Samsung was supposed to start selling its SmartTag+ in the US earlier this week, but it seems that was delayed (it’s missing from Samsung.com and other online retailers). Not so in South Korea, where the location tracker is available as of today.
It can be found on Samsung’s online store as well as Samsung Digital Plaza stores around the country, plus other retailers such as Coupang, 11th Street, G Market and Naver Smart Store. Locals can buy one for KRW 39,600 in Black or Denim Blue.
The difference between the SmartTag and SmartTag+ is that the former relies on Bluetooth LE, the uses Ultra Wide Band (UWB) technology, which provides accurate directional info. This allows users to find their lost keys using an AR application.
You can attach these tags to just about anything, things like keys or pets. Samsung even sees them as anti-theft devices you hook up to your bag or bicycle. But if you’re going to carry them where they can be seen, you can pick up one of the official cases – the Samsung has introduced Disney, Star Wars, The Simpsons and Naver Line branded cases. Most of these are for fun, but there are practical ones like this one with a built in retroreflector.
By the way, the Bluetooth LE connection of the vanilla tags has a range of about 120m. But you can track them (and the Plus) even if they are beyond the range of your phone – if you sign up for the SmartThings Find service, the tags will be detected by other Galaxy owners walking by (in turn, your phone will help other find their tags).
SmartThings also allows you to turn the tags into physical shortcuts for your smart home, allowing you to trigger actions with a short or a long press.
In the US the SmarTag+ goes for $39, the vanilla version is $29 (you can read our review of the SmartTag for more details). Note that for the Plus model you need an UWB-enabled phone like the Galaxy Note20 Ultra or S21 Ultra.
Asus is expected to bring its Zenfone 8 series soon in no less than three sizes according to the latest rumors. The smallest device of the bunch will be the 5.9-inch Zenfone Mini (ASUS_I006D) and the phone was now spotted in the Geekbench database.
Asus I006D Geekbench scorecard
The Zenfone 8 Mini is powered by the Snapdragon 888 alongside 16GB RAM and managed impressive scores of 1,123 in the single-core department and 3,681 on the multi-core thread. Based on previous rumors, the Zenfone 8 Mini will feature a 64MP Sony IMX686 main cam alongside a new Sony IMX663 module. The phone will also bring 30W charging.
All Zenfone 8 series phones are expected to pack OLED displays 120Hz refresh rates and FHD+ resolution. The Mini will be joined by the Zenfone 8 Pro (ASUS_I004D) as well as Zenfone Flip which could be the only device to retain the signature flip-up camera of the previous Zenfone series.s
Xiaomi launched the first flash sale of the Mi Mix Fold, and as expected all available stock was gone in seconds. In a single minute, the company pushed the total batch of devices, recording an income of CNY400 million (that’s about $61.3 million). Simple math reveals this is anywhere between 30,000 and 40,000 units of the foldable phone, or 500 per second.
The Xiaomi Mi Mix Fold has three memory versions 12/256GB went for CNY9,999 (over $1,530), the 12/512GB option is CNY10,999 (north of $1,680), while the mightiest 16GB/512GBstorage units cost CNY12,999 or about $2,000.
All versions come with two HDR10 AMOLED displays, Snapdragon 888 chipset and a 108MP main + 13MP ultrawide + 8MP telephoto camera setup, with the latter having a special liquid lens – a first in the smartphone world.
The Realme Q3 series will be unveiled next week and the company’s slogan, “Dare to leap”, will be painted on the back of the phones with phosphorescent paint that will glow in the dark. The teaser clip below was posted by Realme’s Vice President, Xu Qi Chase.
The VP also called the Realme Q3 the “thousand yuan king”, which contradicts the leaked price of CNY 2,000. The current Q2 series falls in the CNY 1,000-1,500 range ($150-230).
The company expects the new Q3 series to surpass the current Q2 models, which have proven to be quite successful and have reached 1 million sales.
From what we’ve heard from rumors so far, the Realme Q3 will feature a 120 Hz screen, a Dimensity 1100 chipset and a 4,500 mAh battery with 50W fast charging. As Realme loves teasers, we expect to get some official info on the phone before next week’s reveal.
As a reminder, we’re also expecting the Realme 8 5G to go official next week (the Q3 themselves should feature 5G as well).
Initial reports claimed that Samsung’s first dual foldable will arrive this year. However, GizmoChina and leakster Yogesh contradict this info, saying that the actual launch will take place in the first three months of 2022.
The more interesting bit of this leak is that the device in question will be Samsung’s first foldable tablet – Galaxy Z Fold Tab. Devices like the Galaxy Z Fold2 already blur the line with tablets with its 7.6” display, but the Tab will be even bigger.
It makes sense that a triple foldable will be a tablet. Current models are already on the large side even when closed – getting a larger internal screen without increasing the folded size requires another fold. But will it be an internal screen? The form factor is as yet unknown.
The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold2
There’s a lot of time between now and Q1 2022. An important step along the way will be the July/August event that will bring the Galaxy Z Fold3 and Z Flip2. The Z Fold3 in particular will be a testing ground for the Z Fold Tab.
It will bring a hybrid S Pen that will also be used on the tablet. We don’t know what makes it a hybrid, but chances are that it will be similar to the S21 Ultra S Pen Pro – with Bluetooth but no stylus slot built into the phone.
The Z Fold3 will also introduce an improved Ultra Thin Glass (UTG), which will be thicker and more durable. Both the S Pen and UTG will be featured on the Galaxy Z Fold Tab as well.
Naturally, the lessons learned from building the Z Fold3 may lead Samsung to change its plans for the tri-fold tablet, so details may change.
Peak Design has announced it is delaying shipment of products in its Kickstarter campaign for Mobile, a broad range of phone accessories designed to make it easy to mount your phone on everything from a motorcycle handlebar to a simple dock on your desk. It is meant to be compatible with iPhones and Samsung Galaxy phones. Originally targeted for May, the company now expects to be able to begin shipping in August, though some products will also come later. To make up for it, Peak is offering either full refunds for cancellations or discounts on other Peak Design products.
Peak Design has used Kickstarter to launch everything from camera-focused backpacks to tripods and its original product, an innovative camera mounting clip. But this new project is on a different scale of ambition: it’s multiple products designed to work together in an interlocking system of mounts, wireless chargers, mini tripods, wallets, and cases. Key to the entire system is a combination of magnets and physical locking mechanisms which can differ from product to product.
The project apparently started about two years ago, which means that just before the company was running to launch in October of 2020 Apple announced the iPhone 12 — complete with the MagSafe system of cases, chargers, and wallets that connect with magnets.
