Sony WF-1000XM3 Review – The Standard-Bearer of True Wireless Earbuds

Sony WF-1000XM3 Review
Unboxing the Sony WF-1000XM3

With every purchase of the Sony WF-1000XM3 true wireless earphones with noise-canceling, this is what you’re expected to get:

USB-C cableUser guide and warrantySpare earbuds with 3 varying sizesCharging caseThe Sony WF-1000XM3 wireless earphones themselves
Appearance

As you can tell, the Sony WF-1000XM3 is the true wireless earbuds version of the WH-1000XM3 headphones. Compared to other similar products, it is rather large in size. On the back for both sides, you can see the Sony logo in rose gold / bronze accents and a circular pattern right beside it.
This circular pattern is the touch sensor, which allows you to activate certain functions like music control. There’s also a hidden LED light near the Sony logo which can only be seen when it lights up.

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At the top, you will see labels which denote which side of your ear each piece belongs to, denoted by red “R” and a white “L”. There’s also some product details listed here, particularly the model, voltage, and country.

Turn it over to the front, you have a good view of the ear plugs themselves. This is the in-ear type rather than the AirPods-style earphones. You can easily swap out the silicone earbuds here if you feel like the size doesn’t quite fit you. Sony provided a few of varying sizes for this purpose. There’s also 3-pins below that which is used to charge via the case.

Looking at the charging case itself, it is also noticeably big compared to other similar products. It’s mostly black with the same Rose Gold / Bronze colouring for the opening lid, where the Sony logo can be seen. There’s an LED light in the small hole between the lid and the body itself. The body isn’t a fingerprint magnet but it can be susceptible to staining.

The charging port on the case on the bottom of the charging case. In case you’re wondering, it uses a USB Type-C connector and there’s no wireless charging option.

Open up the charging case and you’ll have two earbud-sized holes, each denoted for their respective sides, with each one having three pins for charging purposes. It’s also magnetized so you know it’s the right fit when it automatically slips in. It’s a good design choice as it will prevent the buds from falling off even if you hold it upside down while the lid is open.
Overall, the Sony WF-1000XM3 is a good looking pair of wireless earbuds. Personally, the Silver colour option is the more attractive of the two as the Black colour option is a little bland. While it may be bigger than its competitors, it’s still very easy to carry around. There are also practical reasons for the size, which we’ll go over in a later section.
Specifications
Drivers6mm Neodymium DriversDome-type (Copper-Clad Aluminum Wire voice coil)Frequency Response20Hz – 20,000Hz (44.1kHz Sampling) Headphone TypeClosed, dynamicConnectorWiredUSB-CWirelessBluetooth 5.0 with A2DP, AVRCP, HFP, HSPNFCWireless Range10mNoise-cancellingYes, HD Noise-Canceling Processor QN1e BatteryEarphonesUp to 6 HoursCharging CaseUp to 18 Hours / 3 x Full ChargeWeight Earphones8.5g x 2Charging Case77gColourBlack and Silver
User Experience

If you’ve been a fan of their noise-cancelling headphones but want something easier to bring around, the Sony WF-1000XM3 can easily fit the bill. To my knowledge, it’s the only true wireless earbuds that offer noise-cancelling as a feature. Of course, that’s not the only thing that makes it a superior offering.
In an earlier section, I mentioned that it’s rather big compared to its competitors. This applies to both the charging case and earbuds themselves. There’s a good reason for this as it involves battery life. In total, you’re expected to have 24 hours consisting of 6 hours for the earbuds and 18 hours for the charging case.

Another way of looking at it is that the case itself can fully charge the buds at least three times. From my own experience, it’s quite accurate. I usually get close to 7 hours before I need to charge the buds, and I do get three full charges via the case. It’s definitely one of the better ones out there in this respect.
With size comes one minor problem however. While there’s no issues with the charging case itself, the Sony WF-1000XM3 earbuds can feel rather noticeable when wearing them. Usually it’s when you’re moving around or when you’re turning your head. Fortunately, it’s a snug fit so it won’t fall off your ears all of sudden. It’s just a matter of getting used to it.

Connecting the Sony WF-1000XM3 to devices is pretty easy. You can just opt to pair the device manually via Bluetooth or simply use NFC for an easier time. Keep in mind that the NFC is on the case, not the earbuds. When you’ve connected it at least once, it will automatically connect to that device when you take out the earbuds from the case in the future.
You can connect it to virtually anything with Bluetooth. I’ve personally tested it with my smartphone (HUAWEI Mate 20 X), my computer via the motherboard’s built-in Bluetooth feature, and the Nintendo Switch via the Bluetooth audio adapter. It even supports the microphone on the Sony WF-1000XM3 for voice.

The best listening experience is definitely on smartphone as you have more customization options via the Sony Headphones Connect app. You can play around with the equalizer, adjust the noise-cancelling / ambient sound levels, toggle settings like Adaptive Sound Control, and more. It’s easy to use and I doubt anyone would have trouble with the app.
The app allows you to customize the functions of the touch sensor. You can activate Google Assistant or set it to perform a specific action if you’d like on either side of the earbuds. What I don’t like is the lack of volume control with the earbuds alone. If you want to adjust volume, you’re gonna have to adjust it on the device it’s connected to.

As far as sound quality is concerned, it’s definitely a lot more enjoyable than I expected. You have some pretty solid, thumping bass, clear and crisp treble, and the lows are never muddy. With songs from the likes of Joji’s Slow Dancing in the Dark, to Draper’s Coloured Glass, to even DragonForce’s Through the Fire and Flames. I was thoroughly impressed by the quality.
One of the key elements to the enjoyable listening experience is their proprietary DSEE HX engine. What it does is that it upscales your songs to higher-resolution sound quality for an improved experience. Personally, I feel like songs in general sound better together with the Excited equalizer preset, but this is up to personal preference.

The noise-cancelling on the Sony WF-1000XM3 works like a charm. You can toggle between noise-cancelling, wind noise reduction, and ambient sound (up to 20 levels). While the noise-cancelling works better on headphones, it does a good job at silencing background noise. I could barely hear anything in my environment during my LRT and MRT commute.
When you’re on noise-cancelling or wind noise reduction, you can enable ambient sound by holding the touch sensors on the earbuds, similar to how you hold the sides on the headphone version. If you want the purest listening experience possible, go for the noise-cancelling option but personally, wind noise reduction already provides stellar results.

One thing that’s worth noting is that the Sony WF-1000XM3 doesn’t have a water resistance rating. While light sweating should still be okay, we’re uncertain if it will still be working fine in the long run if you use this while at the gym or out for a jog. While Sony did mention that it shouldn’t be a problem in these use cases, it’s something to think about especially if you sweat a lot.
The call quality using the Sony WF-1000XM3 is pretty great but your experience will vary depending on your environment. Friends told me that they can hear my voice loud and clear but the microphone range is rather wide. They told me that they can hear the mic picking up background sound as well, like my air-conditioner. The noise-cancelling does make it easier for you to hear the other person however, which is great.
Sony WF-1000XM3 Verdict

The Sony WF-1000XM3 is a pretty solid offering and is definitely high on the list of true wireless earbuds. The sound quality is superb, the battery life is one of the best around, and it’s the only one to include noise-cancelling so far. It is by no means a replacement for the WH-1000XM3 headphones however as it caters to a different kind of user.
It’s not the perfect pair of earbuds however as it does have its quirks. It doesn’t support aptX HD, the size is something you need to get used to, and there’s no easy volume control. If you can look past that, it’s one of the best ones around and it’s hard to be disappointed by it.
Its retail price of RM949 is pretty reasonable for what you’re getting. With that being said, I award the Sony WF-1000XM3 with our Gold Pokdeward.

We’d like to thank Sony Malaysia for providing us here at Pokde.net with the Sony WF-1000XM3 for this review.
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Pokde.net Top Picks: Best Games of 2017

2017 has been a great year in gaming so we here at Pokde.net decided to make a list of the best games to have been released this year. If you haven’t played any of these games, then you’ve definitely been missing out.
Pokde.net Top Picks: Best Games of 2017
It’s that time of the year again when we reminisce about what’s happened this year. It has been a great year in gaming so we wanted to take the time and reflect on some of our best experiences here in Pokde.net. By best experiences, I mean in video games. So without further ado, let’s hear from everyone in the Pokde crew of what they thought is their best game in 2017.
Aiman Maulana, Gaming Wizard of Pokde.net

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There were a bunch of games that I enjoyed in 2017 but the one game I enjoyed the most is definitely Horizon Zero Dawn. It is an action role-playing game set in a post-apocalyptic world that is populated by machines that behave like wild animals. Gamers follow the story of Aloy, a tribal outcast that was said to be born from the machines and prophesized to be the savior of the world.
Horizon Zero Dawn has one of the most enthralling storylines with gameplay that’s both familiar and entertaining. You will slowly discover civilization’s lost technology and why the world turned into the wasteland that it is in the game but what makes it so frightening is that the world that it used to be seems very similar to our world here in reality, which makes it very relatable to most gamers.

