Review – ASUS ROG Phone: The Real Gaming Smartphone

The ASUS ROG Phone has just finally been launched! We’ve talked a lot about the ROG Phone here, from its history to the top 5 reasons why the ROG Phone is the only gaming phone you’ll need. Today, we’re here for the in-depth review of the brand new ROG Phone – ASUS’s first attempt in creating a gaming smartphone.
Before you buy it, here’s what you need to know about the ROG Phone from top to bottom. It’s ASUS’s first attempt in creating a true gaming smartphone and we have to say, they’ve done it really well – but it does have some flaws.

In this review, we’re only focusing on the ROG Phone alone as a standalone device. We do not have access to the accessories yet, so we cannot review the ROG Phone as an entire gaming ecosystem.
Unboxing

Firstly of course, the unboxing of this new smartphone. To spice things up, ASUS went with this prism-shaped box with shaved off corners. It looks absolutely stunning and bizarre at first sight and intrigues people to know more about it by just looking at the box itself. This box design is a feat in itself.

ASUS claims that they used the best quality materials to create this box to ensure its durability, look, and feel when you’re unboxing it. Its intricate design made us unboxed it in a rather delicate manner as we do not want to cause any amount of damage to this box. The box is literally a prized possession.

Opening up we can find the accessories box which is shaped like a semi-hexagonal cylinder, the ROG Phone itself, and also the AeroActive Cooler. Yes, the AeroActive Cooler is included in the box.

Supposedly the ROG Phone Case is included with the box too, alongside with the documentations. There’s another compartment that can be accessed through the pull tab underneath the phone’s cradle.

Once we got everything out, the accessories we have is the super high-quality braided USB-C to USB-C cable, and two literally plugs for the proprietary 48-pin connector. More on the latter later.

Once again, just to show you how the high quality braided USB-C cable looks like. I wish more smartphone companies do this, actually.

[nextpage title=”Design”]
ASUS showed us that throughout the conception of the ROG Phone, it didn’t happen overnight. It went through many sketches and eventually shortlisted to 4 different design inspirations – humanoid robot, stealth aircraft, tactical knife, and super car. The tactical knife, which is the 3rd out of the 4 designs, was ultimately chosen.
          Yes, this is the boot animation.            Comes with the signature ROG boot sound from their laptops too.
The ROG Phone is a smartphone that was created with functionality in mind yet focusing on aesthetics at the same time. It is a marriage between function and beauty, and you can feel it when you start using the ROG Phone. There’s just so many components packed into this sleek and slim smartphone!

At the back of the phone we can see the dual rear-facing cameras, the slightly off-centered fingerprint scanner, the ROG logo, and also a piece of metal with a piece of perforated copper inside. Yes, you can feel the perforation with your fingertips. This is supposed to help with cooling and we’ll get into that later.
Off-centered fingerprint scanner.
With certain lighting angles, the back glass of the ROG Phone starts to look a little different as well. The first thing that came into my mind is the Huawei P20 Pro’s Pearl White which has a similar effect under different lighting conditions.

The ROG logo at the back shown above is when the lights are turned off and on. You can head into the Game Center and enable the Aura RGB to literally “outshine the competition”, as ASUS stated in the ROG Phone’s product page. The ROG Phone only has 4 lighting modes – static, breathing, color cycle, and strobing. Unsurprisingly, you can also sync it up with other Aura Sync-compatible peripherals. More on this later in the software part of this review.

Let’s not forget about the included AeroActive Cooler here. It’s literally a thin, external fan that attaches to the ROG Phone with its clamping mechanism. To my surprise, ASUS paid attention and decorated the little space when the clamp is opened. Take a look below.

It also has a ROG logo on it and has RGB as well since it’s covering the ROG logo at the back of the phone.

[nextpage title=”Connectivity & Ports”]
In terms of WiFi connectivity, the ASUS ROG Phone is definitely the best right now. It’s the first ever smartphone to be compatible with 802.11ad WiFi that uses the 60GHz part of the spectrum and has 2×2 MIMO support as well. One of the accessories – the GameVice controller with WiGig Dock – utilizes the AD WiFi to cast the game to the TV. More info about it here.
If you don’t use AD WiFi then fret not, the ASUS ROG Phone also supports 802.11ac WiFi.
Take note of the first microphone.
At the bottom, the ASUS ROG Phone has a microphone, off-centered USB-C and a 3.5mm audio jack.
Take note of the second microphone
At the top, there’s nothing except for one microphone. This is the second microphone.
AirTriggers on both ends.
At the right side, there’s the power button and volume rocker. Looking at it closer, we can see the AirTriggers on both ends as well. But that’s not all.
Here’s the 3rd microphone!
The ASUS ROG Phone also has a triple microphone setup like the ZenFone 5 and ZenFone 5z. Unlike those phones however, the ROG Phone has optimized the position of these 3 microphones. When we played PUBG Mobile, I covered the top and bottom microphone and yet my teammates can hear my clearly since there’s another microphone beside the AirTrigger.
This is how I played PUBG Mobile using the ASUS ROG Phone with AirTriggers.
At the left side, this is where we can find the proprietary 48-pin connector that is custom-made for the ROG Phone itself. It’s a standard USB 3.0 Type-C port + special-speced port.

Speaking of the two USB-C ports, they’re actually made differently. Back at Computex 2018 when we were first shown the ROG Phone, we were told that the bottom USB-C is actually inferior to the side USB-C port.

Side: Custom 48-pin connector; USB-C with USB 3.1 Gen 1/DisplayPort 1.4 (4K resolution)/Quick Charge 3.0/4.0 and PD3.0 (15W)/Direct Charge
Bottom: USB-C with USB 2.0/Quick Charge 3.0 and PD3.0 (20W)/Direct Charge

We can confirm that this is true since the Pioneer USB-C PD Dock (APS-DKPD001) dock that we reviewed here only worked with the side port.
Why did ASUS do this? Well, for the accessories of course.

The included AeroActive Cooler plugs into this proprietary 48-pin port and the AeroActive Cooler itself is not just a cooling fan. It converts the proprietary 48-pin port to a standard USB-C port and also a 3.5mm audio jack.

Why did ASUS do this? So that you can play games using your 3.5mm audio jack while charging the phone at the same time without the cables getting in the way of your hand. This is a brilliant design, yet ASUS didn’t force users to use the AeroActive Cooler for the 3.5mm audio jack and USB-C.
Plug in your power banks and headphones – because it’s time for serious mobile gaming.
Though, I do wish that ASUS had a better implementation for the rubber plugs for this 48-pin port. It’s quite difficult to remove and the rubber plug can only fit in one direction. Also, the rubber plug can be misplaced easily. I already lost one of it!
To ASUS’s credit, they know about this and that’s why they’ve provided two more extra rubber plugs for this 48-pin port.

When we first plugged in the AeroActive cooler, we were notified that the fan noise might hinder the microphone and asks us if we want to configure it to automatically disable the microphones while the AeroActive Cooler is plugged in.

On the left side of the ROG Phone is also where we can find the card tray and another AirTrigger at the bottom. The card tray here only has slots for two Nano SIM cards – and the reason here is that microSD cards cannot match the speed of internal UFS 2.1 storage chips.
Interestingly, the card tray actually has a rubber lining but the ROG Phone is not IP-certified. Unsurprisingly, I can get 4G+ network on both SIM 1 and SIM 2 as well.
The AirTrigger on the left side of the phone is not for gaming, but instead for squeeze functionality like the HTC U-series of smartphones. More on this later at the software part of the review.

At the front is where we can find the two front-facing speakers. These speakers are loud and they’re just fantastic for gaming. I found myself not needing earphones and I can still get my chicken dinner in PUBG Mobile.
[nextpage title=”Display”]
For the display, the ASUS ROG Phone has a notchless 6-inch AMOLED display with 18:9 aspect ratio and 2160×1080 pixels in resolution. That’s not all – this AMOLED display can run at 90Hz and has 1ms response time. It also has HDR with its dedicated hardware display chip.

With the nature of AMOLED displays that only turns on pixels which are needed, the ASUS ROG Phone has “always-on display” as well. Once again, the interface is made to look very “gamer-like”.

Overall color saturation and white balance is nice and sharp – as expected from an AMOLED panel. Without the notch, it makes the scaling of games much easier too as we don’t have to worry about the game elements getting cropped off by the notch.

I do realize that when X Mode (more on this later) is activated, the screen gets brighter. Not only that, but the overall theme of the phone changes from orange to red too.

While the ASUS ROG Phone is indeed rated for 90Hz refresh rate, it runs on 60Hz by default. To utilize the 90Hz refresh rate, you’ll have to manually change it in the settings menu.
Or, you can set it to run at 60Hz for all apps except for games. Game Center has the option for games to automatically switch to 90Hz automatically and seamlessly. More on this later in the software section.
[nextpage title=”Cameras”]
Alright, I don’t think the camera is the main focus of the ROG Phone. It has a dual rear-facing camera like many other smartphones these days, and unsurprisingly – the ROG Phone cameras are very similar to the ZenFone 5 and ZenFone 5z. They use the same sensors but slightly different lenses.

The cameras on the ZenFone 5 and ZenFone 5z is actually quite good – and since the cameras aren’t the main focus of the ROG Phone, then might as well reuse the existing technology. This can reduce the price of the phone as not much additional R&D is needed. Learn more about it here.
You can also learn more about dual-cameras in this post here.
As a refresher, these are the specs for the cameras found in the ASUS ROG Phone:

Rear-cameras

Main camera: Sony IMX363 12MP sensor; f/1.7 26.6mm with PDAF, 4-axis OIS and EIS
Ultra-wide camera: 8MP sensor; f/2.0 12mm fixed focus with 120° wide-angle

Selfie camera

8MP sensor; f/2.0 24mm fixed focus

AI photography makes a return to the ROG Phone as well as it also has the 16 types of scenes that will be detected. So how exactly is the ROG Phone’s cameras?
As usual, all pictures shown here will be uploaded to our Flickr album together will the full EXIF data.
Rear-facing cameras
With a larger aperture and some time has passed for the camera software to mature, I do realize some change from the original ZenFone 5 and ZenFone 5z’s cameras.

They’re not the best when it comes to cameras, and indoor conditions – even with relatively bright light from outside – has a relatively slow shutter speed and causes blurry pictures. The same issue appears in night photography as well.

Night shots are okay to be used for social media and the pictures are just noisy and very susceptible to shaky hands.

The colors, however, are very natural and the white balance is on point in daylight, but shifts to become a little reddish at night.