Some prototypes in Peak Design’s mobile system
Apple’s MagSafe system and Peak Design’s magnet system are different, but the company made the call to try to make its system interoperable in some ways with MagSafe. That has meant testing its products across all the different variables it could think of, mixing and matching Peak Design’s big portfolio of products with Apple’s new system.
That complexity is one of the reasons for the delay, the first in Peak Design’s long history marketing products on Kickstarter. The second is the obvious one: delays introduced from COVID-19. The designers have been unable to travel to the factory to test their designs or go into their local workshop to suss out problems directly.
The company expects its first wave to include the most basic products in its lineup, cases and some “core mounts/accessories,” with a second wave coming “later.”
Peak Design will email Kickstarter backers discount codes for its products (20 percent off anything plus 50 percent off a future purchase in the Mobile product line). It also says people who wish to cancel their pledge can email info@peakdesign.com.
(Pocket-lint) – Affordable phones are getting more competitive every single year. As high end phones push new features and boundaries, the more budget-friendly devices tend to pick up on previous gen advancements.
Best budget phone 2021: Cheap phones for $200/£200 or less
Two very active players in this market are Nokia and Motorola, who often battle it out for the same corner of the market. They sell affordable Android phones at varying increments covering pretty much every price point from the lowest cost phones to the mid-range prices.
Two of the most competitively priced models are the 5.4 from Nokia and the Moto G10. So which should you get?
Design
Moto: 165.2 x 75.7 x 9.2mm – 200g
Nokia: 161 x 76 x 8.7 – 181g
Both: Plastic build
When it comes to the shape and size of the two phones, there’s not a lot to separate them. The Nokia is ever so slightly shorter and thinner than the Moto, and is lighter too, but not be a huge amount. Not enough to make a distinct difference.
What does make a bigger difference to the daily experience is the texture of the back. The two phones both use plastic cases, but Moto has gone with a ribbed design which has a grippy texture where those ripples on the case are actually subtly raised to give you a finish that’s easy to grip on to.
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The Nokia by comparison is shiny and a bit more slippery. The Moto also has a bit more of a solid feel to it too. Both the rear panel and the edges of the phone feel sturdier on the Moto than on the Nokia.
From a purely aesthetic point of view there are some nice choices made by Nokia. Firstly, that subtle patterning on the rear plastic and the blue gradient on this model. Plus, the holepunch cutout for the selfie camera looks a little more modern than the notch in the Moto’s display.
Saying that, the camera housing on the Moto does seem to have a more purposeful design about it even if it’s not perfectly centered like the Nokie 5.4.
On a more practical note, Moto’s texturerd power button is a nice touch and makes it easier to find without looking. As for shared features, both have a Google Assistant button and both have a 3.5mm port for headphones. They also both have a Micro SD card slot for expanding the storage.
There are rear-mounted fingerprint sensors on both phones too. Both are reliable, although not especially fast. But that’s to be expected at this end of the market. We rarely had to try twice to unlock, but we can’t say one phone was clearly better than the other in this specific measurement.
Display
Moto: 6.5-inch IPS LCD 20:9 panel
Nokia: 6.39-inch IPS LCD 19.5:9 panel
Moto: 720 x 1600 resolution
Nokia: 720 x 1560 resolution
Again, there are similarities when it comes to displays. Both manufacturers have gone with an IPS LCD display with 720p resolution.
It’s not in resolution where the two differ then because the sharpness is near enough identical on the two. Even colour reproduction is similar. Moto’s looks a tiny bit warmer at times when looking at pale skin tones on video, but for the most part they’re very similar with other colours like blues and greens. What makes the biggest difference to the experience is actually the brightness.
In our testing, with the display cranked up to full brightness, the Nokia is noticeably brighter than the Moto. That’s even more noticeable if you’re looking at it from a little bit of an angle. When your viewing angle changes away from directly head-on the Moto seems to get darker quicker than the Nokia.
Of course, being LCD means neither is fantastic outside in bright daylight, but the brighter panel is definitely helpful here. It just makes that experience less, well, terrible.
Performance and battery life
Moto: Snapdragon 460 processor
Nokia: Snapdragon 662 processor
Both: 4GB RAM and 64GB or 128GB storage
Both: microSD expansion
Moto: 5000mAh battery
Nokia: 4000mAh battery
What about other areas of performance? Nokia has the upper hand here too. It’s equipped with the Snapdragon 662 processor, while the G10 has the Snapdragon 460. Although, if you do want a slightly more powerful there is the Moto G30, which has a better processor.
What that means in daily use however is that things take a little bit less time on the Nokia. Neither is super speedy though, and both load up Mario Kart Tour – for example – without too much of a struggle, even if you have to wait for it to load for a little longer than you’d like.
One thing we did notice however was that the Wi-Fi performance seems better on the Moto. When we went upstairs, further away from the Wi-Fi router the Nokia lost signal in the bedroom quite a lot, where the Moto stayed strong.
It’s a similar experience with battery. Moto has a 5000mAh capacity where Nokia has 4000mAh. That’s a considerable difference both in spec and in real daily usage. In daily use, that means that with moderate use you can get to the end of a second day with the Moto. For some, maybe even up to three days if you’re a particularly light user.
Cameras
Moto: quad camera
48MP primary – 8MP ultrawide
2MP depth and macro sensors
Nokia: quad camera
48MP primary – 5MP ultrawide
2MP depth and macro sensors
Nokia: 4K video
Moto: 1080p video
As affordable phones neither of these two is going to give you stellar photography, but they will offer similar experiences when it comes to the lenses on offer. Both have 48MP primary cameras sitting alongside an ultrawide camera, plus low res macro and depth sensors.
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There’s no real competition in results though. The Nokia produces much more vibrant and colourful shots. The G10 primary sensor often washed things out quite badly and that meant it didn’t match the ultrawide colours at all often.
If you want the better photographs, it’s the Nokia that outpeforms it’s price tag, although we’d still say the macro on both are pretty useless and not worth using.
Price
Moto: Around £130
Nokia: Around £150
There’s no getting around the fact that the Nokia is more expensive than the Moto, but there’s not a huge amount in it and given the better performance in a number of areas, it’s more than worth the outlay.
Conclusion
Motorola has split up its G-series range even more this year, and as long as you’re able to put up with a poorer display and slightly slower performance, it could well be worth saving money and getting the G10 over the 5.4.
However, there’s no denying the better performance and display on the Nokia, which you’d expect from a slightly more expensive phone.
Still, we think in the G-series it’s the G30 that’s the one worth getting this year. It features a more fluid display than either of these two and is still affordable.
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As Vergecast listeners know, I am a sucker for car phone mounts and chargers. They are a perfect gadget for the modern age — a design problem with no perfect solution, price points that usually land at the higher end of the impulse-buy zone, and completely well-suited for targeted Instagram ads. “People who have bought a Qi-based car mount in the last year,” the marketing director of a tiny accessory company sternly instructs the Facebook ad-targeting system. “Find them and relentlessly pressure them into buying our product which is at best marginally better than the one they have.”
