but the final product ended up looking completely different. Does that mean the item is not “100% genuine” though? And LazMall stores have this as compensation if the item is not “100% genuine” as well:
100% Authentic. Get 2 times your money back if you receive a non-authentic product from LazMall
I wonder what other measures Lazada and Mah Sing is going to implement to ensure a win-win-win situation for the 3 parties involved: consumer, Lazada, and Mah Sing.
We’ll have to wait until 28th November,  as that is when Lazada and Mah Sing will officiate this collaboration and unveil all the details.

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Samsung announced Galaxy Watch Active2 Under Armour Edition

It’s no surprise that the Galaxy Watch Active was a great watch, as per our review here. Then comes the Galaxy Watch Active2 during the announcement of the Note10 series of smartphones, and now comes the Watch Active2 Under Armour Edition.
For every purchase of the Galaxy Watch Active2 Under Armour Edition, it comes bundled with six months of free MapMyRun Premium Membership.

For more information about the Galaxy Watch Active2, click here.
There are still no pricing or availability for the Malaysian version just yet – but we’ll update this page when we have all the information.

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Aigo introduces new darkFlash DLM21 & DLM22 mATX cases

I think many of us PC guys in Malaysia have already heard and know about Aigo, the brand that makes a lot of really affordable and accessible components that actually looks great and has quality. Today here we have two new additions to their family of PC cases – this is the new darkFlash DLM21 and darkFlash DLM 22.
Both of them are mATX cases and comes with tempered glass side panel. The TG side panels are hinged, and there is a pull tab to pull it out.

Opening this case reveals that the case itself is actually rather compact. It’s an mATX case as mentioned and comes with a very large CPU cutout for quick CPU cooler swaps and has cutouts for cable management as well. There are two at the right side of the motherboard tray and on the PSU shroud as well. Though, I would like it to have some rubber grommets to hide the cables.

Both of these cases come with a similar frame – they both support 2x 2.5-inch SSD mounts and 1x 3.5-inch HDD that is covered by the clean power supply shroud. The entire case frame itself is clean and comes in both black and white colors.
Aigo darkFlash DLM21
In terms of differences, the DLM21 comes with a diamond facet look and honestly, I like this case’s aesthetic. It also comes with a fan filter at the top if you wish to mount any fans there.
Aigo darkFlash DLM22
However, the DLM22 comes with a flat front panel and does not have any fan filter at the top.
So far, we still do not have any details for the availability or prices yet, but we now have both the cases with us. Presumably, these cases will be available for sale starting some time after Computex and with a fairly low price.

We will update this page when we have more information regarding the darkFlash DLM21 and DLM22 in the Malaysian market.

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AMD Officiates 7th Gen AMD PRO Processors

It’s now official! AMD’s 7th Gen AMD PRO, the Bristol Ridge PRO-based APUs have been fully announced to the public. These APUs are built for business – delivery both raw computational power and graphics performance while improving energy efficiency. Of course, since they’re built for business, there are some additional features for security too.
There are a few key takeaway points here with the 7th Gen Bristol Ridge-based PRO processors:

Help ensure sensitive data and trusted applications remain secure with the dedicated and integrated AMD Secure Processor technology; a system-wide secure environment that offloads and isolates security functions, providing an independent hardware-based root of trust for secure boot, content protection, application security, and fTPM 2.0 (firmware trusted platform module).
To meet users’ growing compute and graphic demands, new AMD PRO desktop processors provide up to 14% more compute and 22% more graphic performance while being up to 32% more energy efficient than 6 th generation AMD PRO processors.
Open standards and CPU-agnostic DASH manageability allows IT departments to easily integrate and manage systems. The new AMD AM4 desktop infrastructure provides a stable and upgradable platform for the future.

Now, on to the juicy bits. We can see that AMD claims that the AMD PRO A12-9800E is compared heavily to the Intel Core i5, and the first bit of information we get is “up to 17% more system performance” and “up to 88% more graphics performance” compared to the i5-6400T. In the footnotes, AMD’s system configuration is heavily biased towards their own system while handicapping their rival’s in terms of RAM and even storage media. It’s not a one-to-one comparison, so keep that in mind.
Compared to AMD’s 6th Gen PRO Processors, AMD claims that it now has +14% CPU performance, +22% GPU performance, and -32% power consumption. This is because the brand new 7th Gen PRO Processors is fabricated on the 14nm FinFET manufacturing technology. More about FinFET explained here and here.
Of course, there are even more detailed features and explanations from AMD themselves, so check out the entire press deck by AMD right below here.

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Review – Samsung Galaxy A73 5G: The best mid-range smartphone?

When Samsung refreshed the Galaxy A series, we have the Galaxy A73 5G too. The new Galaxy A73 5G is obviously the successor to one of my favorite smartphones of 2021, the Galaxy A72. So what’s new and what’s good? Let’s find out in today’s review.

Design
One of the best things that I like about the Galaxy A73 5G is the design. While it sure looks like last year’s design, there are a lot of design refinements that make it look and feel more inviting. I really like the return of some of my favorite colors from the past – and this Mint color is exclusively only for the Galaxy A73 – and I truly love this color.

The camera bump is once again made into a slope that gradually rises from the back panel of the phone – and I just think it looks very elegant.

Cameras
And comes the cameras. The Galaxy A73 5G comes with a total of 4 cameras, but only two of them are usable to take pictures since the depth sensor and the 2MP macro cameras just shouldn’t exist. The main highlight here though, is that 108MP sensor for the main camera.

To have a look at all the pictures taken with the Samsung Galaxy A73 5G, watch our video at the top of this review. For all I can summarize for you, the 108MP sensor on main camera actually shows good result. Good job there, Samsung.
Yea… we got the 3x optical zoom camera on the Galaxy A72.
However, Samsung removed the telephoto camera. You see, the Galaxy A72 from last year had a 3x optical zoom camera. For some reason, they removed it on the Galaxy A73, and touted that the 108MP main camera is good enough to do hybrid zooming. And yea… by doing a quick comparison, nothing beats the real 3x optical zoom.

Display
The Galaxy A73 5G is using a flat 6.8-inch Super AMOLED Plus screen which is definitely better for screen protector – and it has a resolution of 2400×1080 pixels with refresh rate of up to 120Hz. Rather huge, IMO. Also, there is no factory-applied screen protector, so be careful with the device when you unbox it.

The display looks truly nice but don’t take our word for it – we took out our colorimeter and did the color accuracy test too. At 100 nits of brightness, this display can cover 99.70% or sRGB and 98.50% of DCI-P3 color gamuts, while retaining a low Delta E number – and that just means this display is really good.

But for the maximum brightness though, it’s not exactly the best. It can only reach bout 400 nits of average brightness at max and that means you’ll need to be under the shade during an extremely sunny day to see the screen.

Before we proceed…
Now though, I want to change the script a little and reel in another Samsung smartphone has a very similar spec configuration – and that is the Samsung Galaxy A52s which also has a 120Hz screen.

Performance & specs
The similarities start from the specs. Both the phones come with the same, excellent Snapdragon 778G with 8GB RAM and also 256GB of storage. In our gaming test video for the Galaxy A73 5G, the Snapdragon 778G performs magnificently well in all the games when we turned on the “alternate gaming performance mode” option.

Games like Genshin Impact at the highest graphical settings at about 30fps, and even Mobile Legends has the option to enable 120fps, and can run at 120fps consistently too.

Also, the phone doesn’t get hot as the surface temperature only got up to around 42°C. The phone is just slightly warm to the touch.

I would presume that the Galaxy A52s will also be able to perform the same when the update for the “alternate game performance management” option is available.
Battery life
Then, the battery life. They both will have more or less the same battery life. We also tested the battery life of the Galaxy A73 5G here at 100 nits of brightness running PC Mark 10, and it can reach somewhere above 10 hours only – which is not the best for a 5,000mAh battery.

I guess the power of the Snapdragon 778G is really power-hungry.
Charging speed
Now, the charging speed. The Galaxy A73 5G doesn’t come with a charger in the box, but it supports up to 25W of fast charging – just like the Galaxy A52s. With that said, the charging time is about 90 minutes to get from 15% to 100% when we used the Ugreen 100W GaN charger.