The one thing I like the most about the ASUS ZenFone 5 and ZenFone 5z’s cameras is the HDR mode. The ROG Phone is no different as well as its HDR mode is very well done. The difference between HDR off and on is day and night – figuratively. Take a look at the comparison below.

HDR off.

HDR on.
Then comes the secondary camera. Depending on who you ask, some people like to have a main camera + telephoto whereas another group of people likes a wide-angle camera instead. The ROG Phone comes with a wide-angle camera which is good for sceneries – also partly because the wide-angle lens doesn’t have autofocus.

The manual mode on the ROG Phone’s camera can obviously take great pictures, and we know that since we’ve already experienced the capabilities of this camera module with the ZenFone 5 and ZenFone 5z.
Both the main and wide-angle camera can be used in manual mode too, in case you’re wondering.

Main camera.

Wide-angle camera.
Here’s a little bonus for content creators who wants some serious gaming on the go. I took the ASUS ROG Phone to Desa Park City and used it with the DJI Osmo Mobile 2. The footage that I obtained as looking very good as well.

Selfie camera
The selfie camera however, is obviously nothing special. An 8MP camera without autofocus is pretty basic in the world of smartphones. The ROG Phone takes pretty okay selfies indoors, so I suppose it’s okay for social media use.

Camera UI
Compared to the UI that was on the ASUS ZenFone 5 and ZenFone 5z, nothing has changed.

Some might realize that the “Pro” button is now replaced with Google Lens – at least by default. For me, I use the Pro mode (manual mode) a lot, and I can change it by holding the Pro mode in the list of modes menu, and automatically changed the button at the corner.

The UI is still the same as before but I do hope that ASUS did make some additional enhancements to the overall user experience. Those AirTriggers? They can be repurposed to become shutter buttons and suddenly, taking pictures with the ROG Phone becomes something more ergonomic.

You can still take RAW pictures which is hidden here, by the way. You have to first switch over to Pro mode, then head over to settings –> resolution. Then you’ll find the option to change it to take in RAW format.

The manual mode UI is still the same before, and the ISO can go as low as 25.
[nextpage title=”Software – Android Oreo 8.1 with ROG UI”]
Honestly speaking, the ASUS ROG Phone comes with a re-skinned version of ZenUI 5.0 that’s already found in the ASUS ZenFone 5 and ZenFone 5z. We know this because there is a method to make your ZenFone 5 and 5z to look like the ROG Phone by installing the ROG theme. Of course, the ROG UI has some additional features as well.

Remember that there are a total of 3 AirTriggers – two at the right side, and one more at the bottom left side of the phone. That’s because you can squeeze the phone to activate some shortcuts a la HTC U11. You can customize them, actually. By default, a long squeeze will toggle X Mode on or off.

Being a gaming phone that it is, the ROG Phone already came with two games pre-installed – Free Fire and Asphalt 9. You can uninstall them, obviously.

We’ll be focusing on the three main features that is found only in the ROG Phone – X Mode, Game Center, and also Game Genie. Both Game Center and Game Genie works hand in hand.
X Mode
So what is X Mode anyway? Like we mentioned earlier, activating X Mode will change the UI from orange to red color. According to ASUS, activating the X Mode will also “raise the CPU frequency and optimizes the memory for gaming.” Through our findings, the X Mode is a rebranded version of the AI Boost from the ASUS ZenFone 5 and ZenFone 5z.
          X Mode off            X Mode on
They behave the same as well, since any benchmark apps launched and a notification will pop up telling us that we can enable X Mode to get better scores. More on this in the performance benchmarks later.

Game Center
Then comes Game Center. Just like the desktop version of the Gaming Center, this is where real-time information about the ROG Phone’s stats are displayed. Scrolling down, we can see Game Profiles, fan speed, and Aura lighting.

The fan speed is self-explanatory as it is setting the fan speed for the AeroActive Cooler. Whenever you attach the AeroActive Cooler, there’s a popup message saying that the fan might hinder the microphone’s audio quality. Even though you can actually hear it when it’s running at 100% fan speed, my teammates say that they actually can’t hear the fan.

As for the Aura lighting, you can enable or disable it when X Mode is on or off independently. Obviously, the RGB lights do affect battery life. More on this later in the battery test in this review.

You have a total of 4 different lighting modes to select from – static, breathing, strobing, and cycling. There are two sliders at the bottom as well – which are brightness and speed. However, these 2 sliders aren’t usable for all lighting modes. Take a look at the table below.

Adjustable Brightness?
Adjustable rate?

Static
✔
❌

Breathing
✔
✔

Strobing
✔
✔

Color cycle
❌
✔

It baffles me that cycling mode can’t have its brightness adjusted.

The Game Profiles here gives you the option to manually select what sort of settings you want for each and every app. You can manually add in other apps yourself as well. Maybe you want Facebook to run at 2.96GHz with 90Hz for some reason. For me, I locked PUBG Mobile to run at 90Hz refresh rate and max CPU clock speed at 2.96GHz and Contra at 60Hz refresh rate.
There’s also an option to enable anti-aliasing as well. However, because of the high pixel density of a smartphone, it doesn’t really doesn’t make a difference if anti-aliasing is enabled or disabled. We’ll talk about the performance hit with and without anti-aliasing later.
If you manually add other apps into the Game Center profiles, then you’ll see an additional button on the bottom right side of the navigation bar – the gamepad which signifies Game Genie.
Game Genie
In Game Genie, there are a few buttons for you to toggle right away:

Lock Mode which disables all on-screen navigation.
No alerts which silences all notifications and calls.
Real-time info which adds a floating status bar that tells you real-time CPU and GPU usage, alongside with its temperatures, battery level, and FPS.
Lock brightness which is self-explanatory.

For me, I find the “no alerts”, “lock brightness” and “real-time info” most useful. I can monitor the status of the ROG Phone while playing at a fixed brightness to hunt for enemies in PUBG Mobile. And definitely no messages since I get many messages and calls daily.
While the real-time info is indeed useful, I do wish that it offers more information like per-core utilization and the current clock speed that each core is running.

Then right beside these toggles are a whole column of buttons. These buttons are:

Speed up which clears your RAM.
AirTriggers where you can enable/disable it and remap where the AirTriggers should press on the screen.
Macro where you can record your own set of key presses and replay them with a hotkey.
Record which records the gameplay footage.
Live where you can show off your gameplay on YouTube or Twitch. No Facebook, though.
Search which opens up a smaller browser for you to find videos or websites.
Display Scaling which lets you rescale the app if the automatic scaling has any issues.

Obviously, the biggest, most useful feature here is AirTriggers. I played PUBG Mobile so much while using the AirTriggers, I felt like I’m legally cheating. I can pan the camera while moving about and shooting at the same time!

AirTriggers is easy to set up. You enable AirTriggers after tapping on “enable” for the game, then you can move the left trigger (blue color) and right trigger (red color) to wherever you want to press on the screen.

You can also adjust the sensitivity of the AirTriggers to suit your needs. I set mine to the most sensitive since I’m a trigger happy guy in PUBG Mobile.
Take a look at these footages of me playing PUBG Mobile (I’m a noob) using AirTriggers. I mapped the left trigger to shoot and the right trigger to jump. Of course, it’s recorded using the Record option in Game Genie as well.

Speaking of the record option, I can select the resolution and audio source of the gameplay. Obviously, the footage above is recorded in 1080p – which you can tune in the Game Genie settings as well.

[nextpage title=”Performance & Gaming”]
The ASUS ROG Phone is the first ever smartphone to have a speed-binned 2.96GHz Snapdragon 845 chipset. The base Snapdragon 845 version only runs at 2.8GHz, and the ROG Phone is the one and only smartphone with the factory overclocked chip.
Let’s take a look at the full list of specs on the ROG Phone once more.

6-inch 18:9 AMOLED display with 2160×1080 resolution

90Hz refresh rate with 1ms pixel response time
108.6% DCI-P3 color gamut
Discrete image processing chip that supports HDR display

Qualcomm Snapdragon 845

4x 2.96GHz Kryo 385 Gold (binned) + 4x 1.7GHz Kryo 385 Silver
Adreno 630 graphics

8GB LPDDR4 RAM
128GB UFS 2.1 internal storage (available in 512GB as well)

no microSD card slot

4,000mAh battery

Does the extra 0.16GHz make a difference, though? Let’s take a look at the benchmarks here.

In pure CPU tests, yes. Remember – the architecture for Snapdragon 845 chipsets are 4 cores + 4 cores. This is called “big.LITTLE” where one quad-core is higher powered and more power hungry, while another quad-core is with slower speed but better energy conservation. The ROG Phone only has the higher powered quad-core to be speed-binned and factory overclocked to 2.96GHz.
For GPU-dependent tests like 3DMark, we don’t see much of a difference from other smartphones with Snapdragon 845 chipset. That’s because the ROG Phone’s GPU is the same as any other Snapdragon 845 smartphones in the market.
But what about X Mode and the AeroActive Cooler? Does those help?
Here are more benchmarks for comparison. Whenever we mention “with fan”, it means the AeroActive Cooler is plugged in and manually set to 100% fan speed.

There’s not much difference, really. But for some reason, VRMark seems to consistently get a higher score if we set the ROG Phone to run at 90Hz refresh rate. Not by a huge amount, but a tangible, repeatable result.

Like we mentioned before, the X Mode is actually a rebrand of the existing AI Boost in the ZenFone 5 and ZenFone 5z. For those two phones… the AI Boost did absolutely nothing. As for the ROG Phone? X Mode did nothing as well.

What about the AeroActive Cooler? Does that help in boosting the performance? Not really. It did reduce the temperature while gaming – and cooled my fingers too. Speaking of that, let’s jump to the next section.
Gaming
We are big fans of the utilities that the ROG Phone offers – notchless 90Hz AMOLED screen with 1ms response time, dual front-facing stereo speakers, AirTriggers, and Game Genie specifically.
Throughout our gaming test, we tried with a total of 4 games – Asphalt 9, Honkai Impact 3, and PUBG Mobile. Unfortunately, not all games are able to make use of the hardware that the ROG Phone has to offer. We also used the “real-time info” toolbar in Game Genie to gather the data.

Asphalt 9 for example, is able to run at 90Hz but the Snapdragon 845’s GPU failed to keep up with the demanding graphics. The game is already using 99% of the GPU before reaching 90Hz! Asphalt 9 can only reach about 46FPS in the highest graphical setting.
From here, we can actually tell that the Snapdragon 845’s GPU is not powerful enough for this kind of technology. We also hope that ASUS speed-binned the GPU instead of the CPU, since the CPU isn’t used that much while gaming anyway.
Then comes Honkai Impact 3. It’s a beautiful game but the CPU and GPU utilization is so low that it didn’t even scratch the 90% usage mark. Also, the game is locked at 60Hz only.