Reader, it works.
All of this means I was very excited when Apple added MagSafe charging to the new iPhone 12 line. A series of magnets aligns a wireless charger to the back of the phone, and has enough attachment strength to — yes — hold the phone on a car mount. A dream: you get in the car, seamlessly dink! your phone onto the mount, and drive away, laughing at the suckers fumbling with their cradles and motorized friction arms and other unwieldy ideas. Magnets, baby. How do they work.
The MagSafe attachment plate can pivot independently from the mountNilay Patel
Note the lack of a USB cable plugged in here, because there isn’t a charger in there.Nilay Patel
Unfortunately it has been six months since the iPhone 12 was announced, and there is a pitiful shortage of MagSafe car chargers. In fact, there are no officially-sanctioned MagSafe car chargers. Instead, there is this Belkin Car Vent Mount PRO with MagSafe, which, as the name suggests, allows you to mount a phone to your vents with MagSafe, in, um, a professional way. However, it does not charge your phone.
I have been using a review unit of the Belkin Car Vent Mount PRO with MagSafe, or BCVMPwM, for a couple months now. It is at once supremely satisfying — dink! — and also tremendously frustrating. Like all vent mounts, the weight of the phone is enough to pull the vent louvers down over time, especially if you have a large phone like my iPhone 12 Pro Max. The magnets are indeed strong enough to hold even that phone in place, but if you go over any particularly huge bumps, something will fall down — the phone off the mount, or the mount off the vent.
“Dammit, BCVMPwM,” you will yell, using the full name of this $40 promise to yourself. “Why aren’t you everything I hoped and dreamed of when I looked at the marketing photos on social media?” Then you will put everything back into place at the next stop light, sheepishly glance at your partner, and slowly realize they have completely stopped paying attention to these sorts of antics anymore. You need new antics. You need to add Linux to your smart home.
It’s a clean look, but note that this phone is not charging. Because it’s not a charger.Nilay Patel
Stop it. Have I mentioned that the BCVMPwM does not have C? No, this is not a charger. For that, you still have to plug in a Lightning cable, which sort-of-maybe makes sense if your car does not have wireless CarPlay and you need to plug it in anyway — but there you are, plugging a cable into your phone, which is the complete opposite of the dink! Magnet Experience. Your old car mount, with the horrible friction arms, had a built-in Qi charger. There are hacky wireless CarPlay adapters! People say they are kinda slow and have audio latency issues, but c’mon — a single dink! to mount your phone, charge it, and instantly connect to CarPlay? Now that’s the good shit.
Why isn’t there an approved MagSafe car mount with built-in wireless charging after six months? Why do Apple accessory ecosystems always seem so petrified, in every sense of the word? This is the easiest win of all time, but instead, there is the BCVMPwM. It offers you a glimpse of a dream. Then it falls down. There are better unlicensed ones that might burn your car to the ground that you can buy on Amazon. It is the paradigmatic Apple accessory.
Fitbit may be ready to launch a new fitness tracker soon, if images published by WinFuture are to be believed. The new tracker is apparently named Luxe and features a more fashion-centric design than Fitbit’s existing Inspire 2. It’s not clear when the Luxe will be released or how much it will cost, but I would not be surprised if it has a higher price tag than the $100 Inspire 2.
The big upgrade for the Luxe is a new stainless steel body, which will be available in silver, gold, or black finishes. It also has a color OLED touchscreen, though WinFuture didn’t provide specs or detailed information about it. Both the stainless steel body and the color screen are upgrades over the plastic and monochrome options on the Inspire 2.
The Luxe is expected to have a heart rate monitor, sleep tracking, and all of the activity tracking features that Fitbit’s other wearables support. It’s not likely to have a GPS radio of its own, however — you’ll probably need to have your phone with you for accurate mapping of your runs. In addition to the body colors, WinFuture’s images show various strap color options, so it’s likely Fitbit will position this as much of a fashion accessory as a fitness device.
Fitbit, which is now owned by Google, built its brand on wrist-worn fitness trackers, and it looks like the Luxe is very much in that vein. The company has had less success producing a competent smartwatch, but perhaps it can inject some life into Google’s flailing smartwatch platform once the companies fully merge their resources.
(Pocket-lint) – Back at the end of January 2021, Fujifilm announced this, the X-E4, one of the more junior models in its mirrorless camera line-up. It’s not the total baby of the range, though, a title which goes to the X-T200. The X-E4’s main difference to that camera? It brings the coveted X Trans CMOS sensor type into the fray.
When we first heard announcement of the X-E4, we thought it looked a little like the fixed-lens X100V, except with the obvious addition of an interchangeable lens mount. And given how fond we were of the X100V, that set up this interchangeable equivalent in good stead. Except this adds a flip-forward screen to the series for the first time.
So is the Fujifilm X-E4 a real mid-range champ, or does it lack innovation to elevate it above and beyond its X-E3 predecessor and surrounding X series cameras?
Design & Lens Mount
Fujifilm X mount (for XF lenses)
Dimensions (body): 121 x 73mm x 33mm / Weight: 364g
Vari-angle mounted screen, with touch controls (3-inch, 1,620k-dot LCD)
If you’ve been thinking about a Fujifilm camera then there’s three current models that sit fairly close to one another: the X-T200, the X-E4 on review here, and the higher-end X-T4. So how do they differ?
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The X-E4 sits in the middle of the trio, with a more advanced sensor technology than you’ll find in the lower-end X-T200 – but other features are otherwise fairly similar. The higher-end X-T4, meanwhile, has the exact same sensor as you’ll find here – so while the ‘T’ model doesn’t mean higher quality images, it has more dedicated control dials and can shoot much faster.
The X-E4 is designed with small-scale in mind, too, so our attachment of a 10-24mm f/4 lens (not included) makes it look a bit bigger. Really Fujifilm intends to sell this camera with the 27mm pancake lens, which is sold as a kit, because that really enhances the small scale – but we’d only suggest doing that if you know you’ll want to buy other lenses later, otherwise you may wish to look to the X100V instead (if you can find it for a good price anyway).
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Prominently the X-E4 adds a flip-forward LCD screen for the first time in the X series, enabling that selfie or vlogging angle for those who need to frame themselves. However, the design of the camera – there’s also a built-in electronic viewfinder (EVF) – means you cannot simply flip the screen up in one swift movement. Although it’s not complex, we find the two-part movement to get the screen forward is rather fiddly. And even then the EVF’s marginal protrusion stops it from being completely vertical.