It’s more or less identical to the Galaxy A52s. However, the Galaxy A52s still comes with a 15W charger in the box – which might be a big boon for some people.
Software
And finally – the software It’s using the same Android 12 with One UI 4.1 and I do not have any complaints at all.

It’s still very good overall even though some more advanced settings are nested quite deep into some menus, like the “alternate game performance management” and also GPU Watch.
This setting is nestled quite deep inside Game Launcher.
But, now I want to bring the Galaxy A52s into the conversation again. If there are so many similarities between these two phones, then why should we pick the Galaxy A73 5G? Well, that is because the software support of the Galaxy A73 5G is much better. It gets 4 generations of Android upgrades and 5 years of security patches – and that is superior to the Galaxy A52s’s policy. And that is the strength of the Galaxy A73 5G.

Conclusion
Should you buy the Galaxy A73 5G? Yes. I think the Galaxy A73 5G is still one of the best mid-range smartphones that you can buy right now. The overall experience that the Galaxy A73 5G offers is magnificent – though the price is just… kinda high at RM2,099.

I mean, you can get the Galaxy A52s at about RM1.5k from retailers at Shopee or Lazada now, but you won’t get the same software support as the Galaxy A73 5G, and I think that is one of the important factors that many people do not care about until it is too late.
Few more things before we end…
The Samsung Galaxy A73 5G still comes with IP67-rating.

This phone still has a microSD card slot, albeit a combo slot. I personally don’t use microSD card slots since a few years ago – but it’s still here if you need it.

There is no more audio jack for this generation of Galaxy A series of smartphones.

Where to buy? (Affiliate links)

Amazon US
Lazada
Shopee

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Redmi Note 5 Arrives; Prices Start At RM799

When it comes to the budget-friendly yet with good performance, the Redmi series has been a go-to choice for many consumers. Now, the Xiaomi Redmi series makes a return with the brand new Redmi Note 5.
Looking at the front, the Redmi Note 5 has quite a familiar design – 5.99-inch 18:9 notchless (can’t believe I’m using this word) 1080p display with 450 nits of brightness. If you’ve seen the Redmi 5 Plus review that we done here, then the Redmi Note 5 will most definitely look familiar – again, from the front.

At the back, that’s where the other familiarity comes in. With a vertically stacked camera dual-camera design, the Redmi Note 5 comes with a 12MP 1.4µm with f/1.9 + 5MP 1.12µm f/2.0 camera. Now, the first camera is the one that is used to take the photo, whereas the second one is used only for depth data gathering. Hence the Redmi Note 5 is actually using the stereoscopic dual-camera system. Learn more about it here.

As for the selfie camera, the Redmi Note 5 packs a 13MP sensor with Beautify 4.0.
Xiaomi also mentioned AI cameras that helped in creating beautiful portrait pictures too. We’ll definitely have to take it to the test to know how well it works.

Powered by the Snapdragon 636 chipset fabricated with 14nm process technology, the Redmi 5 Note packs 8x Kryo 260 octa-core processor with Adreno 509 graphics. These hardware are powered by a massive 4,000mAh battery. As for the RAM and storage, the Redmi Note 5 comes in two different variants with two different prices:

3GB LPDDR4X RAM + 32GB storage @ RM799
4GB LPDDR4X RAM + 64GB storage @ RM999

Xiaomi also specifically highlighted that the Redmi Note 5 comes with a 5V 2A charger – which is the standard wattage for chargers these days. Presumably, it’ll have a very similar charging curve like the Redmi 5 Plus that we reviewed here.
Of course, the Redmi Note 5 comes in 3 different colors as well – black, gold, and also in blue!
Pre-order starts from 25th April 2018 at Xiaomi’s official Lazada store, and available in authorized stores nationwide starting 5th May 2018.

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Genshin Impact confirmed to join Comic Fiesta 2022 in partnership with Black Shark; Attractive prizes to be won

Black Shark Malaysia has announced they are joining Genshin Impact’s hype train to enter Comic Fiesta 2022 which is happening in 2 weeks’ time over at KLCC.

The designated booth number of the hottest gacha game of recent years is A001 where visitors will be able to test their luck to win some Black Shark products that include the likes of the Joybuds Pro TWS, FunCooler 3 Pro mobile cooling attachment, or even the Black Shark 5 smartphone itself for some small form factor Teyvat exploration on the go.
You may also come and test out the Black Shark 5 series smartphones on the spot to see its powerful performance in action that pairs a great high refresh rate AMOLED display with high-quality stereo speakers in addition to magnetic pop-up trigger buttons for one of the best gaming smartphones in the market right now.
The Black Shark Joybuds Pro also goes well with the phone to provide ANC and low-latency audio to help you immerse in the virtual world while the FunCooler 3 Pro is an attachment that is compatible with most smartphones in the market so it is not a Black Shark smartphone exclusive and you can see as much as 30°C worth of temperature drops to prevent thermal throttling from ruining your relax gaming session.
The Comic Fiesta 2022 event is slated for December 17 and 18 with halls opening as early as 10AM.

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Second member from the revitalized realme C series C53 launched today at just RM599

realme Malaysia has officially launched the new C53 smartphone that is poised to challenge the budget market once again.

The C53 continues the renewed spirit of the C series which promises to deliver the best in at least one aspect with the C53 being the battery king at its competing price point.
That’s not to say the other things are completely bad though as the SoC and camera are fair game while the memory capacities are plenty for casual users and they too can be expanded if one really needs that extra space.
Here’s a quick rundown of the specs.

6.74-inch IPS LCD Display

1080p Resolution
Middle Punch Hole Notch
90Hz Refresh Rate

UniSoc Tiget T612 Chipset
6GB RAM (Up to 6GB Dynamic RAM)
128GB Storage (Expandable up to 2TB)
Dual Back Cameras

Main: 50MP f/1.8 with PDAF
Unspecified sensor but presumably depth sensor

8MP Selfie Camera
5,000mAh Battery

33W Fast Charge

Champion Gold, Mighty Black Colors

There are also a couple of home appliances revealed at the launch party which are the realme smart 4K TV (50-inch) and the Air Purifier Pro.

The TV is a simple one – 50 inches, 2.6mm bezel, 97.2% screen-to-body ratio, and hosts the exclusive Chroma Boost Picture Engine powered by a MediaTek Processor under the hood.
What’s more, the 24W Quad Stereo Speaker with Dolby Atmos will bring more life into the movies you’re watching. Speaking of Dolby, the TV itself supports Dolby Vision too.

As for the Air Purifier Pro, it has an integrated 360-degree multi-functional 3-in-1 HEPA filter to get out all kinds of pollutants in the air like dust, fine particles, and even bacteria and viruses thanks to the antibacterial/antiviral coating on the H12 filter.
It is designed to handle a room of 57.6m² with good coverage while owning a high Clean Air Delivery Rate (CADR) of up to 480m³/h.
The built-in Laser Air Quality Sensor can accurately detect the quality of the surrounding air while the Digital LED Display is now better in displaying info that includes 6 modes and 4 timer presets.
Lazy much? Then use the realme Link app to remote control it.
Price and Availability
The realme C53 is priced at an astounding RM599 only and you can take one home starting tomorrow through the official Shopee and Lazada stores alongside the TikTok platform and other authorized retailers and dealers.
As for the TV and air purifier, they are tagged at RM1,599 and RM799 respectively but early birds will be able to snag them as cheaply as RM1,099 and RM699!

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Samsung showcases new QLED 8K TV with new advanced features

Earlier today, we were introduced to Samsung’s next-generation of QLED TVs with 8K in resolution. We had a look at the company’s first generation of 8K QLED TVs last year, where we played some games on it. A year has passed and Samsung is introducing its new 8K QLED TV with new features too.
The 8K TV now has a lot of more software-based features which enhances the visual experience of existing content instead of brute-forcing raw 8K content. It’s a smart move since that means legacy content can be viewed in its glory without waiting for any official remastered version.