Last but not least, PUBG Mobile. This one game alone is the reason why ROG Phone is conceived this way. We also gathered the most data from PUBG Mobile, as it is the most demanding title in our list.
We tried and tested PUBG Mobile in multiple different configurations – with and without X Mode, with and without the AeroActive Cooler. We compiled all the data below.

After a long time of playing PUBG Mobile

X Mode off; no fan
X Mode & Aura on; no fan
X Mode off; fan at 100%

X Mode & Aura on; fan at 100%

FPS
41
41
41
41

Temperature (°C)
39
39
37
37

PUBG Mobile in itself is a pretty demanding game but ironically, the game is only using about ~30% of the CPU and ~80% of the GPU. We cannot confirm if the PUBG Mobile is not optimized or there’s another reason behind not utilizing the GPU entirely.
We did realize one thing – when the ROG Phone’s battery drops to 10%, performance throttling starts to happen and the FPS drops to sub-30FPS.
This piece of metal helps a lot in dissipating the heat!
Depending on the game you’re playing and the graphical settings that you’re comfortable with, you can adjust the accordingly to prolong your battery life. Here are a few recommendations that we have for you:

PUBG Mobile – locked at 60FPS

Highest graphical settings with the screen set to 60Hz (since the game can only run at 41FPS)
Lower settings to run at a consistently smooth

Honkai Impact 3 – locked at 60FPS

Highest settings, no issues

Asphalt 9 – can go up to 90Hz

Highest graphical settings with the screen set to 60Hz (since the game can’t reach >70Hz consistently)

Setting the screen to 90Hz at “default” graphical settings in Asphalt 9 doesn’t help, by the way. It still can’t maintain >70Hz.
[nextpage title=”Battery & Charger”]
Speaking of the battery, the ASUS ROG Phone is equipped with a 4,000mAh battery. It’s the same as some other big smartphones in the market right now – but with the speed-binned Snapdragon 845, 90Hz display, Aura RGB light, and AeroActive Cooler, how long can the 4,000mAh actually last?

ASUS actually separated a few different battery modes in the settings menu. The X Mode here is supposed to be the “high performance” mode. Here we compare the ASUS ROG Phone with other smartphones in the market using “balance” only, since X Mode doesn’t improve performance at all.

From our benchmarks and gaming tests, we think that it’s best to stick with 60FPS with X Mode and Aura lighting turned off so that you can game for a longer time, while you can enable 90FPS and lower the graphical settings to enjoy a smoother but uglier graphics.
But since the ROG Phone has so many different settings to play with, what magnitude of an impact will settings and accessories bring to the ROG Phone? Take a look at the comparisons below.

We actually went on and tested a myriad of different settings turned on and off – Aura RGB, 90Hz and 60Hz, X Mode turned on and off, with and without AeroActive Cooler at 100% – while we fixed the brightness and performed the same test. The results we got were astonishing.
That tells us one thing – every setting of the ROG Phone matters. If you want to go all-out baller mode with the fan at 100% and RGB lighting turned on, then you’re in for a treat. The battery lasted for less than 5 hours. Five hours.
Depending on what settings you want to use, the ASUS ROG Phone’s battery can last you a few hours of gaming before depleting entirely.
Charger

This is also one of the confusing thing with the ASUS ROG Phone. In the box itself we have the brand new HyperCharge – a charger that’s capable of outputting a total of 30W max. But hey – didn’t the official specs of the ASUS ROG Phone listed that the side USB-C port can support higher power and faster charging?

Then, we also repeated the test by using a 5V 2A charger which we used in this experiment. We used the bottom USB-C port at first.

Overall, using the HyperCharge to charge from 15% onwards, the ROG Phone takes around 18 minutes to reach 50%, and takes a total of 36 minutes to reach 75%. A total of 87 minutes is needed to reach 100% full charge. Still, it’s a really fast charger.
Once this basic charging test was done, we thought to ourselves – didn’t ASUS ROG mentioned that the side port is actually more powerful than the one at the bottom?
Hence we also did another myriad of charging test where we charged with and without the AeroActive Cooler while using the HyperCharge charger, then redid the entire test with the 5V2A charger.

When we superimpose everything together, we see no significant difference in terms of charging with or without the AeroActive Cooler on the side port, or using the bottom port. That’s one mystery solved.
[nextpage title=”Wrapping up the ASUS ROG Phone review”]
Okay, alright. This smartphone has its arrival rumored and predicted for months prior to its release. Ever since its debut back at Computex 2018, I consistently received the question of “when will the ASUS ROG Phone be released?”
After more than 4 months – it’s finally here. It’s a smartphone made specifically for gaming – and ASUS did it so right, that the ROG Phone is miles ahead of its competitions. The AirTriggers is something truly useful for gamers and I find myself using it way too often. Imagine playing Asphalt 9 without touching the screen.
AirTriggers is the biggest boon here.
The utilities are useful as well. Game Center and Game Genie are the companion that made the ROG Phone become the ultimate gaming phone to date. It can record macros, record game footages, broadcast the gameplay via live stream – just to name a few.
However, the X Mode seems more like a secondary profile with different brightness level only. The AeroActive Cooler didn’t help much in terms of cooling the phone and functions more like an adapter to convert the custom 48-pin connector to become a USB-C + 3.5mm audio jack at the side.

In terms of charging and data transfer, a slower USB-C port at the bottom and a speedier USB-C at the side is rather confusing as well. It wouldn’t hurt to make both of them the same, would it?
While 90Hz did make the entire usage experience buttery smooth, there are many games that are locked in 30FPS or 60FPS only. While Asphalt 9 does run at 90Hz, you’ll have to play it in lower graphical settings as the Snapdragon 845 GPU just isn’t powerful enough. Perhaps speed-bin the GPU instead of CPU next time?
Overall, I’ll still say that the ROG Phone is indeed the one smartphone to get if you are serious about mobile gaming. Other than that, it has a decent camera which does take decent shots. The ROG Phone is available in two storage variants, and you’ll have to be the judge whether it is worth it or not. Remember – the ROG Phone does not have microSD card slot.

8GB RAM + 128GB internal storage – RM3,499 (the one we reviewed)

Also available in Amazon for USD $899.

8GB RAM + 512GB internal storage – RM3,999

From ZenFones to an ROG Phone, it’s a pretty big leap for ASUS and it’s a totally different perspective for us consumers as well. ZenFones have polished the ZenUI throughout the years, and ROG Phone builds upon it to create the best smartphone gaming experience to date. ASUS knows what mobile gamers want, and they did a good job integrated these demands into the ROG Phone. AirTriggers, especially. Now, I can’t use other phones to play PUBG Mobile anymore because I got used to AirTriggers. 🤪

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Gather around Samsung Members, submit a photo representing Malaysia and stand a chance to win some movie tickets

Samsung Malaysia is calling all Malaysian Samsung Members to show them their love for the country through a simple contest.

Users just need to snap a photo of anything that could represent Malaysia within one photo. Let it be a plate of Nasi Lemak, a cup of Teh Tarik, our wonderful multiracial harmony, cultural items, etc. Anything you can think of it to be fitting of reminding others that it is from Malaysia, it is eligible for the contest.
The contest runs until the end of this month and the best pictures with the most amount of likes and creative captions will walk away with a pair of movie tickets. Users will need to upload the picture onto the Galaxy Gallery within the Samsung Members app and attach the caption with the hashtag #Malaysiaku.
Make sure to share a lot to gain enough likes or be creative enough to stand out from the rest!
For applicable terms and conditions of the contest, please click here for more information.

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ASUS ZenPower Pro Now Available In Rose Pink & Baby Blue

Power banks. For many of us, it’s a necessary piece of accessory, if you will. Thanks to our extremely heavy usage of mobile devices, most the batteries don’t last for a long time. While power banks have became a part of our daily lives, why not make it a pretty piece of accessory? That’s why ASUS has got your back with the brand new colours available for their ZenPower Pro power banks! You can get it from ASUS Malaysia’s official online store by clicking right here, or click on the image below!
Remember – there’s also Silver, Black, and Pink, in addition to their latest Baby Blue and Rose Pink in the family. Each of them is priced at RM 129.00, and I think it’s a gosh darn good deal!

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All new Dell Inspiron 2021 laptops are available in both Intel and AMD selections

Dell Malaysia has announced several 2021 models of its Inspiron lineup laptops that consist of CPUs from both Team Blue and Team Red.

Starting from the simplest Inspiron 14, it is currently placed as one of the best-valued laptops for how many features inside it from open-lit sensors and optional fingerprint readers to facilitate a seamless user experience. It is also expected to arrive during early June together with the Inspiron 15 despite no official pricing has announced yet.

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AMD demos “flat PC”

We know clearly that AMD is here to stay for a long time when we saw that that latest next-generation PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One uses the AMD’s Jaguar processors. AMD did in fact go through a few years of much sadness ever since the start of Intel’s bribery that caused AMD’s problems.
Now however, AMD is getting back into the game and make the most amazing PC ever that we’ve seen so far – a “flat PC”. This device is meant to be a home theater PC reference design by AMD, which is expected to be a set-top box solution from AMD. Though calling it a set-top box might be a little misleading, as this small little PC actually packs a very heavy punch.

Engadget reports that AMD showed this flat PC running Windows 8.1 and also FIFA 14 smoothly at 1080p resolution with its AMD Mullins processor – AMD’s next-generation of ultra-low voltage processors – alongside with a 256GB SSD, a camera, built-in WiFi, and a few other capabilities. Remember, all these amazing things are done with only the “flat PC” shown by AMD, and the size of it is just like your palm.
Amazing engineering, isn’t it? Since this is a reference design, we’re expecting to see a whole lot more “flat PCs” that are of this size. Maybe this type of designs are more feasible to be a Steam Machine instead of those OEM ones that costs a ridiculously high amount of dollars too.
Via : Engadget

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Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 3 is now IPX8-rated, supports S Pen, and more compact

Samsung’s third Unpacked event of the year has happened – and we have a total of 4 different devices announced. One of those devices – which I am most excited about – is the new Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 3. This is the third generation of the foldable device from the company – and it brought a lot of improvements.

First, let’s talk about the specs.