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The screen quality is otherwise perfectly decent, at 1,640k-dots, and the little nub on the side makes it easy to position by 90 degrees (or similar) in a single motion – which is handy for waist-level work. The touchscreen is highly responsive, which is both great for quick reaction, yet annoying because we took heaps of unwanted pictures while the camera was in low-power mode in-between shooting proper.
A big part of any X series camera is the style, though, with this silver and black finish the epitome of retro cool. The X-E4 is made primarily from magnesium alloy, which gives it a robust feeling in the hand. However, it’s not weather-resistant like the pricier X-T4, so if you’re keen to always run around in the rain then this might not be the choice body for you.
The camera’s dials aren’t just there to look pretty either – you can quickly control the shutter and exposure compensation via their individual dedicated dials (many XF lenses have aperture control rings as the third piece of the puzzle). Sadly, there’s no lock of the exposure compensation dial, which we found was a little too easy to knock out of place (and so we took a number of images at +/-0.7EV).
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Want to point and shoot? No problem. The X-E4 can be set to auto in every regard so you can just snap away. Even applying various filters – Toy camera, Miniature, Pop color, High-key, Low-key, Dynamic tone, Soft focus – if you want to get a bit ‘arty’ with results.
Performance
Battery: 2,200mAh (circa 450 shots per charge)
Autofocus system: 117 selectable areas
Face Detection & Eye Detection AF
Low-light focus: to -7EV
Adjustable AF point size
Up to 8fps burst
The X-E4’s focus system is an echo of the X-T4 too. The camera uses a massive 2.16-million phase-detection pixels embedded across its sensor’s surface, designed to cover the full width from edge to edge. That means you can focus anywhere in the field of view, as far vertically or horizontally as you wish, and still acquire the same focus ability as you would in the centre.
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The autofocus system is pared down to 425 areas maximum – it’s 117 selectable areas though – which can be further reduced to simplify operation as you wish. The AF point can be adjusted between a variety of point sizes, too, by using the front thumbwheel; the miniature joystick to the rear, meanwhile, handles repositioning with speed – if you’re not using the touchscreen.
However, there’s still no Panasonic Lumix S1-style Pinpoint mode, which we always miss when using other brands’ mirrorless cameras. Pinpoint is great for still life work, as it enables really specific focus – not that the X-E4 struggles, but you may find focus is positioned a millimetre forward/back to expectation based on available contrast, for example.
Now we wouldn’t say the autofocus is the very best going for moving subjects, but it’s still highly capable. It’s hard to ignore Sony’s forward motion in this department, really, where it’s excelling in fast-moving subject capture.
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The 8 frames per second (8fps) burst shooting is also capable, although approaching half that of the X-T4 – which is yet another clue of the X-E4’s target audience.
Autofocus is said to be good to -7EV, which means really dim conditions. With the curtains closed and not much light available the camera had little qualms in capturing – even when the sensitivity was forced to be maxxed out to ISO 12,800 as a result.
In terms of longevity the X-E4’s battery is relatively high capacity, capable of delivering 450 shots per charge or thereabouts. This will vary depending on the screen’s on time, how much movie shooting you wish to do, and so forth. There is a low power mode that auto-activates by default, though, so the rear screen will go into a low brightness and super-low refresh rate to retain battery – but mean it’s instant to reactivate when you want it for that next shot.
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Recharging takes place via USB-C, much like an Android phone, but you’ll need to use a 15W charger at the wall for the fastest possible recharge times. It’ll take about three hours to recharge the one cell, which isn’t especially quick, but use a low power USB port and it’ll take three or four times longer than that. In short: don’t think plugging it into the side of your computer will serve the same result, as it won’t.
Image Quality
26.1-megapixel X-Trans CMOS 4 sensor
4K at 30fps, Full HD (1080p) at 60fps
Sensitivity: ISO 160 to 12,800
Inside, this lightweight camera houses the same 26.1-megapixel X-Trans CMOS 4 and X-Processor 4 combination as you’ll find in the X-T4 – so quality is, in effect, one and the same. It’s lens dependent, of course, as that’s a major part of what attributes part of the clarity and sharpness of an image.
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: ISO 200ISO 200
This sensor type is backside illuminated, with the copper wiring placement beneath the photo diodes in the sensor, in order to create a cleaner signal path. But the real sell is the X Trans CMOS aspect, which uses Fujifilm’s unique colour array, not the typical Bayer array, to make benefit of a larger sequence to determine colour results.
Fujifilm shots tend to look very natural as a result, sometimes a little cooler in appearance, but there’s a lot of options within the camera to manipulate as you please – including traditional film stock equivalent, if you want to shoot Velvia for added punch, or Provia for softer portrait tones.
We’ve often praised Fujifilm for its image quality prowess, a trend that the X-E4 continues. It’s handled our various snaps well in terms of exposure, colour balance, scale and detail. The real sweet-spot is in the lower to medium ISO sensitivity, as higher up the range things beging to reveal a lot more image noise – not to the point of destruction, as such, but detail drifts away and processing is more apparent, even from ISO 3200.
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That you’re getting Fujifilm’s current best-of-best (well, ignoring its medium format line-up) in a camera that sits in the middle of the range is impressive.
Verdict
Although the X-E4 is the first Fujifilm X series camera to offer a screen that can face forward, we don’t actually think that’ll be the main appeal for its target audience (it’s also a bit fiddly to position as so) – as much as the spec can cater for vloggers wanting to shoot 4K or Full HD video.
The real appeal of the X-E4 lies in a range of points: from the top-tier image quality from the X-Trans CMOS 4 sensor, to the small-scale body and retro chic design; to the capable autofocus system and variety of filters and film stocks.
If you don’t want the super-fast shooting of the X-T4, don’t need the weather-sealing either, then the X-E4 wraps much of its higher-spec cousin’s features into a smaller, tidier body with a smaller price tag.
Also consider
Pocket-lint
Sony A6400
Not the most up-to-date Sony – that goes to the over-four-figures A6600 – but the A6400 is a great example of small scale with big capabilities. And it did the whole facing-forward screen feature first too.
Read our full review
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Fujifilm X-T4
Want that water resistance and almost double-speed burst mode? That’s where the X-T4 comes into play. It’s far pricier, and it’s larger too, but it’s all-round more accomplished – and will feel better balanced with larger lenses, too, if that’s your future thinking.
I’m really serious about quitting Twitter this time, I promise. I deactivated my account on March 15th and declared the event to my friends in Slack. They earnestly congratulated me. They’re all still on Twitter, but they all know how exhausting and distressing it can be. Now that I’m gone, their new joke on Twitter is that I “don’t exist.”