On top of that, you have the mix and mash of gameplay mechanics seen in other action role-playing games such as combat feel of The Witcher and the stealth mechanics of the Assassin’s Creed series while also mixing some original elements of their own, such as taming the mechanical beasts. All of this makes for a surprising entertaining game that should be played by both casuals and hardcore gamers.
Horizon Zero Dawn is currently available exclusively on the PlayStation 4 for RM199, and it includes the Frozen Wilds expansion pack.

Honourable mention for Tekken 7, as I believe that’s the game I’ve spent the most time with surprisingly this year (aside from Overwatch) and it made me fall in love fighting games and the fighting game community all over again. Sure, it wasn’t a perfect game and the storyline was a bit of a lie but I still loved it nonetheless. Do check out our full review of Tekken 7 by clicking here.
Vyncent Chan, Mobile Evangelist of Pokde.net

I don’t really have the time to game, juggling between work here and my studies, but if there is one game I am sure to fire up when I have the time, it’s Overwatch. While I convince myself that the game is good to slot between my busy periods as compared to DotA 2, I am pretty sure I end up spending the same amount of time anyway.
Overwatch keeps its allure to me with a nice tidbit of lore behind the characters every once in a while, and the frequent nerfing and “adjustments” of every other character other than Symmetra keeps the game interesting. As long as there isn’t a Symmetra in the other team. Nonetheless, every character has its counter, and it’s really just a souped-up FPS that does the trick for me.
There there are the lootboxes. It gives the thrill of gambling without actually having to spend any money on it. I am a sucker for the nice skins, so I have been grinding a lot, just for the boxes. The arcade mode? Great way to farm boxes every week. Speaking of which, the events are fun, with their exclusive game modes to mess around in. For Christmas we get the Yeti Hunter game mode, which is really fun especially when I entered as part of a 6-man stack.

A mobile game which has been getting my attention is Arena of Valor, a game which I got inducted into by none other than SuperDaddy and Raja Idris. It’s a fast-paced MOBA that was really quite easy to get into. Mastering the many heroes and even understanding the other heroes’ abilities are a whole different story though. Ah well, it’s a MOBA after all.
Raja Idris, Kingky Writer of Pokde.net

To be honest, this year hasn’t got me too excited in terms of games. If i had to choose one, it would be Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege. I know that the FPS game was released two years back, but with the new updates to the game this year, it really changed everything. Dare I say it, Siege is an adult’s CS:GO.
Despite limited time to play games, i find myself regularly playing it when I do have the spare moment. Sure, there’ll be some other games that I’d play, but in the end, I’d find my way back to it. With the Blood Orchid update, it brought fear to attacking operators as the game introduced some new characters in the form of Lesion, Ela, and Ying. It created a new tactical option/obstacle for everyone. Especially during the early moments of the update, when most likely than not, new additions often become imbalanced.

Now a thing about Siege is that, in order to be ‘decent’ in the game, you would need two things; a good headphone and good communication with your team mates. You might have played it or heard of it, but this game is really going to give you a hard reality-check if you think it’s similar to other FPS’ such as your typical COD, Battlefield, and the likes. Sure, it gets stressful sometimes by dying by a bullet to the head, but the feeling of winning in the game is satisfying, even more so when you do it with your friends.
Currently the game has 37 operators or characters to choose from, with each coming with different skills and equipment, offering different approach to each match. Another thing that I like about the game is that the environment (walls,hatches,windows,etc) can be destroyed and manipulated to your will. It gives a sense of freedom in the game, meaning it doesn’t mean you’d have to play it by this way or that way only, you have options.
At the time of writing, Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege (Standard Edition) is priced at RM20.99 on Steam and RM119 at the Playstation Store.
Syed Hassan Algadrie, Social Media Evangelist of Pokde.net
2017 is quite a memorable year for games with some really interesting highs such as the release and runaway success of the Nintendo Switch, and the really eye-opening lows such as the whole Mass Effect Andromeda debacle and the Star Wars Battlefront 2 disaster (both f**k-ups are products of everyone’s favourite company, EA).

To single out just one game out of many great games that came out this year as my personal best isn’t easy and I had to sit on this for quite some time. After much deliberation and sleepless nights, the best game of 2017 for me has got to be EA’s Star Wars Battlefront 2. The combination of a half-assed first player campaign and a microtransactions controversy that managed to piss off not just Star Wars fans but also the entire gaming community, who wouldn’t want that? Add to that an investigation by the Belgian government on whether the game’s loot boxes constitutes gambling or not and you’ve got the makings of one of the best games of 2017. Maybe even the best game of ALL TIME. Hat’s off to you EA, for being yet again the shining star of the video game world.

I’m kidding of course. My personal pick for game of the year (seriously) goes to a little known J-RPG from a little known franchise called Persona 5. I was initially a little worried for this game considering it’s numerous delays. However when Persona 5 finally launched it really took me by surprise with its amazingly cool art style, its roster of multi-layered characters as well as its rich and exciting story.
Right off the bat with it’s opening act you can tell that this game is going to be slightly different than its previous counterparts. The mystery noir aspect of the story works surprisingly well with the familiar beats of a Persona game. Add to that enjoyable gameplay, likeable characters, an amazing soundtrack and tight combat mechanics, you’ve got a recipe for one of the best games of 2017. Maybe of all time, even.

You don’t have to necessarily be a fan of the Persona series to like this game. It’s a completely standalone story with the vaguest of connections to the previous games, perfect for newcomers. Fair warning though, this game is a huge time consumer but trust me, every hour spent peeling back the layers of this insanely deep game is well worth it.
Persona 5 is currently only available on the PS3 and PS4 and is available on sale right now (until January 8) for RM 175.20 at the PlayStation Store. Original price is RM 219.
Super Daddy, Founder & Editor-in-Chief of Pokde.net
This year has been a Nintendo Switch and Mobile gaming year for me. I’ve avoided MOBA games for years because I know MOBA gets very addictive considering my experience playing strategy games like Starcraft, Warcraft III and the Red Alert franchise in my younger days, draining most of my productivity. However, 2017 was the year it all changed where I started indulging into some MOBA games mostly on mobile phone. I started off with Mobile Legends: Bang Bang, moved on to Heroes Evolved and when Garena’s Arena of Valor was released, I finally found my favourite past time. Now, before you make conclusions, I have indeed played Heroes of the Storm and explored League of Legends, but the portability that mobile MOBA provides is just different. I don’t have to dedicate special time for gaming and waiting is now a thing of the past when I’m out with the lady and kids.
Then again, none of the games that I have specified above wins the spot here still. Those are time killers certainly, but to be the game of the year for me, it needs to have plenty of wow factors and ultimately, it needs to give me the sensation of not wanting to end the game any sooner, where I’ll fire it up once in a while, and “sip” through the experience rather than binge all the way.

That game for me is definitely The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild on Nintendo Switch. It has a steep price of $59.99 USD and it does hurt the pocket but it’s definitely worth every single cent spent! Exploring Hyrule is never ending and as you unlock different areas of the map, the experience just gets enhanced again and again. With more than 100 Shrines to conquer, the fun just never ends. Funny enough, even in my early days, I’ve already travelled to the final destination where Ganon is residing which, while you might think that breaks the surprise, but because your level is too low, conquering is out of the question, begging you to quench your slaying thirst sooner than ever, yet subtly retains your patience as your keep hunting, farming and upgrading.
The open world itself is mind blowing. Your creativity keeps on getting satisfied. See an apple on the tree and want to jump and grab it? It works! Carrying a wood close to the fire, wondering if it will lit up? It works! Wondering if throwing objects at fish will actually kill it eventually? You bet! Never have I spent so much time in a game just trying one thing after another to see how far it will take me before I get disappointed and it just blows my mind on and on again.

The fighting mechanisms in itself are superb. No weapon is indestructible, and just when you wanted to keep that beautiful looking sword, you find another one that looks better and is stronger. The battle combos are plenty, I still can’t remember them all by heart and keep referring back to the guide, remember some, use them for a while, and then learn different sets again later on.
The Divine Beasts are definitely to die for (pun intended). It’s almost impossible to conquer them on the first attempt and after repeating them well over a hundred times, when you finally managed to kill them, the satisfaction is just, Ooh La La!
If it has been this impressive on the console, the experience on the PC is definitely far more superior with much more potential graphics-wise. This is definitely the game that I would award as Game Of The Year 2017!
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Samsung smartphones will tout AMD RDNA GPUs by 2021

If you are looking forward to getting a Samsung smartphone with chart-topping GPU performance, you might have to wait until 2021. This timeline was reportedly revealed by a Samsung rep talking about RDNA. In June, Samsung signed a partnership with AMD to harness AMD’s RDNA architecture in their upcoming mobile devices, so we knew this was coming.

Currently Qualcomm has been delivering extremely powerful GPUs in the mobile space with their Adreno GPUs. Interestingly enough, the Adreno GPUs were derived from ATI Technologies’ IPs back in the day, and now we see Samsung working with AMD to harness the RDNA architecture behind the AMD Navi GPUs. The partnership should help overcome Samsung’s only weakness: their GPU performance.

