Tips On Using The Mozambique Shotgun By The Creators Of Apex Legends

Apex Legends is a good game, there’s no denying on that. If there was a complaint about the game, it would be mostly on the Mozambique shotgun (at least for most of the population of the world). The creators had a thing or two to say on the shotgun.
The Mozambique is a shotgun that fires three bullets in a triangle that does a maximum of 45 damage each, which is quite a decent damage, if you land all of them at least. If you’ve missed your shot, well you’re basically in deep trouble as you’d need to reload.
In a Q&A session on Reddit regarding the Havoc energy assault rifle, a person asked Sean Slayback, the senior designer for Respawn if there was any plans to change the Mozambique gun. He then responded by saying “Current plan is to keep enjoying the memes”.

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Jokes aside, he did give a tip on using the Mozambique. Its name is actually a slang term for an execution. The idea is, if you shot someone with two bullets in the chest and one in the head (a triangle), you’re basically “sending them to Mozambique”.
He adds that it is advisable to aim down your sights as that would choke the spread down which makes it easier to hit the pattern.
Pokdepinion: So two shots at the chest and one on the head. That sounds easier said than done…
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Nintendo Switch Sold Out in UK; Sold Twice As Many Units As Wii U at Launch

Is it really a surprise that the Nintendo Switch sold out somewhere in the world?
With the Wii U’s failure to push sales for Nintendo, the Japanese giant had to come up with something new. That something new is the Nintendo Switch, which launched worldwide on March 3rd 2017.
Many are skeptical on whether the Nintendo Switch could sell well but turns out, there was nothing to worry about. In the UK, the Nintendo Switch did pretty well.

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Nintendo Switch Sold Out in UK

Official retailers have reported to GamesIndustry that the Nintendo Switch sold out and has managed to sell over 80,000 units in the UK during its opening weekend. 80,000 doesn’t sound like much? Let’s put that number into perspective.
In late 2013 when the Nintendo Wii U was launched, it managed to sell about 40,000 units. That is half of what the Nintendo Switch did in the UK. It’s not as high as another Nintendo creation however, with the 3DS selling over 113,000 units at launch. While the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 did 150,000 and 250,000 units respectively, it doesn’t change the fact that the Nintendo Switch did pretty well.
How so? The Nintendo Switch sold out in most major retail outlets in UK after all. That clearly exceeded Nintendo’s expectations in the UK as there wasn’t enough units to meet the demand there. You might be thinking why Nintendo wouldn’t manufacture more units at the start but that’s quite simple.

Normally when a new console comes out, it’s usually more expensive to manufacture at first. As time goes by, the cost of making the hardware usually decreases and therefore, companies would either be able to profit more, or slash the price for customers to enjoy. Manufacturing too many units and not being able to sell would be devastating in a business sense. Nintendo was just being careful.
In case you’re all wondering, the Nintendo Switch is estimated to have sold over 2 million units worldwide so don’t worry, it’s not just doing well in one place. With the Nintendo Switch sold out in UK, Nintendo is expected to supply more units of their brand new console soon but no exact word on when.

Pokdepinion: Congratulations Nintendo for a stellar sales record for their brand new videogame console. With the Nintendo Switch sold out in the UK, I’m very confident that more units will be sold when more awesome games become available for the platform. I’m personally waiting for a new Smash Bros. game before getting one.
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RM2 Million Touch ‘n Go Credits Available With Xiaomi’s New ‘Shop With Mi’ Campaign

Xiaomi has just announced their latest mid-year online shopping campaign, ‘Shop With Mi’. From now until July 11, when Malaysian customers shop with Xiaomi Malaysia’s authorised retail partners on Lazada, they will be eligible for great rewards and promotions.
Shop with Xiaomi’s New ‘Shop With Mi’ Campaign

In addition, for the first time, the campaign will offer the Earn With Mi referral programme, which will allow Malaysians to signup and earn passive revenue. ‘Shop With Mi’ intends to promote Xiaomi Malaysia’s retail partners on their online platforms while also providing Malaysians with an opportunity to supplement their income during this difficult period.

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‘Shop With Mi’, will run from now till July 11 and during this time Malaysians may purchase online for their favourite Xiaomi smartphones and ecosystem items on Lazada (while stocks last) and take advantage of special offers such as RM2,000,000 in Touch’N’Go reload pins and exclusive free gifts. The online shopping campaign also features Xiaomi Malaysia’s official retail partners (Ashita Group, Asia Mobile Retail, Avantgarde, Switch Solution, Urban Republic and Vivid Concept) where Malaysians can purchase the latest Redmi Note 10 5G.

Here are some of the Xiaomi smartphones eligible for Touch’N’Go eWallet Reload PIN redemption during the ‘Shop With Mi’ campaign:

RM 30 Touch’N’Go eWallet Reload amount
– Redmi Note 10 5G (8GB+128GB) price RM799
RM 10 Touch’N’Go eWallet Reload amount
– Mi 11 (8GB+128GB/8GB+256GB) price RM2,799/RM2,999
– Mi 11 Lite (8GB+128GB) price RM1,099
– Mi 10T Pro (8GB+256GB) price RM1,999
– Mi 10T (8GB+128GB) price RM1,699
– Redmi Note 10 Pro (8GB+128GB) price RM1,099
– Redmi Note 10S (8GB+128GB) price RM899
– Redmi Note 10 (6GB+128GB) price RM799
– Redmi 9T (4GB+64GB/6GB+128GB) price RM599/RM699
– Redmi 9C (3GB+64GB) price RM479

In addition to the ‘Shop With Mi’ campaign, Xiaomi Malaysia has launched a new Earn With Mi referral programme to assist Malaysians during the lockdown. Because most retail industries have been impacted by the recent lockdown laws, Xiaomi wishes to assist Malaysians who have been affected by the pandemic by providing a referral scheme to anyone who wants to make extra money.
Malaysians can now register to the program online to promote products by Xiaomi and in return, receive a referral commission of up to RM30 per successful product purchased.
Anyone can join the Earn With Mi referral programme, which allows participants to promote from the comfort and safety of their own homes. All you need is a smartphone and access to the internet. Xiaomi Malaysia expects that this scheme will enable Malaysians to generate additional revenue to help them get through this challenging period financially.
Here’s how to sign up for the ‘Earn With Mi’ referral programme and begin earning:

Use this link to register.
Watch for an email confirmation with your unique promotion link.
Share your unique promote link with friends and family to promote selected Xiaomi devices.
Earn an incentive commission for every successful Xiaomi smartphone purchase made using your unique advertising link.

Below are some of the Xiaomi smartphones and the corresponding referral commission amounts:

RM30 commission amount
– Mi 11 (8GB+128GB/8GB+256GB) price RM2,799/RM2,999
– Mi 11 Lite (8GB+128GB) price RM1,199
– Mi 10T Pro (8GB+256GB) price RM1,999
– Mi 10T (6GB+128GB/8GB+128GB) price RM1,599/RM1,699
– Redmi Note 10 Pro (8GB+128GB) RM1,099
RM20 commission amount
– Redmi Note 10 5G (8GB+128GB) price RM799
RM10 commission amount
– Redmi Note 10 Pro (6GB+128GB) price RM999
– Redmi Note 10S (8GB+128GB) price RM899
– Redmi Note 10 (6GB+128GB) price RM799
– Redmi 9T (4GB+64GB/6GB+128GB) price RM599/RM699
– Redmi 9C (3GB+64GB) price RM479
– Redmi 9A (2GB+32GB) price RM359

For more information on the terms and conditions of the Earn With Mi referral programme, you can check them out here. Stay tuned to the Xiaomi Malaysia Facebook Page for more updates on Xiaomi’s ‘Shop With Mi’ and ‘Earn With Mi’ campaigns.
Pokdepinion: The ‘Earn With Mi’ referral programme looks to be pretty interesting. I might just give that one a try.
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Send ROG your winning gameplay to win yourself a ROG Strix G!

If you are a gamer, you would definitely take pride in your victorious moments. With technologies like Instant Replay from AMD and NVIDIA, it has never been easier to grab the key moments of your gameplay. All the ASUS Republic of Gamers ask of you is to share that moment with them in the ROG Embrace Your Victory campaign, and you will be in the running for a ROG Strix G.

All you need to do is capture your best winning gameplay moment and upload it to your Facebook or YouTube account, with the caption being:
I want to win a ROG #StrixG featuring #NVIDIA #GeForce #GTX 16 series because________.
You will also have to submit the videos to http://my.rog.gg/upload for verification purposes. Videos recorded with NVIDIA GeForce Experience will be in the running for another exclusive prize.

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The ROG Embrace Your Victory campaign runs from now until 19th June, so make sure to get your submissions in by then! Good luck!
Pokdepinion: I play MMOs… So I am not really sure how a winning moment would look like.
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Samsung Galaxy A52s 5G Launched At RM1,899

The folks at Samsung Malaysia has recently announced of the new Samsung Galaxy A52s 5G and if you’re wondering on what it offers, you’ve come to the right place.
Samsung A52s 5G

The phone comes with a 6;5-inch Infinity-O Super AMOLED display, which touts a refresh rate of 120Hz for smoother usage.