There are a total of 5 different parts where Samsung has done to enhance the audio-visual experience, and it’s mostly in part thanks to cutting-edge technology and AI-enhancements. The products this year is also sleeker than ever before, making it blend into your living room seamlessly.
The breadth of our 2020 QLED 8K TV lineup demonstrates the potential of what AI-enabled technologies can achieve. This segment is poised to grow with the size of the displays, and the amount of features they are equipped with is expanding rapidly. We are pleased to be able to share our latest display innovations with the world and hope that our consumers enjoy using the new features across the home.
– Jongsuk Chu, Executive Vice President of Visual Display Business at Samsung Electronics

Samsung shared the latest features and hardware packed in 4 different product lineups of TVs – we have the QLED 8K TV series, The Frame, The Serif, and also the new The Sero. A few key highlights are:

2020 QLED 8K and Industry Leadership: The latest updates and innovations in QLED 8K TV technology, including the rise of ultra-large screen and Ultra HD picture quality as well as enhancements to design, AI upscaling, HDR, viewing angles and more.
Sound Innovation: The latest sound enhancements with Object Tracking Sound+ (OTS+), Active Voice Amplifier (AVA) technology, Q-Symphony, and new additions to the soundbar lineup including the CES 2020 Innovation Award-winning Q950T.
Smart TV Enhancements: Highlights on Samsung’s innovative deep-learning AI features developed to enhance the 2020 QLED 8K TV lineup’s Smart TV capabilities, including AI upscaling, Multi View, Digital Butler, Bixby, Voice Assistant syncing, Adaptive Picture and more.
Gaming Experiences: Overview on the growing gaming industry and how Samsung’s 2020 QLED 8K TV lineup can support consumers interested in gaming with improved performance, reduced input lag and enhanced motion graphic features.
Expansion of Lifestyle TVs: Updates to Samsung’s growing Lifestyle TV lineup, including new global rollouts and expansions to The Frame, The Serif and The Sero.

From the information we’ve gathered, Samsung is paying attention to pixel response time so that the overall gaming experience is better than other TVs in the market.
Let’s talk about each of the TV a little more.
2020 QLED 8K TVs
This time around, the TVs have a particularly special design around them. They’re bezel-free. Samsung says that they redid the circuitry and re-engineered the sides, too. Take a look at this image here.

Yes, that’s the Samsung QLED TV Q950TS. This TV cannot be mounted flush with the wall because it has perforations around the sides to make sure that the components inside the TV would not overheat.

There’s a more conventionally-designed TV, which is the Samsung QLED 8K Q800T. It doesn’t have that zero-bezel design like the Q950TS, but it’s still very, very thin.
The Sero
This new lineup of The Sero lifestyle TV was shown off during CES2020. This TV is a rather weird one as Samsung says it appeals to the millennials and Gen Z because of its ability to rotate 90°, making it vertical. The purpose of this rotation is so that we can watch vertically-made content at its proper form factor.

Sero means vertical in Korean, which ties in with its ability to rotate. Of course, after there are more uses than just viewing content vertically. Think of The Sero as a full-body mirror when it is rotated.

The Sero is also equipped with Samsung’s QLED technology and The Sero also won CTA “Best of Innovation” prize at CES2020 and a gold award from iF Design Awards.
The Serif
The Serif is made in collaboration with Paris-based design brothers Ronan & Erwan Bouroullec, two of the world’s most famous industrial designers that specialize in furniture. That tells us why The Serif is so sleek that it blends into the living room so nicely.

The Serif also won multiple different awards because of its design.
The Frame
I have personally seen The Frame before. It literally looks like a picture frame hung on the wall, but it’s actually a TV. Its bezel thickness and depth of the TV are impossibly thin. Moreover, The Frame also has sensors so that it can adapt to the room’s lighting environment. In other words, it is to trick us to believe that it’s a picture frame.

For this year’s version of The Frame, it is using Samsung’s prestigious QLED technology and has Dual LED technology to further increase the contrast based on the backlight temperature.

The 2020 QLED 8K TV, The Sero, The Serif and The Frame will be available in the Malaysia market soon. To learn more about Samsung’s latest AV product lineup, check it out at either https://www.samsung.com/my or https://news.samsung.com/my.

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[UPDATED] Best Tech Gifts 2016 – One Gift Guide For Techies

Last year, we did a really big best tech gift guide. This year we’ll be doing a new one for you – the Best Tech Gifts 2016. This gift guide will get you through this year’s brand new recommended tech, and it’ll mostly be what that caught my eyes through the year of 2016 until now.
We’ll be ranging from laptops to smartphones, peripherals, and many other accessories. I’m very sure that you’ll find something for everyone here. Of course, it’s all categorized – so it’ll be easy to navigate. Also, we’ll highlight the recommended suggestions in bold so it’ll be much more easier to navigate.

Without further ado, let’s start!
[alert type=”info” icon-size=”normal”]Items listed are with prices from Lazada Malaysia as of 24th November 2016. The final price might vary. Also, we’re not sponsored to include any brands in this list.[/alert]
Smartphones

I’m never gonna include those high-end phones, as they’re all pretty much overpriced phones yet they’re all the same. The most expensive phones we’re gonna include here is the budget high-end phones. For this year’s Best Tech Gifts 2016, things have shifted quite a lot. High-end devices don’t really have much more performance difference than the mid-ranged ones. Also, the battery life on mid-range smartphones somehow have greater battery life too.
For <RM 1,300
This category is simple – there is no need for the highest end of specs, but performs decently and has all of the basic things done. Suitable as a gift for parents and grandparents who don’t need the fastest and best smartphones out there.

LEAGOO T1 Plus @RM699
Honor 5C @RM698. Click here to read our full review! (Recommended)
ASUS ZenFone 3 Max @ RM666. Click here to read our full review! (Recommended)
Flash Plus 2 @RM479/RM605 (the price written on the banner is wrong by the way) (Recommended)
Honor 7 @ RM 1,049; Honor 7 Enhanced @ RM 1,115. Click here to read our full review!

For <RM 1,700
Mid-tier priced devices fall into this category. Fits those who wants more than just the basics. By today’s standards with this generation’s hardware, the performance is actually very sufficient. I’m personally rocking both the Honor 8 and the ASUS ZenFone 3. I’m was (and still am) torn between these two devices. Be sure to check out each of this device’s individual reviews to know more!

Honor 8 @RM 1,699 (lots of free gifts!). Click here to read our full review! (Recommended)
ASUS ZenFone 3 @ RM 1,159 for 5.2-inch version; @ RM 1,425 for 5.5-inch version! Click here to read our full review! (Recommended)

For >RM 1,700
Woah, big budget you have here! Nonetheless, which is where all the best smartphones out there have fall into. They offer the highest end specs within a very reasonable and reachable prices. That being said, the OnePlus One is the main pioneer of this category, so I really have to pay respect to it.

OnePlus 3 @ RM 1,749. Or get it from DirectD. Or wait for the OnePlus 3T. (Recommended)
Huawei P9 @ RM 2,090

Laptops

This time around, there are a lot of focus given to ultrabooks. Not the true ultrabooks by Intel’s standard, but they’re still quite thin. Surely we’ll still take a look at student-centric laptops too. For this Best Tech Gifts 2016, I think we should highlight the fact that the due to the intensely fluctuating currency, prices increased quite a lot. compared to last year’s specs. While that might be true, laptops have gotten pretty slim and light this year around.
Also, make sure you get an upgrade to at least 8GB RAM. No excuses – and that should be the norm of today.
Let’s take a look at some of them in this year’s Best Tech Gifts 2016.
For <RM 2,000
Personally wouldn’t recommend this tier of laptops, so take this category as your final resort. Seriously, get a better laptop than these.