7.6-inch Dynamic AMOLED 2X Infinity Flex main display

S Pen Support
2208×1768 pixels
120Hz refresh rate
374 ppi

6.2-inch Dynamic AMOLED 2X Cover Display

2268×832 pixels
120Hz refresh rate
387 ppi

Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 chipset
12GB RAM
Up to 512GB Storage
Triple Rear Camera

Ultra-Wide: 12MP f/2.2
Wide: 12MP f/1.8 with AF, OIS
Telephoto: 12MP f/2.4 with 2X Optical Zoom, OIS

4MP Under Display Camera
10MP Cover Camera
4,400mAh Battery

In terms of specs, it seems like not much has changed since the Galaxy Z Fold 2. However, the new Galaxy Z Fold 3 is actually IPX8-rated, which means it can resist some water. This is unheard of in terms of foldable devices and I wonder if we can still fold and unfold in shallow water and still have that IPX8 rating?

Then, the second big feature highlight is the under display selfie camera. Yea yea, lots of people have been wanting this feature. Now we’re seeing an under display selfie camera for the Galaxy Z Fold 3. That selfie camera is hidden under the display.

That’s why we only have a 4MP selfie camera though. With that said, I’m not overly concerned by the resolution of the selfie camera. We can use the rear-facing cameras to talk selfies since that’s one feature that is already possible on the Galaxy Z Flip and the Galaxy Z Fold 2.

Thirdly – the S Pen support. The Galaxy Z Fold 3 is the latest addition into the list of devices that supports the S Pen, and it also has a “Fold Edition” S Pen. I’m really surprised that within just a few short years, we now have S Pen support on the Galaxy Z Fold 3. Remember how people complained that the first generation Galaxy Fold had a very soft polymer screen? Now we can poke the screen using the S Pen.

Samsung also announced the S Pen Pro which has BLE support. This new S Pen Pro also has a toggle to change between standard S Pen mode and “Z Fold” mode. Again, we don’t have much information about what’s the difference between the two modes.

Generally, it’s an iterative upgrade over the Galaxy Z Fold 2 in terms of hardware. The device is also slightly smaller in all dimensions, making it a bit more compact. Samsung also claims that they have been working with more app developers to optimize the user experience on foldable devices – which again, is an uphill battle for the company as they’re the pioneers in foldable devices.

Pricing
For the US pricing of the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 3, it is at USD $1799.99. That’s the same price as the Galaxy Z Fold 2’s recommended retail price after the permanent price cut earlier this year.
I thought that the price will be slightly increased – but it didn’t.
As of now, we still do not have the Malaysian pricing for the new Galaxy Z Fold 3 yet. We’ll keep you updated when more information arises.

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Dell’s XPS 13 Plus is an evolution of its already-great design

The Dell XPS lineup of laptops got a major redesign in the year 2020 and everyone loved it. The new-look was supremely clean and offers such a beautiful user experience that many consider the XPS lineup of 2020 to be the best of the best thin and light laptops. While the layout remains the same, the keycap becomes edge-to-edge design, or gapless design. It’s not the first time we’ve seen a laptop with such a keyboard layout design and that is what I’m worried about.
There is a reason why we don’t see this design much. For the keycaps being so close means that it is very prone to typos – and that is coming from personal experience too. Sure, we’ll get better over time – but everyone’s tolerance towards this design will differ.

Another major difference is the trackpad. The entire wrist rest is now covered with just one single piece of glass and there is no cutout for the trackpad. I’m not sure if there are any sort of indicators to where the trackpad starts and ends or that entire glass is the trackpad, else it’ll be a funky experience while using the trackpad.
As for the specs, the XPS 13 Plus comes with up to:

13.4-inch

Either in 3840×2400 InfinityEdge Touch IPS LCD display
or 3456×2160 InfinityEdge Touch OLED display

Intel Core i7-1280P
32GB LPDDR5 at 5200MHz
2TB PCIe Gen 4×4 SSD

Either way, the Dell XPS 13 Plus is expected to launch later this year.

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Android users can now pay with Boost on Google Pay Store and make in-app purchases

Boost has just launched its integration with Google Play, enabling Malaysian Android users to make in-app transactions seamlessly and securely on any Google Play Store app.
To enjoy all these convenient in-app purchase experiences, users simply have to link their Boost account to Google Play, then select Boost as the preferred payment method.

In conjunction with the launch, Boost is also running a ‘Play To No End’ promotion from 1st November 2022 until 31st January 2023, offering up to RM10 cashback for users who pay with Boost on Google Play Store or any Google Play Store apps.
Kindly refer to the following link for more information on Boost’s integration with the Google Play Store:
https://www.myboost.com.my/googleplaystore-promo/

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84% of Malaysians are ready for long-term remote work, according to a research Dell Technologies

Dell Technologies has released report numbers regarding the Remote Work Readiness (RWR) Index that is used to find out the relevant rating of how employees are ready for remote work in a long-term basis.
Responded by more than 7,000 professionals from Asia Pacific and Japan region (1,030 from Malaysia), around 84% of Malaysians feel that they are ready for extensive period of remote-based workflow but the current situation is challenging them in various aspects especially in the productivity area. The study revealed that the lack of interaction, remote network stability and blurred boundaries between work and personal lives are amongst the most concerned areas of identified issues.

On the minor side of things, less than half respondents believed that their employers are fully supportive of long-term remote work but half of the entire participants felt that employers are not supporting the necessary infrastructure to conduct remote workflow. Supporting the results are various identified resource challenges such as bandwidth constraints, signal quality, company portal, management tools of finances/customer relationship/accounting. Around 36% to 42% respondents want employees to at least guarantee these issues does not arise to stay productive. Interestingly, HR support is also an important aspect to look into with lack of team engagement, in-person communication and established practices for remote working being the top challenges to face during the crucial time of digital transition.
Here are some other key findings and numbers for Malaysia you might find interesting.

Remote work is not new to employees in Malaysia. As many as 70% of Malaysia employees  had worked remotely to some degree before MCO measures were implemented. 91%  of Gen Z employeeshad worked remotely before MCO.
The most important factor for remote working is having a stable remote network at 48%. This factor is particularly critical to those in large organisations with more than 1,000 employees, where 54% see this as the number one factor.
Instability of remote networks, including Internet bandwidth limitations, is the top technology obstacle across all age groups and organisational sizes – 61% of employees aged 55 and above (Baby Boomers) see it as a key challenge, while more than half (52%) of employees in large organisations with more than 1,000 employees
The lack of or insufficient team engagement initiatives is especially felt by surveyed employees aged 55 and above (Baby Boomers), with half of them (50%) viewing it as the top HR challenge.

You can check out the full findings of the report right here or click here for the infographic version if you want a quick rundown instead.

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Stand a chance and win yourself a Redmi Note 12 Pro 5G in Xiaomi Malaysia’s Vivid Night Photography Contest

Xiaomi Malaysia has launched its Vivid Night photography contest, in which participants may win the Redmi Note 12 Pro 5G, so fellow photographers, it’s time to move!
Running now until 9th July 2023, the brand invites its fans across Malaysia to enter the contest via social media platforms and boast about their creativity and talents through photography.

To participate, follow these simple steps below:

Capture your most creative night photography and post it on either Facebook or Instagram.
Tag @XiaomiMalaysia on Facebook or @xiaomi.malaysia on Instagram, then include hashtags #RedmiNote12Series #LiveVivid #VividNight

After that, the best photo entry will be chosen and the participant will grab home a brand-new Redmi Note 12 Pro 5G.
Kindly refer to Xiaomi Malaysia’s official Facebook Page for further details on the Vivid Night photography contest.

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Taking a look the whole Huawei MatePad series of tablets

Huawei is doubling down in the tablet market and they’re flushing out the entire MatePad series of tablets, ranging from budget MatePad T tablet all the way to the laptop-level MatePad Pro.
So, let’s take a look at the whole lineup of tablets offered by Huawei, and we’ll go through who should buy which tablet.

All of these tablets are using Huawei’s AppGallery, and if you’ve already updated to EMUI 10.1, then you can run Netflix on the tablet too.

Huawei MatePad Pro
Let’s start with the highest-end tablet that Huawei is offering now. The Huawei MatePad Pro was announced earlier this year – and it comes with Huawei’s latest flagships specs and hardware. It has a fantastic screen and the accessories that come included with it are also fantastic to type on.

There’s also the Huawei M Pencil which is an active stylus so we can scribble, draw, or write notes directly on the MatePad Pro. There are also apps built-in to help facilitate that as well.
The best is, the new MatePad Pro is absolutely perfect for media consumption too since it also supports a lot of Huawei’s own video service and partnering video streaming platforms too.
MatePad
In the middle of the MatePad series of tablets, we have an aptly-named MatePad tablet. Yes, that sentence is correct – and the MatePad is kind of an in-between the MatePad Pro and also the MatePad T 10s.
This tablet has a more powerful chipset compared to the MatePad T 10s and yet supports the keyboard and the Huawei M Pencil too. This makes the MatePad a little more like a budget, mid-range laptop replacement kind of Android tablet.
Huawei MatePad
I mean, if you want more than just a basic Android tablet like the MatePad T 10s but don’t require the top-of-the-line specs, the MatePad is the one for you. It can also run Netflix since it uses the same software, hence it’s good for media consumption and also to get some work done.
MatePad T 10s
Now, the main highlight of the MatePad T 10s is going to be its price at RM999, and also the eBook mode. It’s an interesting feature to be included in a tablet and makes this tablet an excellent budget-oriented tablet for media consumption.

We just reviewed the MatePad T 10s, which you can watch it here. Just bear in mind that it is using Huawei Mobile Services and uses the Huawei AppGallery.
But before you buy
Make sure you do your research on what you need. Huawei has a total of 3 tablets in the market right now, each of them is meant for a specific type of user. Also, Huawei is constantly doing promotions too.
These promotions may range from a simple price drop or bundling with other useful accessories, or maybe even both!
Where to buy?
From a few places, actually. But I highly recommend you to check out Huawei’s official stores on these platforms:

Huawei’s website
Huawei’s official Shopee store
Huawei’s official Lazada store

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HONOR expands its ecosystem to products; including household electronics

HONOR just announced a bunch of new products – ranging from its usual smart products like tablets, laptops, and smartwatches into household electronics – including fans, humidifiers, vacuum cleaners, and even kettles.
To those who are aware of the whole tech industry, Xiaomi is the other company that offers this many different product categories.

Today, we have a bunch of new devices – so we’ll briefly go through them.
HONOR MagicBook Pro
Here, we have a new 16.1-inch laptop by HONOR that has a 90% screen-to-body ratio. It’s available up to the Intel Core i7-10510U processor with up to NVIDIA’s new GeForce MX350 GPU, too.