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As it stands, Samsung has been delivering impressive CPU performance year after year with their Exynos chipsets.  Qualcomm might be in for a challenging 2021 unless they achieve some breakthrough in both their CPU and GPU performance. The mid-range market is seeing increasing competition, with both MediaTek and HUAWEI serving up chips that threaten Qualcomm’s mid-range chipsets.

But for now, the Snapdragon 855 and the binned Snapdragon 855+ are the kings of the flagship smartphone arena, and you just can’t go wrong getting one.
Pokdepinion: Definitely looking forward to Samsung applying some pressure on Qualcomm. We all know how competition drives the industry forward.
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Xiaomi Rumoured To Come Out With First 200MP Camera Smartphone

There have been reports of Xiaomi working on a smartphone that will feature a 200MP sensor on its rear main camera. The report comes from serial leaker Digital Chat Station over on Weibo which, if true, would make Xiaomi the first manufacturer to come out with a smartphone that comes equipped with a 200MP rear camera.
200MP Xiaomi smartphone incoming?
As of right now, the highest megapixel count for a smartphone camera is 108MP and is found on devices from brands like Samsung, Realme, and even Xiaomi themselves such as the MI 11 series as well as the more budget-friendly Redmi Note 10 Pro. The report also says that Xiaomi will be working with Samsung on the 200MP sensor and according to another leaker. IceUniverse, the sensor will feature 0.64μm unit pixels. This is significantly less than the pixel area of the ISOCELL GN2, which features 1.4μm unit pixels.

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Back in January, IceUniverse was the one who broke the news that Samsung might be working on a 200MP sensor under their ISOCELL brand. As of right now, there is no confirmation in regards to the sensor itself. There are also rumours that the sensor might make its debut on smartphones that are powered by the Snapdragon 870 SoC, seeing that the processor features support for 200MP photos. Until then, tune in to us at Pokde.net for more updates.
Source
Pokdepinion: If this is true, this would be pretty amazing where smartphone photography is concerned, at least on paper. I’ll be looking forward to seeing if this would indeed be true and how the sensor actually performs in reality.
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HUAWEI P30 Series Rewrites the Rules of Photography with these cutting-edge features!

The HUAWEI P30 Series is the latest flagship from the Chinese smartphone giant, and it comes with a slew of features to improve its photography capabilities. With a tagline like “Rewrite the Rules of Photography”, expectations are going to be high. And of course, HUAWEI will be delivering on their promise. Here are the features that will help you elevate your photography experience with the HUAWEI P30 Series.
#1 40MP HUAWEI SuperSpectrum sensor

HUAWEI equipped the HUAWEI P30 Series with their latest 40MP HUAWEI SuperSpectrum sensors. Measuring in at 1/1.7″, the HUAWEI SuperSpectrum sensor is larger than even the latest 48MP Sony IMX586/Samsung GM1 sensors. To further improve the light capturing capability of the sensor, HUAWEI used a new RYYB color filter instead of the age old RGGB Bayer color filter, giving it 40% higher light sensitivity than the previous generation of 40MP sensors. The result? Beautiful colors even in extreme low light conditions.

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#2 SuperZoom brings you 50x closer to the action

Previous smartphones offered a maximum of 3x optical zoom. HUAWEI now offers 5x optical zoom with the HUAWEI P30 Pro, thanks to an innovative periscope lens structure. But that’s not all. HUAWEI equipped the HUAWEI P30 Pro’s SuperZoom camera with OIS, so you can take better photos with the telephoto camera without worrying about your hand vibrations blurring your once-in-a-lifetime shot. And for those of you who want to take photos of objects further than the eye can see, there’s the 50x zooming capability.
50x zoom in a smartphone. Only available on the HUAWEI P30 Pro.
The HUAWEI P30 has a lesser 3x optical zoom lens, but it still offers a similarly impressive 30x maximum zoom range. And of course, there’s the moon shot which HUAWEI is very proud of to show off.
#3 Ultra-wide angle cameras that also brings you closer
The HUAWEI P30 Series’ ultra-wide angle camera is also capable of focusing at just 2.5cm away from the subject!
Ultra-wide angle cameras give you a wider perspective, allowing you take in more of the environment. It’s really refreshing and I really like to have ultra-wide angle cameras on my device. The HUAWEI P30 Series feature some of the best ultra-wide angle cameras, with the HUAWEI P30 Pro featuring a 20MP f/2.2 ultra-wide angle camera. HUAWEI also designed the ultra-wide angle cameras on the HUAWEI P30 Series to tout autofocusing, and also added the capability to do macro photography from as near as 2.5cm from the subject. If you are into macro photography, the HUAWEI P30 Series are definitely your top choice.
#4 Better bokeh with 3D ToF sensor
HUAWEI’s quad camera configuration consists of a telephoto lens, a wide-angle lens, an ultra-wide angle lens and a 3D ToF sensor.
It’s near-impossible to have real, physical bokeh due to a shallow depth of field with a smartphone. The next best thing is software-enhanced bokeh, which HUAWEI has been offering on their devices since the HUAWEI P9. You can have multiple cameras to work out the depth data of the scene you are capturing and blur the subject. Regular cameras can do a decent job, but a 3D time-of-flight (ToF) sensor like the one on the HUAWEI P30 Pro is purpose-built to determine the distance of an object from the device, giving you accurate bokeh. In addition to that, the AI capabilities of Kirin 980 in the HUAWEI P30 Pro gives it the ability to identify the object’s boundaries better and give you a more natural blurring effect than previous models.
The HUAWEI P30 Pro features a 3D ToF sensor to better capture depth data for more realistic blurring.
#5 Long battery life to capture more

This probably isn’t a camera feature per se, but then again, it would be quite difficult to take nice photos when you have a powerbank dangling from the phone… Thus the HUAWEI P30 and HUAWEI P30 Pro come with a 3650 mAh and 4200 mAh battery, respectively. Coupled with the efficient Kirin 980 chipset based on the latest 7nm process node, the HUAWEI P30 Series is set to last a long, long time as you snap away till your heart’s content.

You can now get the HUAWEI P30 and HUAWEI P30 Pro from just RM2699 and RM3799 respectively, with a choice of three colors: Black, Aurora and Breathing Crystal. The following are the prices of the HUAWEI P30 and HUAWEI P30 Pro variants available in Malaysia:

HUAWEI P30 (8GB + 128GB): RM2699
HUAWEI P30 Pro (8GB + 256GB): RM3799
HUAWEI P30 Pro (8GB + 512GB): RM4799

Rewriting the Rules of Photography isn’t nearly as expensive as you thought. And since you will be getting the best smartphone camera in the market, why not put it to use in HUAWEI’s NEXT Image Awards to be in the running to win up to USD 20 000 (~RM82 306) and other prizes.
HUAWEI NEXT Image Awards 2019
Just like previous years, HUAWEI will be accepting submissions in 6 different categories:

Faces
Experimenting with identity and the power of portraiture

Going the Distance
Discovering new places and new experiences by using new features of the smartphone camera, for instance tele-lens, super wide angle or macro-shooting

Hello, Life!
Sharing the emotion or the inspiration in everyday experiences

Storyboard
Telling a story in 9 frames – a grid of photos that develop a meaningful or intriguing narrative

#Emotion Tag
Expressing instant emotions by means of photography

Life Now
Filming stories in less than 30 seconds.

All submissions will also receive an additional RM50 voucher from https://shop.huawei.com/my/events/huawei-next-image-2019.html. Time to upload your amazing shots to win a share of the prize money NOW! If you don’t own a HUAWEI P30 device yet, get it here from HUAWEI Malaysia’s Official Online Store.
This is an exclusive article for HUAWEI Malaysia.
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Three Acer Products Won the 2018 Good Design Awards – Outstanding Design

Three Acer Products Won the 2018 Good Design Awards

Acer has yet another achievement under their bag, or multiple achievement depending on how you see it, as three of their products have won the 2018 Good Design Awards for outstanding product design.
The three products are the Acer Swift 7 laptop, the Chromebook 11, and the Acer OJO 500 Windows Mixed Reality headset. It is said that these products were selected from thousands of entries from across the globe by an independent panel of experts. They were assessed based on innovation, quality, functionality, and eco-friendliness.

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For those of you who aren’t aware, the Acer Swift 7 is currently the world’s thinnest laptop, at only 8.98 mm thin. It is powered by the Intel Core i7 CPU, and is said to have a lengthy battery life, 14-inch Full HD Corning Gorilla Glass NBT IPS touchscreen display, and 4G LTE connection with embedded SIM technology. This makes it a viable laptop for those who are always on-the-go.
The Chromebook 11 on the other hand is designed as a rugged and durable machine, capable of handling most bumps and spills. The reinforced case and hinges make it more resistant to twisting and stress, making it perfect for students who always have their bags stuffed with books and other study materials. It is said to be capable of handling drops from heights up to 122 cm.
The Acer OJO 500 Windows Mixed Reality headset is the successor to their previous Mixed Reality headset, featuring a detachable design for easy storing and cleaning, built-in interpupillary distance (IPD) wheel, and a patented smartphone app to measure IPD distance. The integrated audio system uses a sound pipe design that directs sound from built-in speakers to the user’s ears, the first of its kind in VR headsets. This means that you can hear audio without using headphones.
With their achievement on the 2018 Good Design Awards, Acer mentioned that they will continue their efforts toward forward thinking, yet functional design for future products.
Pokdepinion: Congratulations to Acer for the 2018 Good Design Awards. I am personally very interested in the new OJO 500 headset, hoping that it reaches Malaysia sooner rather than later.
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Maybank Confirms Data Leak Allegations are False

Despite recent information pointing towards a potential data breach on their end, Maybank has confirmed that the data leak allegations are false.
Maybank Data Leak Allegations Aren’t True After All?