HP 14-AM031TU/033TU – 14-inch 768p LED; Intel i3-5005U; 4GB DDR3L RAM; Intel HD Graphics; 500GB HDD @ RM 1,399
HP 15-AC197TX – 15.6-inch 768p LED; Intel i3-5005U; 4GB DDR3L RAM;  AMD Radeon R5 M430 2GB VRAM Graphics; 1TB HDD @ RM 1,526
Lenovo Ideapad 100-15IDB 80QQ0018MJ – 15.6-inch 768p TN; Intel i3-5005U; 4GB DDR3L RAM; Intel HD Graphics; 500GB HDD @ RM 1,259
Lenovo Ideapad 100-14IDB 80RK0031MJ – 14-inch 768p LED; Intel i3-5200; 4GB DDR3L RAM; NVIDIA GeForce 920A graphics; 128GB SSD @ RM 1,422.90
ASUS X540L-JXX640T – 15.6-inch 768p LED; Intel i3-5005U; 4GB DDR3L; NVIDIA GeForce GT920M 2GB VRAM; 500GB HDD @ RM 1,599 (Recommended)
ASUS X455L-JWX360T/361T/362T – 14-inch 768p LED; Intel i3-5005U; 4GB DDR3L RAM; NVIDIA GeForce GT920M  graphics; 500GB HDD @ RM 1,470. Available in black, red, and blue. (Recommended)

For ~RM 2,000 – RM 2,500
The recommended budget range for students and general users who wants a balance between performance and price, in my opinion. There are some great laptop deals here for their hardware, but definitely not the lightest to carry around. These are the most famous range of laptops in the market, and it’ll definitely be the most crucial for this Best Tech Gifts 2016. Check them out.

HP Pavilion 15-AU502TX – 15.6-inch 1080p LED, Intel i5-6200U; 4GB DDR3L RAM; NVIDIA GT940MX 2GB VRAM Graphics; 1TB HDD @ RM 2,376.15 (Recommended)
Lenovo 500-14IDB 80N400LAMJ – 14-inch 768p LED; Intel i3-5020U; 4GB DDR3L RAM; NVIDIA GeForce 920A graphics; 500GB HDD @ RM 2,029 at Jayacom only
ASUS K401U-BFR011T – 14-inch 1080p LED; Intel i5-6200; 4GB DDR3 RAM; NVIDIA GeForce GT940M graphics; 1TB HDD @ RM 2,469 (Recommended)
ASUS UX360CA – 13-inch 1080p IPS; Intel Core-M; 4GB DDR3 RAM; Intel HD Graphics; 128GB SSD @ From RM2,505 onwards. They have way too many variants. Click here to read our full review!
Acer V Nitro VN7-572G57N0 – 15.6-inch 1080 IPS ; 4GB DDR4 RAM; NVIDIA GeForce GTX950 4GB VRAMl 1TB SSD @ RM 2,999

Other types of devices
Here is the place where you’ll find ultrabooks, ultraslim or ultraportable laptops. Whatever you want to call them. There are some of these ultrabook-esque devices which doesn’t quite fit in Intel’s guidelines of what an ultrabook should be, and they’re included here just because of its price. Few milimeters don’t bother me, but the price does. Here are some top picks for the Best Tech Gifts 2016.

HP ENVY 13-D044TU – 13.3-inch 1080p LED; Intel i5-6200U; 4GB DDR3L RAM; Intel HD 520; 128GB M.2 SSD @ RM 2,789 (Recommended)
Lenovo Yoga 900-13ISK 80MK006RMJ – 13.3-inch QHD IPS LED; 4GB LPDDR3L RAM; Intel HD Graphics; 256GB SSD @ RM 4,288. Available in silver and gold by the way. Click here to read our full review!
ASUS VivoBook Flip – 13-inch 768p LED; 4GB DDR3  RAM; Intel HD Graphics; 1TB HDD @ From RM 2,029. Another one with a few variants. Click here to read our full review!
Acer Switch Alpha 12 – 12-inch QHD IPS; Intel i3-6100U; 4GB DDR3L RAM; Intel HD Graphics; 128GB SSD @ from RM 2,396. There are other variants with higher specs. (Recommended)
Acer Spin 5 – 13.3-inch Touch screen 1080p IPS; Intel i3-6100U;  4GB DDR4 RAM; Intel HD Graphics; 128GB SSD @ RM 2089 (Recommended)
ASUS UX330U – 13-inch 1080p IPS; Intel i5-7200; 8GB DDR3 RAM; Intel HD Graphics; 256GB SSD @ RM 3,855. Be careful of which version you’re getting. There’s one that’s more expensive, and it uses the older generation of processor instead of the latest Intel Kaby Lake architecture.
HP Spectre x360 13-4136TU – 13.3-inch 1080p IPS touch screen; Intel i5-5600U; 8GB DDR3 RAM; Intel HD Graphics; 128GB SSD @ RM 4,099. Comes with quite a lot of free gifts too! Highly recommended!

Storage accessories

I really wonder – how much can you rely on cloud storage with jumpy internet? I mean, the Malaysian internet isn’t particularly fast or cheap, let alone both. Here are some of the more reliable old-school storage media tech that  I think is still very useful in today’s society. These are the highlights for Best Tech Gifts 2016.

SanDisk Ultra Dual Drive m3.0 @ From RM19. Prices go up depending on the capacity you want. Also comes with a micro USB OTG port on that tiny device. (Recommended)
Brand new redesigned Western Digital My Passport @ from RM209. Prices go up depending on the capacity you want. Too beautiful to not get it. (Recommended)
Military-graded Transcend 25H3 @ from RM244. Prices go up depending on the capacity you want. Though protective, its colours and design is the definition of going pure function in the battle of function vs form. (Recommended)

For music lovers
With the rise of wireless audio and ever-dropping prices of Bluetooth speakers, here are some that I personally like.  They’re good stuff. For the Best Tech Gifts 2016, we’ve diversified a little into other forms of home speakers too.

Also, we’re not focusing on wireless earphones just as of yet. For me personally, I’ll stay out of them for now as they’re still too new. Wait for another year let it mature first before diving in. In the Best Tech Gifts 2016, we focus mostly on wireless Bluetooth speakers more.

Harman Kardon Aura Plus @ RM 1,599. Yes, the price is quite insane – but for a modern home speaker, I think the Aura Plus really great.I’m do have one at home, and I love streaming Spotify Premium on the speaker through WiFi. Do becareful as there’s a Bluetooth-only version that costs more or less the same. (Recommended)
SonicGear Pandora Neo series of Bluetooth speakers @ From RM109. Prices vary between the form factor and design that you want. Personally, I like the loop handle to carry it around. Click here to read our full review of the Pandora Neo Classic!
Logitech X100 Bluetooth Speakers @ RM89. Simple, minimalist, and and colourful. It sounds good, but just too bad it isn’t waterproof like the UE series of speakers.
Beyerdynamic CUSTOM STREET @ RM699 at Jaben. Unique aesthetics, really great sound quality. Also customizable in terms of looks and feautres too – hence the name CUSTOM. Click here to read our full review! (Recommended)
Armaggeddon Molotov-5 headphones @ RM99. While some of the colour scheme doesn’t look as appealing as others (grey/blue vs. black/yellow), the sound quality isn’t that bad for its price. Click here to read our full review! (Recommended)
Logitech Bluetooth audio adapter. @ RM79 This little device is pretty much essential for all aux speaker users. It converts your 3.5mm audio jack or an RCA speaker into a Bluetooth speaker. I think spending RM79 to get this instead of an entirely new set of speakers is fair. Click here to read our full review! (Recommended)

Peripherals

All I can say is – this is the year of RGB peripherals. There’s even an RGB mousepad, FFS. Anyway, here’s a list of a few peripherals for oyur computer that I really commend, so please check out these items before considering getting any sub-par keyboards. In the Best Tech Gifts 2016, we go through the best of the best peripherals money-can-buy and effort-can-mod peripherals in the market today.

Ducky One keyboard @ From RM 309. Price varies greatly depending on which size, backlight, and what switch you’re getting. I’m rocking a Ducky One TKL non-backlit version, and I’ve modded it to have an orange backlight. Click here to read on the guide on how the mod was done. (Recommended)
Click here for the review of all Ducky One keyboards!
Armaggeddon SRO-5 HAVOC III mouse @ RM99.90. One of the best mouse I’ve for this year solely because of its ergonomic deisgn a la the ROG Gladius and Razer Deathadder. Also, they’re having a bundle promotion with many other free gifts for RM99.90! Click here to read our full review! (Recommended)
GameSir G4s @ RM341. While it doesn’t have the most appealing look, it feels fantastic and functions greatly. The seller is NOT local, so be aware of the shipping time. Click here to read our full review! (Recommended)

Wrap up
We’ve reviewed waaaaaay too many products this year, and this is a condensed version of what we like in the Best Tech Gifts 2016. Some upgrades I’ve done over the course of this year is my keyboard and gamepad. Again, I’m now rocking a custom modded Ducky One TKL – now signed by Team Secret too – and a GameSir G4s. My home’s living room speaker was also upgraded to the Harman Kardon Aura Plus, and it pairs perfectly well with Spotify Premium Family plan. For audio, I’m using a Beyerdynamic CUSTOM STREET as I like the size, comfort, and most importantly the sound quality for both music and gaming.