The price will be revealed in mainland China on 13th June and will be available overseas later.
HONOR Router 3
The brand new HONOR Router 3 comes with WiFi 6 capability and through our test, we have already tested that WiFi 6 is fantastic speeds. The new HONOR Router 3 also supports OFDMA multi-user technology and it is only priced at RMB 219.

The router will be available in oversea markets starting from July 2020.
HONOR Vision X1 series
The HONOR Vision X1 is the official name for the HONOR smart TV that was showcased since last year. It is within a series, and there are multiple different sizes.
The HONOR Vision X1 series of smart TV comes with a few features like motion estimate, motion compensation, and built-in 4x10W.

As of now, the HONOR Vision X1 series of smart TV will be available in two sizes with this price:

65-inch @ RMB 3,299
55-inch @ RMB 2,299

HONOR Choice smart home devices
And now, the HONOR Choice. It’s an array of smart home devices We have a bunch of devices here.

Within the HONOR Choice array, we have the TWS Earbuds X1 that is priced at RMB 169. There is also a smart vacuum cleaner with a 350W power at 100krpm motor.
Another thing within the HONOR Choice, there’s also an air multiplier fan (reminiscent of the Dyson air multiplier), a humidifier, desk lamp, electronic toothbrush, and also smart kettle. According to the official announcement, the selected HONOR Choice smart home products will be available in overseas markets from June.

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Review – JOI Book 5115 & JOI Book 7115: Excellent competitors in the ultrabook market

This laptop is made possible thanks to Intel. It’s an initiative by Intel last year to create a “NUC laptop kit” which essentially is a laptop kit that any other brands can use. Even the laptop’s box already highlighted that it is an Intel NUC M15 Laptop Kit.

And this JOI Book 5115 and the JOI Book 7115 are made from that Intel NUC laptop kit. Essentially, once you saw one of these Intel NUC laptop kits, then you’ve pretty much seen it all. So, let’s talk about them.

Okay, so the JOI Book 5115 and JOI Book 7115. Both these laptops come in fairly simple boxes. Inside it, we have some documentation, a 65W power brick, and of course – the laptop.
Moving on. These Intel NUC laptops have some of the best design and build quality that I’ve seen. It’s very clean and I think it’s made out of metal – and I also think that it is comparable to other brand’s premium laptop lineup in terms of build quality and design. And these laptops are relatively lightweight and thin too.

Opening up the lid reveals a 15.6-inch IPS LCD screen with a piece of glass on top. That is because this laptop has a touchscreen. The screen looks amazingly good as it can be rather bright and also has fantastic colors.

What I truly love about the screen though, is the hinge. Opening the lid feels smooth and it’s not that high in terms of resistance – and yet the screen doesn’t wobble much when I poke the screen! That’s great!

The keyboard and trackpad are also fantastic on the JOI Book 5115 and JOI Book 7115. They both have a typical 13-inch laptop keyboard layout – which means there’s no number pad and the arrow keys are squished inside. This keyboard feels fantastic to type on, and I find myself enjoying the time I spent typing on this keyboard.

Something to nitpick here – the print screen key is nested inside the function key, which I don’t like. I personally would’ve liked a dedicated screenshot key. This isn’t a big deal though, since I have some other ways to fix it. Check it out here instead. 😉

The trackpad feels great and I have no complaints about it either. Perhaps a little too small but hey – that’s okay since this laptop has a touchscreen.

My only complaint here feels like a personal one – the speaker placement. Currently, the speaker is bottom-firing but there is quite a lot of empty space at the left and right sides of the keyboard.
          Bottom-firing speakers at both the left and right sides.            The space on the left and right side of the keyboard are unutilized.
Bottom-firing speakers mean that we can’t really use the laptop while sitting on the couch or sofa and listen to music without the music sounding a little weird.

Ports are also rather generous and make sense since it has a Thunderbolt 4 and USB 3.2 Gen 2 on both sides, but there’s another HDMI on the left side and a 3.5mm combo audio jack on the right side.

These Intel NUC laptops – including both the JOI Book 5115 and JOI Book 7115 – have a few special features. There’s a utility called “Intel NUC Software Studio” which brings a few new features to the table – like user presence detection. That feature works really well. When the laptop goes idle and went to sleep, it automatically wakes up when I went near the laptop and unlocks before I even sit down.
This quick unlock time is also because it has Windows Hello facial recognition.

Back to the Intel NUC Software Studio – that light bar. The light bar is utilized for Alexa integration. For us here in Malaysia, it’s not officially supported or usable – but I switched the Windows 10 to the US region and I managed to get Alexa working.

And the performance. Essentially, the difference between the JOI Book 5115 and JOI Book 7115 is the processor. The JOI Book 5115 is using the Intel Core i5-1135G7 with 8GB RAM, whereby the JOI Book 7115 is using the Intel Core i7-1165G7 with 16GB RAM.

Obviously, the performance is going to differ between the two in both CPU and GPU performance. If you need to do something like an intense Excel sheet with a lot of calculations, then the JOI Book 7115 is much more suitable for you because of the more powerful CPU and more RAM.
Though, if you want to play some game, you technically can since the new Iris Xe graphics is powerful enough to run some games like Dota 2.

And for the battery life. Both the JOI Book 5115 and JOI Book 7115 have a 73Wh battery inside. I spent most of my time with the JOI Book 7115 and the battery life is insanely good. It went through my usual usage of many Chrome tabs, some YouTube and Spotify mixed in – and I lost track of how long the battery lasts. I think it’s more than 12 hours within a single charge. And keep in mind that this battery life is on the JOI Book 7115 with the more powerful Intel Core i7-1165G7.

I presume that with the same usage on the JOI Book 5115 with the Intel Core i5-1135G7, then it’ll last even longer!
And back to the power brick – these JOI Books charge using USB-C and I honestly didn’t use the power brick even once since I can use my other 65W USB-PD chargers.

And all in all, I’m truly impressed by both the JOI Book 5115 and JOI Book 7115. They’re both very well-built and go directly up against the best of the best ultrabook laptops that are available in the market right now.

And yet, the price for the JOI Book 5115 and JOI Book 7115 starts at RM4,599 and RM5,399 respectively for the FreeDOS version. You’ll have to add another RM300 for Windows 10 Home, and another RM300 for Windows 10 Pro.
And that’s all we have to share with you about the JOI Book 5115 and JOI Book 7115. These are Intel NUC laptops and they’re fantastic. I can’t believe that I’m actually loving them so much.

Where to buy? (Affiliate links)

JOI Book 5115

Lazada
Shopee

JOI Book 7115

Lazada
Shopee

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OnePlus Malaysia officially brings in the Nord 3 5G and Nord Buds 2r

OnePlus Malaysia is happy to announce the launch of the brand new Nord 3 5G smartphone and Nord Buds 2r TWS for the local market.

Before we start, if you prefer the video format of the review for the Nord 3 5G then watch the video above.
Anyway, the number ‘3’ of the Nord family continues the tradition of value-packed smartphones without breaking the bank.
It has a great set of cameras, a high-quality OLED screen, a highly capable SoC, large memory capacities, and fast charge.
Although these seem like paper specs of what a flagship should be, the performance and capacities ARE actual flagships but a couple of years back.
However, with technologies maturing every single day, one may gain access to those “best from the past” with relative ease and lower cost as the main benefit.
On the other hand, the colors and design are straightforward yet vibrant which is not too boring. The iconic OnePlus slider is still here as well.
Here’s a quick specs rundown.

6.74-inch Fluid AMOLED Display

1080+p Resolution
Middle Punch Hole Notch
120Hz Refresh Rate
HDR10+ Support

MediaTek Dimensity 9000 Chipset
16GB RAM
256GB Storage
Triple Rear Camera

Main: 50MP f/1.8 with multi-directional PDAF, OIS
Ultra-Wide: 8MP f/2.2
Macro: 2MP f/2.4

16MP Selfie Camera
5,000mAh Battery

80W Fast Charge

Misty Green Color

Moving onto the Nord Buds 2r, this thing packs a great set of 12.4mm drivers to give you the thumps and oomphs while the high-tension wire copper coil improves the tension and endurance of the earbuds.
The Master Equalization system holds multiple sound profile presets for you to swap around across different music styles while the Dirac Audio Tuner keeps the signal stream steady and clear.
As usual, it supports AI noise-canceling dual microphones transmitting clear speech from your end while the speaker side has the same thing that removes ambient voice so you can hear clearly.
Battery life-wise, it can do up to 8 hours off a single full charge and a total of 38 hours if including the charging case.
The IP55 rating keeps itself safe from dust and liquid. And if you really happen to get a bad unit, there’s a 1-year warranty with a 1-to-1 replacement guarantee.
Notable features also include 94ms Game Mode (highly subjective whether this is good or not), and Google Fast Pair.
Price and Availability
The OnePlus Nord 3 5G is officially priced at RM2,199 while the Nord Buds 2r is at RM299 respectively.
If you’re quick enough, get the smartphone right now via preorder from July 5 to July 9 and get the TWS for free!
Preorders are available on OnePlus Malaysia’s official website, Lazada, and Shopee.

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Grab yourself a HUAWEI product at lower price during its Perfect Moments Together Chinese New Year sale

As the Chinese New Year is just around the corner, HUAWEI is bringing exciting deals to its fans across Malaysia to celebrate this once-in-a-year occasion.
Running from 7th January until 5th February, shoppers can purchase the following HUAWEI items at a lower price point alongside some free goodies:

Product
Price (RM)
Free Gift

MatePad Pro 12.6 inch
4,299
Keyboard + M-pencil

MatePad Pro 11 2022
2,999 (128GB) / 3,699 (256GB)
Keyboard + M-pencil

MatePad 11 10.95 2021
1,799 (128GB) / 2,199 (256GB)
Keyboard + M-pencil

MatePad 10.4 inch 2022 LTE
1,499
Keyboard

MatePad 10.4 inch 2022 WIFI
1,299
HUAWEI Keyboard

MatePad SE 10.36 inch
999
–

MatePad T 10.1 Inch
899
–

Mate 50 Silver/Black
3,699
50W Car Charger

Mate 50 Pro Silver/Black
4,499
50W Car Charger

Mate 50 Pro Silver/Carbon Black
4,899
50W Car Charger

Mate 50 Pro Orange
5,299
50W Car Charger

Mate Xs 2
7,999
Lipstick

P50 Pocket White
4,499
–

P50 Pocket Premium Edition
5,799
–

P50
2,999
Watch

P50 Pro
3,699
Watch Fit

nova 9
1,599
Power Bank

nova 10 Pro
2,599
Power Bank

nova 10
2,199
Power Bank

nova 10 SE
1,499
Power Bank

nova 9 SE
1,099
Power Bank

nova Y70
699
Fan

nova Y90
999
Fan

MateBook D15 Intel i3 11th Gen 8GB+256GB
2,199
–

MateBook D15 Intel i5 11th Gen 8GB+512GB
2,699
–

MateBook D15 Intel i5 11.5th Gen 8GB+512GB
2,599
–

MateBook D15 Intel i5 11th Gen 16GB+512GB
2,999
–

MateBook D16 Intel i5 12th Gen 8GB+512GB
3,699
–

MateBook D16 Intel i5 12th Gen 16GB+512GB
3,999
–

MateBook D16 Intel i7 12th Gen 16GB+512GB
4,799
–

MateBook 16S Intel i7 12th Gen 16GB+1TB
6,799
–

MateBook X PRO Intel i7 12th Gen 16GB+1TB
9,999
–

WATCH GT3 46mm
999 (Leather) / 899 (Black)
–

WATCH GT3 42mm
899 (Leather) /
799 (Black)
–

WATCH GT Runner
999
–

Watch 3 Pro
1,799
–

Watch 3
999
–

Watch Fit 2 (Active)
549
–

Watch Fit 2 (Leather)
649
–

Watch D
1,799
–

FreeBuds Pro 2
849
–

In conjunction with the promotion, HUAWEI is also holding a lucky draw contest which runs in three separate weeks from 7th January to 5th February.