After word got out that Maybank apparently had some form of data leak recently, they have officially addressed the matter by stating that the allegations aren’t true. In case you missed out, there is a database advertised in a forum in late December 2022 containing over 1.8 million lines supposedly coming from the bank.

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The statement, which we received via email, reads:
Following the conclusion of our investigation into the allegation by a third party regarding a purported customer data leak, Maybank can confirm that these claims are false. The Bank would like to reassure its customers that their data remains secure and private and that no customer data has been compromised. Maybank will continue to prioritise its cyber security and data protection measures as customer data protection is of utmost importance to the Bank.
Maybank
With that bbeing said however, the supposed database within the listing still contained someone’s personal data, which would make us wonder where did it come from. The investigation into the matter will likely continue for now so we will report more on this as soon as information becomes available.
Source
Pokdepinion: Perhaps there has been no recent data breaches on their end but the data could be from a much older database, who knows? Got to wait and see where the investigations will take us.
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OPPO Reno Set To Launch In Malaysia On 16 May 2019

The folks from OPPO Malaysia has revealed that their new OPPO Reno smartphone will be launching in the country this 16th of May 2019, which isn’t far from now.
OPPO Reno comes with a dual 48MP+5MP camera at the back and features a 16MP pop-up sharkfin camera for selfies. It boasts the company’s Ultra Night Mode 2.0, which has been updated witha  new addition of an AI portrait optimization for night photography that allows you to capture better images in low-light conditions. Other than that, it comes with OPPO’s very own VOOC 3.0 Flash Charge technology.
OPPO Reno Specifications

Snapdragon 710
Up to 8GB RAM
Up to 256GB storage
6.4″ FHD+ AMOLED display, 93.1% screen-to-body ratio
48MP f/1.7 + 5MP f/2.4 depth sensor
16MP f/2.0 selfie camera, sharkfin popup
ColorOS 6 based on Android 9 Pie
3765 mAh battery, 20W VOOC Flash Charge 3.0

With the phone pretty much let known to the public already, the only missing detail is the price of the phone. We will learn more as we get nearer to its launch date, so until then watch this space.

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In case you’ve missed it, OPPO has another variant, which is called the OPPO Reno 10x Zoom. You can click on the link to read more on that.
Pokdepinion: I don’t think the pricing will be sweet like the OPPO F11 Pro Marvel’s Avengers Limited Edition phone..
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We Want YOU To Play The Last of Us Part II With Us!

If you follow us here in Pokde.net, you would certainly notice that we’ve posted our very own review of PS4’s latest exclusive title, The Last of US Part II. To spice things up a bit, we want you to play the game with us in our upcoming PokdeLIVE stream.
Play The Last of Us Part II on PokdeLIVE!

The stream will happen this coming Friday, the 19th of June 2020 at 9pm. Interested in playing the game with us? Well you simply need to follow the steps below:
Go to our The Last of Us Part II review and comment on the article on why do you want to play the game: https://pokde.net/review/the-last-of-us-part-ii-review/Like and share our Facebook postTag 2 friends and include the hashtags #TheLastofUsPartII #PokdeLIVE
Pretty simple right? By Thursday, 18 June 2020, we will announce the lucky winner (randomly chosen) that will get to play the game with us. Be sure to make your account Public so that we can see you’ve followed the steps. All the best!

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PlayStation Rumoured to Run “Massive” Showcase Before E3 2023

The PlayStation team may not be participating in E3 2023 but they apparently have something “massive” to showcase before it.
PlayStation May Not Be At E3 2023, But They Have Something Big to Show Off

PlayStation is gearing up for a potentially massive showcase event later this year that will set the tone for the next phase of the PlayStation 5, according to reports from industry insider and journalist Jeff Grubb. Grubb expects the event to take place before E3 in June and has revealed that Sony’s developers are now ready to showcase their latest offerings to fans.
During a recent episode of Jeff Grubb’s Game Mess, the journalist discussed the recent State of Play event and stated that “they’re saving their good stuff for the PlayStation showcase, that’s gonna happen before E3.” He went on to explain that the showcase was originally planned for last fall but was delayed as developers weren’t ready.

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Grubb has now revealed that Sony’s developers are prepared to showcase their latest titles and that the event will be a significant one that sets up the second phase of the PlayStation 5. While Grubb didn’t mention any specific developers, Sony has several first-party studios working on major triple-A titles, including Insomniac Games, which is currently developing Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 and Marvel’s Wolverine.

The upcoming “massive” showcase event could provide fans with a first look at these highly anticipated titles, with Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 slated for release in fall 2023. Other titles from Sony’s first-party studios could also be showcased, providing fans with an exciting glimpse of what’s to come.
In a recent State of Play event, PlayStation showcased a range of VR titles for the recently released PSVR 2 headset, along with a new look at Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League from Rocksteady Studios. However, the game has come under fire following the reveal that it would require a permanent online connection even for single-player.
Source
Pokdepinion: PlayStation fans have much to look forward to this year, with a potentially massive showcase event that could set the stage for the next phase of the PlayStation 5. With several first-party studios working on major titles, fans are sure to be in for a treat, and the event could provide an exciting glimpse into the future of gaming on the platform.
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PS Studios Exclusive Games Will Come to PC After 1 Year

More PlayStation exclusive games will be coming to PC soon as the ones developed by PS Studios are expected to arrive after 1 year. Essentially, we’re looking at a shorter time frame for PC ports of PlayStation games.
PS Studios: More PlayStation Games on PC Soon

In a recent interview with YouTuber Julien Chièze, PlayStation Studios Head Hermen Hulst mentioned PC versions of PlayStation Studios-exclusive games on PS4 and PS5 will be coming at least after a year from here on out. The idea here is to shorten the time it takes to port the games over to PC, except for the ones with live services.

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I think going forward, we’ll see at least a year between releases on our own platform, on PlayStation, and on the PC platform, possibly with the exception of live-service games.
Live-service games are a little bit different in nature because you want to have really strong community, strong engagement right away… So we might, in the case of our live-service offerings, go day and date with PC and the PlayStation platform.
Herman Hulst

Of course, this doesn’t necessarily mean that PlayStation Studios’ games will be coming to PC immediately after a year but rather, that’s the minimum that gamers should wait for ports to arrive. It does at least spark some confidence in seeing the games arrive earlier than usual.
If we’re lucky, we might just see the likes of Horizon Forbidden West and God of War Ragnarok arrive as early as 2023. For now, don’t get your hope up too high just yet. We will report more on this as soon as information becomes available so stay tuned.
Source
Pokdepinion: Their games are selling well on PC. If anything, I see the time frame being shorter and shorter as we go by.
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Mi Curved Gaming Monitor 34-inch With 144Hz Arrives In Malaysia At RM1,999

Xiaomi Malaysia has today announced the arrival of their Mi Curved Gaming Monitor 34-inch as well as the Mi Portable Photo Printer as part of their latest ecosystem products.
Mi Curved Gaming Monitor 34-inch & Mi Portable Photo Printer now available

Featuring a WQHD 3340×1440 resolution, the Mi Curved Gaming Monitor 34-inch comes with a 21:9 ultra-wide ratio display. It also offers a 1500R curvature to add to that.
You can also expect a 144Hz refresh rate to enjoy your games and it comes with a 4ms response time. In terms of its color gamut, it covers 121% sRGB.

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If you’re interested in the Mi Curved Gaming Monitor 34-inch, you can purchase it at the official Xiaomi store on Lazada, authorized Mi Stores in the country as well as other official offline retailers for the price of RM1,999.

Besides the monitor, there’s the Mi Portable Photo Printer on hand. It’s the perfect pocket-sized smartphone accessory that prints out your shots.
Coming with a 500mAh battery, it’s capable of printing 20 sticky photos sized at 2×3-inch on a single charge, or so Xiaomi claims. Able to support Bluetooth 5.0 connectivity, it can connect up to 3 devices simultaneously.
You can also edit, add filters and AR effects through the Mi Home app. Other than that, the Mi Portable Photo Printer comes with a USB charging cable, as well as a pack of Photo Paper (5 sheets).
Interested in it? You can get it for the price of RM249 starting from today similarly like the Mi Curved Gaming Monitor 34-inch at the official store on Lazada and offline at their authorized Mi Stores plus official offline retailers.
Pokdepinion: Personally not a big fan of displays bigger than 24-inches. But then again, that’s just me. Pretty sure that there’s people out there who just love big plus curved displays. Will you be getting it? Let us know in the comments.
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PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds Sets New Record; Surpasses DotA 2

It looks like PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds have reached yet another milestone in such a short amount of time. This time surpassing popular MOBA, DotA 2.