25th November is Black Friday and the following Monday is Cyber Monday. The reason why I link everything back to Lazada whenever I can is because of their massive sales happening now. Check out their Online Revolution sales that’s happening from now until the 12th December 2016!

And yes, remember to combine Lazada vouchers whenever you’re shopping with Lazada – you can get impossibly low prices this #LZDMYRevolution!
This concludes our Best Tech Gifts 2016 – for now. We’ll still be updating it till the end of the year! Stay tuned!
Also, leave us a comment below and tell us – which of these gifts did you get? We would like to know your feedback!

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Redmi Note 9 & Redmi Note 9 Pro comes at RM649 and RM1,099; Mi Note 10 Lite at RM1,599

Not long ago, Xiaomi had a global launch for the Redmi Note 9 series of smartphones. Apparently, it’s not the same as the Redmi Note 9S that we’ve reviewed here as it comes with a few major differences. Think of the Redmi Note 9S as an in-betweener for the Redmi Note 9 and the Redmi Note 9 Pro.
And the Mi Note 10 Lite is also a part of this announcement. Let’s do a quick recap on each phone alongside the prices and availability.

Redmi Note 9
Starting off with the new entry-level smartphone into the Redmi Note series. The Redmi Note 9, even though it is technically the lowest in price within the Redmi Note series, it still packs in quite a punch.

6.53-inch IPS LCD screen

1080p resolution

MediaTek Helio G85 chipset
Up to 4GB RAM
Up to 128GB storage
Quadruple rear-facing cameras

Main: 48MP f/1.8 with PDAF
Ultra-wide angle: 8MP f/2.2
Macro: 2MP f/2.4 with AF
Depth sensor

13MP f/2.3 selfie camera
5,020mAh battery

Wired 18W fast charging

It has an interesting list of specs with an interesting price to match as well:

3GB RAM + 64GB storage @ RM649 (Flash sale on 18th May @ RM599)
4GB RAM + 128GB storage @ RM749 (pre-order 11th to 17th May, free 10,000mAh Redmi Powerbank)

Redmi Note 9 Pro
In many aspects, the Redmi Note 9 Pro is very similar to the Redmi Note 9S. Here is the full list of specs for the Redmi note 9 Pro:

6.67-inch IPS LCD screen

1080p resolution

Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G
6GB RAM
Up to 128GB storage
Quadruple rear-facing cameras

Main: 64MP f/1.9 with PDAF
Ultra-wide angle: 8MP f/2.2
Macro: 5MP f/2.4 with AF
Depth sensor

16MP f/2.5 selfie camera
5,020mAh battery

Wired 30W fast charging

The main advantages that the Redmi Note 9 Pro has are only the main camera sensor and also the faster 30W charging. It has a price bump to RM1,099, too. While I think the price is reasonable for those upgrades, we should consider if those upgrades are worth getting.
Anyway, here is the local price for the Redmi Note 9 Pro:

6GB RAM + 129GB storage @ RM1,099

Pre-order begins today until 17th May 2020, and you can also get a free 10,000mAh Redmi Powerbank too.

Mi Note 10 Lite
Yea, Xiaomi just announced the arrival of the Mi Note 10 Lite too. This is to complete the Mi Note 10 series of smartphones and it comes with this list of specs:

6.47-inch AMOLED screen

1080p resolution

Qualcomm Snapdragon 730G
6GB RAM
Up to 128GB storage
Quadruple rear-facing cameras

Main: 64MP f/1.9 with PDAF & Laser AF
Ultra-wide angle: 8MP f/2.2
Macro: 2MP f/2.4
Depth sensor

16MP f/2.5 selfie camera
5,260mAh battery

Wired 30W fast charging

Technically, it is still in-line with the Mi Note series mantra, as it still is a phone with a focus on its cameras. It is equipped with a 64MP main camera sensor as opposed to the 108MP on the Mi Note 10 that we reviewed here.

But then again, pixel count is not the full story. Maybe the Mi Note 10 Lite can also take striking images, but without the resolution to match.
The Mi Note 10 Lite is available at these variants at these prices:

8GB RAM + 128GB storage @ RM1,599

Free Mi Business Backpack 2 for purchases on Lazada
Free 20,000mAh Redmi Powerbank for authorized retail stores

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Find out how OPPO takes on the sustainable practice game with technology

Plain design and raw computing performance are not the only things customers are looking out for particularly in the smart mobile market. Because of how easily the world can be wrecked by the continuous exploitation of nature and its resources, it is important to protect them but OPPO has its ways of doing it with sustainable tech. Let’s find out how they do it.

Firstly, OPPO has included a Color Vision Enhancement tailored towards those who have color vision impairment by including up to 766 display profiles to allow users to fine-tune their visual display according to their circumstances. Through this, one will not need to buy or utilize extra equipment to get the necessary color offset thus cutting back on demand for said product indirectly.
On the other hand, a durable product means that it can be used for a long time so manufacturers won’t need to churn out as much, and here’s where OPPO decided to focus on and applied to its batteries via the Battery Health Engine to maintain and expand the lifespan of its portable juice blocks with more than 80% health even after 1600 charging-discharging cycles.

Aside from doing things their own way, the green brand contributes in a similar and direct way to other companies by adhering to the 3R+1D sustainable packaging principles alongside reducing the weight of packaging, reusing recycled materials, and using recyclable and biodegradable materials in its packaging. Specifically, OPPO ensures approximately 45% of packaging is made from recycled fiber and only less than 5% plastic is found in the overall packing process.
In the end, they might not sell their stuff as cheap as other competitors can but at least they are doing something for the environment!

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Logitech M720 Triathlon Multi-Device Mouse Revealed

It’s been quite some time since Logitech had released any mice with multi-device connection. The last one that I had the chance of giving the NLT treatment to was the MX Anywhere 2. I personally love that mouse, and now Logitech M720 Triathlon is the latest addition to this family, and comes in a more ergonomically shaped design.
I’m definitely seeing what Logitech’s standpoint is about here – one single mouse on a desk that will be occupied with multiple devices. Maybe a tablet, a laptop, and a desktop together. So, let’s connect them all together with a single mouse!

Now, the Logitech M720 Triathlon features the signature single Easy-Switch technology too, where a button can be pressed to swap between devices in a jiffy. Other than that, the Logitech M720 Triathlon can be connected by either Bluetooth, or the Logitech Unifying receiver. Your choice.
See that button right behind the scroll wheel? That’s my favourite feature of all – the hyper-fast scrolling lock. Impressively, it runs on a single AA battery – and Logitech claims that it has a 24-month battery life. Twenty-four!!! That’s two years’ worth of battery life with a single AA battery!
Anyway, the Logitech M720 Triathlon goes for RM259, and it’s actually available now, actually.
Check it out here!

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Dell looks into new goals for 2030 with strategic agenda

We’re just at the start of the new decade, and now Dell is looking forward to what we can expect from the coming decade. Interestingly, there is a revolution happening now, too. The company published a list of plans to be achieved during this decade, aptly named Progress Made Real.
Within the Progress Made Real plan, Dell came out and said a few things – and here’s a summary of the key highlight points. Dell Technologies is committed to expanding further into the market while maintaining and improving upon its existing corporate social responsibilities.