Week 1 — 7th to 16th January
Week 2 — 17th to 27th January
Week 3 — 28th January to 5th February

To take part in the lucky draw contest, follow these simple steps below:

Buy any HUAWEI smartphone or tablet worth RM 1,000 and above during the campaign period.
Show your receipt to HUAWEI retail assistants or promoters at any HUAWEI Experience store.
HUAWEI retail assistants or promoters will then ask you to scan a QR code to enter you into the lucky draw.

And here’s a quick list of the prizes to be won:

Prizes
Products

Grand Prize

MateView 28.2 inch + MateStation S

Second Prize

Vision S 65″
Starpeed Plus (only available in Week 3)

Third Prize

GT 2

Consolation Prize

WATCH Fit
Band 6
Powerbank

With that being said, take advantage of this sale if you had been eyeing them for a while now, and treat yourselves to one of these HUAWEI products!

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11street revealed LOVE 11

It’s not a surprise that whenever a big event is coming by, everyone wants to be a part of it – be it the retailer, the manufacturer, or the consumer. Here’s 11street answer to the latest and biggest event, Single’s day. Just like its main competitor, 11street is running this event until December!
Among the key announcements Hoseok Kim, CEO of 11street, made at the press conference was:

Unveiling of their biggest giveaway of the year – deals totaling to RM 11 million up for grabs for Malaysian shoppers. Starting from yesterday 11 November until 31 December, shoppers can redeem daily offers of deals and coupons with up to 90% discounts.
Marking the 11th of each month as ‘LOVE 11’ Day for consumers to enjoy significant giveaways
Exclusive Premiere of Thematic TVC – will be available nationwide via free to air TV networks and 11street’s YouTube channel starting from November 16th.
More quality products for ‘Shocking Deals’ promotions – double its variety of product listings to help consumers continue finding what they love at 11street
A stronger mobile app strategy for an enhanced shopping experience with more curated content with an improved user interface and user experience designs with additional personalized features. In line with this, 11street will be offering more mobile exclusive value deals and discounts.

There’s also a little trivia that Hoseok Kim, CEO of 11street, told us – in Korea, November 11 is commonly known as a day where people show their affection towards loved ones by exchanging chocolate sticks of Pepero. I guess that fits in the number  “1” really neatly!

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Apacer AH13A & AH15A USB Drives Have A “Snap Hook”

Whenever I ever went to any of the gadget stores recently, I see lots of USB drives. Most of them have this generic design they’re trying to achieve – either being extremely tiny as an “expandable storage” for laptops, or one that has OTG capabilities for easy data transfer. Apacer wants to bring more than just convenience with the AH13A and AH15A – and here’s what they’ve got.

Firstly, both the AH13A and AH15A has god an all metal finish design, as the former has a mirrored silver finish and the latter has a black nickel finish. For robustness of the chips inside the metal housing, Apacer used COB technology, also known as chip-on-board, to ensure that these USB drives are “accident-proof”.
By “accident-proof” I mean that both AH13A and AH15A are actually waterproof, dustproof, and shockproof! this is the true meaning of robustness of a portable device – and it only gets better.

Built with convenience in mind, the AH13A and AH15A have a snap hook that lets you hook into anything you like. Just press the button and attach it to any metal ring on your handbag or keychain as a piece of accessory. Since it’s a capless design, no one will have to worry about losing a cap. Also – let’s be honest, other USB drives with a plastic hole break off easily.
The AH15A are using USB 3.1 Gen 1 (USB 3.0), but the AH13A is using USB 2.0 standards. Both of them come in 8GB, 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB. However, the AH15A comes in a massive 128GB variant too.

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Xiaomi 3rd gen under-display camera is entering mass production

Some cool announcement from Xiaomi is their smartphones equipped with their 3rd Generation Under-Display Camera technology is entering mass production next year.
Originally, the announcement of this next-gen camera tech came after Mi 10 Ultra’s 120W graphene battery with its ability to perfectly disguise itself under normal light exposure to achieve the no punch-hole, waterdrops, and any kind of notches. Just the good-old panel at the front surface, nothing else.

The self-developed pixel arrangement used in Xiaomi’s 3rd Generation Under-Display Camera Technology allows the screen to pass light through the gap area of sub-pixels,  to retain a complete RGB subpixel layout without sacrificing pixel density for each of the pixels. With double the number of pixels than other competitors, it could capture the same level of brightness, color gamut and color accuracy like a standard camera could do.
It also adopts a special circuit design to hide more components under the RGB sub-pixels to further increase the light transmittance of the under-screen camera area for a fully updated photographic experience thanks to the company’s own optimization algorithm.
Take a look at the demo video to see the prototype in action or click here for the blog post about it.

My question is – what happened to the first and second generation of the under-display cameras?

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Upgrade Your VivoWatch For Omron Connect Support Sync

It’s great news for those who have an ASUS VivoWatch on their hands right now – because a new firmware update it out! This update is not your typical bug fix or incremental upgrade – it’s enables a whole new feature called the Omron Connect Support Sync.
In case you haven’t already know, the Omron Connect is an ecosystem of smart healthcare devices. So with this new update on your VivoWatch, it can finally talk to products which are running on Omron Connect systems. This offers a whole lot of benefits – and makes it easy to view insights to your health.

In ASUS’s case for the VivoWatch, all of these information will be shown in their own app, the ASUS HiVivo.
For more information of VivoWatch, HiVivo, and the Omron Connect:

Get ASUS HiVivo app (Android): https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.hivivo.dountapp
Get ASUS HiVivo app (iOS): https://itunes.apple.com/tw/app/hivivo-plus/id998460270
Learn more about ASUS VivoWatch: http://www.asus.com/VivoWatch
Learn more about the Omron Connect: http://www.omronconnect.com/my/en_gb/

Here are a few key highlight points.

Updated ASUS HiVivo app enables synchronization of health data with healthcare products that support the Omron Connect service
Connected GPS is a new ASUS HiVivo feature that lets users view their speed and distance on VivoWatch while exercising
The updated ASUS HiVivo app with Omron Connect integration is now available as a free download on the Google Play store and the App Store

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Review – OPPO A91: It’s a decent phone; but its price…

OPPO has a wide variety of devices available in the market nowadays. The new A series of smartphones from OPPO is curated for the mid-range market. With the mid-range market being so saturated with smartphones nowadays, how does the new OPPO A91 stand out from the rest?
Let’s just say that for the price of RM999, the OPPO A91 is not the cheapest smartphone in the mid-range segment. So what’s so unique about this phone?

Unboxing
The entire OPPO A91 box itself is fairly simple. We have the image of the phone itself and there’s also a RAM + storage configuration printed at the top right corner. Makes things easier for those who want to know the information at a glance.

Digging out everything, we have:

OPPO A91
20W Charger
A pair of earphones
Documentation
Clear TPU case
USB-C charging cable

And that’s about it. Pretty straightforward, in my opinion.

Design
Looking back at the box itself, the OPPO A91 should be available in the glistening color as well… but that’s not the case. For us here in Malaysia, we only have the Lightening Black color. Despite being named as “black”, it’s still a very shimmery color.

However, OPPO used a high gloss finish on the OPPO A91 – which means that it is very prone to scratches. Make sure to use that included TPU case. Luckily OPPO included a transparent case so that the shimmery Lightening Black can still be seen.

OPPO also made the A91 to be really thin – which is something that I think is worth mentioning.
Connectivity & Ports
Once again, nothing particularly wrong with the phone itself. It supports 5GHz WiFi and it uses USB-C for charging too.

It also comes with an audio jack and a total of 3 independent card slots too. There’s no eSIM support here so having triple card slots is definitely needed.

Display
OPPO opted for a decently-sized 6.4-inch AMOLED display with 2400×1080 pixels in resolution. The entire display looks and feels amazing and the colors are well-balanced. Of course, with an AMOLED screen means that OPPO is using an under-display fingerprint scanner too. Not something that I personally prefer, though.

There is a waterdrop notch at the top for its selfie camera and we’ve become accustomed to that for more than a year now.
Cameras
The cameras on the OPPO A91 are pretty basic for cameras of today’s mid-range smartphones. There are a total of 4 different cameras at the back of the phone – but only 2 of them are usable.

Quadruple rear-facing cameras

Main: 48MP (only 12MP is usable) f/1.8; PDAF
Ultra-wide angle: 8MP f/2.2
B/W sensor
Depth sensor

16MP f/2.0 selfie camera

Look at the specs itself, it’s quite weird that OPPO included a total of two sensors. That means if you’re not keen on using those two extra sensors for bokeh shows or whatnot, then they’re essentially there just for show.
Even the 48MP camera can only shoot 12MP pictures. There is no way to enable 48MP mode, so it’s defaulted to the pixel-binning mode by combining 4 pixels into 1.
Still, the picture quality turns out to be rather okay, as shown in our video at the top of this review. To view all the pictures taken with the OPPO A91, please watch the video at the top of this review.
Software – Android 9.0 Pie with ColorOS 6.1.2
We’ve used ColorOS 6 on many other smartphones in the past. It’s quite a good custom Android skin as it does its job nicely. There is some clunkiness here and there and there’s no dark mode, but it does its job well overall.
Performance & Gaming
The OPPO A91 is using a rather dated chipset. It is packed with:

6.4-inch AMOLED display

2400×1080 pixels in resolution
Waterdrop notch

MediaTek Helio P70 chipset
8GB RAM
128GB of internal storage
4,025mAh battery

Its overall performance… is rather disappointing since the chipset is rather old at this point in time. That MediaTek Helio P70 chipset is more than a year old now, and its performance is the same as the OPPO F11 Pro from a year ago.