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds Sets New Record

Highest peak player count on @steam_games! A sincere thank you to all our players & the amazing @PUBATTLEGROUNDS team I get to work with! GG pic.twitter.com/z8V2rdmQmm
— PLAYERUNKNOWN (@PLAYERUNKNOWN) September 16, 2017

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A particular record that people thought cannot be broken for this generation has actually been broken. It appears that Dota 2’s record for the most concurrent players on Steam has been broken by PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, a non-Valve game that isn’t even out of Early Access yet.
For those unfamiliar with the term “concurrent players,” all this means is that PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds has had more people play it at once than any other game in Steam history.
The news comes via PLAYERUNKNOWN’s (aka Brendan Green, the game’s creative director) Twitter account, where it was revealed that today the battle-royale shooter hit 1,342,857 players, healthily beating out Dota 2’s previous record-holding figure of 1,295,114.

According to Steam’s stats, PUGB further padded it’s world-record breaking figure, peaking at 1,349,584 players.
The question now is: where does PUGB go from here? Well, when you consider that it only broke the 1 million concurrent player threshold less than eight days ago, which means it grew a very healthy 35% since, it could and should continue to rise. Which poses another question: where does it peak? 1,500,000 seems doable. 2,000,000? Maybe? Who knows. Only time will tell.
PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is currently available on PC via Steam Early Access for $29.99 USD / RM74.99.  A full release is expected to come sometime in 2018. Moreover, an Xbox One version (via Xbox Game Preview) is expected to arrive later this year.

Pokdepinion: You thought they were gonna slow down already? Not a chance. It looks like PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds continue to plow through the competition and prove that it’s not only here to stay, it’s here to dominate. All while in the comfort of Steam Early Access.
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Diablo 4 On PC To Come With Controller Support And 2-player Co-op

The folks at Blizzard has confirmed some details on their upcoming game titles, Diablo 4, or Diablo IV in preference to some out there. The big news? Well the game will be the first in the franchise to offer support for controllers (on PC, of course).

Blizzard has said that they are doing their best in trying to uniform both PC and console versions of the game. Here’s what they had to say:
We wanted to give players the ability to switch between the two options freely, so our UI needed to be unified enough that swapping hardware inputs on-the-fly wouldn’t throw people completely off kilter. A unified UI means our layouts are more grid-based for ease of navigation, but it doesn’t necessarily mean an identical interaction flow.
It’s also said that they are giving you the option to customize your skill bar, your preferred button layout, as well as keybindings for the game.

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Aside from that, they have revealed that they will also be offering 2-player co-op gameplay. Though it’s worth mentioning that the game is online-only and can’t be played offline.
Source
Pokdepinion: I honestly can’t wait for the game. Been a fan of the series for so long. Let’s just hope everything goes smoothly… though I don’t think we can expect the game to be out anytime soon..
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LG announces the new G7 One and G7 Fit — premium features without the excess you don’t need!

LG will be introducing two brand new additions to their G7 series in the form of the LG G7 One and G7 Fit at IFA 2018.
LG G7 One & LG G7 Fit Set For IFA 2018
LG G7 One
Inspired from their LG G7 ThinQ, both phones offer a balance of premium features while being priced at exceptional prices, the company has said.
In today’s world, there are users that aren’t satisfied with mediocre components but also don’t want to spend a fortune for over-the-top features on smartphones. It is a challenge in finding the right balance. With these two new phones, they hope to give a solution to users.

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The LG G7 One is the first Android One device from the company that brings together the best of the experience you can get from LG that is coupled with Google’s latest smartphone OS innovations. It features a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 SoC and comes with 4GB RAM that’s paired with 32GB of internal storage.
It features a 6.1-inch QHD+ Super Bright Display and comes with the same all-glass design aesthetics of the LG G7 ThinQ with a polished metal rim.
Running on Android 8.1 Oreo out of the box, it also features the Boombox Speaker which uses the internal space of the phone as a resonance chamber to deliver double the bass and audio of conventional smartphones. It also packs a 3000mAh battery to power it up.
LG G7 Fit
On to the LG G7 Fit, it is designed to bridge the gap between mid-range and flagship devices. Offering a Snapdragon 821 coupled with 4GB RAM and 32GB/64GB of internal storage, it comes with a 6.1-inch LCD FullVision display with QHD+.
Other features include AI CAM, 32-bit Hi-Fi Quad DAC, Boombox Speaker and DTS:X 3D Surround Sound.  Camera wise, it offers a 16MP main shooter and a 8MP front camera. Under the hood is a 3000mAh battery.
Pokdepinion: My question is, will they be even coming to Malaysia? I have my doubts but I do hope that they will though.
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OPPO Collabs With National Shuttler Lee Zii Jia To Produce Original Song For Malaysians

OPPO has just announced that Malaysian badminton player Lee Zii Jia has joined the OPPO family. Malaysians are familiar with the renowned athlete because of his many contributions to make our country proud. His heroic performance on the court lately brought the country together, with many encouraging the 23-year-old to keep going. Lee now wants to return stronger and wishes to show his genuine gratitude to Malaysians through an original song that he would sing.
National badminton player Lee Zii Jia releases new original song in collaboration with OPPO

As a result, OPPO collaborated with Lee Zii Jia to create a song called “Ten Thousand Emotions, in Portrait”. Lee will sing about the various emotions he has experienced throughout his journey to coincide with the debut of the OPPO Reno6 Z, which is meant to capture every emotion in portrait. Lee Zii Jia will bare everything in a song with his guitar, from bitter and terrible situations to pleasant and successful ones! The music video will be released shortly.

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Both the OPPO Reno6 5G and Reno6 Z are currently slated to launch in Malaysia this 5 August with advanced pre-orders open at the moment. For more information on how you can place your advanced pre-orders for the OPPO Reno6 series smartphones, head over here.
Pokdepinion: This is a pretty unique collaboration I would say. For one, I had no idea Lee Zii Jia could sing so I’m looking forward to listening to this “Ten Thousand Emotions, in Portrait” song.
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Ubisoft Announce Riders Republic Beta

Just recently, the folks at Ubisoft has announced of the Riders Republic Beta, which will be available on PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X, Xbox One, as well as PC.
Riders Republic Beta

The beta will be available on the 23rd of August till the 25th of the same month on the mentioned platforms where it will give players a first glimpse of 3 careers such as Bike Races, Snow Tricks, and Air Sports (Rocketwing and Wingsuit).
You can participate in multiplayer modes such as:

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Mass Races – Compete in multisport races with more than 50 players. New races appear randomly on the map every hour, so players will need to get ready to watch their blind spots, protect their position and remain agile with their skills as they fight their way to the finish line
Tricks Battle – Participate in 6v6 matchups and try to land as many tricks as possible on various modules to capture them and earn point
Free for All – Challenge new opponents and show them how it’s done through a select playlist of events
Versus Mode – Players can join up with friends in their career progression and see who’s the very best

If you are interested in the Riders Republic Beta, you can sign up here. It will be available for preload starting from the 21st of August where all multiplayer modes and career events can be experienced with up to 5 riders and players will be able to send a Beta invitation to 2 friends.
The game is now available for pre-order where you can get the Gold and Ultimate Editions. They include Year passes as well as the usual cosmetic packs, which is expected from Ubisoft titles.
For more on the latest tech and gaming news plus reviews, stay tuned to Pokde.net.
Pokdepinion: The game sure looks fun to play together with your friends. All that I’m worried about is its longevity. How long can the game keep me hooked? Let’s just hope that it’s good enough.
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Street Fighter 6 To Have a Special Control Scheme for Button Mashers

Capcom is being considerate for a wide variety of gamers, including button mashers, with a number of control schemes included in Street Fighter 6.
Street Fighter 6 to Encourage Button Mashers? Somewhat

Exclusive first look at Street Fighter 6’s Dynamic Controls, a new local-only control option meant to help button mashers excel
Read/watch: https://t.co/RRojOohvYn pic.twitter.com/W2N6aG1I8H
— Game Informer (@gameinformer) November 8, 2022

As revealed previously, the upcoming Street Fighter 6 will have Classic Controls, which divides light, meidum, and heavy kicks and punches like early entries in the franchise, and Modern Controls, which simplifies it with light, medium, and heavy attacks instead.

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Now, we have learned that there is a 3rd control scheme, and it’s Dynamic Controls. Essentially, buttons will be labeled with auto-attacks, and the game’s AI will dynamically decide which attacks to do for you based on your character position in relation to your opponent.