It’s not the first time I haven’t existed, and sure as death and taxes, it won’t be the last. But my nonexistence on Twitter didn’t stick right away. When I first quit on the 15th, I came back three days later because I decided that I wanted to tweet about a new project.
Then I got owned by my friends, and I deserved it:
welcome back to twitter btw
— Casey Newton (@CaseyNewton) March 18, 2021
It doesn’t feel good to quit something over and over again — especially when everyone knows you’re coming back. When I deactivated my account again for real on March 25th, my friend Casey Newton wasn’t buying it: “writing about people deleting Twitter should be like reporting a missing person to police. You have to wait at least a day.”
And so I returned to Slack to declare, once again, that I had quit Twitter. But now I’m subject to a real financial penalty. I’ve agreed to pay Casey $1,000 if I reactivate my Twitter account, and I really don’t want to cut that check. It’s an absurd amount of money. Fortunately, I can’t think of a single tweet that would be worth it.
I know this sounds like a stunt or a joke, but it’s not. Hours after I deactivated my account and put a bounty on it, Chrissy Teigen announced she, too, would be leaving Twitter. When I saw her goodbye letter it felt like it was in my own handwriting. “This no longer serves me as positively as it serves me negatively, and I think that’s the right time to call something,” she wrote. “…one thing I haven’t learned is how to block out the negativity.”
That’s not to say my experience on Twitter was anything like Chrissy’s. Twitter works differently when you have millions of followers and an endless eruption of mentions and replies. (Even rarer: her tweets often generated coverage from reporters and created entire news cycles.) And like other women on the internet, she received years of public abuse simply for being herself — except at a scale few people will ever experience.
But everyone is exposed to the online abuse of others at scale, even if they are not targeted by it. And that means Twitter is a horror show for people who feel real anxiety just from witnessing anger and cruelty. I’ve directly received plenty of abuse and threats through Twitter over the years because of my work, but the stuff that actually sticks with me is what I see happening to others. Whether it’s learning too much about the sacrificial character of the day, or falling down a thread of abusive replies to a random tweet, it’s difficult to avoid “negativity” on a platform that seems designed to reward it. Even the intermittent rewards that Twitter does provide — Llamas on the loose! Small boulder the size of a big boulder! — are at risk of becoming their own nightmares.
Making a change when you’ve been worn down for so long can feel more like something that’s already happened instead of a clear moment in time that separates past and future. I’m worn down, and that makes quitting Twitter feel a lot easier. (Well, that, and theoretically owing Casey a thousand bucks.) But the stress from Twitter’s toxicity is not the only reason I’m leaving.
There’s a deeper problem that comes with using a tool for more than a decade — the way it shapes how you experience the world. How it makes you form words and sentences to fit certain kinds of boxes. How it makes you feel compelled to fill those boxes, and why. How these things alter the rhythm of your life.
I’ve never liked the moral panic around “internet addiction,” but there is something resonant about the metaphor. (Let’s just leave aside stuff like the New York Postcalling screens “digital heroin”.) The little voice I once had in my head telling me to smoke cigarettes actually never sounded much different from the little voice telling me to tweet. I will let other people figure out the mechanisms behind that — all I need to know is that, for a time, I heard and I listened.
When those little voices go away, you find how much room there is for other kinds of thinking — in different shapes of time and color and texture. In 2014 I permanently quit Facebook after a few failed attempts. It didn’t take long to stop seeing things in my head that were Facebook-shaped. I found other places on the internet to enjoy and other ways to communicate with people. Just because Facebook and Twitter are free doesn’t mean you have to let them live rent-free in your head.
This past weekend, a thought passed through my mind in the shape of a tweet, and I felt the urge to tweet it. But I couldn’t, so I didn’t. And as the thought drifted away from me, I felt lighter. It wasn’t put on a permanent record. I didn’t stop to watch my phone and see if anyone else would acknowledge it. I let it go, closed my eyes, and felt the sun on my face.
Blink’s cheap wireless cameras have seen better days.Photo by Thomas Ricker / The Verge
Blink, the Kickstarter success bought by Amazon in 2017, has long been synonymous with inexpensive battery-powered home video cameras that don’t require a monthly contract for cloud recordings. Open-source projects like Homebridge, Home Assistant, and HOOBS have made the cameras even more extensible by allowing Blink’s temperature and motion sensors to work with smart home platforms like HomeKit and act as triggers for various automations. This combination of price and functionality led many smart home enthusiasts to buy Blink cameras in bulk for whole-home monitoring, especially those who don’t want to be beholden to a corporate overlord (and its requisite subscription fees). But instead of embracing its most passionate fans, Amazon has turned against them, threatening to terminate Blink accounts while challenging the very concept of ownership.
To set the stage, I recently set up a Raspberry Pi running Homebridge with the goal of creating a single iPhone dashboard to tie my smart home together. I started automating my home about 12 years ago, long before you could buy into complete ecosystems from Amazon, Google, and Apple. Now it’s a devil’s brew of Z-Wave and Zigbee devices, some controllable with Siri, some with Alexa, and a few with Google Assistant. It’s held together with a smattering of IFTTT recipes and four disparate hubs from Ikea, Aqara, Philips Hue, and Vera. It works, kind of, but requires several different apps, many interfaces, and lots of patience, especially from my family.
Homebridge turns this Blink XT outdoor camera into a temperature and motion trigger for other automations in Apple’s Home app.
Over most of a weekend, I was able to configure Homebridge to link every one of my 50+ smart devices to HomeKit and each other in the Apple Home app. This allowed me to create rules that were previously impossible, like using the Blink XT camera’s motion sensor in my garden to trigger a Z-Wave siren and Hue lightbulbs at night. Nerdvana unlocked!
My sense of delight and intense pride lasted exactly one week before my Blink cameras suddenly went dead. The reason was delivered in an email from Amazon the next morning:
“My name is Tori and I am with the Blink team. While doing a routine server audit, your account was flagged and subsequently disabled due to unsupported scripts or apps running on your system. The only automation that is permitted for use with the Blink system is through Alexa and/or IFTTT. Please disable these scripts or apps and reach back out to me so that I can re-enable your account.”
After a brief WTF exchange whereby I explained that Alexa and / or IFTTT are wholly inferior to the capabilities of Homebridge, Tori helpfully directed me to the exact paragraph of the Blink Terms of Service that I had violated. Terms which, admittedly, I was now reading for the first time (emphasis mine):
“We may terminate the Agreement or restrict, suspend, or terminate your use of Blink Services at our discretion without notice at any time, including if we determine that your use violates the Agreement, is improper, substantially exceeds or differs from normal use by other users, or otherwise involves fraud or misuse of Blink Services or harms our interests or those of another user of Blink Services. If your use of Blink Services is restricted, suspended, or terminated, you may be unable to access your video clips and you will not receive any refund or any other compensation. In case of termination, Blink may immediately revoke your access to Blink Services without refund.”
