Puzzle games are a great way to kill time and exercise your brain in one fell swoop. They challenge you to think strategically and plan ahead, whether that's to create killer chain combinations for maximum points, or to plain old keep from getting killed.
Someone out there is testing an unknown mid-range phone codenamed "Heart," and it has a 16% lead in speed on the Oppo F3 Plus and is just 15% shy of the Samsung Galaxy S8+, according to GSM Arena.
Samsung devices have two pre-boot menus that every Galaxy owner should know about: recovery mode and download mode. The recovery screen allows users to wipe cache files or perform a factory reset, which can help save the phone from a soft brick. Download mode, on the other hand, allows you to flash firmware files using utilities like Odin and Smart Switch, which can truly be a lifesaver.
Some bacteria can already do it—generate electric current, that is—and those microbes are called "electrogenic." Now, thanks to the work of a research group from the University of California, Santa Barbara, we know how to easily turn non-electrogenic bacteria into electricity producers.
Google's Pixel phones have a feature that lets you swipe down on the fingerprint scanner to open your notification shade and Quick Settings panel. It's one of those features that make you wonder why it wasn't there in the first place, since it gives you another way to interact with your device, and your fingerprint scanner isn't being used while you're screen is on anyway.
Emojis, for better or for worse, have essentially taken over online forms of communication. And now, thanks to a recently discovered feature in iOS, they are going to change the way you search for nearby places.
At their annual I/O event, Google introduced their latest app to the public: Allo. The messaging app is the company's latest and most powerful entry into the expanding world of similar apps, with one twist—the inclusion of artificial intelligence.
When it comes time to sell your smartphone or trade it in for your annual upgrade, you'll have to make sure that all of the sensitive data the device accumulated while you owned it is properly erased so that no one else can access it. This process is referred to as a "Factory Reset," and regardless of if you own an iPhone or Android device, like a Samsung Galaxy model, HTC One, or Nexus, I'll show you how to do it below.
Those of you who have been a part of the Null Byte community for even a short while know that I sincerely and firmly believe that hacking is the most important skill set of the future.
Usually when a hacker takes control of a system, they use it for a good purpose (on their end, anyway). But some hackers have made jokes or pranks with their hacks. Here is a list of the top of them...
Even if my phone has only 1% of battery life left, I'll keep using it until I can get to a power source somewhere. Most times I never make it to a charger, and my device eventually powers down on its own.
Given how much use it gets on a daily basis, the power button is always one of the first hardware features to call it quits on an Android phone or tablet. So if your power button is acting up, or you don't want it to, you can extend its lifetime by simply finding ways to use it less.
Most custom ROMs are built from the freely-available source code of AOSP, so they share a lot of common ground with stock Android. The difference, though, is the fact that Google adds many minor tweaks and finishing touches to AOSP while creating the version of Android that ultimately comes pre-installed on Nexus devices.
Welcome back, my nascent hackers!
When my Nexus 5 received the Lollipop update, one of the first things I noticed was how subtle and quiet the new lock and unlock sounds were. Sure, this is a minor quibble, but it's also an easy fix.
Android "Lollipop" introduced a ton of cool new functionality. Unfortunately, the Nexus 5 didn't get all of these features, as some were exclusive to other devices. For example, the Ambient Display function on the Nexus 6 that shows new notifications as they come in with a black-and-white lock screen. Sure, the new Nexus phablet has an AMOLED display that doesn't waste any battery to power black pixels, but it would be nice to have this feature as an option on the Nexus 5, wouldn't it?
One of the more talked-about features of Google's new flagship device is the fact that all of the data on the Nexus 6 is encrypted by default. At face value, this certainly seems like an added bonus for the 6-inch phablet, especially in this day and age with growing security concerns abound. It's definitely something that the FBI is none too pleased about.
With the Power key located on the back of the device, LG included a convenient "double-tap to sleep" function in their G2 and G3 devices. The function allows users to simply double-tap the display to put their device to sleep instead of picking it up and pressing the Power key.
We recently ran into a serious iPhone 6 issue here in the Gadget Hacks office, where the device was stuck in an infinite bootloop with intermittent red and blue screens (of death?) and an unresponsive touchscreen and buttons. From what we can tell, we weren't alone, though some are experiencing only one or a few of the issues we've had.
Battery drain. App crashes. Random reboots. All of these issues can be attributed to an uncooperative third-party app on your Nexus device. To be sure that's the problem, rebooting into "Safe Mode" is the way to go.
Battery life is precious to all mobile device users, and nothing is worse than running out of it. The only thing that can save a device from the dreaded low battery warning is the charger, but who carries those around?