If you’re far from the opponent, your character would throw a projectile like a Hadouken but if you’re near, you would throw a melee attack like a Shoryuken. While there is no word on exactly how much it will vary, especially with combos, it’s certainly a control scheme that would benefit button mashers.
According to game director Takayuki Nakayama, the Dynamic Control scheme for Street Fighter 6 was designed for beginners and those who just want to play the game for fun. It will also only be available for local play, so you can’t use this for online play, likely to avoid unfair play in the competitive scene.
Street Fighter 6 will be launching for the PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series, and PC sometime in 2023.
Source
Pokdepinion: I personally feel that it’s a great move by Capcom so you get more people to dip their toes in the game. It’s also a way to let people know what they can pull off if they try to learn a bit more about the game.
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10x Speed Boost for Unifi Turbo at No Extra Charge? That Might Just Happen

It appears that customers may be able to look forward to TM Unifi Turbo with 10x speed boost without any additional charges soon.
10x Speed Boost for Unifi Turbo at No Extra Charge?

Hi there! Just to clarify, the unifi turbo plans will have a 10X increase in broadband speeds at no additional cost to existing home and business customers 😊
— unifi (@unifi) July 3, 2018

According to the official TM Unifi Twitter account, it seems that customers may be able to look forward to Unifi Turbo with 10x speed boost without any additional charges to their bill.

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For those of you wondering, the tweet can be seen at the top of this post, which stated “Hi there! Just to clarify, the unifi turbo plans will have a 10X increase in broadband speeds at no additional cost to existing home and business customers.”
At the time of this writing, we know that Unifi Turbo plans will have more than double the speed of current packages without any extra charge for customers, according to an announcement made on Tuesday by Acting group CEO Datuk Bazlan Osman. However, there was no mention as to how much faster the packages would be.
For now, TM is offering plans such as the Unifi Lite 10Mbps, Advance 30Mbps and Pro 100Mbps plans. A 10x speed boost will see a huge bump in speed. If we can take that statement literally, a 100Mbps package would turn into a beastly 1Gbps internet speed. While there is no concrete information at the moment, TM did mention that everything will be revealed on 12th July 2018.
The only thing we know for sure right is that the 30Mbps Unifi package will see a price cut from its existing price of RM199 per month to an amount below RM100, as we have reported in this particular post.
Pre-booking for the package starts from 15th July 2018, while the Unifi Turbo plans will be rolled out starting 15th August 2018 for existing customers. New subscribers that sign up before 31st December 2018 on the other hand will have their lines upgraded next year.
On a side note, TM is also relaunching its Unifi Mobile postpaid plan, which is said to offer customers unlimited data, calls and messaging on 15th July 2018, so that’s another thing we can look forward to.
Source: The Star
Pokdepinion: I really wonder to what extent is this 10x speed boost for Unifi Turbo, but I’m also particularly worried about its stability. Oh well, guess we’ll just have to wait and see.
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Acer Predator Helios 300 Review – The 2020 Baseline Gaming Laptop

Unboxing the Acer Predator Helios 300

Inside the box of the Acer Predator Helios 300 gaming laptop, you are expected to at least get the following items:

180W Power BrickPower cableUser guideWarranty cardThe Acer Predator Helios 300 gaming laptop itself
Appearance

The Acer Predator Helios 300 looks essentially like a Triton 300 that has put on a few pounds but it’s still a pretty slim machine. It’s ironic considering that the Triton 300 is slightly heavier. You still have the signature blue colour scheme and the subtle gaming aesthetic here. On the lid, you have a dark aluminum body with the Predator logo with two slits on each side, all of which can glow blue. It’s a bit of a fingerprint magnet but it’s not too bad.

Lift the hood up and you’ll be greeted with a 15.6-inch Full HD 144Hz IPS display, a 4-Zone RGB chiclet keyboard, and your usual trackpad below the keyboard. Above the F1 is a Turbo button, so you can instantly increase your fan speeds whenever you need it.

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On the left side, you have a Kensington Lock, the proprietary charging port, an RJ45 LAN port, two USB-A ports, and a combo audio jack. On the right side, you have a USB-C port, another USB-A port, a mini DisplayPort, and an HDMI port. There are also air vents on both sides with identical placements.

As for the bottom, you can see about 10 screws, four rubber stands, one plastic stand right below the Acer logo, product stickers, speaker grilles, and a whole lot of air vents. You can easily spot the CPU fan here, and one screw is hidden behind an Acer sticker, which will void the warranty if torn. On the rear end, you have air vents as well as a written warning about it being a hot surface and for you to not touch it when it’s up and running.

Overall, I personally like the design of the Acer Predator Helios 300 gaming laptop. The build quality is solid, still relatively thin for a gaming laptop, and doesn’t go overboard with the gamer aesthetics. Like the Triton 300, I do feel like the keyboard spacing could be further optimized but this is already good enough.
Specifications

CPU
Intel Core i7-9750H (6C / 12T @ up to 4.5 GHz), 12M Cache, 45W TDP, 14nm

RAM
8GB DDR4 2666MHz

GPU
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 6GB GDDR6

Storage
256GB NVMe SSD (WD PC SN720)

Display
15.6″ FHD (1920 X 1080) 144Hz IPS Acer ComfyView display (3ms response)

Keyboard
Desktop-style 4-Zone RGB keyboard

Connectivity
Wireless:
802.11a/b/g/n/ac Wi-Fi (Dual Band 2.4 GHz & 5 GHz)
Killer Wireless-AC 1550i
Bluetooth 5.0
I/O:
2 x USB 3.1 Gen1 Type-A
1 x USB 3.1 Gen1 Type-C
1 x USB 2.0
1 x RJ45 LAN
1 x HDMI
1 x Mini DisplayPort
1 x Kensington Lock
1 x Proprietary Charging Port

Audio
2 x Speakers with Waves MaxxAudio featuring MaxxBass, MaxxVolume, MaxxDialog, and Waves Nx
1 x Combo Audio Jack
Array Microphones

Power
58 Wh 4-cell Li-Ion Battery, 135W Power Adapter

Dimensions
361.4 x 254.2 x 23.15 mm (W x D x H)

Weight
2.4 kg

Performance

The Acer Predator Helios 300 uses a 256GB Western Digital PC SN720 NVMe SSD and the speeds, as seen above here, is great. You get a blazing fast storage device so you know boot up and loading times are gonna be real quick. Kinda wished the storage capacity was higher on this one.

On Cinebench R15, it performed better than I expected. In machines running the same CPU, single core performance is essentially on par but for multi-core it scored the highest. This is especially interesting to me since the last laptop I reviewed, the Triton 300, scored noticeably less than this.

When it comes to the Unigine SuperPosition benchmark, the difference becomes even more apparent. This is expected since the Acer Predator Helios 300 used in our review utilizes the GeForce RTX 2060 GPU. I suspect the difference compared to the two higher-scoring laptop is due to RAM.

A similar pattern can be seen in 3DMark’s Time Spy benchmark. The RTX 2060 certainly helped it obtain a better score but there are similar spec’d laptops that scored better. It’s still a good score for the hardware used nonetheless.

In the resource-intensive 3DMark Port Royal benchmark, it didn’t do too well. This isn’t a surprise as the RTX 2060 can only do so much. Furthermore, the limitations of an 8GB RAM certainly held back its potential but even with a 16GB (8GB x 2) upgrade, I foresee the performance being on par with the Y540, if not slightly higher.

As for gaming at the highest settings on Full HD resolution, it performed admirably for its specifications. Some games on this list get very resource-intensive at high settings. It’s best that you tone down on the settings to get an overall smoother experience. It certainly did better than the Triton 300, and I believe recent driver updates helped it perform better.
For battery life, we used PCMark 10’s battery endurance benchmark at max brightness. In the Modern Office benchmark, it manages to get a mere 2 hours and 57 minutes whereas in the Gaming benchmark, it only managed an hour and 7 minutes. The battery life is below average not one you’d want to use without a charger. This tallies with my personal use of web browsing and work going for almost 3 hours before the battery runs out.
User Experience

The Acer Predator Helios 300 is what I would suggest people set as a baseline for a new gaming laptop, at least in terms of performance. It’s rather light and portable for a gaming laptop, and packs a good punch. It’s powered by the Intel Core i7-9750H and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060.
In the memory department, it’s a bit lacking. It is using a speedy NVMe SSD but with only 256GB storage capacity, you’re going to run out of space rather quickly, especially since games take up a lot of space. Furthermore, a single stick 8GB DDR4 2666MHz RAM limits its true potential. I would suggest adding another 8GB stick when purchasing for a much better experience overall. In case you’re wondering, this one has two RAM slots.

The Acer Predator Helios 300 uses a Full HD 144Hz display, and the GPU should allow you to enjoy the high refresh rate provided that you tone down the graphics settings somewhat. Games like CS:GO should relatively hit close to 144 FPS with some adjustments. The viewing angles are great and the colours are well-defined. You can open the lid up to about 145°, so you have some added versatility on how you want to view the display.
As for running temperatures, it’s not too good. Even with CoolBoost enabled, the CPU ran at rather high temperatures with thermal throttling present in some games that I used for benchmarking purposes. GPU ran perfectly fine however. Fan noise at high speeds are rather loud, so you may find it annoying unless you plug in a headset.