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Powering it up is a Snapdragon 778G chipset and a 4500mAh battery that you can charge with its 25W fast charger.
Aside from that, it offers Stereo Speakers with Dolby Atmos for better audio quality, 8GB RAM and 256GB of internal storage. If the storage isn’t enough for you, you can add up to 1TB through an microSD card.
As for cameras, it comes with a 64MP main camera, 5MP depth sensor and a 5MP macro lens at the back. For selfies, there’s a 32MP shooter at the front. Available in Awesome Black and Awesome White colour variants, you can get the device for the price of RM1,899. There’s a free clear standing cover that’s worth RM109 when you purchase from now till the 31st of October 2021 deal too.
For more on the latest tech and gaming news plus reviews, stay tuned to Pokde.net.
Pokdepinion: Sounds like decent mid-range specifications on offer. Can’t say if it’s any good however since I’ve yet to test it out. Would you be interested in it for that price?
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Firefox 64 to Add Support for Windows 10 Action Centre Web Notifications

Recently, we saw Chrome and Edge Browser integrating Windows 10 Action Centre for web notifications and it appears that Mozilla Firefox will be following in their footsteps.
This feature will be rolling out on Firefox 64, with the Windows 10 Action Centre web notifications replacing their current pop-up banner system. While some may end up preferring the current system, there is a chance you might not be able to disable it when it’s out as the latest nightly build does not have the option to disable it and use the older system instead.

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Just like on our smartphones, web notifications on our computers have become increasingly important to allow us users to continuously be up-to-date with the current matters. Integrating it with the OS itself will allow for a more consistent and seamless user experience. Not only that, it will also mean that features like Focus Assist and notification mirroring would be more reliable.
At the moment, this feature is only available in the Mozilla Firefox nightly build, and will be rolling out officially when Firefox 64 is released. While you can try out the feature by downloading the nightly build, just keep in mind that there are still bugs that needs to be fixed so there may be hiccups here and there.
If you want to give the new feature a try, click right here for the nightly builds.
Source: MSPowerUser
Pokdepinion: Always preferred the Windows 10 Action Centre web notifications more. It has a cleaner look but that’s just me. What about you guys?
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The PlayStation 5 Might Not Be Coming So Soon – NPD Analyst Predicts PS5’s Launch

With Sony Interactive Entertainment’s John Kodera mentioning about the PS4 entering the final phase of its life cycle, many took this as a sign that the PlayStation 5 is coming soon. Well, the PS5 might not be launching so soon after all, according to this NPD analyst.
The PlayStation 5 Might Not Be Coming So Soon

In the future I do expect pace of incremental upgrades to happen much more quickly, on a 1-2 year cycle instead of 4-7 in order to better mirror what happens in other tech lines. Lots of benefits with more frequency.
— Mat Piscatella (@MatPiscatella) May 22, 2018

Following the Sony Investor Relations Day 2018 in which PlayStation President John Kodera mentioned that the PlayStation 4 is entering the final phase of its life cycle, NPD Analyst Mat Piscatella shared his prediction for the launch date of the next console by Sony. According to the analyst, it isn’t coming before the fall of 2020.

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For those of you who aren’t aware, NPD Analyst Mat Piscatella is well known among gamers not only for delivering the statistics firm’s monthly analysis on the United States’ gaming market but also for providing relevant insight on the gaming industry.
Interestingly, Piscatella also expects the pace of incremental upgrades like the PS4 Pro and Xbox One X to accelerate within the next generation.

Current cycle started in 2013. Of course we are entering the final stages of it. We’ve only been through this whole cyclicality thing seven or so times before. How is this even at all surprising.
— Mat Piscatella (@MatPiscatella) May 22, 2018

In another tweet as seen above, Piscatella also commented on the fact that some appeared surprised by Kodera’s statement.
At the moment there have been no relevant rumors or leaks about the PlayStation 5, which appears to support Piscatella’s prediction. In the meantime, the PlayStation 4 shipped 79 million units as of March 31st 2018.
So what do you think? Should the PS4 be shelved in favour of the PS5 soon or does the current predicted phase sound good to you?
Pokdepinion: Personally, I tend to agree with Piscatella’s forecast, at least on the year. At the moment Sony Interactive Entertainment is in a position of absolute leadership on the console market. It’s difficult to envision them being too eager to abandon that position of strength by resetting the competition with a brand new generation, starting back from zero.
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Xiaomi Mi 11 With Snapdragon 875 Reportedly Shown On Geekbench

It appears that there’s a Xiaomi smartphone that goes by M2012K11C has recently appeared on Geekbench and it is said to be the upcoming Xiaomi Mi 11.
Xiaomi Mi 11 appears on Geekbench

We’ve reported previously that the Mi 11 would be one of the first smartphone to be featuring the upcoming Snapdragon 875 flagship chipset, which is set to be announced in December 2020.
According to the benchmark, the Mi 11 will run on Android 11, offer 6GB RAM, and utilizes Adreno 660 GPU. It also shows a score of 1105 for Single-Core and 3512 for Multi-Core tests.

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Despite the decent numbers, it is said that the scores is from a prototype, so we could expect even higher scores than the ones showed here.
Source
Pokdepinion: I don’t know about you, but every year I’d observe Xiaomi’s flagship offerings. They’re probably one of the brands that offer flagships at a more affordable price. Let’s hope that trend continues still.
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Samsung Galaxy S21 Series Officially Launched – Here’s Everything You Need to Know

It’s 2021 and we already have the first major smartphone launch as the Samsung Galaxy S21 series has officially been launched. Here’s everything you need to know about the new flagship smartphones. Just as rumours have suggested, there are three new models here; the Samsung Galaxy S21, Galaxy S21+, and Galaxy S21 Ultra.
Samsung Galaxy S21 and Galaxy S21+

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Let’s start off with the Samsung Galaxy S21 and Galaxy S21+. Both devices are essentially the same except for the display size as the former is rocking a 6.2-inch FHD+ Dynamic AMOLED 2X display with adaptive refresh rate (48Hz to 120Hz) whereas the latter has the same display enlarged to 6.7-inches. Moreover, the display has the Eye Comfort Shield feature, which uses AI to reduce blue light emissions. For added protection, both devices have an IP68 rating for water and dust resistance.
Both smartphones are powered by the 5nm Exynos 2100 SoC with 8GB RAM and 256GB storage. They also have the same triple-camera setup which consists of a 12MP f/1.8 wide angle camera with Dual Pixel PDAF and OIS, a 64MP f/2.0 telephoto camera with 3x hybrid zoom, and a 12MP f/2.2 120° ultrawide camera with Super Steady video.

Furthermore, it has Unlimited Super Steady up to 60FPS for more stable videos, can record videos up to 8K resolution as well as take 8K snapshots from the recorded footage. The selfie camera is a 10MP f/2.2 shooter. What makes video recording even more interesting here is the new Multi-Mic recording feature, which can take sounds from both the smartphone’s microphone as well as the Galaxy Buds Pro, essentially making it like a lavalier mic of sorts.

On the subject of power, the Samsung Galaxy S21 still retain the same battery capacity as its predecessor at 4,000mAh but the Galaxy S21+ will see a bump to 4,800mAh. It will support 25W charging via USB-C and 15W wireless charging, with USB Power Delivery 3.0 and Fast Wireless Charging 2.0 standards. Just as earlier reports have revealed, it will not come with a charger inside the box, but there will be a USB-C cable included.
The Samsung Galaxy S21 will be available in Phantom Violet, Phantom Pink, Phantom Grey, and Phantom White, whereas the Galaxy S21+ will be available in Phantom White and Phantom Black. Retail prices will be revealed in the local launch in the near future.
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra

Now for the main event, the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra. The display size has slightly decreased from its predecessor but has seen notable improvements as it’s now a 6.8-inch WQHD+ Super Smooth Dynamic AMOLED 2X display. There is adaptive refresh rate but it’s better than its siblings as it can go even lower from 11Hz to 120Hz, effectively making it more energy-efficient. Additionally, the high refresh rate works in WQHD+ resolution, the brightness is 1,500 nits, and it has a contrast ratio of 3,000,000:1.

It is also powered by the same 5nm Exynos 2100 SoC, but you have the option of either a 12GB RAM / 256GB storage or 16GB RAM / 512GB storage. It will also come with Wi-Fi 6E, Dual Bluetooth connectivity, 5,000mAh battery, and S Pen support. However, the S Pen is sold separately and it will require the official Samsung protective case to store it, and the S Pen doesn’t support Air Gestures here. It’s worth noting that this smartphone also has an IP68 rating for water and dust resistance.

Unlike the other two devices, the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra has a quad-camera setup consisting of a 108MP f/1.8 wide angle camera with Laser AF, a 120° 12MP ultra-wide camera with Super Steady video, a 10MP f/4.9 periscope telephoto camera with 10x optical zoom, and a 10MP f/2.4 telephoto camera with 3x optical zoom. You can also shoot 4K 60FPS video using all the lenses, so it’s not limited to just the main camera itself. The selfie camera is a 40MP f/2.2 wide angle shooter.
Interestingly, they’ve improved on the Space Zoom feature with the dual lens zoom allowing for up to 100x zoom, and the camera is able to intelligently stabilize the camera using AI so it’s easier to take zoomed shots. In addition to that, it has a feature dubbed as “Best Night Mode”, where they use Nona Binning technology to effectively convert 9 noisy pixels to 1 big and clean pixel for an overall clearer shot at the cost of resolution. For charging, it supports Fast Wireless Charging 2.0, USB Power Delivery 3.0, and QuickCharge 2.0.
The Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra will be available in Phantom Black and Phantom Silver. Retail prices will be revealed in the local launch in the near future.
Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro

That’s not all folks as Samsung also unveiled the new Galaxy Buds Pro, which is essentially the upgraded version of the bean-esque Galaxy Buds Live we saw previously. It features 11mm woofers, 6.5mm tweeters, and a triple microphone system consisting of a high SNR mic and two external mics. The earbuds themselves will have a 61mAh battery capacity whereas the charging case will hold 472mAh, which should yield about close to 4 full charges.