It turns out that Amazon’s crackdown on Blink automators has been a known issue in the community for at least a year. My question is: why does Amazon bother?
My Homebridge integration may well be in violation of Blink’s terms and conditions, even if the terms seem unduly restrictive. But why is Amazon, owner of those massive AWS server farms that earned nearly $50 billion in 2020, resorting to such draconian measures in response to my meager deployment of five Blink cameras? I could see a crackdown on large-scale corporate installations hammering away at the Blink API, but why me and other small-time enthusiasts?
According to Colin Bendell, developer of the Blink camera plugin for Homebridge, there are at most 4,000 homes using open-source plugins like his. “Even if we round up to 10,000 users, I think this is probably small potatoes for Amazon,” says Bendell, who should know. Not only did he reverse engineer the Blink app to mimic its behavior, but the O’Reilly author and self-proclaimed IoT hobbyist is also the director of performance engineering at Shopify.
Blink could easily look the other way for small home deployments like mine without waving its rights. It says so right in the T&Cs it sent me:
“Blink’s failure to insist upon or enforce your strict compliance with this Agreement will not constitute a waiver of any of its rights.”
But that’d be a cop out. Really, Amazon should be embracing Blink hobbyists. Homebridge is, after all, a project that extends Apple HomeKit to work with a wide variety of uncertified devices including cameras and doorbells from Amazon-owned Ring. And study after study have concluded that Apple device owners love to spend money. Surely this is a community Amazon should encourage, not vilify.
At the risk of saying too much (please don’t shut me down, Amazon!), why is it that my two Ring cameras aren’t raising any red flags during “server audits”? I certainly check them more frequently as one is my doorbell. Perhaps it’s because I already pay a monthly subscription to Amazon for Ring and pay nothing to Blink. (Although sadly, even that early benefit has come to an end. As of March 18th, Amazon requires owners of newer Blink cameras to pay a subscription fee to unlock every feature.)
When I reached out to Amazon with the questions I raise above, and asked if enthusiast initiatives like Homebridge would be officially (or unofficially, wink) supported, I was given this boilerplate response:
“Blink customers can control their cameras through the Blink Home Monitor app, and customize their experience using the If This Then That (IFTTT) service. We are always looking for ways to improve the customer experience, including supporting select third-party integrations for our devices.”
Gee, thanks.
One of Blink’s biggest advantages has come to an end.Image: Blink
We kid ourselves about ownership all the time. I say I own my house, but, in fact, the bank owns more of it than I do. I listen to mymusic on Spotify, but those Premium playlists I’ve so carefully curated for years will be plucked from my phone just as soon as payments lapse. But somehow, Blink cameras were supposed to be different. They were for people drawn to Blink on the strength of that “no monthly contract” pitch. These were devices you were supposed to own without limitations or tithes.
How things have changed.
In 2017, Blink stood alone in the field; today there’s Wyze, Eufy, TP-Link / Kasa, Imou, and Ezviz to name just a few of the companies making inexpensive wired and wireless cameras for every smart home ecosystem, including Amazon’s, often with better features and value.
I’ve been a smart home evangelist for more than a decade, doling out advice to friends, often solicited, often not. Blink used to be an easy pitch: cheap and dead simple to install for normies, and highly extensible if you’re willing to put in the effort. But Amazon’s heavy-handed enforcement of T&Cs alongside the introduction of subscription fees have negated any advantage Blink once held over its camera competitors. While Blink sales will undoubtedly benefit from Amazon’s promotion machine, longtime Blink enthusiasts like myself will be taking their allegiances elsewhere.
You’ve probably been caught off guard by videos that play automatically on Facebook, Twitter, or just across the internet in general. They begin playing as soon as you load a page or (if they’re more deviously implemented) when you start scrolling through a page.
Automatic video play is a feature that, while nice to have when it’s surfacing content that’s related to your interests, can be pretty annoying. Autoplay videos can be harmful, too, exposing you to violent, offensive, or otherwise unwanted content that you shouldn’t have to see by default.
Whether you just want to put an end to autoplay videos on social media platforms or are looking for a more comprehensive fix, we’ve got some tips. Keep in mind that you’ll need to adjust these settings for every device that you use, since your preferences on, say, your phone do not automatically push to your PC.
Illustration by James Bareham / The Verge
Facebook
If you’re using Facebook on your browser, you can turn off autoplay videos this way:
Go to the drop-down menu at the top right of the page.
Select “Settings & Privacy” > “Settings.”
Look for the “Videos” listing on the left-hand menu. Inside of that option is a toggle where you can turn off autoplaying videos.
Facebook has similar options available for its iOS and Android apps:
Using the iOS app
Click the menu button on the bottom of your screen.
Once you’re there, tap “Settings & Privacy,” then “Settings.”
Scroll down until you find “Media and Contacts,” then tap “Videos and Photos.”
Finally, once you find “Autoplay,” you can turn off the feature.
Using the Android app
Click the menu button at the top right of your screen.
Once you’re there, scroll down and tap “Settings & Privacy,” then “Settings.”
Scroll down until you find “Media and Contacts” and tap on it.
Tap on “Autoplay” and set it to “Never Autoplay Videos.”
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
Twitter
Click on “More” in the left-hand menu, and then on “Settings and privacy.”
Select “Accessibility, display, and languages” > “Data usage”
Click on the “Autoplay” setting. You can then switch off the autoplaying of videos on your feed.
Using the iOS and Android apps
Click the profile picture at the top of your phone screen.
Select “Settings and privacy” in the menu.
Navigate to “Data usage,” tap on “Video autoplay” and set it to “Never.”
Instagram
Instagram doesn’t allow for autoplay videos to be turned off, so you’ll have to tread carefully here. Videos won’t autoplay with sound if you use Instagram on your browser. Stopping autoplay on mobile devices is possible, but a little roundabout.
Using a mobile app
Go to your profile page and tap on the three lines in the upper right corner
Go to “Settings” > “Account” > “Cellular Data Use”
For Android: toggle the “Data Saver” on and tap on “High Resolution Media.” If you then select “Never,” then media such as videos won’t load in advance.
For iOS: toggle on “Use Less Data”
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
Reddit
Reddit, like most sites that host video, autoplays videos by default. However, it’s pretty easy to turn it off.
Using the newest design
Click your username in the upper-right corner and select “User settings” in the menu.
Select the “Feed settings” tab at the top of the page, and toggle off the “Autoplay media” switch.
Using the legacy version
Click “Preferences” next to your username in the top right of the window.
Under “Media,” look for and uncheck “Autoplay Reddit videos on the desktop comments page.”