Battery & Charger
Its battery life though… isn’t particularly bad. It can barely last throughout a day’s use, but we’ll have to be thrifty. It can achieve nearly 10 hours in our test so maybe we’ll have to lower the brightness to hit that 11-hour mark in our test.

Charger
With that 20W charger, the OPPO A91 can charge from 15% to 100% battery in just about 63 minutes. That’s quite good.

Wrapping up the OPPO A91 review
When we focus at only the phone itself, there is nothing wrong with the phone itself. The chipset might be a little dated, but it still works great. The camera is decent and the battery life is pretty okay.
When we take the price into consideration, that RM999 price tag makes it difficult for us to recommend it.
I think that if you can find the OPPO A91 during a flash sale or promotion, then it should be better. RM999 is just a tad bit high, in my opinion.

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Review – POCO X3 NFC: The best mid-range specs money can buy

POCO. It’s a brand that came out of nowhere and their focus is to bring the best specs at an unbelievably low price. They shook the world with the POCOPHONE F1 with its specs and an unbelievably low price tag, then shook the world once again with the recently-announced POCO F2 Pro. Now, they shook the world again with the new POCO X3 NFC.
So, I spent nearly a week with the POCO X3 NFC and this is what we have to share about it.

Performance
The world’s first smartphone with the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 732G chipset. Here is the full specs of the POCO X3 NFC that we have with us:

6.67-inch IPS LCD

2400×1080 pixels in resolution
120Hz refresh rate
240Hz sampling rate

Qualcomm Snapdragon 732G

Kyro 470 octa-core
Adreno 618 graphics

6GB LPDDR4X RAM
128GB of UFS 2.1 storage

Expandable via microSD

5,160mAh battery

Supports 33W charging

The overall performance of the POCO X3 NFC is actually as expected. It’s better than the Snapdragon 720G (as shown in the Redmi Note 9S) while having a noticeable difference in benchmarks. Then again, I doubt you’ll feel any difference if you’re comparing both Redmi Note 9S with the POCO X3 NFC when it comes to gaming.

Speaking of gaming, we also tested the POCO X3 NFC’s gaming capabilities. Needless to say, it’s performing really well. Funny enough – I’m not sure if it’s because the POCO X3 NFC is the first to use the Snapdragon 732G or just the developers not doing their due diligence – not all games can run at 120fps even when we set it to 120Hz.

Either way, we tested a few different games and they run, and yes – it can run at 120fps if the developers of the games allow it. We have clarified with POCO and we were informed that POCO did not blacklist any games from running games at 120fps, it’s the developers that are imposing the blacklist.
Screen
And since we’re already talking about the refresh rate and FPS, the screen. Ah yes, the POCO X3 NFC is using a 6.67-inch IPS LCD screen with 2400×1080 pixels in resolution that has a center punch hole at the center top of the display.

At first, I realized that the color temperature of the screen is slightly colder – but I then found out that the POCO X3 NFC has a feature that automatically adapts the screen’s colors based on the environment. Once I changed it back to “standard”, the colors returned back to how it should be.

Overall, this is a pretty nice display with good colors. The screen lamination is done well as there is no black glow around the punch hole selfie camera, but there is a tiny amount of it at the bottom. It’s hardly noticeable unless you know what you’re looking for – and it’s not something that we should be focused on.
Battery life
Now, what about battery life? Well, when we run at 60Hz, the 5,160mAh battery in the POCO X3 NFC can last for more than 18 hours in our battery life test. And that translates to 2 days worth of usage with just a single charge.

As for the charging speed, I am impressed. The POCO X3 NFC comes with a 33W charger bundled with the phone, and the charging time from about 15% to 100% in about 60 minutes. That’s pretty good!

Cameras
And now comes the cameras of the POCO X3 NFC. It comes with this list of cameras at the back:

Main: 64MP f/1.89
Ultra-wide angle: 13MP f/2.2; fixed focus
Macro: 2MP f/2.4
Depth sensor

And yes, the camera cutout does look a little weird. I mean, the unused portions of the camera bump are chopped off – and yes, it’s a camera bump because I didn’t expect it to be this thick.

Anyway, the cameras on the POCO X3 NFC can take some beautiful pictures and videos too. Check all of them out in the video at the top of this review.
Software – Android 10 with MIUI 12 for POCO
Alright, we’ve talked about MIUI 12 multiple times before. Check out our POCO F2 Pro review where we talk about it more. The usual complaints are still the same – the settings menu is still a mess but the updated camera app is really good.

Design
Okay, so now let’s talk a little about design. The POCO X3 NFC comes in two different colors – Shadow Gray and Cobalt Blue – the one we have here is the latter. Both of the colors come with this fancy design at the back – the shaded area with the POCO branding written with an iridescent material. Yes, the POCO name shines and changes color when looking at different colors.

It’s eye-catching for sure, and I have to say, I started to like the design after spending some time with the device. The phone also comes bundled with a transparent TPU case but the camera cutout is circular instead of the chopped off circle.

And before I forget – the POCO X3 NFC also comes with a few more different things – IR blaster which we have been accustomed to, which we actually use it to control our air conditioner, camera, TV, fans, and many other things.
The most surprising thing to me was the inclusion of stereo speakers on the POCO X3 NFC! That’s a rare feature to have on phones in general – let alone mid-range smartphones! Yeah sure – I know it’s not a real stereo speaker since it’s pointed at different directions – but it’s still stereo at the end of the day.

It also comes with a power+fingerprint button which is much better than an under-display fingerprint scanner but I still miss the physical fingerprint scanner at the back of the phone.
Should you buy the POCO X3 NFC?
Absolutely. POCO once again shattered the definition of a mid-range smartphone by including great specs, magnificent battery life alongside fast charging, and also some quality of life changes that are nice to have.

Now I know that I have mentioned that high refresh rate screens are not a necessity in smartphones, but hey – it comes with a 120Hz refresh rate screen and you can also run games at 120Hz despite some weird developer whitelist/blacklist situation going on now. That will definitely change as time goes on.
I mean, for the starting price of RM899 and the higher storage configuration at only RM1,099? The POCO X3 NFC is unbelievably low-priced.

Where to buy?

Shopee

6GB RAM + 64GB storage @ RM899
6GB RAM + 128GB storage @ RM1,099

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Digi’s 5G demonstrates 360° live broadcast of Langkawi’s Gunung Machinchang 500km away

The day of 5G is coming – and Digi is doing all that it can to demonstrate the power of 5G through a few high-speed usages that require truly low-latency transmission. One of these applications is to have some sort of real-time virtual tourism.
Malaysian Finance Minister, Lim Guan Eng, had the opportunity to experience a livestream of Malaysia’s first 5G-powered real-time virtual tourism use case, hosted by Digi Telecommunications Sdn Bhd (Digi) at Langkawi International Airport.

With 5G’s low-latency and high-speed transmission, Lim literally experienced a 360° view of Gunung Machinchang using a VR headset from about 500 kilometers away – which is at Cyberjaya. This was only as a part of a tour of Rekascape, where the 5G OpenLab by Digi and Cyberview was set up.
The 360° view was set up at the Langkawi International Airport to have visitors enjoy a livestream of Gunung Machinchang from a camera mounted at the Langkawi SkyCab middle station. With tourism, this show case is one of the many different possibilities of how 5G can be utilized.
The demonstration is open to the public until March 2020, and the virtual tourism experience was created in collaboration with Malaysia Airports and Panorama Langkawi and is part of Digi’s use case in the 5G Demonstration Project (5GDP). The 5GDP showcase in Langkawi is part of the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC)’s efforts to facilitate, develop and foster 5G use cases in a live but controlled environment.

Previously, the Malaysian Prime Minister, Tun Dr Mahathir, also witnessed real-time medical data transfer through Digi’s 5G. Paramedics inside the ambulances were able to communicate and provide data to doctors at Hospital Sultanah Maliha Langkawi during an emergency state.
It sure is interesting – and I really want to see if 5G can enable me to play games on Google Stadia. Or at least stream 4K 60fps videos smoothly.

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Alcatel announces the ONETOUCH POP C9

Alcatel is truly aiming at the budget range for their smartphones these days, and they just keep having new ones in the market!

Alcatel just announced that their new ONETOUCH POP C9 to be available in the Malaysian market in mid-February, which is now!
One thing to note is that the models available in Malaysia differ from other countries. The specs of the ONETOUCH POP C9 are :

1.3GHz Quad-core processor running on Android 4.2.2
5.5-inch IPS display running at 540×960 pixels
8MP rear-facing camera
1GB RAM, 4GB storage (2GB usable, expandable to 32GB)
Dual-SIM capability
2500mAh battery

Oh, it’s available in Full White and Slate too, which is basically just white and dark blue colour. As mentioned before this, these are the only two colours available in the Malaysian market.
Well for the phone of such specs, it is priced at an RRP of RM699. Is it better than the Moto G? Maybe, but for such a price you get a large 5.5-inch display. Combined with minimalist specs, surely it is good for the elderly. Surprisingly, it has quite a thin bezel too. Maybe it’ll be better if it has on-screen buttons instead of capacitive ones at the bottom.

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The Redmi Note 10S Starlight Purple and 9C with bigger storage capacity arrives in Malaysia next Wednesday

Xiaomi Malaysia is going to bring in the galactic Redmi Note 10S and the budget Redmi 9C with greater memory capacity into the country in the next few days.

These devices are simply new colors or a new set of configurations from old releases that we have talked about or reviewed in the past so we’ll put them down for a quick recap.
Redmi Note 10S

6.43-inch AMOLED DotDisplay

Middle Punch Hole Notch

MediaTek Helio G95 Chipset
8GB RAM
128GB Storage
Quadruple Rear Cameras

Main: 64MP f/1.8 with PDAF
Ultra-Wide: 8MP f/2.2
Macro: 2MP f/2.4
Depth Sensor

13MP Selfie Camera
5,000mAh Battery

33W Fast Charge

Redmi 9C

6.53-inch IPS LCD Display

Middle Punch Hole Notch

MediaTek Helio G35 Chipset
4GB RAM (Upgraded!)
128GB Storage (Upgraded!)
Triple Rear Cameras

Main: 13MP f/2.2
Macro: 2MP f/2.4
Depth Sensor

5MP Selfie Camera
5,000mAh Battery

10W Fast Charge

Pricing and Availability
Both of these devices will be launched on August 3 with the MSRP being RM899 for the Redmi Note 10S Starlight Purple edition and RM499 for the 4GB+128GB Redmi 9C. However, they are dedicated for offline sales as of now but online platform will be announced at a later date.

