Tag: featured

Company Estimote creates a new range of wearable devices to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in workplaces

Posted in smart devices, technologyTagged , , , , Leave a comment

Estimote has been making wearable and programmable devices for a while now but with the current pandemic, they’ve adapted their technology to help prevent the spread of COVID-19 in workplaces. Even though companies have social distancing and physical isolation measures in place, we all know there are times when we accidentally slip up. If there is someone that is frequently slipping up, this technology can help to identify them and find out why.

The hardware uses passive indoor GPS location tracking with proximity sensors powered by Bluetooth throughout a workplace facility, ultra-wide-band radio connectivity and built-in LTE to trace contact and provide data to employees and employers in real-time. Through a simple but powerful interface, employers can then track everything from frequency and length of individual close encounters to mapping the most troublesome locations in a workplace where multiple close encounters seem to happen. Companies can track and identify hot zones versus safe and pre-authorized zones.

wearable
Employers can then track everything from frequency of one-on-one close encounters to mapping the most troublesome locations in a workplace

On an individual level, the devices can warn you when you are too close to someone else who is wearing a device. Individuals can also indicate their own health status (e.g. “Quarantined”) with an app and display their workplace status publicly with built-in LEDs. Employers can then monitor those who are “Quarantined” and warn those that may have accidentally come in contact with them.

The wearable is constantly scanning for other wearables to register close interactions

*Technomuscle is in no way affiliated with, or supported by Estimote. However, we think this is a product worth sharing and investing in, especially during these challenging times. If you are interested in the product, feel free to reach out to the Estimote team by email.

Samsung Galaxy S20, S20+ and S20 Ultra 120Hz Display – Does it stand up to the hype?

Posted in mobile, smart devices, smartphoneTagged , , , 1 Comment

The Galaxy S20 lineup has been touted for it’s new cameras but tech enthusiasts will probably not care to use their phone for photography. Luckily, they all come with one upgrade that many would consider as a huge leap – 120Hz displays.

New super smooth 120hz display

First, let’s get into how great this display really is – it’s amazing. The refresh rate of the screen has doubled from the original 60Hz to 120Hz which makes menu transitions, scrolling through websites, and enjoying supported media* and games impressively smooth. I say supported media and games because YouTube doesn’t truly support 120Hz yet and most games don’t have that option either but you can bet that they will catch up with this display evolution soon. The S20 lineup isn’t the first or only phone to have this either, the older OnePlus 7 Pro has a 90Hz display and the new Oppo Find X2 Pro has a 120Hz QHD (1440p) display.

The downfalls

120Hz means that the screen refreshes double the amount of times every second which takes a significant toll on its battery life. Testing from Tom’s Guide shows the difference as the phone took a three-hour (or 25%) hit on their browsing test. That’s not to say that the S20 phones don’t last, because the S20 Ultra, with a 5000Mhz battery can last up to 14 hours a day with about 5 hours of screen on time on a single charge. It also has new fast charging, capable of a full charge in only 38 minutes!

Another main downfall that Samsung wasn’t very clear on announcing at launch is that the 120Hz display is only supported when using the FHD (1080p) display option. Ever since the S6, Samsung phones have supported QHD resolution. Some will argue that the 120Hz is worth the downgrade to FHD, while others prefer the higher resolution at 60Hz for an increased battery life.

THERE’S HOPE!

According to Max Weinbach, a well-known Samsung leaker, there should be a software update that will bring 120Hz to WQHD+ resolution in one to three months. Apparently, Samsung needs to test out the performance and battery life to ensure that it meets its standards before making the feature accessible. The 120Hz + WQHD+ resolution will probably reduce the battery life even further, but at least you will have the option.

Let us know in the comments if you are interested in the S20 lineup of phones. If you already have one, will you be using the new 120Hz refresh rate, or are you sticking with WQHD+ at 60Hz?

Tesla Model Y Unveiled – S3XY Lineup Complete!