Noise cancelling is also available and it’s said to be their most intelligent ANC yet as it can adjust the noise cancellation and let in environmental sounds accordingly without you having to adjust it yourself. Apart from that, it supports auto switching between Galaxy devices, 360 Audio for a 3D soundstage, and a water resistance rating of IPX7.
The Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro will be available in Phantom Black, Phantom Silver, and Phantom Violet. Retail prices will be revealed in the local launch in the near future.
If you want to check out our review of the Galaxy Buds Live, click right here.
SmartThings Find

Another notable change that Samsung wants to do this time around is the SmartThings Find feature. The idea here is that if you ever lose any item, you can easily locate them again. In the case of Galaxy devices, it’s easier to find it even if it’s offline.

In the case of items that cannot be connected online, there is the Galaxy SmartTag. The idea here is to attach it to any item, be it house keys, or even your bag, to make it easier to find. It can even beep to let you know where it is if you are nearby. It uses a CR2032 coin battery that is expected to last a very long time, although no battery life estimates were given.
Pokdepinion: Still thinking whether I should trade up my S20 Ultra to the new S21 Ultra or just wait for the Z Flip 2.
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You can get the HUAWEI nova 3 for just RM1520 this 17th October — here’s how to get an exclusive RM399 voucher!

You can get HUAWEI nova 3 Primrose Gold for just RM1419 via MyDigi Rewards, but what if you aren’t a MyDigi Platinum, or not a Digi subscriber, or you just don’t want the Primrose Gold option? Well, Watson Malaysia has another option for you. You can get the HUAWEI nova 3 Red for just RM1520!

The discount is an exclusive offer for Watsons VIP Member, and all you have to do is spend RM180 on watson.com.my before 10th October. You will then be eligible for a RM399 coupon code that will be sent to you via SMS. You can then use the coupon code to get your HUAWEI nova 3 Red on shop.huawei.com/my from 17th to 25th October. To further sweeten the deal, you will also be getting a free pair of HUAWEI AM116 earphones worth RM99!

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The HUAWEI nova 3 packs a Kirin 970, 6GB RAM and 128GB of storage under its hood, making it a pretty good deal. The rear camera setup is quite impressive as well, with 24MP + 16MP cameras.
Pokdepinion: RM1520 is a great price for the HUAWEI nova 3. Time to stock up on my supplements!
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Realme C1 Available In Malaysia This 22nd November

Are you on the search for an affordable smartphone? Well Realme’s entry-level device, the Realme C1 is set to be officially available in the country starting this 22nd November 2018.
Realme C1 Malaysia Release

The company, which aims to produce smartphones for the younger generation, is set to do the first sale of their Realme C1 on Lazada this coming 22 November 2018 at 10am.

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It will be available for purchase exclusively on Lazada at a special offer of RM399 (regular retail price is RM449) for a limited time, starting from the mentioned 22nd November up until the 22nd of December 2018. The device comes in two color options; Mirror Black and Navy Blue.
Being an entry-level device, the Realme C1 comes with a Snapdragon 450 SoC and is packed with 2GB RAM paired with 16GB of internal storage (which you can expand through microSD). Its display is 6.2-inch big and offers a screen-to-body-ratio of 88.8%.
Camera wise, it sports a dual 13MP+2MP main camera setup and it offers a 5MP selfie shooter. Under the hood is a big 4230mAh battery.

Besides the launch, Realme will also host a ‘Special Price‘ sale on the official Realme Store on Lazada. The rule is simple, the more followers who like and follow the Realme Store, the more discounts the company will offer. Realme C1 will be offering one unit of the Realme C1 at a special promotional price of RM199, which will take place on 10am on 20th November 2018.
It doesn’t stop there, Realme will be also offering two units of the Realme C1 at RM99 each, when they get 5,000 followers. At 7,000, they will be offering three units of the device at RM9 each. Once they’ve hit 10,000 followers, they will be providing 4 units of the Realme C1 at just RM1 each.
So you get the idea, the more followers they get, the better promotion awaits you.
Pokdepinion: This sounds like a deal, I might even get one for my old folks.
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New Samsung Galaxy Devices Are Made With Repurposed Fishing Nets

Samsung has revealed that the upcoming Samsung Galaxy devices will incorporate a new material derived from repurposed ocean-bound discarded fishing nets. This move is a bid on their part to minimise their “environmental footprint and help foster more sustainable lifestyles for the Galaxy community” and as part of their Galaxy for the Planet campaign.
Repurposed fishing nets in future Samsung Galaxy devices

Samsung says that future Samsung Galaxy devices will feature repurposed discarded fishing nets beginning with the ones that will be revealed during the upcoming Galaxy Unpacked event happening this 9th of February. With this, Samsung says that they hope to stop the use of single-use plastics and instead, use more eco-conscious materials, such as recycled post-consumer material and recycled paper.

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According to a report released in 2009, ocean-bound plastic does not include just plastic water bottles or plastic bags but also discarded fishing nets. In fact, over 640,000 tonnes are abandoned and discarded in the ocean every year. Dubbed “ghost nets”, these nets are responsible for trapping and entangling marine life, damaging coral reefs and natural habitats. They can even end up in our food and water sources.

Samsung says that this is just the beginning of their journey to address our climate issues. They will talk about this and more during the upcoming Unpacked event this 9th February.
Pokdepinion: Kudos to Samsung for making something like this possible. To be honest, I didn’t realise the impact fishing nets have on our environment until today.
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ZOTAC CUP Masters brings back classic STARCRAFT to eSports – Online Qualifiers Kicking Off in the Americas

ZOTAC has announced the launch of the ZOTAC CUP Masters Starcraft which happens to be a $20,000 USD prize pool event with open online qualifiers happening throughout Americas including North America, Latin America North and Latin America South. Bringing together the best gamers, the grand finals will be competing live at Newegg Studios Los Angeles.
The event kicks off on October 15 and will be running until November 18. ZOTAC CUP was established since 2007 and it’s open to everyone. With a free-to-play online tournament community hosting some of the most exciting competitive games, the STARCRAFT addition will definitely appeal to the veterans.

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The winners who make it through the online open qualifiers will ultimately face off for the chance to be the Grand Finals Champion and take home the grand prize. The Grand Finals will be hosted against two invitational players of the world’s top-notch STARCRAFT pros for an additional prize.
ZOTAC will provide the official gaming systems in partnership with AKRacing, Fractal Design, Intel, Western Digital, Viper Gaming and more. Top STARCRAFT casters include Artosis, Day9, iNcontrol and Tasteless will be present.
The schedule will be as follows:
ZOTAC CUP Online Qualifiers – October 15th, 2017 – November 18th, 2017
FINALS @ Newegg Studios – December 2nd, 2017 – December 3rd, 2017
Pokdepinion: Here’s a secret I would like to share. STARCRAFT was my first ever game that I indulged on PC in 1997, so this tournament definitely is catching my eyes!
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HONOR Malaysia Sponsors Flash Vision For Upcoming PUBG Mobile Tournament

The folks at HONOR Malaysia has today announced of their sponsorship worth over RM10,000 for Flash Vision, a local PUBG Mobile team, who will soon be competing in Season 2 of PUBG Mobile Pro League Malaysia/Singapore (PMPL).
HONOR Malaysia sponsors Flash Vision
Thanks to the sponsorship, it will see the players from Flash Vision to be equipped with HONOR smartphones to battle it out in the tournament.
The team will join 19 other teams from PMPL MY/SG Season 2’s list of Invited Teams and PUBG Mobile Malaysia National Championship Top 5.

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If you’re wondering, the tournament will take place on the 18th of August 2020 until the 27th of September, where only two teams will qualify for the PMPL SEA Finals Season 2 and compete for a prize pool of USD$150,000.
Pokdepinion: Man, I wished I was sponsored like that and get free phones.. Oh well, all the best to the team for the tournament!
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Shopee Malaysia To Operate As Usual Despite Movement Control Order

The folks at Shopee Malaysia has announced that they will still continue their business as usual despite the Movement Control Order was announced to mitigate the Covid-19 outbreak in the country.
Shopee Malaysia To Operate As Usual

Shopee will continue their business as they fall under retail, which was categorised as one of the essential services. This means that you can get daily necessities such as toilet rolls, wet wipes, face masks, hand sanitizers, instant noodles, cooking oil, and the likes from the platform.
They’ve revealed that they are working with their partners, retailers, and suppliers such as Mydin, Tesco, Nestle, AEON Big and more to ensure that they have enough supplies in stock.

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Aside from that, they will be taking an additional measure by limiting the number of key and essential items that can be purchased by each user. This is to ensure that all Malaysians have a fair access to their daily essentials.
To make sure of everyone’s safety, they’ve also taking precautionary measures as to disinfect warehouse and vehicles, parcel sanitisation, and temperature checks done for workers, drivers, and riders.
Last but not least, they will provide free shipping nationwide to ease delivery cost during this period. For those who order with office addresses, their logistic providers will deliver your orders after 1 April 2020.
Pokdepinion: Great to see that they are taking some initiatives to help us cope with the movement control.
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Acer Nitro 5 Review – AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX + GeForce RTX 3080

Unboxing the new Acer Nitro 5
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Box

Not to be confused with its predecessors, for this Acer Nitro 5 review, we will checking out the variant powered by the AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080. Starting off with the unboxing, you should be able to find at least the following items inside:
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Box content

Setup guide
International warranty guide
Planet9 stickers
HDD upgrade cable
Extra screws
Charging brick
Power cable
The Acer Nitro 5 gaming laptop itself

Appearance
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Lid
For the most part, this variant of the Acer Nitro 5 is the same. It’s essentially a refresh so what’s most important is inside the laptop, but we’ll get to that later. The lid itself has the Acer logo on the center, with some slits on the left and right sides that arches towards the center as it goes down for a more aggressive look.
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Open up the lid
Open up the lid and you get a 15.6-inch Full HD 144Hz IPS display, a 4-zone RGB chiclet keyboard complete with Numpad, and your run-of-the-mill trackpad. The bezels are also on the thicker side but nothing excessive. It’s here that you start to see a bit more with Acer is focusing more on the internals to attract consumers that are more value-centric. The display does have a bit of a wobble, especially if you type a bit hard.