The "Knock Knock" features on LG's G2 phone have proven popular and useful enough to spawn various apps and mods cloning these abilities for other devices. Porting the "Knock On" feature to our Samsung Galaxy S3 isn't as easily doable, since developers would need to create a modded kernel, like they did for the HTC One. The "Knock Off" function, on the other hand, is a lot more manageable.
LG's new KnockOn feature for the G2 wakes the phone up just by tapping on the screen twice, in lieu of using the power/lock button.
As softModders, the first thing we do after updating to the newest version of Android is to root, install a custom recovery, and install a superuser app. By doing this you open up your HTC One to a vast quantity of new apps and tweaks you can use to truly make your phone One of a kind.
I regularly listen to music on my Nexus 7 while working or playing my Xbox. It's light and easy to carry around, and has basically become an extension of my body. The only thing that bugs me is having to constantly turn the screen on to pause or change music tracks. Even if I can do it from my lock screen instead of the actual music player app—I don't want to.
The sensors in your mobile device are integral for gaming (try to beat my Temple Run 2 score), as well as many of the basic Galaxy S3 features like Smart Stay and other fancy additions. But sometimes those sensors can become overly sensitive or just downright unusable.
Getting into fastboot or recovery mode on your Android device is nothing new, especially if you're a softModder. Accessing the bootloader menu is the genesis to a lot of mods, and if you're like me and constantly tweak your device, you probably get irritated every time you have to shutdown, then use the power button and volume rockers to access the special menus.
The infamous Red Ring of Death plagued the Xbox 360 for years, leading people like me over to the PlayStation 3 console. Now it looks like Sony and its new PlayStation 4 are running into the same problems as Microsoft did.
So, you've got a brand new PlayStation 4, but unfortunately, you've got "No Signal" now, too. You can't really game or watch movies on your new toy if you can't even bring up the PlayStation menu on your TV screen.
We've all been there. Your phone's either dead or barely hanging on with a few minutes of life left, and you only have a small window of time to charge it before you need to head out. Sure, you can charge it for the few minutes you have, but what's the point if your device is going to die again in several minutes?
Gaining remote access to a phone isn't only for super hackers and spies. There are plenty of times when the average smartphone user would want to have remote access to their device.
Having trouble getting a strong Wi-Fi signal on your Samsung Galaxy S3? Does the signal drop out on you when changing rooms? Frustrating, isn't it?
For most people, the battery life on a DSLR is more than sufficient, but if you want to do a really long exposure or time-lapse, one charge might not last long enough to get the shot you want. You can always connect it to an extension cord to charge while you shoot, but that can be really annoying to work around.
Even though iOS 6.1 was only released a couple of weeks ago, hackers released evasi0n a couple days after. Evasi0n, the only iPhone 5 jailbreak currently on the market, is the most popular jailbreak in history—with nearly 7 million iOS devices already hacked in the mere four days after its release. Well, now it seems that iOS 6.1 is being taken advantage of again, this time with a simple exploit figured out by YouTube user S1riOS6, which lets you bypass the lock screen on an iPhone running iO...
Since the emergence of GoPro, the company's cameras have been been on a steady incline for the past several years. Adventure enthusiasts had difficulty recording their extreme activities without a huge price tag before the GoPro came along in 2002.
There's nothing worse than when you come up with a brilliant idea while you're busy with other things and then promptly forget it. Whether it's the perfect ending for your novel or a comeback you should've said during that argument with your roommate last week, it's always annoying.
Tripwires are a new mechanic released in Minecraft 1.3, and people are still trying to figure out how best to use them. Minecart returns are a great idea, but what about traps?
André Broessel of rawlemon has developed a solar energy generator that can use both sun and moonlight to create usable power. Oh... and it's gorgeous. The device is essentially a huge glass sphere filled with water that uses a ball lens to refract light in a way that increases energy efficiency by 35 percent. It's completely weatherproof and has an optical tracking device, meaning that it can be incorporated into architecture. Here's a concept design of how it could be used to power buildings...
If you've ever found yourself wandering about a room, holding your phone up to the sky searching for a signal, this is just the trick for you. Edward from Redmond Pie found a great way to configure the readout with just a simple phone call, making your iPhone display its exact signal strength in decibels (dBm). Step 1: Put Your iPhone into Field Test Mode
In last Saturday's workshop, the tutorial was on the ABBA switch, so named because it fires redstone pulses in A-B-B-A order. While the turnout was low, it was a really productive workshop! We experimented with a lot of things and had a great time. Hopefully you'll consider joining us next time!