We media friends also had lunch with Dell Technologies to just casually chat and exchange thoughts.
In the Progress Made Real plan, Dell Technologies wants to achieve these things:

Advance sustainability

Recycling an equivalent product for every product sold
Leading the circular economy by using recycled or renewable energy for more than half of the content production
To use 100% recycled or renewable material in all packaging
Deliver future-ready skills development for workers in their supply chain
Drive a comprehensive science-based climate program, setting emissions goals across facilities, supply chain and operations to customer use of our products including partnering with suppliers to meet a greenhouse gas emissions reduction target of 60% per unit revenue by 2030

Cultivate inclusion

Acquire, develop and retain women so they account for 50% of the company’s global workforce and 40% of global people managers
Acquire, develop and retain black/African American and Hispanic team members so they account for 25% of the company’s U.S. workforce and 15% of U.S. people managers
Educate 95% of all team members on an annual basis about unconscious bias, harassment, micro-aggressions and privilege

Transform lives

Advance the health, education and economic opportunity of 1 billion people
Digitally transform 1,000 nonprofit organizations
Achieve 75% team member participation in charitable giving and volunteerism in communities

These goals are going to take time, and Dell Technologies give itself a decade to achieve. So far, from what I have seen, Dell Technologies is already on track with the recycled and renewable material part. It was announced that there is a backpack that is made out of recycled materials.
We expect to see future products from Dell with its packaging made entirely out of renewed and recycled materials. I mean, we don’t even keep most of the boxes of products that we buy – so have packages made out of renewed or recycled materials are better.

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Review – Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Pro

Take a look at this laptop. It’s the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Pro with the codename 14IAH7. That “i” is used to denote if it’s using an AMD or Intel chip – which is something that Lenovo had been doing for years – like the Lenovo Legion 5 and 5i for example.
Name aside, I actually like this laptop a lot. I’m sure you’ll agree with our reasons as well – so, let’s get started.

When I first got the box, I thought it was empty inside. It felt weightless. Turns out, it is really light and also relatively thin too. Everything is covered in a classy color that they’re calling Slate Grey.

When we open up the lid, we are presented with a gorgeous 14-inch IPS LCD screen. I literally mean it when it is gorgeous because the laptop automatically turns on when the lid is opened, there is a “YOGA” boot screen logo and the colors are vibrant. Once we enter Windows, the vibrant colors are just astonishing.

I actually thought this laptop is using a touchscreen since Lenovo used a layer of smooth glass on top of the display. Unfortunately, this laptop doesn’t have a touchscreen but using glass instead of a matte layer on top of the display really made the colors and sharpness pop. The downside is, of course, reflections and glare.

And I guess one reason why Lenovo chose glass is because of the pixel density of this screen. You see, despite it being a 14-inch laptop, this display actually has a resolution of 2880×1800 pixels at 90Hz refresh rate. According to our color accuracy test, this display is amazing – covering virtually 100% on both sRGB and DCI-P3 color gamuts while also having a low Delta E number.

By the way, the maximum brightness can reach 400 nits. It’s definitely bright enough to be used indoors but outdoors – it’ll be rather difficult since we’ll be battling both glare and also reflection of the sunlight. There is also an ambient light sensor beside the Windows Hello camera which I ultimately disabled because I was playing Overwatch at that time and suddenly, the brightness was turned down without any reason.

And when I started using this laptop – this is the point where I start to like it even more. The keyboard is using the signature AccuType keycaps and it actually feels good to type on. I just wish that the travel distance is a bit longer – but overall, it’s good.

The trackpad works well, multitouch gestures work as expected, and its palm rejection is also good.

Before we talk about hardware and performance and whatnot, I want to highlight the upgradability first. Technically, only the SSD can be upgraded. Even though the WiFi chip can be swapped out, I’m not sure what other WiFi chips are compatible with the laptop.

Okay, now for the specs and performance. This specific configuration of the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Pro is unavailable for purchase locally here in Malaysia. It has a very weird hardware combination too:

Intel Core i7-12700H
16GB of LPDDR5 RAM at 4800MHz
1TB SSD
Intel Iris Xe integrated GPU
NVIDIA RTX 2050 discrete GPU

Now, I have to say, the RTX 2050 is rather obscure. There isn’t much information on the internet about this GPU and Notebook Check has a very good summary of what to expect from it.

Either way, due to the resolution of the screen, playing games that do not have DLSS might be a bit difficult. Take Halo Infinite for example. I can get at least 30fps and that is already on the low graphical preset.

Games like Overwatch works okay and is able to reach 90fps because of AMD FSR but I have to play it somewhere around medium graphical preset.

Oh, by the way, the power brick that came with the laptop is a 100W charger that connects to the laptop via USB-C. In case you’re wondering if we can use some other third-party charger – yes you can. However, I tried using the Ugreen 100W GaN charger but the laptop seems to be only taking in about 80W, thus limiting the performance. When I plugged in the original 100W charger, the laptop takes in 100W.

While on that subject, let’s talk about the ports. Even though they are only a few of them, I think the placement of those ports is fine. I do wish that there is one more USB-C port on the right side of the laptop, though.

I also would not talk much about the battery life of this laptop. The 61Wh battery doesn’t last for long in this laptop – maybe about 3 hours and that’s all we can get. I’m not sure if the MX550 version is able to get a longer battery life, though. I think probably not since the laptop runs on the Intel Iris Xe when it’s on battery anyway.

Should you buy the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7i Pro?
Okay, so with that out of the way – if you want to buy this laptop locally in Malaysia – you can only get it with the NVIDIA MX550 GPU. The performance is definitely not going to be as good as the RTX 2050 and also lacks ray-tracing and support for DLSS. Moreover, the MX550 only has 2GB of VRAM – so if you want to play games at that native 2880×1800 pixels resolution, that 2GB VRAM is insufficient.

But, if you want to use this laptop for content creation using Premiere Pro, then it’s actually quite okay. Even with the MX550, I think it should be okay for content creation too – just nothing too complicated or advanced.
The spec configuration that you can actually buy locally in Malaysia.
All of this is packed into a relatively thin and lightweight body – and that is what I like about this laptop. I treat this Yoga Slim 7i Pro as an ultrabook with an impressive screen that can also do some graphical work on the side. It’s just unfortunate that you can’t buy the RTX 2050 version here in Malaysia.
Either way, the MX550 version with the configuration listed on the screen here is priced at RM4,899 (exclusively available in Lenovo Experience Stores only) – and I still think that it’s a reasonable price for this laptop overall.
Quick highlight about the name again – even though it is within the Yoga lineup of laptops, this laptop cannot rotate 360°. It can only flip open to slightly below 180°, and that’s the maximum.

Where to buy? (Affiliate links)

Amazon
Lazada
Shopee
Lenovo Malaysia’s website

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MCMC-MMU MESCORP Conference 2013: The biggest Internet of Things Gathering in Malaysia coming soon!!!

This year with another great pleasure,  Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), TM and MMU-Multimedia University Engineering Society Overseas Research Programme (MESCORP) will soon host a conference entitled “Connected Lifestyle and Internet of Things: How NFC, RFID, WSN and LTE can impact our life” and this will be one of the largest Internet of Thing (IoT) gathering in Malaysia!

During the conference, there will be a lot of exhibitions based on the themes this year. Nothing to lose but a lot of prizes to be won from challenges and lucky draws with a lot of unexpected big prizes!!! So what you have to do now is register yourself and secured your seat!!! (To register click HERE)
For more information about the conference, please visit Digital Lifestyle Malaysia website  and follow MESCORP page for more instant updates of the conference and prizes that will be won that day. Can’t wait to attend this conference and see you all that day!
Also, we’ll be covering the event!

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Intel confirms USB bug on Lynx Point chipsets

Intel has confirmed in a Product Change Notification that the Lynx Point chipset designed for the upcoming Haswell family of CPU is plagued by a bug that will cause USB 3.0 devices to disappear after waking up from S3 standby mode. The issue has been rectified in stepping C2, which will start sampling in mid April, and hit the market in July.

The following chipsets are affected:

Desktop – Q87, Q85, H87, Z87, B85
Workstation – C222, C224, C226
Mobile – QM87, HM87, HM86

Intel is expected to introduce the new CPU before the new chipset is available in the market, thus most of the customers should not be affected by the bug.
In 2011 the Cougar Point 6-series chipset designed for Sandy Bridge was affected by a bug causing the SATA ports to degrade and ultimately fail over time. The issue was discovered after the chipset went on sale. Rectifying the issue cost Intel approximately US$1 billion, do I think this time Intel will learn from their previous mistakes.
Via Guru3D
Source : Bright Side Of News

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Review – Honor 5A: Unique Entry-Level Smartphone

Honor 5A is the continuation of their budget-centric smartphones. This time around, Honor stepped up their game in the budget smartphones compared to the previous Huawei Y6. Let’s take a look at what the Honor 5A has to offer.
Its box has a pretty standard Honor-style here. Blue box with the Honor logo embossed. I was expecting the word “5A” to be printed somewhere on the front too, but that didn’t happen. The only part that it says “Honor 5A” is at the back, where the serial number is found.