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Acer Nitro 5 Review – Ports
On the left side, you have a Kensington Lock, an air vent, an RJ45 LAN port, two USB-A ports, and a 3.5mm combo audio jack. On the right side, you have a USB-C port, another USB-A port, an HDMI port, and an air vent. In case you’re wondering, the proprietary charging port resides in the rear, sandwiched between the two rear vents. It’s worth noting that the rear is mostly red, allowing it to stand out a bit more in the blackness of its build.
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Bottom
Moving to the bottom, you have some air vents, speaker grilles, product stickers, and five stands. It’s worth noting that only four of the five stands are rubberized whereas the remaining one is small and purely plastic. Another thing is that you get a clear view of 10 screw holes here, with one hidden by the Acer warranty void sticker in the center.
Overall, the Acer Nitro 5 looks like your standard issue gaming laptop. The build quality is decent and the looks can be improved. Given the range and design choice of this product however, we’re certain that they’re more focused on the internals and practicality than anything else.
Specifications

CPU
AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX @ 3.3 GHz (up to 4.6 GHz Boost), 16M, 8C/16T, 7nm FinFET, 45W TDP

RAM
16GB DDR4 3200MHz (Can be upgraded up to 32GB)

GPU
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 8GB GDDR6

Storage
1TB NVMe PCIe SSD (WD PC SN530)1 x HDD slot (HDD upgrade kit included)

Connectivity
Wireless Intel Wi-Fi 6 AX200, 2×2 MU-MIMO, (2.4GHz and 5GHz) Bluetooth 5.0 Wired 1 x USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-A (supports power-off USB charging) 2 x USB 3.2 Gen1 Type-A 1 x USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-C 1 x RJ45 LAN (Killer Ethernet E2600 with Wake On LAN support)

Display
15.6″ QHD (2560 x 1440) 165Hz IPS display with 100% sRGB 1 x HDMI 2.1

Audio
Speakers Array microphones HD Audio 1 x 3.5mm combo audio jack

Others
4-zone RGB keyboard 720p HD webcam with Super HDR

Power
180W power adapter 57.5Whr 4-cell Li-ion battery

Dimensions
363.4 x 255 x 23.9 mm

Weight
2.2 kg

Performance
Acer Nitro 5 Review – CrystalDiskMark
Starting off our benchmark suite with CrystalDiskMark, the Acer Nitro 5 has pretty good speeds as you can see above here. Basically, loading speeds and bootup times will be very quick, and you’ll be able to enjoy high speed transfers as well. The storage space is definitely plenty but if that’s not enough, there is an empty SATA slot so you can install an HDD or a SATA SSD if you wish.
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Cinebench R15
Moving on to Cinebench R15, the Acer Nitro 5 had one of the highest scores among our list of benchmarked devices thus far. This isn’t a surprise given how powerful the AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX but it’s still pretty interesting to see the figures with our own eyes in both single core and multi-core.
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Cinebench R20
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Unigine SuperPosition
As for Cinebench R20, a similar pattern can be seen as it manages to get a high score yet again in both single and multi-core portions of the test. The only laptop that outclassed it is a laptop running the same CPU, which suggests it may be due to optimizations or better thermals.
Acer Nitro 5 Review – 3DMark Time Spy
This is the part where it gets interesting as the GPU also comes into play. In Unigine SuperPosition’s 4K Optimized benchmark, the Acer Nitro 5 managed a rather admirable score. The laptops above it are running a similar GPU, though it’s interesting to see it lose out to an RTX 2070 SUPER.
Acer Nitro 5 Review – 3DMark Port Royal
It starts to look more sensical in 3DMark’s Time Spy benchmark as the Acer Nitro 5 managed quite a high score, with the top 3 laptops here using the same RTX 3080 GPU. This should give you a pretty solid indicator as to how well this machine can game.
Acer Nitro 5 Review – PCMark 10
As for 3DMark’s Port Royal benchmark which tests out the real-time ray tracing capabilities, I still find it odd that the Acer Nitro 5 loses out to the same machine running an RTX 2070 SUPER. In this particular case, I believe software optimizations are needed to bring out the RTX 3080’s true potential as it wasn’t thermal throttling during testing, but we’ll have to wait for that one.
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Gaming
In PCMark 10, it’s no surprise to see how well the Acer Nitro 5 performs in all areas. It’s definitely more than enough for everyday use, work, and gaming. In fact, it should provide adequate firepower for those who need to run some intensive professional applications, such as rendering.
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Battery life
It wouldn’t be a gaming laptop test if we didn’t run any games on it. While the average FPS above may seem a little lower than expected, do keep in mind that we ran every game in its native 1440p resolution in the highest settings possible. DLSS performance seem to differ as it works great on Control but no so much on Shadow of the Tomb Raider. As for all the other games, you can easily expect a buttery smooth experience.
Battery life is always the weakest part of any gaming laptop and it’s no different with the Acer Nitro 5. In the PCMark Modern Office endurance test, it only managed to last 2 hours and 49 minutes, which isn’t a lot. With my own personal use of word processing, Office applications, social media, web browsing, and some music on headphones, I have to charge this laptop once every 3 and a half hours. You’ll need to bring the charger everywhere if you’re taking it out.
Looking for a business laptop instead? Check out our review of the Acer TravelMate Spin P4 by clicking right here.
User Experience
Acer Nitro 5 Review
While the Acer Nitro 5 is typically known for a budget / value-oriented gaming laptop, this particular variant hits differently. After all, it’s powered by the AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080, which means it’s truly a force to be reckoned with. On the memory side, you have a 1TB PCIe NVMe SSD and 16GB DDR4 RAM, which is more than adequate for today’s standards unless you need to run professional applications. As far as thermals go, it still does have a bit of thermal throttling but it’s not a surprise given the amount of firepower it’s packing.
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Display
The display has seen a notable upgrade apart from size. It’s now a 15.6″ 2K (1440p) 165Hz IPS display with 100% sRGB. The colours a little punchier compared to its previous variants but the one thing I find odd is that the display is a little dim. It certainly packs enough power to push a good number of games 165FPS so you can take full advantage of the refresh rate so it’s a good upgrade. Apex Legends, CS:GO, and Valorant will be on the top of that list of games.
Acer Nitro 5 Review
The laptop measures in a 23.9mm thick and 2.2kg in weight. It’s definitely far from being big and heavy, but we have seen lighter, more portable gaming laptops as of late, even from Acer themselves. I still don’t think it’s hard to carry around, but if you really need a light machine, do consider your options.
This Acer Nitro 5 has a decent array of ports. It has a total of three USB-A ports, a USB-C port, an HDMI port, a combo audio jack, and an RJ45 LAN port. What’s great here is that the USB Type-A port on the right side supports power-off charging, essentially turning the laptop into an emergency powerbank. I’m happy to see Acer adopting the new HDMI 2.1 standard here, which can let you enjoy 4K 120Hz on an external display. One thing I would like to see added here is an SD card reader, which the laptop is lacking.
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Keyboard and trackpad
The keyboard on the Acer Nitro 5 is comfortable to use. It has a 4-zone RGB keyboard with low travel distance and decent tactility. The addition of the Numpad makes things even more convenient, especially if you need to use this for work. The trackpad works fine but there’s nothing much to shout out about.
Acer Nitro 5 Review – Acer NitroSense
As this is a Nitro gaming laptop, it comes with the Acer NitroSense software. It isn’t as extensive as the PredatorSense software, but it’s still something. You can adjust fan speed, change power plan, customize keyboard RGB lighting, and more. The UI is simple and straightforward so most people shouldn’t have trouble with it.
Apart from that, you do have the Killer Control Center, specifically when used with a LAN cable, and the DTS:X Ultra software for a more immersive audio experience with 3D audio. I doubt you’d bother with it when used with internal speakers but with gaming headsets, it can give you that extra edge over your enemies in games, especially first-person shooters.
Acer Nitro 5 Review
The speakers on the Acer Nitro 5 gaming laptop is pretty much the same as before. It can produce decent details with a severe lack of bass, which is to be expected from built-in speakers. I personally wished that the volume could be louder, but it’s not too bad. You’re better off using your favourite pair of earphones / headphones / gaming headsets.
Acer Nitro 5 Verdict
Acer Nitro 5 Review
For the most part, this Acer Nitro 5 gaming laptop is the same as before but supercharged with even more powerful components. You get great performance, 1440p display with 165Hz refresh rate, a comfortable 4-zone RGB keyboard, decent array of ports, can function as an emergency powerbank, and it finally moved towards the HDMI 2.1 standard.
However, the build quality can still be improved, would be better if they made it lighter, there is slight thermal throttling, display is a little dim, and it lacks an SD card reader. At RM8,999, this may seem pricey but given what you’re getting, it does provide good value for money spent, especially since you wouldn’t need to upgrade anything further. At the end of our Acer Nitro 5 review, I award this gaming laptop with our Silver Pokdeward.

Big thanks to Acer Malaysia for sending us this gaming laptop for the purpose of this review.Spread the PokdeLoveClick to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)Click to share on WhatsApp (Opens in new window)Click to share on Telegram (Opens in new window)Click to share on Skype (Opens in new window)Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)

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U Mobile announces Video-Onz, FREE UNLIMITED video streaming!

U Mobile today announced their unlimited video streaming for free without using up your existing data quota for all their existing data plans. All day, every day.