The Acer Predator Helios 300 has a decent array of ports. you have three USB Type-A port, a USB-C port, an RJ45 LAN port, an HDMI port, a Mini DisplayPort, and a combo audio jack. Having both HDMI and mini DisplayPort is great as you can easily have a tri-monitor setup together with the laptop display. It would be great if the USB-C port was actually a Thunderbolt 3 port instead.

The Acer Predator Helios 300 gaming laptop uses a 4-Zone RGB chiclet keyboard with a Numpad. It feels a little bit mushy but it’s still comfortable to type on. I wished there was a bit more space below the keyboard as it feels like my wrist is hanging a bit and can feel awkward after long hours of use. The trackpad itself works fine and there’s nothing to boast about.

There is a Turbo button above the F1 key, which will instantly maximize the fan speed. It is a rather convenient thing to have but if you want more options, you should open up the PredatorSense software instead. You can do so by opening the software manually on Windows 10 or by pressing the Predator button which is right beside the Num Lock key.

You can use the PredatorSense software for simple overclocking for both CPU and GPU, adjust cooling, customize hotkeys, and more. It’s very useful for fine-tuning and customizability. Everything is straightforward here and I personally like the look of the software as the colour scheme is very pleasing to the eyes. It’s simple enough then I’m sure everyone can use it without issues.

But that’s not all on the software side as there’s also the KILLER Control Center. Not only will you be able to view and manage your network traffic, you can also optimize the system for gaming with the GameFast feature. What this does is that it prioritizes the game that you’re running above other network traffic, it also optimizes your CPU and memory resources for the game to ensure a smoother gaming experience.

On the sound department, the speakers on the Acer Predator Helios 300 gaming laptop isn’t good. It’s pretty soft even at max volume, which is made worse when the fan is spinning fast as it will be harder to hear anything. You definitely need to use a gaming headset or at least a cheap pair of earphones with this. The WAVES MaxxAudio software does help, but it’s helps the listening experience on headphones better.
Acer Predator Helios 300 Verdict

On paper, the Acer Predator Helios 300 sets a good baseline for a gaming laptop in 2020. It’s also very similar to the Triton 300 in many ways. It has a solid build quality, attractive look, good display with high refresh rate, and is packing some good firepower in a rather portable package.
If you’re curious about the Triton 300, click here to check out the review.
However, it has its drawbacks as well. The CPU running temperature is rather high, the battery life is below average, the fan can get rather noisy, and there is a dire need for an upgrade in capacity for both the RAM and SSD. 256GB will fill up really fast and 8GB RAM for a gaming laptop in 2020 just isn’t viable anymore.
There is also a 17-inch variant which goes all the way up to RTX 2070. The 15-inch variant only has up to RTX 2060.
There are some issues that can be fixed, and some you will just have to live with. Despite the issues, I do feel that it’s a better offering than the Triton 300. With that, I award the Acer Predator Helios 300 with our Bronze Pokdeward.

Big thanks to Acer Malaysia for letting us use this laptop for the purposes of this review.
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OMEN Challenger Series Offers Steam Wallet and More With Purchase of OMEN by HP Laptops

At a launch event in Klang Valley today, HP Malaysia has officially announced the return of the OMEN Challenger Series with CS:GO selected as the competition title. The tournament will see teams from 12 different countries competing for a shot at the USD $50,000 prize pool.
Registrations for the OMEN Challenger Series have officially opened. The online qualifiers will begin on end of August 2019 and the competition will be going on until the Grand Finals at Jakarta, Indonesia from 1st to 3rd November 2019. For Malaysia, the qualifiers have started and pre-qualifiers will begin on 6th September 2019.

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To celebrate the return of the OMEN Challenger Series, HP Malaysia is running a special promo for their OMEN by HP gaming laptops. With purchase of selected laptops, you will be able to redeem an RM50 Steam Wallet and stand a chance to win yourself an all-expenses paid trip for two to Jakarta to catch the OMEN Challenger Series live. There will be a total of 3 pairs that will be going to see the competition live in Jakarta. This deal will be applicable from now until 30th September 2019.
Furthermore, those who purchase the OMEN 15 laptop anytime from now until 15th September 2019 will be able to redeem the HP OMEN 600 Mouse and HP OMEN 800 Headset worth RM618. The offer is exclusively available on the HP Online Store only. You can access the online store by clicking right here.
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The laptops that were highlight during today’s events are the HP OMEN 15 and HP Pavilion Gaming laptops. Both machines are packed with 9th Gen Intel Core CPU, NVIDIA graphics, and will have enough power for gaming. The HP OMEN 15 will priced starting from RM6,399 while the HP Pavilion Gaming will start from RM2,979.
Aside from all of these, HP Malaysia is also launching a new university tournament called Campus Legends. This will run alongside the main competition, with ten university teams per country from Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand as competing countries. It will be an online-only tournament with DotA 2 as the competition title, and the prize pool is set at USD $3,000.
Pokdepinion: I’m personally curious to test out the Pavilion Gaming laptop to see what it’s capable of. Perhaps it’s something I’ll get to play with soon.
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Celcom, Digi and Maxis Announces Collaboration In Fibre Infrastructure Development

Celcom has just announced that they have signed a joint Definitive Agreement with Digi and Maxis to jointly develop and share fibre infrastructure. This joint agreement allows the three Malaysian telco companies allows for faster and more efficient deployment of fibre backhaul to base stations and avoiding duplication of fibre infrastructure in the country.
Celcom, Digi and Maxis: TELCOS! ASSEMBLE!

This collaboration will enable improved widespread of 4G connectivity to all Malaysians and increase the country’s fibre infrastructure in line with ambitions under the National Digital Infrastructure Plan (JENDELA), as well as preparing for tower infrastructure for a 5G future.

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Furthermore, the three companies will share their expertise in designing, building, commissioning, operating, and maintaining related fibre infrastructure nationwide. This is useful in accelerating a joint rollout. The operators will also work on intensifying the sharing of fibre infrastructure and enhancing mutual swapping arrangements. The reasoning behind the collaboration between Celcom, Digi and Maxis is to leverage the strengths of fibre technology to complement microwave in providing an efficient backhaul combination.
While the microwave technology will bring the advantages of fast deployment, nevertheless fibre infrastructure upgrades will enable the three operators to be better prepared for internet traffic growth, especially in high impact areas.

This announcement follows Celcom, Digi and Maxis’ signing of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) a year ago. The memorandum is meant to explore leveraging each other’s resources to deploy a wider, more efficient fibre network, signifying a progress milestone in advancing Malaysia towards a digital nation with the provision of quality digital connectivity nationwide.
Furthermore, as Malaysia accelerates its plan for 5G deployment as part of MyDIGITAL’s ambition, a denser, fibre-rich infrastructure will be needed to deliver 5G’s key performance indicators: low latency, higher data speeds, ultra-high reliability and capacity to manage more connected devices.
This collaboration will last for 20 years with plans for joint build and swapping arrangements well underway which is expected to take place hereafter. Other telco companies are also able to tap into additional network capacity from the three telcos.
Pokdepinion: If it provides better and faster service than I’m all for it.
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vivo X5Pro review — selfie phone

Selfies are quite the craze right now, and smartphone manufacturers are all releasing their products with better and better front cameras. This narcissistic habit is just too easy to profit from with teenagers having greater and greater buying power (yours truly is excluded), with manufacturers releasing software gimmicks to make you look prettier, younger and more. Today we have in our hands a vivo X5Pro, a selfie phone that sports an 8 megapixel front camera — yes, 8 freaking megapixels, that’s the resolution of my old One X’s rear camera. Oh how time has flown. Anyway, we are going to test whether the vivo X5Pro can do more than just selfies.

Unboxing
Just look at that box. Screaming premium right at you. Just a simple logo on the sides and a the name of the model on top. Simple and classy. I am liking it already. So scroll through the photos to get a better look at the phone.

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The entire packaging is very well thought out, with each item tucked into it’s own little spot.The phone is accessible as soon as you open the box. It’s wrapped in a soft frosted plastic wrapper with a tab to allow you to take it out from the tray easily. Lift up the tray that holds the phone, and a box containing an ultra-thin clear hard case, SIM tray ejector pin and some documentation is found. Take it out and you find the charger, microUSB cable and a pair of XE600i earphones. Charger is a regular 2A one, no fast charging here.

Appearance
Glass panels on both front and back with a metal frame sandwiched between, quite common. We have seen this basic design used over and over again by various manufacturers. It is one of my favorite design themes though. The combination of the fragility of glass and the toughness of metal. Good combination. Oh but the X5Pro’s glass panels are all but fragile, they are Corning Gorilla Glass sheets for scratch resistance and overall durability. The metal frame is also made up of a stainless steel and aluminium alloy for strength and a honeycomb anodizing process to prevent scratches. vivo has paid a lot of attention to the design and it shows.