Simple, yet clean. Maybe a little too clean.
Honor included the least amount of things as possible, as our unboxing shows. There’s the Honor 5A itself wrapped in a plastic bag, a micro USB cable, a wall charger, and some documentation.
That red thing is not included!
That’s pretty much it. I can understand why Honor didn’t include some other accessories. However, that’s another story for another day.
[nextpage title=”Design”]
While being an entry-level smartphone, the Honor 5A doesn’t fail to disappoint in terms of aesthetics. The one that I’ve got here is the white colour version, and I think it  accentuates its beauty very well.

As you can see above, this white Honor 5A is generally white, but has a gold rim around its edge. I find this really appealing, considering that the gold hue compliments the white colour. Also, take a look at the back.

Ah, the wondrous interlacing design. The entire pattern is laid upon a hard plastic back. It’s quite easily seen – just need to reflect light in a slightly slanted angle. I have to say, thanks Honor for making our boring entry-level phones look great!
Actually, I can feel this texture with my finger too. It’s not really significant – but a slight bump can be felt over each line. Does it feel good? Definitely! I absolutely love this design, but I think it’ll be better if it’s made out of a combination of glossy and sandstone material. Better grip, yet it looks absolutely stunning.
On the left side of the Honor 5A, nothing can be found there. It’s absolutely flushed clean. On the right side however is where the power and volume rocker can be found. They’re both textured and placed quite close together, so differentiating them will be quite an issue at first.

At the top is where the usual 3.5mm audio jack is found. Somewhere in between the camera and the 3.5mm audio jack is where the secondary microphone is found. Pretty standard layout.

At the bottom however is where the microUSB port is found alongside with a microphone and speaker grill. Again, it has mono speakers. Only the right side grill is the real speaker.

[nextpage title=”Connectivity”]
In the recent months of smartphones, there’s one thing that always bugged me – SIM 2 and microSD card slot sharing the same slot. Luckily, the Honor 5A did not commit such sin. Just have a look at the lower half of the Honor 5A and look for a small notch, then pry open the backplate from there.

Opening the back cover reveal nothing much. The speaker can be seen at the lower part, then there’s a big metal plate covering the not-so-easily-removable battery. At the top of the Honor 5A is where the microSIM and microSD card slots are found. They have their own dedicated slots, of course. That’s a pretty huge deal!
[nextpage title=”Display”]
There’s nothing spectacularly special here. The Honor 5A packs a 5.5-inch 720p display, which presumably uses IPS LCD panel.
That banding effect is caused by my camera. My apologies.
Although the resolution on the Honor 5A isn’t spectacular, the colours however do pop out. They’re very vivid, and in a way has better calibration than some other smartphones with 5.5-inch 720p IPS LCD out there.
On the subject of brightness, I personally think it’s adequately bright, but suffers from reflection issues while using it under bright daylight. Would that be an issue though? I highly doubt it.
[nextpage title=”Camera”]
Then comes the camera. Which I think is one of the essentials in smartphones these days. Sporting a 13MP f/2.0 rear-facing camera, it takes some pretty decent pictures. Now, the camera isn’t anything spectacular – and by today’s standard, it’s pretty basic actually.

The pictures taken are indeed decent for social media purposes. In dimly-lit conditions, the camera is quite noisy, whereas the noise levels are pretty low in bright places. The one big issue I have is the colour reproduction. It’s very washed-out. Again, I have no idea why., but the colours are pretty dull.

I mean, just look at the orange power bank there with the Xiaomi LED. It’s not as vivid as it should. And heck, even the texts have gone really fuzzy upon zooming in. However if you don’t zoom it, it looks pretty decent. Again, the Honor 5A’s camera isn’t meant to take pictures in a split second, but it takes some decent pictures for social media.
As for the front-facing camera however, there’s an 8MP sensor with a lens with undisclosed aperture value. The picture quality okay, and it’s the standard Huawei/Honor selfie camera features too. I look too dang pretty on selfies though.
[nextpage title=”Software”]
The Honor 5A sports the exact same version of EmotionUI  4.1(or EMUI for short) as the Honor 8 that we reviewed here. Is it good? Better than before of course, but improvements can still be made. Especially when there are some UI erros with non-standard notification items like Google Maps.
Just like the Honor 8, EMUI 4.1 is indeed reliable and easy for day-to-day use.
Everything about the EMUI 4.1 on the Honor 5A is the same as the Honor 8, just that there’s no IR blaster or knuckle gesture.
Oh by the way – there’s no fingerprint sensor on the Honor 5A. That’s why we never mentioned anything about it, obviously.
[nextpage title=”Performance”]
Performance on the Honor 5A is pretty decent, actually. It scores an impressive 54.1FPS on Epic Citadel, but only in High Quality. For some reason, I can’t turn on the highest quality setting on the Honor 5A – and I’ve seen this issue on only a handful of devices thus far.

Should you be worried though? Not really. I can presume that the FPS floats around at about 40-ish FPS. It should perform just a little less as the ASUS ZenFone 3 Max, actually.
After running the Epic Citadel test a few times consecutively, I jumped on over to CPU-Z and look at the temperatures. I’m very surprised that it kept everything below 45℃ all the time! This is definitely good news, as we’ve discussed here on why smartphone batteries nowadays last longer even though they have the same battery capacitiy as before.

Then comes the Vellamo test.  While the test doesn’t tell us much in a real-life scenario, I can translate them for you. All I can say is this – the Honor 5A performs admirably. Day-to-day usage is fine, it doesn’t lag much, but it definitely is a split second slower when launching the app menu app when compared to other flagship smartphones that easily costs double the Honor 5A. Not a big deal, in my opinion.

[nextpage title=”Battery”]
When it comes to the battery life, the Honor 5A can score pretty good operating time too on PCMark for Android.

Looking at the benchmark scores and the battery life it gives, all I can say is that the scores here aren’t the highest. That’s completely fine, because the Honor 5A isn’t supposed to be the smartphone with the best benchmark scores anyway. The most important part is its battery life. It can run the benchmark continuously for nearly 8 hours straight!
For the price, I think the Honor 5A is great. However, the charger is the biggest problem I have with the Honor 5A.

Sure, the charger is collapsible and compact, but the problem is the output. At 5V 1A, this is indeed the bare minimum charging wattage. I mean, it’s not the end of the world, because even the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus includes a 5V 1A charger too. It’s just that with a 5V 1A charger, it’ll take the longest time to charge. And mostly you’ll have to adapt to the life of “plug it in to charge before I sleep” lifestyle.
I’ve gotten used to this lifestyle actually, and I prefer it this way.
[nextpage title=”Wrap Up”]
The Honor 5A. It’s definitely a smartphone that caught my eyes with just a glance. Having a smartphone at this price point, it just doesn’t seem possible, especially coming from Huawei – the company that made the Huawei P9 and Honor 8 (which we reviewed here). The Honor 5A just doesn’t look like what’s it’s priced at – it should be priced a lot higher.

For a smartphone that costs RM600-ish, I think the Honor 5A paved a spot for itself in the budget spectrum that is flooded with smartphones.

Wanna get yourself a Honor 5A? Click here to find a special deal over at Lazada – you’ll get a free tempered glass, free 16GB microSD card slot, and another free selfie stick – all for just RM 629 for the gold version, and RM 599 for the black version!

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vivo Malaysia invites everyone to participate in the vivo T1 series X PUBG Mobile Turbo Cup Challenge

With the release of the T1 series smartphones, vivo Malaysia is following with a big tour to get more exposure to probably the most affordable gaming smartphone right now.
All Malaysians are welcome to join the tournament, and the MVP in the local tournament will have a chance to represent Malaysia at the SEA Finals, joined by Thailand, Vietnam and Philippines.