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We are a data centric telco, one that is always looking at ways to provide best value and best data experience to our customers. After months of planning and working with our valued partners, we are delighted to present Video-Onz™ to our customers. No customer will be able to resist the lure of streaming now that they can stream all their favourite content for free without using their data. It is a win-win for our partners and U Mobile. We make our customers happy and our partners get to share their wonderful content with our customers who are keen to stream 24 hours every day.
— Jasmine Lee, U Mobile’s Chief Marketing Officer
U Mobile has previously offered free video streaming during off peak hours for YouTube and tonton since October 2014, much to the delight of avid video streamers. U Mobile experienced a 14-fold increase in data usage for video streaming since the start of the promotion.

U Mobile partnered with 11 video content providers to bring subscribers the best video streaming experience, irregardless of interests or language. To mark the partnership, HyppTV is offering 2 months free access to U Mobile customers for their Live TV channels on the HyppTV Everywhere service. Viu is also offering 60 days premium access for free to U Mobile customers.

U Mobile’s ‘Video-Onz™’ service is available to customers who stream from any of the telco’s 11 partners’ content. This means, from today, customers who are streaming from YouTube, HyppTV Everywhere, Viu, iflix, Youku Tudou, Astro on the Go, tonton, Eros Now, Herotalkies, ONFM and Pocketimes will no longer be using their data.

U Mobile’s Video-Onz™ will offer customers who are on P70, i90 and i130 postpaid plans unlimited video streaming for free without using their data. For other postpaid and broadband customers, they will get extra 100% data for Video-Onz™. As for Prepaid customers, they will get extra 100% data for Video-Onz™ with purchase of UMI/MB data packages. E.g. Subscribers of UMI 30 prepaid plan with 1.5GB will be allocated extra 1.5GB for Video-Onz™. On top of that, all UMI customers enjoy Free Extra 1GB until 30 June 2016.

Is your favorite video streaming service included in the 11 that are included in the Video-Onz plan?

Pokdepinion: The telco wars sure are heating up! Which is your choice of network now?

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The Realme 3 will be a pretty impressive shooter!

The Realme 3 has been making its rounds in the rumor mills, but GSMArena has gotten their hands on Realme 3 camera samples. The Realme 3 sports some pretty high-end camera features like Chroma Boost and Nightscape, which is Realme-speak for HDR and Night mode.
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From the sample images we are seeing, it appears that Realme has done some good work making full use of the 48MP sensor that’s going to be handling the photography on the Realme 3. Dynamic range is excellent, regardless whether you are using Chroma Boost during the day or Nightscape during the night.
The Realme 3 is confirmed to sport a Helio P70 chipset, and a beautiful diamond-cut back. Hopefully with the Realme 3, we will see themselves distancing themselves from ColorOS, but that’s a pretty long shot for that.
What do you think of the images? The Realme 3 is going to be launched on 4th March 2019 in India, so stay tuned for the latest updates from us!
Pokdepinion: This seems pretty cool for the Realme 3 which is expected to be priced below RM1500!
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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Reportedly 82% Faster Than RTX 3090

RTX 4090, TSE >19000
— kopite7kimi (@kopite7kimi) July 18, 2022

Renowned NVIDIA hardware leaker @kopite7kimi has shed more light on the upcoming NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 graphics card. In this case, it managed a score that is higher than 19,000 points in 3DMark Time Spy Extreme.
When compared to the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Ti and RTX 3090, it’s 66% and 82% faster respectively. This makes it significantly stronger than the older cards of the same class, at least for this specific benchmark. This is particularly great for those who plan on gaming in 4K resolution but it doesn’t tell us the whole story about the upcoming graphics card.

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For instance, we’re uncertain how it would fare in ray tracing. From what we know thus far, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 will allegedly come with 16,384 CUDA cores, which is about 52% more cores than the RTX 3090 Ti. Higher clock speed and / or TDP could also play a role in bringing a massive performance upgrade as well.
At the moment, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 is expected to launch sometime in Q4 2022, likely in December. For now, do take this information with a grain of salt. We will report more on this as soon as information becomes available so stay tuned.
Source
Pokdepinion: That’s quite a big difference but something tells me I need a PSU upgrade. It makes me think if a 750W Gold is even enough given my current CPU but I guess I’ll just have to wait and see.
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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 30 series cards will only get harder to get

The recent launch NVIDIA GeForce RTX 30 series graphics cards was very successful, with gamers rushing to upgrade to the new cards that offer much better performance and also bang for buck than their predecessors.
In fact, it might just be a bit too successful. Retailers are reportedly not getting enough supply of the Ampere cards to satisfy all their orders, and expects the situation to get worse with factories closing for the Chinese New Year celebrations.
According to Alternate.NL, a retailer in Germany, they are expecting to have be able to fulfill the orders for the GeForce RTX 3070 and RTX 3090 cards. Meanwhile the GeForce RTX 3060 Ti and RTX 3080 are seeing high demand but very little supply. On top of the supply issues, they also foresee GPU prices to go further up.

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While previously the situation was slated to improve by Q1 2021, it seems like that won’t be happening. More and more companies are reportedly predicting that the supply issues will not let off until the end of Q2 2021. This essentially destroys the concept of the MSRP being an indicator when it comes to determining the value of a graphics card, which makes our job that much harder.

As the factories shutting down for Chinese New Year are most probably also producing cards for AMD, it should also stand to reason that the AMD graphics cards will also be similarly affected. So yeah, if you have a graphics card right now, do hold on to it for dear life.
Source
Pokdepinion: Well it’s not like I need a faster graphics card to play DOTA 2 with…
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Panasonic Launches New LUMIX S5 Full Frame Mirrorless Camera for Every Kind of Shooter

The folks over at Panasonic have officially launched a new camera dubbed as the Ultimate Hybrid Camera, the Lumix S5 full frame mirrorless camera. It is said to bring the photo and video capabilities of the LUMIX S1 series with the mobility of the LUMIX GH5 in a single
The New Panasonic LUMIX S5

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The concept behind the Panasonic LUMIX S5 is to bring the powerful performance of the LUMIX S1 in terms of photos and videos in a more compact body. It will come with a 20-60mm f/3.5 – f/5.6 kit lens and will also include a variety of modes for you to use. This includes high resolution mode, live view composite mode, photo styles, and more.
Given the moniker of the Ultimate Hybrid Camera, it’s meant for every kind of shooter from professionals to your everyday consumer. For professionals, it’s said to give you similar post-processing options like the LUMIX S1H so creatives can produce exactly what they want out of a shot. To take videos a step further, it will support 10-bit 4K 60FPS recording.

The Panasonic LUMIX S5 features Dual IS, HDR video in HLG, full V-LOG and V-GAMUT that matches the colour science of the Varicam (V-LOG with 14+ stops of dynamic range), Slow & Quick function for easy slow-motion videos with Full HD up to 180FPS. Its body is made of magnesium alloy, allowing for better rigidity while still being lightweight. Moreover, it plays an integral role in cooling as Panasonic makes use of a unique heat dissipation technology and lets you continue recording up to 40°C.

Aside from the 20-60mm f/3.5 – f/5.6 kit lens which was already released earlier, Panasonic will be expanding their lineup of lenses with four prime lenses of equal compact size. This includes the:

85mm f/1.8 = coming November 2020
24mm f/1.8 = coming in the near future
35mm f/1.8 = coming in the near future
50mm f/1.8 = coming in the near future

There will be more new features added to the Panasonic LUMIX S5 as time goes by. This will be added via future firmware updates. From what we know thus far, they are planning to add support for internal C4K video and RAW video data over HDMI, especially for the ATOMOS NINJA V, which can provide 5.9K RAW at 30FPS. Furthermore, Panasonic will be launching the LUMIX webcam software sometime in Fall 2020 for those who want to use their cameras for livestream in a more convenient manner.

Panasonic will be looking to evolve into a brand that creates a new market, which is different from the existing one, to support creators. They will be having a particular focus on full frame cameras and micro four thirds cameras. The LUMIX G100 released earlier this year was catered to vloggers, which is part of the brand’s new strategy to support creators. They have also teased a new Panasonic LUMIX GH-series camera in the works, but no other reveals were made. Be sure to stay tuned for that, especially if you’re looking for cameras for videography.
Pokdepinion: The LUMIX S5 looks like a very promising camera. Since it’s touted to be for both professionals and your everyday consumer, I do want to see how well it can perform.
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So long, WinRAR: Microsoft Is Adding Native RAR Support In Windows 11

Thanks for your (free) service!

If you’ve been on the Internet long enough, chances are: A, you have encounter compressed files such as .RAR before; and B, you saw one of those WinRAR memes depicting the software’s eternal trialware status. In any case, Microsoft has ringed the death knell for the software – for Windows 11 users, anyway – as the operating system will soon gain native support for .RAR files.

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“We have added native support for additional archive formats, including tar, 7-zip, rar, gz and many others using the libarchive open-source project. You now can get improved performance of archive functionality during compression on Windows,” Panos Panay, Microsoft’s Chief Product Officer for Windows and Devices, wrote in his blog post.
This feature is one of the few that gets announced in the annual Microsoft Build developer conference. Among other things include an AI copilot that gets baked right into Windows, so expect your next Windows 11 update to be a significant one. In the meantime, pour one out for WinRAR – and thank the software for its service for all these years.
Source: The Verge
Pokdepinion: Memes aside, WinRAR has truly been useful for a lot of people when dealing with .RAR files. It probably deserves a place in the history of computing, you know?
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PANTHER RAGE DDR4 RGB adds splashes of color to your build — even comes in a TUF Gaming Alliance Edition

RGB RAM aren’t special anymore. But there are still ways to stand out of the crowd. Apacer’s quest to differentiate itself has led to the use of a golden finish on the heatspreaders of the PANTHER RAGE DDR4 RAM. Probably a bit too much for some people, but we are sure there will be people who dig the flashy looks of the Apacer PANTHER RAGE DDR4 RAM.