You’ll need to hit “save options” at the bottom of the screen to put the changes through.
Using the mobile app
Tap the icon next to the search bar, then hit “Settings.”
You’ll see “Autoplay” near the top of the page, and you can easily choose to turn it off.
Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge
Desktop browsers
There are a variety of desktop browsers out there — some of which let you turn off video autoplay and some of which don’t.
Using Google Chrome
If you use Google Chrome and want to turn off video autoplay — you can’t. There used to be an experimental command-line flag that allowed you to turn them off (you can find the flags by typing chrome://flags/ into Chrome’s address field), but it’s disappeared.
You can turn the sound off (which might help a bit):
Tap on the three dots in the upper right corner
Select “Settings” > “Site settings” > “Sound”
Toggle sound off. You can add exceptions for specific sites here.
Using Microsoft Edge
Interestingly, Microsoft’s Edge browser, which is also based on the Chromium open-source design, does let you turn off — well, at least, limit — video autoplay:
Click on the three dots in the upper right corner and select “Settings.”
In the left-hand column, click on “Site Permissions,” and then scroll down to and select “Media autoplay.”
You can either allow audio and video to play automatically or limit it. According to the instructions, whether autoplay will work or not will depend on “how you’ve visited the page and whether you interacted with media in the past.”
Using Firefox
Firefox has a similar feature that lets you turn off autoplay, for the most part.
Click on the three lines in the upper right corner of the browser and select “Preferences.”
In the left-hand column, click on “Privacy & Security.”
Scroll down to the section headed “Permissions” and look for “Autoplay.” Click on the button marked “Settings.”
A drop-down menu will let you allow audio and video, block audio, or block audio and video. You can also specify sites that you want to differ from your defaults — for example, if you block audio and video as a default, but you want to allow it for, say, The Verge.
Using Safari
Safari makes it simple to disable autoplay. In fact, it assumes that you want the feature disabled to begin with. However, if it hasn’t been disabled — or if you want to make some exceptions to the rule — here’s what you do:
While in the app, go to Safari > Preferences in the top menu.
Click on “Websites” in the top menu.
Look for and select “Auto-Play” in the side menu.
Look for the drop-down menu at the bottom right of the window and select “Never Auto-Play.”
As with Firefox, you can whitelist any sites that you want to be an exception to the rule.
Update September 4th, 2020 5:11PM ET: This article was originally published on March 15th, 2019. Most of the entries have been updated.
Update April 15, 2021 5:30PM ET: Additional entries have been updated.
OnwardMobility is about to release its first BlackBerry smartphone with 5G support and a physical keyboard. Take a look at the first concept photos.
The Canadian smartphone manufacturer BlackBerry is at the beginning of a new era. Last year, the Chinese licensee TCL announced that it would stop selling BlackBerry phones. The 4 year license agreement had come to an end. Obviously, this raised many questions about the future of the Blackberry brand. It soon became clear that the American company OnwardMobility has taken over the license rights.
OnwardMobility issued a press release stating; “In the first half of 2021, we will release a 5G BlackBerry Android smartphone with physical keyboard in North America and Europe.” For the design and manufacture of the BlackBerry smartphones, the company started an exclusive partnership with Android smartphone maker FIH Mobile Limited, a subsidiary of Foxconn.
Last month, the financial newspaper Nikkei Asia published an interview with Peter Franklin, the CEO of OnwardMobility (and former Microsoft employee). The publication revealed that the new BlackBerry smartphone will not only include 5G support and a physical keyboard, OnwardMobility also intends to integrate a “top-of-the-line camera”. This is somewhat remarkable, as the camera has never been a real spearhead for the BlackBerry business smartphones.
Of course, OnwardMobility will also pay extra attention to data protection and privacy. For this, the help of an external cybersecurity company is called in. More details will be revealed in the coming months, Franklin reported.
BlackBerry Key 3 with triple camera
Based on all the information available to date, graphic designer Jermaine Smit, aka Concept Creator, in collaboration with LetsGoDigital, has designed a BlackBerry 5G smartphone with a physical keyboard. It is the BlackBerry Key 3, the successor to the BlackBerry Key 2 – released by TCL in 2018.
Where its predecessor still had a dual camera, the Key 3 designed by Jermaine is equipped with a triple camera. The distinctive design with curved display and a narrow bezel for the front camera has remained intact – as shown in the following YouTube video.
Unfortunately, as yet, few details are known about the specifications of this new device. We are also still in the dark about the model name. Since it will be OnwardMobility’s first BlackBerry smartphone, no comparison material is available either. Naturally, the company will try to honor the strengths of BlackBerry, in order to be able to offer the business user a valuable Android alternative.
However, it is still unknown what this will look like in practice – apart from the fact that a physical keyboard is chosen, in order to increase productivity. This will certainly be a feature that many loyal BlackBerry users will appreciate. It will also be the brand’s first 5G phone.
Three-and-a-half months have now passed from 2021. If the company manages to stick to its initial schedule, the new BlackBerry phone will be officially announced for the American and European markets within three months from now. In time, the device will also be released in Asia. As yet, no information is known about the pricing.
BlackBerry over the years
BlackBerry was very popular among business users for years and was able to distinguish itself from other brands with its own software and the implementation of a physical keyboard. Due to increasing competition, the Canadian manufacturer decided to stop producing BlackBerry smartphones in 2016, after which the focus shifted to intelligent security software and services.
TCL took over the license for the production and sale of BlackBerry smartphones. Due to disappointing results, TCL decided not to renew the agreement after a period of four years.
OnwardMobility, on the other hand, still sees plenty of opportunities for the characteristic BlackBerry brand. Partnered with FIH Mobile Limited, the company is committed to reviving BlackBerry. In the coming period we will undoubtedly hear more about the new BlackBerry 5G smartphone.
Note to editors : The product images in this publication are created in collaboration with Jermaine Smit, aka Concept Creator. These 3D renders are for illustrative purposes only, this product is not for sale. The images are copyright protected. Feel free to use these materials on your own website, please be so respectful to include a source link into your publication.
Ilse is a Dutch journalist and joined LetsGoDigital more than 15 years ago. She is highly educated and speaks four languages. Ilse is a true tech-girl and loves to write about the future of consumer electronics. She has a special interest for smartphones, digital cameras, gaming and VR.
(Pocket-lint) – DJI has long been the champion of the consumer drone market, pushing boundaries and implenting technology that makes it easy for the average person to do previously impossible aerial photography and videography.
It was undoubtedly through the Mavic series that it saw success reach new heights, but over the past couple of years DJI has been focusing on its smaller, more nimble drones.
It ditched the Mavic name with the Mini 2, and has now followed up the excellent Mavic Air 2 with a new-and-improved Air 2S. No ‘Mavic’ moniker in sight.