Here are more details about the Turbo Cup Challenge:

Open Registration: 13 May 2022
Preliminaries: 11 June 2022
Country Finals: 18 June 2022
SEA Finals: 9 July 2022

Participants can win a grand prize of RM2,500 locally and compete at the international level as they represent Malaysia in the SEA Finals and stand a chance to win the 20,000 USD prize pool.
Visit vivo Malaysia’s official Facebook for more information about the vivo T1 series X PUBG Mobile Turbo Cup Challenge.

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Samsung announces new Exynos 2100; shows monumental improvements

Samsung kept saying that “Exynos is back”, but honestly – they never left in the first place. They are still the closest competitor to the best chipset available in the world right now – and Samsung is also promising a lot of power in the new Exynos 2100 that’s found inside the new Galaxy S21 that will be announced on 14th January.

But, Samsung also created a special announcement specifically for the new Exynos chipset. The entire announcement is shorter than 15 minutes in total and mostly talked about specs and its technical details, including the architecture of the new Exynos 2100.

A few key highlights – the Exynos 2100 is fabricated using 5nm lithography process and it is using a tri-cluster CPU architecture with this GPU:

ARM Cortex-X1 core (customized for Exynos through Cortex-X Custom program, in close collaboration with ARM)
3x Cortex-A78 cores
4x Cortex-A55 cores
ARM Mali-G78 (14 graphics engines)

Samsung also promises 30% better CPU performance, 40% better GPU performance, and 3x the NPU performance for image recognition.
There’s also a brand new SoC governor called AMIGO (Advanced Multi-IP Governor), which controls how much performance to boost. This, in turn, can push for the performance that only the app needs and nothing more so that it won’t waste energy.

And of course, since it is an SoC, the cores are not the only thing that impacts the overall performance and user experience. There are codecs, DSP, ISP, and many other aspects that are affected by an SoC.

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Romantic deals sees the vivo X90 series getting a free CLIO eyeshadow palette in every purchase until February 28

vivo Malaysia is here to cheer your lady up with a new simple yet effective promotion.

The campaign is very straightforward – buy the vivo X90, and get a CLIO eyeshadow palette for free. Not only you’ll get to surprise her with the latest and greatest of vivo that can capture photos and selfies at extraordinary quality even in very low light environments but also the timeless design in conjunction with the most powerful processing hardware makes it one of the best smartphones to get for the photogenic ladies.
Consisting of the base X90 and the more premium X90 Pro, the former will cost you RM3,699 while the latter is a grand RM4,999 so adjust your expectation and budget accordingly.
They are on Shopee and Lazada right now.
Need a quick review? Check it out down below.

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Samsung Launches Gear Sport, Gear Fit2 Pro, Gear IconX

Samsung just launched their brand new iteration of sports-centric wearables! Samsung has been pretty quiet about the whole thing over quite a long time but now they’re coming back to announce the brand new Gear Sport, Gear Fit2 Pro, and Gear IconX.
As of now, Samsung did not provide us official prices for any of these products, but we’ll update here when we have it.

Firstly, let’s talk a little bit about the Gear Sport and Gear Fit2 Pro. They’re both smartwatches which are water resistant of up 5 atmospheres of water pressure! Also, with their integration of Speedo’s swimming app, Speed On, both the Gear Sport and Gear Fit2 Pro allow you to track your key swimming stats.
That said, Samsung also partnered with Under Armour and Spotify to provide a much more integrated experience as it has fitness apps like Under Armour Record, MyFitnessPal, MapMyRun, and Endomondo access built-in. Again, this integration is to provide a much better activity, nutrition, and fitness tracking. Interestingly, Samsung’s partnership with Spotify is to bring you offline mode so that you can enjoy music even without your smartphone, regardless of location. Now, this something I like.
Samsung also touts a “top-of-the-line heart rate monitor” as it has improved accuracy and offers real-time heart rate monitoring. Also, Samsung touts a new “auto activity detection” as it can detect your body and recognizes a few activities – walking, running, cycling, and performing Dynamic Activities – including dancing to basketball.

Gear Sport

The Gear Sport features a circular 1.2-inch Super AMOLED display with interchangeable standard 20mm straps for maximum customizability. Also, it can be used as a remote control for “PowerPoint presentation or Samsung Gear VR headset”. Also, the Gear Sport is able to pay for goods via Samsung Pay.
It’ll be available in both Black and Blue and arriving in Malaysia somewhere in November.

Gear Fit2 Pro

As for the Gear Fit2 Pro, it’s more of an advanced GPS fitness tracker. With a larger curved 1.5-inch Super AMOLED screen, it’s made to display updates and notifications clearly and easily readable. It has an all new ergonomic band that is lightweight and comfortable to use, according to Samsung.Available in Black and Red.
Available in Black and Red and it’s coming to the Malaysian market sometime at the end of September.

Gear IconX
I’ve always been interested in the original Gear IconX that was launched slightly over a year ago. It’s a tiny pair of wireless earphones which is meant for sports. This time, Samsung has updated the design and brings a few new highlights to the table.

Firstly, they’ve shaved off some weight and improved its geometry for a more ergonomic fit. Then, Samsung now lets you use Bixby directly from the Gear IconX directly, too.
For fitness enthusiasts, the Gear IconX now automatically tracks your running routines and has a Running Coach function that provides you updates of your exercise status via in-ear audio.
The new Gear IconX now touts fast-charging and improved battery life of up to 5 hours of music streaming, or seven hours of standalone music playback via its maximum internal storage of 4GB. comes in a few colors too!

The all new Gear IconX will come to Malaysia sometime in November too.

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Xiaomi Launches Mi 9; Snapdragon 855 with triple cameras

Xiaomi has been posting lots of teasers about the Xiaomi Mi 9 for the past few days – starting from the ambassador that we saw a few days ago. And today, the Xiaomi Mi 9 has officially been announce – and the specs are as we expected.
First, let’s talk about the full specs list of the Xiaomi Mi 9:

6.39-inch Super AMOLED display with waterdrop notch, 2340×1080 pixels in resolution
Qualcomm Snapdragon 855

1x Kryo 485 @ 2.84GHz
3x Kryo 485 @ 2.42GHz
4x Kryo 845 @ 1.8GHz
Adreno 640 GPU with 384 ALUs

6GB or 8GB LPDDR4X RAM
64GB or 128GB internal storage
Triple rear-facing cameras

Main camera: 48MP f/1.8 with laser AF and PDAF
Ultrawide: 16MP f/2.2 at 13mm with laser AF and PDAF
Telephoto: 12MP f/2.2 at 54mm with laser AF and PDAF

20MP f/2.0 selfie camera
Under-display fingerprint scanner
3,300mAh battery

27W QuickCharge 4+ compatibility
20W wireless charging compatibility

By looking at the specs alone, we know that the Xiaomi Mi 9 is obviously packing the latest and greatest chipset that is currently offered by Qualcomm.

To see that Xiaomi is doing away with the unusable depth sensor in favor of a dedicated ultrawide and telephoto lens is interesting as well, as many other big manufacturers like Samsung never had a depth sensor in their flagship devices for bokeh effect.

Also, Xiaomi is opting to use a Super AMOLED display that is manufactured by Samsung, which might be because of the many complaints that many people had voiced out regarding Xiaomi’s display quality. Though, it is quite jarring to see that Xiaomi still uses a waterdrop notch display rather than opting for a circular cutout like the HONOR View20 (review).
With that said, Xiaomi is having two versions of the Xiaomi Mi 9 for sale – the usual model comes in both 6GB RAM + 128GB storage for 2,999 yuan (~RM1,816.39)and the 8GB RAM + 128GB storage for 3,299 yuan (~RM1,998.12).

There’s also another Mi 9 Transparent Edition which has 12GB RAM + 256GB storage and it is priced at 3,999 yuan (~RM2,422.10).
By looking at the prices, Xiaomi certainly will once again capture the hearts of those who wants a smartphone with greatest specs at a low price.
As of now, we are only seeing prices from China but we do expect that the launching for the global version with the Battle Angel: Alita version to come on the 24th, which is on MWC.

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