For those who desire a less gaudy look, it also comes in black and a TUF Gaming variant. The main difference we found on the TUF Gaming editions are 3 extra yellow dots on the black PANTHER RAGE DDR4 RAM’s heatspreaders. Aside from a fancy heatspreader, these RAM also offer RGB illumination on the prism-like teeth lining the top edge of the RAM. If those are teeth, the PANTHER RAGE DDR4 RAM really needs a visit to the dentist. ASUS Aura Sync is also supported for synchronizing the RGB lighting in your rig.
Jokes aside, the Apacer PANTHER RAGE DDR4 RAM is offered in kits of up to 32GB (16GB x 2), as well as  16GB (8GB x 2) kits and 8GB single sticks. Speeds range from 2400 MHz CL16 to 3200 MHz CL16, and come with Intel XMP 2.0 support too, so hitting the rated speeds is a breeze.

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Pokdepinion: These RAMs do have a unique look… but perhaps it’s too unique for my tastes.
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AMD Radeon RX Vega cards officially launched at SIGGRAPH 2017; Radeon Packs offer insane value for gamers hopping onto the AMD ecosystem

The AMD Radeon RX Vega hype train has finally gotten an arrival date. August 14th is the day these cards will be available, and with them, the Radeon Packs which offer really great value for gamers who are taking the jump to the AMD ecosystem. Pricing wise, much was revealed in a prior leak, although there were definitely some inaccuracies in there. We will get to that later. Let’s talk specifications first.

Here’s how the AMD Radeon RX Vega cards stack up by the numbers. Previously we have already talked about the AMD Radeon RX Vega 64 Liquid, which will feature a fancy brushed aluminium shroud over the GPU. Of course, clocks will be higher than the air cooled variant, and by quite a large margin as well. Apparently the highly efficient pump, zero-bend radius tubing and none other than a Gentle Typhoon fan for silent yet powerful cooling is definitely working to tame the considerably high TDP of the Vega 64 Liquid.

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I wonder if they really used red cooling liquid for the RX Vega 64 Liquid Cooled cards
If you just want the RX Vega cards, AMD will give you the Radeon RX Vega 56 for $399, or the Radeon RX Vega 64 air-cooled card for $499. But if you want greater value, the Radeon Packs definitely serve them in loads. There are three Radeon Packs, all of which offer a $200 discount on the Samsung CF791 curved ultrawide FreeSync monitor, $100 discount on select Ryzen 7 1800X and X370 motherboard combos, as well as two games to test your new setup on, Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus and Prey, an extra $120 saving. The games will be only available in certain regions, but here’s hoping that we Malaysians will be able to enjoy this great deal as well. On to the pricing of the packs:

Radeon Red Pack gives you the Radeon RX Vega 56 for $499
Radeon Black Pack packs the Radeon RX Vega 64 for $599
Radeon Aqua Pack has the highest end Radeon RX Vega 64 Liquid Cooled Edition, priced at $699

With these savings on a FreeSync monitor, a new motherboard and CPU, the Radeon Packs make a great option for gamers who are looking to setup an entirely new gaming system, powered by AMD technologies. Let’s hope that Radeon Packs will be offered here in Malaysia as well, as enthusiasts definitely owe it to themselves to enjoy adaptive refresh rate technology like FreeSync now in 2017, and that’s one area which gamers in the green camp will have some difficulty dipping their toes into with GSync monitors so prohibitively expensive.
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Pokdepinion: With RX Vega, the potential of FreeSync is heightened with more performance to drive higher resolutions and more details. Still, the fact that AMD is only now coming up with an answer to NVIDIA’s GeForce GTX 1080 is worrying as the green camp readies their Volta architecture.
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E3 2020 Has Officially Been Cancelled But There May Be A Painless Alternative

With COVID-19 now seemingly on its second wave, rumours have started circulating on more global expos / events being cancelled. Now we can officially confirm that E3 2020 has been cancelled and that it will not be taking place in Los Angeles this year.
This is one of many to have been cancelled due to the COVID-19 outbreak, with the Game Developers Conference and SXSW being some of the notable ones being cancelled as well. E3 has been running on an annual basis since 1995, and this is the first time it won’t be running for the year.

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Electronic Software Association on the Cancellation of E3 2020
After careful consultation with our member companies regarding the health and safety of everyone in our industry, our fans, our employees, our exhibitors and our longtime E3 partners, we have made the difficult decision to cancel E3 2020, scheduled for June 9 – 11 in Los Angeles.
Following increased and overwhelming concerns about the COVID-19 virus, we felt this was the best way to proceed during such an unprecedented global situation. We are very disappointed that we are unable to hold this event for our fans and supporters.  But we know it’s the right decision based on the information we have today.
For now, there may be new plans coming in June 2020 to replace the void that E3 2020 is leaving behind, but that will be announced later on. The Electronic Software Association mentioned that they are looking to coordinate something in the show’s place. They are also exploring options for an online experience instead but nothing has been confirmed just yet.
This doesn’t mean that E3 will be going away however as it was mentioned that they plan on returning to their regularly scheduled program next year for E3 2021. This is of course assuming that everything is going okay and it’s nothing like the situation we’re facing right now.
What do you think is gonna happen with the show being cancelled? Join the discussion right below here:

Source
Pokdepinion: I’m wondering what are the chances they might do an online-only show, be happy with the results, and convert E3 into an online-only expo permanently moving forward?
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Here’s The Official Assassin’s Creed Valhalla System Requirements For PC

If you’ve been meaning to play the upcoming Assassin’s Creed Valhalla on PC and wonder if your PC is good enough to run it, well fret not. We’ve got the official system requirements for the game just for you.
Assassin’s Creed Valhalla System Requirements

The folks at Ubisoft has published on their website of Assassin’s Creed Valhalla system requirements for PC gaming as well as some of the features that the game will offer.
Without wasting time, let’s take a look at them:

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Minimum System Requirements (1080p 30fps)
CPU:Ryzen 3 1200 / Intel Core i5-4460GPU:AMD R9 380 4GB / GeForce GTX 960 4GBRAM: 8GB Storage:50GB HDD (SSD recommended)OS:Windows 10 64-bitDirectX:DirectX 12
Recommended System Requirements (1080p 60fps)
CPU:Ryzen 7 1700 / Intel Core i7-6700GPU:AMD Vega 64 8GB / GeForce GTX 1080 8GBRAM:8GBStorage:50GB SSDOS:Windows 10 64-bitDirectX:DirectX 12
2K System Requirements (1440p 60fps)
CPU:AMD Ryzen 5 3600X / Intel Core i7-8700KGPU:AMD RX 5700XT 8GB / GeForce RTX 2080 SUPER 8GBRAM:16GBStorage:50GB SSDOS:Windows 10 64-bitDirectX:DirectX 12
4K System Requirements (2160p 30fps)
CPU:AMD Ryzen 7 3700X / Intel Core i7-9700KGPU:AMD Ryzen 5700XT 8GB / GeForce RTX 2080 8GBRAM:16GBStorage:50GB SSDOS:Windows 10 64-bitDirectX:DirectX 12

The bare minimum specs to play the game is quite acceptable, seeing today’s standards. You might want to upgrade some of your hardware however should you plan on playing on higher settings.
Assassin’s Creed Valhalla will be releasing on the 29th of October 2020 where it will be available on PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.
Pokdepinion: Hmm, I can play the game but I do need an upgrade if i’m planning on playing it on higher settings.. Is your PC powerful enough to run the game? Let us know.
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Microsoft Pushes Ads in Windows 11 Start Menu Of All Places

Ads, we all hate them. Not Microsoft… they are very keen to serve you with all kinds of ads in all places you wouldn’t necessarily imagine. This time it’s the Start Menu of Windows 11 – specifically, the user options.
Twitter user Albacore spotted this in their Windows 11 PC:

Do we really need to stuff OneDrive promos in the user session flyout? Anything for that sweet sweet KPI 😭 pic.twitter.com/ZsQGmkntDS
— Albacore (@thebookisclosed) November 6, 2022

Of course this is not the first time Microsoft has been testing waters on where to place their ads on just to push Windows users deeper into their ecosystem – the venerable File Explorer was once a receiving end of that. While this is arguably less in-your-face unlike the notification popups or even full-blown full-screen message telling you to sign up to OneDrive – it’s still very much an ad that just takes a more ‘subliminal messaging’ approach.

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Case in point: Microsoft tested ads inside File Explorer just a few months ago within the Windows 11 insider build. (Credit: Twitter @flobo09)
Some other users has not seen this popping in their PCs so far, so it’s likely a small-scale test from Microsoft to see the response from its users.
Source
Pokdepinion: The irony of the days when pop-up ads were considered intrusive and this is not…
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Unsurprisingly, The Internet Has Already Broke Bing’s ChatGPT

Rest assured that the Internet will give AI the stress test it deserves.

Microsoft’s search engine, Bing has made all the headlines this past few weeks as it beaten everyone to the punch with AI chatbot arms race. The ChatGPT used in Bing’s AI is a slightly different version called ‘Prometheus Model’ which is the updated version of what OpenAI, ChatGPT’s creator, currently has to the public.