Posted in Cars, technologyTagged , , , , , , Leave a comment

Today at 8PM PDT (11PM EST), Tesla livestreamed the unveiling of the Tesla Model Y and what an exciting event it was! Look at this crowd…

Model Y Unveiling - Crowd

Elon said that up to today, they’ve made 550,000 cars and in 12 months, they will have made over a million vehicles. 11 years ago when “electric cars was thought to be a stupid idea” they made 1 car (the first Tesla Roadster). They had to break this mindset and make something for mass-production that could compete with gasoline cars, looked better than gasoline cars and was just as competitively priced – so they designed and created the Model S (‘S’ for “sedan”). From there, they designed:

  • Model X (‘X’ for crossover SUV), the best electric SUV
  • Model 3 (originally aiming for ‘E’ but “Ford killed SEX” says Elon because of the naming trademark infringement!), the cheapest electric car in their lineup that doesn’t skimp on performance
  • New Roadster, the fastest car in the world that can do 0-100 km/h in 2.1 seconds (60 mph in 1.9 seconds)

Afterwards, Elon highlights how far they’ve come in terms of production and scale through their new gigafactories. He also highlighted that “2019 is the year for the Solar Roof and Powerwall”. It has so far been delayed because the power cells were needed for the Model 3 production issues.

In 2010, there were no high-power superchargers. Today they have 1400 Supercharger stations and 12000 Superchargers in 36 countries and have introduced the Supercharger v3, delivering up to 1600 km range / hr (1000 mi / hr).

And finally, the moment we were all waiting for, the…

MODEL Y

Model Y Unveiling - Model 7

Driving out, the Model Y looks like a cute hatchback version of the Model 3. It has very similar design features with a big widescreen in the middle, no other user interfaces and a nice panoramic glass roof. A big difference, it has 3 rows of seats instead of 2 and can therefore fit 6 people comfortably and 7 max. Surprisingly, it comes in at very similar prices to the model 3, $47,000 for the first long range models and $39,000 for a standard version by Spring 2021. See other specs and full range/pricing below:

Other Key Specs

  • 0 – 60 mph in 3.5 seconds
  • Very low centre of gravity which allows for great handling and tight turns
  • 300 miles range true useful range

Model Y Unveiling - Model 7 pricing

Elon ends the formal presentation with “… and there you have the S3XY presentation”! Everyone there is then allowed to take a closer look and take a test drive if they’d like. I wish I was there! Let me know in the comments if you’d consider the Model Y over the other models :).

What to buy? New Macbook Pro vs. New Surface Book

Posted in ComputersTagged Leave a comment

This was an exciting week for the big two. Microsoft unveiled its new Surface Book on Wednesday, October 26th, and Apple followed suit the next day with their new Macbook Pros. This left me wanting both laptops so I have a big decision to make!

This article isn’t about all the new features of these products but I will just give a small snippet of the big differences for those of you who haven’t seen the multitude of coverage already:

Review of new technology in both systems

Late 2016 New MacBook Pros:

  • New ‘Touch Bar’ allows for dynamic control of content, settings and actions that adapts to the app you are using
  • Upgraded to Intel 6th generation processors
  • Better screen brightness and colour range
  • Dedicated graphics on 15″ (Radeon)
  • Larger trackpad and 2nd gen butterfly switched (similar to the MacBook keyboard)
  • Thinner (who knew?)
  • and of course, as they never fail to mention it is their “best MacBook ever”…

Surface Book with Performance Base:

  • As the name suggests, they added higher-performance dedicated graphics to the base (Nvidia)
  • up to 16 hrs battery life (with base attached)

As you can tell from above, Apple was more innovative in their laptops this year (rather Microsoft’s big reveal was their Microsoft Surface Studio All-in-one). However, we can’t forget that the Surface book already has some great innovation built-in!

Comparison by price and specs

So, let’s get right into it. The pricing for both of these systems are quite evenly matched but I created a price-by-price specs-based comparison. Based on that data, it would appear that the new MacBook Pros are a better bang for your buck. Now, keep in mind that a comparison of specs vs. price is just the tip of the iceberg. There is so much more that needs to be compared here. However, note that all of the internals have received performance upgrades this year for the MacBook Pro while the Surface Book with Performance Base only received a boost in graphics performance. The MacBook Pro has 2133 MHz clock speed ram and new PCIe-based SSDs which should make a significant difference in file transfer and multitasking.