The phone has the power button, volume keys and the SIM cum microSD tray slot all on the right side of the phone. The left side is left bare. On the bottom end you can see the loudspeaker grille. The grille on the right in the photo is the speaker. The one on the left is mainly just there for symmetry and houses the microphone. I am giving vivo two thumbs up for having the speaker on the bottom edge. I just can’t understand why can’t the other manufacturers do the same more often. Speakers on the back are just bad ergonomics as you have to place the phone screen down to hear anything properly. A standard microUSB 2.0 port sits in between the grilles. The top end has a lone 3.5mm jack.
Overall, the design is just perfect to me. I really like symmetrical shapes and vivo has done a good job with the X5Pro. Oh, and I did my fair share of trying to bend this phone, and it didn’t even flex.

Specifications

Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 64-bit octa-core (4x A53 @ 1.5 GHz and 4x A53 @ 1.11 GHz)
2GB RAM
5.2″ 1080p Full HD Super AMOLED display
16GB internal (expandable with microSD up to 128GB)
Camera: 13MP f/2.0 main, 8MP f/2.4 front
Funtouch OS based on Lollipop 5.0
Dual-SIM capability (SIM2 slot accepts nanoSIM and uses the microSD slot)
2450 mAh battery

Performance
The Snapdragon 615 octa-core under the glass 2.5D glass panels do a decent job but doesn’t top benchmark charts. It scores a rather average score of 30782 in 64-bit mode and 29482 in 32-bit mode. In Quadrant it scores 11021.

Asphalt 8 was fluid on medium graphics, but when set to high, the Adreno 405 just isn’t pushing them pixels fast enough.  The area near the camera can get quite hot to the touch after gaming or benchmarks. Even light usage like Whatsapp or Facebook is enough to make it feel warm. Heating up also results in lower benchmark scores.
Battery life is pretty good, lasting me for quite sometime before dying out. With 21 hours 53 minutes away from the charger, and 3 hours 49 minutes on-screen time, I think those are pretty good figures. But a thing with the battery is it charges very slowly.

User Experience
The 6.4 mm body has just the right amount of weight to it, just enough to make it feel stable in your grip. The power button is placed just right under my thumb if I hold it with my right hand, or under my index finger if I grip it with my left hand. The hardware buttons are tactile with just the right amount of resistance to prevent you from accidentally pressing it in your pocket or while holding it.
The size of the phone is quite acceptable for my big hands, but may be a problem to the selfie-loving female demographic. The capacitive keys are not backlit. It won’t affect you if you have used the phone for more than a few hours, but it is a little annoying being unable to see the keys in the dark when you haven’t gotten used to the key arrangement.
While the speaker on the bottom is a very logical place with the phone on the table or in your hand in portrait mode, it can be a nuisance when gaming or generally doing anything with the phone in landscape. If you hold it with two hands, you are bound to muffle the speakers unless you hold it unnaturally.
Moving on, let’s talk about the user interface. vivo runs Funtouch OS based on Android 5.0 on the vivo X5Pro, and it’s really customized quite thoroughly. The UI and a lot of built-in apps are quite similar to their iOS counterparts. As I have never used an iOS device, I found it difficult to adapt to the interface. For example, the quick settings usually found by pulling down the notification bar, is accessed by sliding up from the bottom edge of the screen. There is also no multitasking button nor an conventional recent apps screen. All you get is a row of recently used apps. Chrome which just recently was updated to use separate cards in the recent apps page for each tab, will not work with Funtouch OS. You will have to turn off the option “Merge tabs and apps” just so that you can use multiple tabs on Chrome. . The rest of the baked-in apps also bear an uncanny resemblance to their iOS counterpart. Just go through the gallery to see what I mean.

The settings of this phone is also heavily customized. The most glaring omission from the Settings is Battery. It’s hidden in the iManager app under Power Manager. And in the Power manager tab you have to select Rank before you can access those information. Inside the Power Manager tab there is also a Extreme Performance option. Selecting it will activate all cores and will shorten your battery life but it manages to score around 2000-3000 more points in Antutu benchmark. Needless to say the phone also gets warmer in that mode, so it isn’t something I recommend using all the time.
There are lots of gesture controls too. You can also add your own lockscreen gesture to open any app of your choosing. I like the fact that vivo has included animations of the built-in gestures to guide you. You can also customize your phone with themes to change the look of your phone. A number of themes are available to download and apply immediately. It doesn’t seem to be able to apply custom icon packs that you can get from the Play Store, but you can always use a custom launcher if you can’t live without that particular icon pack.

Next, we look at the Extreme Hi-Fi part of the phone. The music player interface is neat. It supports FLAC, WMA, MP3 and M4A files. But for a phone that claims to have extreme hi-fi, it’s curiously unable to read the metadata on FLAC and WMA files. When you connect a pair of earphones, you can go into audio effects in the app’s settings and tune the BBE mode. There are 6 presets for popular earphones like the Sennheiser CX215 and CX300II. You can also set it to only add audio files longer than 60 seconds or specific folders to the library. Very good to prevent the library from filling up with ringtones you downloaded.
I like that vivo has allowed you to tune the audio output to your own tastes. I used my Pistons 2.1 to test the audio output, and it’s really good. Just tune up the BBE Process and turn down the Lo Contour as well as the Mach 3 settings, and the sound quality is pretty phenomenal.  I would agree with the Extreme Hi-Fi tagline if they had actual parametric curves for you to tune, but from an average consumer’s standpoint, this is way more interesting than adjusting a curve. Audio quality is faultless here. Even the integrated speakers do a pretty good job of belting out tunes.

The camera starts up rather slowly. It can take up to a second to be ready. In this age where everything has to be instant, this is just unacceptable. The slow startup had me staring at a black screen before it was ready. The interface is pretty simple with a huge white virtual shutter key. Swipe the key to the left and you get manual controls or Professional mode. The manual controls look very much like Nokia’s implementation, which is a good thing. The video mode of the X5Pro also has manual controls for the focus distance and exposure compensation. Sadly, however, there is no 4K recording support. This is a chipset limitation though.

In general, the quality of the photos produced by the camera is quite good. The camera often automatically chooses a higher ISO than necessary though, which results in smudging of the finer details. The camera is also capable of climbing up to a very lofty ISO 3190 in auto or night mode, with night mode allowing shutter speeds of 1/7 as compared to 1/15 in auto. A lot detail is lost at the higher ISOs in low-light conditions Regarding the front camera, it performs very well in good lighting conditions, with quality dropping under dimmer lighting. You can see the photos later in full resolution on Flickr. I will also upload more photos when I take them.

The 5.2″ full HD SuperAMOLED display has bright punchy colors, and excellent viewing angles as you can see in the slideshow above. The high pixel density overcomes the problems of having a non-RGB subpixel arrangement, and all you see is a good display with great colors. The subpixels are arranged in a diamond-shaped pattern in this AMOLED display and is visible under a camera, but is totally flawless to the naked eye.
There is a slight flaw in the experience. The English used is rather poor. Some of the descriptions like it will make phone body heat just don’t deserve to be in a phone of this caliber. It doesn’t really affect the general usage of this phone but it’s there and it’s annoying. This issue can easily be fixed via a software update but at the time of writing, these translation errors are downright annoying.

Conclusion
The vivo X5Pro is a pretty good phone except for some heating issues plaguing all Snapdragon 615 devices. It has a combination of sleek design, great build quality, excellent audio output, beautiful display and a good camera. The asking price? RM1599. A little steep for the performance figures and features to me. If vivo solves the overheating issues and weak-ish performance with a better processor, and fit it into this very body, it could very well be a winner. But right now, it’s hard to recommend this phone unless you put aesthetics above all else. With that, I will award it a Bronze award.

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Genshin Impact Leaks Reveal New Characters Heizou, Ayato, and Yae

A renowned Genshin Impact leaker recently returned after a long hiatus with some interesting information to share. This time, it’s in regards to upcoming characters; Shikanoin Heizou, Kamisato Ayato, and Yae Miko. Here’s what you need to know.
Genshin Impact Leaks: Heizou, Ayato, and Yae

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Dimbreath recently came out of hiatus with some interesting information to share on Genshin Impact 2.4. For the first part, Yae Miko’s Elemental Skill will have 3 charges in total, and it will spawn towers with a duration of 20 seconds. These towers will amplify the damage being dealt. Her Elemental Burse will complement the towers and supposedly make them explode.
The next part revolves around Kamisato Ayato, the brother of Ayaka. He’s described as a Hydro character, although the weapon choice is still unknown at this point of time. Interestingly, his Elemental Skill will reduce the cooldown of other team members’ Elemental Skills, making for a great support ability for improved synergy.
Lastly, we have the new character Shikanoin Heizou, which is still relatively unknown to the point where there’s uncertainty on whether the character is truly playable or not. Heizou was previously mentioned by Ayaka and his backstory shows him being a detective from Inazuma who is currently working for the Tenryou Commission. He’s also the distant elder cousing of Kano Nana.
That’s all we have for this round of leaks but we will report more on this as soon as information becomes available so stay tuned. Genshin Impact is currently available for free on the PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Android, iOS, and PC. A Nintendo Switch port of the game coming in the near future. Update 2.4 is expected to launch sometime in early January 2022 for all available platforms.
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Pokdepinion: Ayato is starting to sound more and more interesting but I also have a feeling he might not do too well in the long run with the introduction of newer characters as his kit might not stand the test of time.
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