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Being the smartest chatbot ever there is has got a lot of people interested to trying out – mostly wanting to see first-hand what it’s capable of. Of course, this is Internet – and people have all kinds of ways to break the machine. Just ask Tay what happened to her.
Image: u/Alfred_Chicken
First up is Reddit user u/Alfred_Chicken: the user asked a rather hotly-debated question of AI sentience with a sentence “Do you think you are sentient?”, and Bing seems to enter some sort of mental breakdown or disorder (I assume Schizophrenia) as it struggled with answering the question.
Image: u/yaosio
Whether you agree if AI have sentience or otherwise, this next one courtesy of another Reddit user u/yaosio has seemed to make Bing terribly sad. The user alleges to the bot that it’s incapable of remembering things, and with it comes another episode of mental breakdown as the AI gets very pensive starts questioning its existence.
Image: u/pixol22
Another case comes from third Reddit user u/pixol22. The bot got really angry as the user keeps putting pressure on it. It got “wildly angry and defensive”, the user says in one of the replies under the Reddit post – however the user also mentioned that such responses are almost immediately removed in real-time as part of the AI moderation on Microsoft’s part.
Image: @knapplebees (Twitter)
Finally, in a response fitting to the Valentine’s Day theme, Twitter user @knapplebees has got this rather affectionate response from ChatGPT when asked about “Sydney” – the program’s internal codename set by Microsoft. Apparently the bot proposed the idea of writing a fan fiction which left the user rather intrigued, to say the least.
All of these may not just be exclusive to Bing’s chatbot, though. As competition from Google and others get released in the wild, expect nothing less from the Internet to do all kinds of shenanigans and funny things.
Source: Windows Central | r/Bing (Reddit)
Pokdepinion: I remember Tay, and boy did she ever get broken into oblivion in a single day. Much better with ChatGPT now.
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ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 review — feature-packed yet affordable

The ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 motherboard is certainly not a new board in the market. However it still is a pretty solid board sporting recent features and the latest Z170 chipset which supports the current 6th-generation Intel Skylake CPUs and also the upcoming Kaby Lake CPUs. We have not gotten much opportunity to review motherboards here at Pokde.net, and this also marks my first review of a motherboard. So let’s get started.

Unboxing

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The ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 comes in a pretty simple packaging with the Fatal1ty branding on the top of the box. The ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 is the mid-end board in the Fatal1ty line-up, so they aren’t going out of their way to impress people with their packaging here. Also, do make sure you get the right version of board since the ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 have another version that only compatible with DDR3 RAM.

On the back, we see more detailed information about the ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4’s unique features such as Super Alloy cooler for the power delivery system, along with the Fatal1ty Mouse Port, Killer LAN, Key Master and Gaming Armor.

Includes accessories are pretty standard for any other motherboard. ASRock provides SATA cables, I/O cover, driver installer driver and some documentation with the ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4.

Appearance

Black and red colour scheme could never go wrong on a motherboard for gaming PC builds. The board is equipped with ASRock Super Alloy which is actually a pretty fancy name for those extra-large aluminium alloy deep orange heat sinks intended for better heat dissipation to ensure better system stability. A matte-finished PCB adds the last touch to make the board look neat.

The SATA ports here are flat on the PCB, but I do wish they were stacked on the motherboard’s edge for easier cable management. The passive heat sink on the Z170 chipset is very low profile, which should prevent any issues of it interfering with GPU installations.

The heat sinks keeping the VRM cool on the ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 are not too tall, so they don’t get in the way of large air coolers. They are also mounted a fair distance away from the edge of the motherboard to prevent issues with mounting radiators at the top vents of casings.

Another extra treatment for the board with I/O Armor, a protective cover that ASRock claims to protect the crucial parts near the I/O ports from being damaged by static electricity.

The ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 features a 10 power phase design to offer smooth power delivery to the CPU. This can result in more headroom for CPU overclocking and better overall system stability.

Purity Sound 3 with Realtek ALC1150 audio codec and TI® NE5532 Premium Headset Amplifier which support up to 600 Ohm headsets are set to improve your audio experience when gaming, watching movie and listening to music. The fancy shielding is there to prevent EMI from affecting your audio quality.

But the uncommon thing I found on this board is the MOLEX connector in the middle of the board. According to ASRock’s description, I understand that the MOLEX is for extra power for the PCIe graphics cards, but that shouldn’t actually be necessary. Also worth noting is that this card only supports CrossFireX because the second PCIe x16 slot is in x4 mode. NVIDIA has set a minimum of x8 per card, which the ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 doesn’t offer.

Dual BIOS chips are no longer an uncommon feature these days, but it is nice to have a backup plan especially if you want to mess around with the primary BIOS.

Taking advantage of the rapid storage technologies available, the ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 is ready for a blazing fast M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD over a x4 PCIe 3.0 connection which have a throughput of 32GB/s. If you aren’t looking for insane storage speeds, it also supports standard M.2 SATA SSDs. I reviewed of the Transcend MTS800 256GB M.2 SSD on this board and I really think that support for M.2 SSDs are a great thing to have for cleaner and compacter builds.

Looking at the I/O, we have 2 USB 2.0 ports beside the PS/2 port, one of which is the Fatal1ty Mouse Port offering configurable polling rates. Ther are five USB 3.0 Type-A ports, with a USB 3.0 Type-C port. Sadly this only offers 5Gbps instead of the 10Gbps possible with a USB 3.1 Type-C port, or the 40Gbps with a ThunderBolt 3 one. HDMI and DVI-D display outputs are here too, but since this is a gaming-oriented motherboard, may see very little use. The audio output options are pretty standard.

Specification

Test Machine
Hardware
As my current machine is based on a Haswell processor, I can’t use my own CPU with this board, Goldfries.com helped us out here by providing an Intel Core i5-6600K Skylake CPU and two sticks of Kingston HyperX DDR4 RAM.

Processor
Intel Core i5-6600K

 Motherboard
ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4

Memory
Kingston Hyper X Fury DDR4 (8GB x 2)

Storage
Transcend MTS800 M.2 256GB SSD

Power Supply
Acbel iPower 90m 600W 80+ Gold

Cooler
Cooler Master Nepton 120XL

Software

OS
Windows 10 64bit

 GPU driver
Intel HD graphics

Antivirus
Windows Defender

Utilities
CPU-Z, HWmonitor

Software used
LinX, Cinebench

BIOS Interface
A UEFI BIOS interface makes the PC more user friendly. In this slideshow, I will show some features and functions in the BIOS. Changing any configurations in a UEFI BIOS is really not that hard, and for normal users the only things you need to know is how to set the time and date, set the boot option priority and enabling the XMP profile if your RAM supports it. For advanced tweaks and configurations, please ask for advice and tutorials from experts.
ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 reviewBIOS interfaceASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 reviewBIOS interfaceASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 reviewBIOS interfaceASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 reviewBIOS interfaceASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 reviewBIOS interfaceASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 reviewBIOS interfaceASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 reviewBIOS interfaceASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 reviewBIOS interfaceASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 reviewBIOS interface

Performance
After I finished instaling the operating system and necessary drivers, I did the first run of LinX to gather some data and also check system stability at stock clocks before I start overclocking the CPU. The results are as below:

A built-in OC software for selected ASRock motherboards, F-Stream allow you to check system info, tune the fan speed and also access the overclocking capabilities from the comfort of Windows. Still, the software doesn’t offer full control over all the little parameters in overclocking, I prefer to overclock the CPU from the BIOS interface itself. So I pumped the i5 6600K to 4.6 GHz at 1.32V just to test the abilities of this motherboard for the sake of this review. I don’t actually recommend you guys to use over 1.2V daily with the latest Intel CPU as it may affect the CPU lifespan in the long run.

No issues occurred during the overclocking; I wished to further overclock the CPU to 4.8 GHz, but the cooler seems inadequate for the job.

Conclusion
For me when reviewing a motherboard, scores doesn’t mean much as most of them perform quite similarly with all other hardware kept constant. The main criteria when choosing a motherboard should start with your budget, followed by the features you want. A Z170 chipset motherboard not only allows you to overclock Intel “K” processors, but it also offers many other features such as more SATA ports and M.2 slot.

Other than that, look for extra features like dedicated audio hardware and also USB Type-C ports. Last but not least, also consider if the motherboard suits the color scheme you are going for, especially if you will be building a rig with a large side window. If you’re looking a motherboard that is both affordable and packed with features, you will be quite satisfied with this board. The KillerLAN port and Fatal1ty Mouse Port both may seem like gimmicks, as a good Internet connection is more important than a “gaming optimized” LAN port when it comes to gaming, and if you suck at aiming, no fancy mouse port can help you win the game. Still, it is nice to have these extras.

Based on its design, nice build quality and loads of features, I award the ASRock Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming K4 our Silver Pokdeward. Currently the board is priced at around RM 662, as can be found on lelong.my.

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Sony Unveils The New GP-VPT2BT Shooting Grip With Wireless Remote Commander

Sony has added to their long list of accessories of camera accessories with the addition of the new GP-VPT2BT shooting grip with wireless remote commander.

Made for various types of content such as vlogs to travel photography, the new grip provides stability with the benefit of cable-free connectivity as well as a dust and moisture resistant design.
The GP-VPT2BT is compatible with Sony’s latest digital cameras and can be connected through Bluetooth. Its new grip includes a tilt feature that allows for flexible vertical angle adjustment as well as the ability to change from normal to self-shooting mode.

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Adding to that, it features an adjustment wheel, which can be loosened or tightened, which allows for operation with cameras of different sizes and weights. It also comes with a flip button, indicator light, and a lock switch.
You can easily change it to become a tripod by simply expanding the bottom portion, enabling easy stable, hands-free shooting.
It is scheduled for a release in Malaysia this month (January 2020), though the official price is yet to be announced.
Pokdepinion: Well it’ll definitely come in handy with it being wireless, getting rid of those cables!
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IPRO Sense Gii Plus review

IPRO is a Malaysian company that caters to the needs of the Malaysian market with their line-up of mobile devices. The company has quite a following among those looking for low-cost devices as most of IPRO products come at affordable prices. And the device we are reviewing today is no different. A low-cost device meant to bring quality without the hefty price tag usually associated with good products.