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vivo introducing the new Y55+ 5G smartphone in Malaysia

vivo Malaysia is introducing a new addition to its Y series family: the Y55+. Let’s check out what it has to bring to the table.
Looking for a smartphone that performs well and is reasonably priced? The Y55+ 5G is here to fulfill your needs as it’s packed with all the essential features of a modern smartphone.

Specifications

6.58″ 1080 FHD+ IPS Display, Waterdrop notch
MediaTek Dimensity 700 5G Chipset
6GB RAM
128GB Storage
Triple Rear Camera

Main: 50MP
Macro: 2MP
Bokeh: 2MP

8MP Selfie Camera
5,000mAh Battery (Fast charging 18W)
Available in Starlight Black and Glowing Galaxy

Pricing and Availability
The vivo Y55+ will be available starting from 9 June 2022 via vivo concept stores, YES online, and all YES stores, priced at RM1,099.
By the way, customers can also receive a free Y55+ while experiencing the unlimited high-speed 5G connectivity by subscribing to YES Infinite+ Basic plan for only RM58 per month without any upfront payment, hidden charges, and bill shock.
Kindly refer to vivo Malaysia’s official Facebook page for more information.

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Samsung Galaxy S20 series hands-on

Samsung Malaysia has invited us over to have a preview of the Galaxy S20 series. We got our hands on it and we have quite a few new discoveries beyond the specs list. We have already covered the basics of the Galaxy S20 series here.
Before we forget – the Galaxy S20 series pre-order details are already here. Both the Galaxy S20+ and Galaxy S20 Ultra pre-orders will receive the Galaxy Buds+, but it is on a first-come-first-serve basis. To learn more about the pre-order, click here.

Introducing the Samsung Galaxy S20 series

We will be talking about these devices one by one, as they do have their own differences from one another. I do realize the curvature of the screen is very minimal now. It’s not gone, but it’s just kept to a minimum.

For us Malaysians, all of the Galaxy S20 series are available in 128GB variants. They are expandable via microSD card too.
There is no headphone jack on all of the Galaxy S20 smartphones but it does have a much larger battery now. Even the base model Galaxy S20 now comes with a 4,000mAh battery.

All of the Samsung Galaxy S20 series of smartphones also come with 120Hz refresh rate at 1080p resolution. Once 1440p resolution is achieved, the refresh rate drops back to 60Hz. In a way, it’s logical to preserve battery and also GPU performance.
Galaxy S20
Let’s start with the smallest one. The Galaxy S20 is the new lowest entry point into the Galaxy S20 series of smartphones. The “e” variant of the flagship is no longer available, and the Galaxy S20 does have all of the features covered.

I do feel that the 6.2-inch display is very comfortable in the hand and great for those who prefer a smaller phone for one-handed operation. Another thing I like about the Galaxy S20 is going to be the colors. It’s available in a total of 3 different colors –  Cosmic Grey, Cloud Pink, and Cosmic Blue which is my favorite.

While the camera area is rather large in comparison with other phones, the camera hump on the Galaxy S20 is rather small.
The price of it is at RM3,599, and I think that’s a fair price.
Galaxy S20+
The Plus variant is now no longer the highest end in the Galaxy S series of smartphones. With that said, the Galaxy S20+ is still a commendably strong smartphone in the market with its set of features.
The Galaxy S20+ really does feel like a plus-size of the base model Galaxy S20 as it comes with a much larger 6.7-inch display now. All of the features are retained, and some are upgraded too – like the camera.

The Galaxy S20+ does come with the Depth Vision camera. It is essentially a TOF camera, which we have discussed here. We expect the Galaxy S20+ to be able to do 3D object scanning too, like the Galaxy Note10+ that we’ve reviewed here.

With that said, the camera cutout is larger than the Galaxy S20, but the bump is still rather tiny.
It does come with a larger 4,500mAh battery and it is priced at RM3,999. Available in a total of 3 different colors- the Cosmic Grey, Cosmic Black, and also Cloud Blue.
Galaxy S20 Ultra
Samsung is entering uncharted territory with the Galaxy S20 Ultra. Nothing was held back as Samsung gave their all into developing the Galaxy S20 Ultra.
Firstly, the much larger display. It has a 6.9-inch display which is nearly edge-to-edge and has rather tiny bezels around the display too. Surprisingly, the 6.9-inch display here doesn’t make the phone feel too big to hold. It’s just slightly larger than the Galaxy S10+.

Of course, the biggest difference here is the cameras. The Galaxy S20 Ultra comes with a 108MP camera sensor and has a feature to achieve up to 100x zoom, as we have shown in this short video here.

From what we can deduce, Samsung is using AI to process the image. So, the image might look heavily pixelated in the camera app, but the image clears up after taking the picture and viewing it in the gallery.
From what we’ve tested, the 108MP camera is able to take pictures in HDR too, which is unheard of. So far, any smartphones that are using 48MP, 64MP, or 108MP sensors cannot take pictures in HDR. Samsung is able to do it.
108MP HDR!
But that’s not all – the Galaxy S20 Ultra is also able to take videos in 8K 24fps with HDR enabled. That’s impressive!
Yeah. 8K video recording with HDR too.
Throughout our brief time with the Galaxy S20 Ultra, we discovered that there are some delay in taking 108MP pictures, but it is much better compared to the Xiaomi Mi Note 10.
The Galaxy S20 Ultra is available in Cosmic Grey and Cosmic Black colors at the price of RM4,999. It comes with a massive 5,000mAh battery too!

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Samsung Galaxy S10 Lite fully detailed; comes with crazy new OIS

Now, the Samsung Galaxy S10 Lite has been in the rumor mill for quite a lot of time. We’ve seen a bunch of rumors since, but today – the Galaxy S10 Lite completely exposed and we know nearly everything about this upcoming smartphone.
Nah, Samsung actually just officially unveiled the new Galaxy S10 Lite. Yes, it’s now official. No more leaks.

All About Samsung has posted this video on YouTube showcasing the Galaxy S10 Lite in all of its glory. We got all the details here and hey – it’s looking to be a great smartphone – but we still don’t have the price just yet.

Let’s just start with the specs first. Despite its “lite” postfix, the Samsung Galaxy S10 Lite is actually looking up to be a very strong flagship smartphone and comes with a humongous screen with lots of performance horsepower.

6.7-inch Super AMOLED display with 2400×1080 pixels in resolution

Punch-hole at the center-top

Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 chipset
Up to 8GB RAM
128GB internal storage (expandable via microSD)
Triple rear-facing cameras

Main: 48MP f/2.0 with a new Super Steady OIS system
Ultrawide angle: 12MP f/2.2
Macro: 5MP f/2.4

32MP f/2.2 selfie camera
4,500mAh battery

Supports 45W charging

Android 10 with Samsung One UI 2.0

The video also stated that the Galaxy S10 Lite will come with a plastic back and does not have the 3.5mm audio jack. That is quite a bummer since we can safely say now that Samsung is indeed leaving out the audio jack permanently.

One interesting feature here is the new super steady OIS. In the video, it is shown and stated that the new suspension that “compensates ±1~3%” of movement. This is a purely optical stabilization and has zero cropping. Since it is fully optical, there is no artifact like any other EIS systems on smartphones.
From the demonstration of the new super steady OIS, it looks very steady, as if there is a gimbal built right into the OIS system in the Galaxy S10 Lite.

The Galaxy S10 Lite already has some aspects of the upcoming Galaxy S11 (or Galaxy S20, whatever they want to call it), like how the camera bump looks. From what we can see, the camera bump isn’t that large anyway.

Like many other tech enthusiasts, I am quite confused by the release time – or perhaps the naming – of the Galaxy S10 Lite. Perhaps Samsung should wait for a little more and launch it as the Galaxy S11 Lite (or the Galaxy S20 Lite) instead.
Samsung has officially unveiled the Galaxy S10 Lite. We still do not have any details about its price yet, though.

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Samsung welcomes another member into the FE family with the new Galaxy Tab S7 FE

Samsung has officially launched the long-awaited Galaxy Tab S7 FE in Malaysia.

FE products are kind of a no-joke series as they really pack a ton of features and performance while being priced competitively all fueled by the feedbacks of fans and customer’s needs. So, for the new Galaxy Tab S7 FE, it packs a big 12.4 display for literally any kind of task from productivity to entertainment and the good news is the S-Pen is included – one price for all – to make your note jotting and digital drawing more efficient.
Additionally, the device is configured with Samsung DeX and by using that coupled with the Book Cover Keyboard, the tablet can essentially function as a PC. Or, literally, turn it into part of your PC setup by utilizing the Second Screen feature. At that price, it is really a flexible device that fills in multiple roles in a household or working environment.
Here’s a quick rundown of its spec sheet.

12.4-inch TFT LCD Display
Qualcomm Snapdragon 778G 5G Chipset
Up to 6 GB RAM
Up to 128GB Storage
Single 8MP Rear Camera
5MP Selfie Camera
10,090mAh Battery

45W Fast Charge

Black, Silver, Light Pink Colors

Price and Availability
The Samsung Galaxy Tab S7 FE is currently available for purchase in 2 configurations: 4GB+64GB for RM1,899 and 6GB+128GB for RM2,199 with extra gifts bundled for each purchase (Until October 31) which are a Book Cover (4GB+64GB, 6GB+128GB) and Smart Keyboard Trio 500 (6GB+128GB Only). Not only that, but all models also included free subscription plans for Youtube Premium (4 months) and Clip Studio Paint (6 months) to jumpstart your premium tablet experience.

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End 2021 with a blast with your lady by gifting her the OPPO Reno6 Z x Shiseido Gift Box

As 2021 comes to an end in like 40 days, OPPO Malaysia and beauty/skincare brand Shiseido have collaborated and released the OPPO Reno6 Z x Shiseido Gift Box to let you surprise your loved ones. A pretty smart idea to instill value into a limited edition product while keeping aesthetics and uniqueness in check.
On the other hand, if you’re curious about what the phone is capable of or to make sure it matches everything your girl needs, check out our review below to get the hang of it.

The gift box will go on sale officially starting December 2 but we are not sure which platform OPPO Malaysia will open up for the purchase so keep yourself updated through the brand’s Facebook page!

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