Everyone has their own unique idea of their ideal laptop and then they make compromises to save money and start valuing different features over others. At least this is how I usually end up making my decision. So, although it is a unique decision-making process for every individual, there are two categories of laptop users that I have a strong recommendation for:

Design Professional who primarily uses Adobe Creative Cloud (Adobe CC):

This user should definitely consider a Surface Book with Performance Base over the new MacBook Pros and this is not even because of the digitizer on the Surface Book series. A lot of people would recommend the Surface Book to designers because of the digitizer but a lot of pro designers already have their preferred way to draw. This recommendation is because several Adobe CC apps now support GPU acceleration to borrow processing power from the computers GPU to speed up rendering for example. AMD cards do not support this whereas Nvidia cards do! So that fancy 4GB AMD card on your new MacBook Pro 15″ for $2700 will not be helping you much!

Apple Developer:

This is something I was struggling with up until now. I have a couple ideas for iOS apps and am looking to partner with a team of other developers to make an app or two. I bought a new laptop recently (Dell Inspiron) with the intention of using VMWare Workstation to create a virtual MacOS setup and save some money since I didn’t need a laptop that costs me an arm and a leg! After a couple months, huge regrets… It’s definitely not the same which is why I will be turning to the new MacBook Pros. They have new 6th gen processors (I wish they were 7th gen…), excellent battery life, faster RAM, faster SSD storage, they look and feel beautiful, I’m not worrying too much about graphics and most of all, it will work beautifully with XCode! The new touchbar will contain your favourite tools as well for even faster coding!

Everyone Else

If you haven’t made up your mind yet, I don’t blame you! A laptop purchase decision is something that should take more research than one article but I hope this article did help shed some light. My last advice, if you are looking to save some money but still want a MacBook whether you are an Apple developer or prefer MacOS, considering getting the previous generation MacBook! When it comes to specs, the processor is merely less efficient and the RAM clock speed is slow but it is still a very capable machine. Plus, you could spend the extra money on a bigger hard drive! If you do not have a preference of OS or like Windows better, the Surface Pro 4 is a cheap and powerful alternative as well!

Snapdragon 820 Official News and Announcements

Posted in mobile, smartphoneTagged , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
qualcomm

Qualcomm recently announced its new Snapdragon 820 chip and it is looking good! It is more efficient and powerful than previous chips and will likely power many of next year’s flagship phones. With past rumors of the chip overheating being officially denied by Qualcomm on Weibo, manufacturers and consumers are more excited than ever.

Among the many improvements to the chip, the features that stand out are the new Kyro CPU which promises 2x better speed compared to the 810 while also increasing battery life. Along with this improvement to battery consumption is the support for “always-on” low-power sensors and Quick Charge 3.0 which is promised to be 4x faster than traditional charging and 33% more efficient than Quick Charge 2.0. According to tests by Droid-Life for the Quick Charge 2.0 of Samsung’s S6, the new chip in Samsung’s future S7 could promise a full charge (from 0% –> 100%) in under 1 hour!

The new Adreno 530 GPU offers a 40% graphics performance boost compared to the Adreno 430 GPU of the 810 chip. This can hopefully pave the way for upcoming VR applications. With better performance, developers will be able to push the new GPUs to their limits with high-res VR environments and actions.

Sources: Qualcomm, Droid-Life, CC

Samsung’s Upcoming Foldable Phone

Posted in smartphoneTagged , , , , Leave a comment
Samsung Foldable Phone Concept

EDIT 28SEP2017:

  • Samsung has a new hinge design patent meant for small devices
  • It has a single flexible hinge which would suggest a single fold in the middle of the phone
  • This patent combines Samsung’s flexible OLED technology with a simplistic minimal hinge in the center
  • Will Samsung use this technology for larger phablet sized devices to allow extreme portability without the cost of not fitting in your pocket?

The smartphone code-named Project Valley (aka Project V, model number: SM-G929F) is rumored to launch in 2016 according to sources speaking to SamMobile. Samsung is known to make bold moves when it comes to their popular smartphone products. How soon will Samsung bring back the classic flip-phone style with a new twist and hopefully new features? Let us know if you would be interested in a new foldable phone in the comments below! Also, Behance has a concept idea that I found quite interesting in explaining how the fold itself may function when opened/closed.

Sources: TechnoBuffalo, SamMobile, Hexus,