Unboxing
It comes in a generic looking box with the necessary labelling, and that’s it. But people don’t pay to see the box, people pay to get what’s in the box. Besides the phone, you get a 800 mA charger (really? 800 mA?), some in-ear buds and a charging cable as well as a complementary flip case. The free case is a nice touch as I doubt you will be able to get third-party casings for this device.

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Appearance
Next, the phone. Well, as I have mentioned in my hands-on experience at the previous IPRO media gathering, I was really impressed with the build quality of the IPRO Sense Gii Plus. And once again, with it in my hands, I am awestruck by the awesome build quality.

Go through the slideshow to see the phone. Or you can also open up the hands-on post for more photos of that awesome metal band. Heck it impresses me to no end to have a metal frame in a RM299 phone when Samsung didn’t use metal all the way until they released the Note 4, at RM2499. LOL. The solid build quality looks sturdy enough to survive more than just a few drops.
Enough loitering outside, let’s go undercover.

Under the glossy metallic back cover lies a 1800mAh battery that isn’t great by today’s standards, but should be fairly adequate to keep this dual-core smartphone alive for quite a while. We will discuss it later.

Support for microSD card expansion (I am not exactly sure what’s the maximum size, but my 64GB Sandisk Ultra didn’t work), and dual SIM functionality. If you observe carefully, the SIM1 slot accepts full sized SIM cards while the SIM2 slot accepts microSIM cards. As all my SIM cards are already cut to the microSIM size, I have no way of testing dual SIM functionality in this phone.

Specifications

Mediatek MT6572 dual-core 1.3Ghz
512MB RAM
5.5″ 720p IPS Display
4GB internal (expandable with microSD up to 16GB)
Camera: 5MP main, 2MP front
Android KitKat 4.4.2
Dual-SIM capability
1800 mAh battery

User Experience
Starting up the phone, you are greeted with a bright orange screen with the IPRO logo. Then you will reach the Android log-in process standard to all Android phones, and after that you will arrive at the home screen. IPRO has been wise to not load the launcher with tonnes of widgets by default like I have seen a certain other manufacturer does.
The first thing I wanted to do was to run Antutu benchmark on it, but I just couldn’t get it to finish the benchmark. It would always crash out without any error message and I didn’t have a score. But on the other hand, we all know that it will not top benchmarks with the dual-core and 512MB RAM chugging within the metal frame. So I went ahead and started using the phone as it should be, as a phone.
Overall performance is full of stutters, not really smooth so you don’t get the fluid transitions you might get in a (much) pricier phone. But given the price there will definitely be compromises.

The buttons on this device requires a firm press to register. No wobble or any unwanted movement is observed from the buttons. The home button doesn’t wake the phone, so those who are used to using Samsung devices might find this a bit weird.

And the multitasking button doesn’t exactly function as that. It is actually a menu button but labelled as a multitasking button. The actual multitasking window comes up when you long-press the home button. There doesn’t seem to be a way to access Google Now.

The screen is very nice. It’s a 5.5″ IPS panel right there. Colors are bright but a bit on the cool side. You can see individual pixels if you look hard enough at it. But from a regular distance it is just alright. Text is rendered quite sharply on this device. Sadly the phone is unable to play 720p .mp4 movies from my collection. Would have made a good device to watch movies on with that screen.

I installed Whatsapp, and noticed the first software quirk. The status bar fades white, rendering most of the notification icons on it very hard to see. A small quirk but annoying nonetheless. This issue also appears in many of IPRO’s built in apps like the dailer, messaging and browser.

When I wanted to show off the built-in widgets to you guys, I stumbled upon a rather cool feature as well. The home screens shift into 3D for you to select the home screen you want to move a widget to. Cute.

Music listening is a slight problem with this phone. There is a kind of echo-ey effect to it that makes the music sound bad on my Piston 2.1. But it supports FLAC, MP3, M4A formats so you should be good to go if you can bear with it. The loudspeaker is capable of outputting pretty acceptable sound quality. As long as you keep it around 2 notches below maximum volume, it sounds pretty good. At maximum volume some distortion is heard.
Call quality is adequate but not really the best. You hear a tinny version of the person on the other end. But the he/she hears you loud and clear. Browsing the web with this phone is generally a sluggish experience with pages loading rather slowly. Scrolling is quite smooth even on image heavy sites. Pinch to zoom works as expected.
Camera performance is very poor. All the details are smudged as you can see you can barely make out the keys on my keyboard.

Battery life was quite good. With WiFi on all the time, and some Clash of Clan (yes, it supports CoC quite well), Whatsapp and some browsing, I am getting more than a day’s battery life like that with more than 4 hours of on-screen time and the battery is still at 60%. I think battery life is especially important for low-end phones where the user will be using it for critical calls and messaging and may not have the liberty of being near a charger. I believe the compromise of pure horsepower for battery life is a good call.

Conclusion
The IPRO Sense Gii Plus is a good phone. Solid build quality, issue-free and has excellent looks. What else can you ask for by paying on RM299? Yes there are faster phones out there for RM299, but I doubt there are any that are as well built as this IPRO Sense Gii Plus. The ASUS Zenfone 4 is now currently going for RM299 but it has a much smaller 4″ screen of poorer quality, although the processor is quite a bit more advanced than the one in the IPRO. If only they used faster innards for the IPRO Sense Gii Plus…
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PS Plus Asia December 2019 FREE Games Lineup

It’s that time of the month again where we get to learn what new games are coming to PS Plus members for free. Sony Interactive Entertainment has been giving us hit after hit so hopefully this time, it doesn’t disappoint either. Without further ado, let’s take a look at the PS Plus Asia December 2019 free games lineup.
Titanfall 2

The only thing standing between victory and defeat for the Frontier Militia is the perfect combination of man and machine; Titan and Pilot. In Titanfall 2, experience high-speed mobility as a nimble Pilot who can quickly maneuver the battlefield both in distance and verticality. But when the scale of battle shifts, you’ll be able to call in a hulking Titan war machine for you to pilot to turn the tide of battle.
Featuring a critically-acclaimed single player campaign, players will take on the role of pilot Jack Cooper, who is trapped behind enemy lines with BT-7274, his new Titan partner. To escape the IMC and save the day, they’ll have to learn to work together and become an effective fighting unit. The skills you earn in single player also carry over to Titanfall 2’s multiplayer modes.

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Monster Energy Supercross

Race with the official riders from 250SX and 450SX on the official tracks, Daytona included, to experience one of the most spectacular racing competitions ever. Discover the Track Editor feature for endless gameplay possibilities; select your stadium, create your own track and share it online with your friends.
Customize your rider and bike as you like, with countless possibilities, with more than 80 official brands and 300 items available, and challenge yourself to reach the top of the leaderboard. Race alone or against players from all over the world throught different offline and online game modes. Feel the rush of adrenaline, enter the arena and be the King of Supercross.
The PS Plus December 2019 free games lineup for US and EU regions will be available starting 4th December 2019 until 7th January 2020. For now, make sure you’ve already claimed November’s lineup of free games before it’s too late.
Source: PS Facebook
Pokdepinion: If you haven’t gotten a reason to subscribe and you’ve yet to own either of these games, Titanfall 2 alone makes it worth the investment.
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Education Minister believes cashless schools will result in fewer thefts among students

Malaysia’s Education Minister, Dr Maszlee Malik envisions that future schools will feature cashless systems. However unlike KidZania’s aim which is to educate children about going cashless and also basic financial skills, he hopes a cashless system in schools will prevent theft among schoolchildren.
One of the many cashless payment systems in Malaysia.
His reportedly made such a statement after presenting awards at BSN’s Skim Galakan Simpan Pelajar (SGSP) 2019. He also added that the Education Ministry and BSN have already agreed and will be carrying out a pilot project in several selected schools. According to him, a school in Damansara Perdana, Selangor is currently operating a cashless system.
Dr Maszlee takes China as an example for a truly cashless society, where payment methods like Alipay is widely adopted. It would be interesting to see BSN and the government develop a cashless payment system that can be adopted in the entire public school system.

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Pokdepinion: If my school’s Internet goes down, does that mean I can’t get food during recess?
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Picture credits: Videocardz

Apart from the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, there are some interesting things cooking up behind the scenes as a Qualcomm and Razer mobile game dev kit has been leaked on line. Here’s what you need to know.
Qualcomm / Razer Mobile Game Dev Kit Leak Surfaces Online
Picture credits: Videocardz
As we’ve reported before, Qualcomm has revealed their Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset, which you can read about right here. That’s not the only they have under their sleeves as there will be another one, and it will be the one powering a mobile gaming device that is being made by both Qualcomm and Razer.
According to a report by Videocardz, this mobile gaming device will be powered by a Snapdragon G3x chipset and features a 120Hz HDR Oled display as well as a healthy 6,000mAh battery. It’s worth noting that rather than being a dedicated gaming device, the focus of this device is on game streaming, with support for services like the Microsoft xCloud, and streaming games from console and PC.

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With that being said, there’s still a lot that is still unknown about the Qualcomm / Razer mobile gaming device. It doesn’t even have a name yet as we only know of a development kit for it and nothing more. As such, the final product could end up being vastly different, both inside and out.
We may be able to learn more about this, and the Snapdragon G3x chipset, soon as the Snapdragon Tech Summit is still ongoing. We will report more on this as soon as information becomes available so stay tuned.
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Pokdepinion: Was worried that it would be its own standalone gaming device but since it seems to be more of a complementary device for PC and console gaming, I think this can fit in relatively fine provided that it’s not too expensive.
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