What’s new?
For the most part the DJI Air 2S looks just like the Mavic Air 2. It has the familiar Mavic-style sharknose front and arms that fold inwards to make it compact and easy to carry around.
The new stuff isn’t necessarily all that visual. Improvements are almost entirely performance enhancements. It has a bigger 1-inch sensor and more advanced sensors for spotting obstacles. That means better photos, better video quality and much smarter obstacle avoidance.
That’s not to say there aren’t any visual changes. For example, the extra upward-facing obstacle sensors are easy to spot on the front. Plus, the propeller blades now have bright orange tips – just like the Mini 2 – and the camera housing is silver rather than black.
If it ain’t broke…
Dimensions (unfolded): 183 × 253 × 77mm
Dimensions (folded): 180 × 97 × 80mm
Weight: 595g
DJI’s Mavic design is the company’s best idea to date. By making it possible to fold the drone up into a small enough size that it can easily fit in your backpack, it made quadcopters accessible. That’s still here with the Air 2S, which is small enough to fit in your hand when it’s folded.
Pocket-lint
FOLDABLE AND COMPACT
Like its predecessors, the top arms fold outward, while the bottom ones pivot down and out to form the traditional quadcopter shape. Those front/top arms sit slightly higher, too, with feet that rest on the ground to ensure the camera system has enough space beneath it.
This particular camera is mounted underneath the nose and mounted to a three-axis mechanical gimbal, meaning that any movement or shakiness is counterracted – resulting in smooth and sharp images and video. It’s a pretty familiar mechanism by now, and has worked well in previous models.
The removeable battery makes up part of the body of the drone too. In fact, the rear two-thirds of the drone is practically all battery. It’s held in place by a couple of internal clips that you release by pressing a button on either side of the battery. It’s a secure system and keeps it in place unless you really want to take it off.
Pocket-lint
As you’d expect, the drone ships with the redesigned controller we first saw ship with 2020’s Mavic Air 2. It’s a larger, chunkier controller than the old control pads, but it’s practical. It’s easier to grip for one, and the phone holder is much sturdier and less likely to mess with the buttons up the sides. Plus, it’s easier to fit larger phones in it.
Sensors galore!
Four-sided obstacle avoidance
3500mAh battery capacity
31 minutes max flight time
8GB internal storage
microSD to 256GB
DJI drones have led the way when it comes to obstacle avoidance and smart flight paths, and that’s not likely to change any time soon. This latest drone features sensors to avoid obstacles on the front, back, underside and the top. It doesn’t just stop in front of obstacles either, it makes use of DJI’s latest version of APAS (Advanced Pilot Assistance Systems) – which can automatically plot a route and move around obstacles.
The company also says it uses something called ‘binocular zooming technology’ which means the drone can pick up obstacles from further away and detect when they’re coming towards the drone. It should result in obstacles being much harder to hit and easier to avoid, even when they’re coming in fast.
Pocket-lint
There are lots of smart flying modes included too. Those include the usual QuickShots – which can move in a preset path around a subject – but more impressive-sounding is MasterShots.
With MasterShots enabled the drone decides for itself how to fly around the subject in a number of different paths for a couple of minutes and then create a unique video from that footage.
FocusTrack is another staple, where you can focus on a subject and then either get the camera to stay locked while you manually fly the drone around it, or get it to follow the subject in a set direction.
The best drones 2021: Top rated quadcopters to buy, whatever your budget
By Cam Bunton
·
Improved optics
1-inch CMOS sensor
20MP (2.4μm pixel size)
5.4K video (to 30fps)
4K (to 60fps)
Digital zoom/sensor crop up to 6x
Just a couple of years ago if you wanted really good quality images and stills from a DJI drone it meant spending quite a lot of money. The Phantom 4 Pro was the first consumer-ish drone with a 1-inch CMOS sensor, before it was followed up by the Mavic 2 Pro. Both of those drones are significantly more expensive than the Air 2S.
Now, that same-sized sensor is in the Air 2S and on first impressions the results are very good. We’ve managed to get a little time in the air testing a few of the different modes and the photo quality already looks to be a huge improvement on what the last Mavic Air 2 managed.
That’s no surprise really. Larger sensors mean bigger pixels and that means more data is captured and you usually see better colours and more light, which is more noticeable in low-light situations. We’ve not done enough testing yet to give our final say, but it’s looking to be a very competent camera so far.
It’s similar for video. It can shoot 4K resolution up to 60fps, so you can capture that sharp and smooth footage. If you want to up the sharpness for cropping in post production, you can up it to 5.4K resolution – but this tops out at 30fps.
Of course, there are other resolutions and frame rates which includes slow-motion options. Full HD (1080p) resolultion can go all the way up to 120fps to help give you that slowed down footage. In addition, DJI has added digital zoom to this latest drone, so depending on which resolution and frame-rate you’re filming at you can zoom up to 6x.
Should you get the Fly More combo?
Two additional batteries (three total)
Charging hub – charges all three at once
Ships with 4 ND filters
Carrying bag included
While battery life should be pretty strong on the DJI Air 2S, the 31 minutes flight time might not be quite enough if you’re planning on a long stint out in the hills. And those are 31 minutes in windless and sterile conditions.
Extra batteries are always a good idea – and the Fly More combo gives you more than just extra batteries. You get a charging hub that allows you to charge all three batteries at the same time, plus a little case with four ND (neutral density) filters.
Pocket-lint
These filters attach to the front of the camera and offer varying strengths. If you’re shooting on a bright day, or shooting near a lake or the sea, it’s always worthwhile to have an ND filter or two kicking around to reduce some of the harsh light and highlights.
The kit comes in a bag which can carry all of it, meaning you don’t have to take your own backpack if you don’t want to carry a big bag around with you.
Of course, getting the Fly More combo pushes the cost up by £270 in the UK, so it’s not cheap, but is a far more cost effective way to get extra batteries and accessories. Just one Intelligent Flight Battery for the Air 2 costs £105 on its own, while the charging hub would set you back £49 and the shoulder bag costs £69.
First Impressions
To get a 1-inch sensor in a DJI drone used to mean spending over four-figures and going with something quite big. Granted, the older Mavic 2 Pro is still foldable, but it’s nowhere near as compact as the Air 2S.
What’s more, the new Air drone still features a lot of the same capabilities of its bigger, more expensive siblings. It’s a win-win. It’ll cost you less, do mostly the same stuff, and takes up less room.
On the whole, based on our short time with the Air 2S so far, this could quite possibly be the best drone for consumers that DJI has ever released. It’s well-equipped, has a great camera, and all the tech and sensors you’d usually expect come in a much bigger and more expensive machine.
Writing by Cam Bunton.
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