Many modern Android devices use a display technology called AMOLED. These screens differ from traditional LCD displays in that each pixel emits its own light, so a backlight is not required. Even better, when rendering a black element on the screen, AMOLED displays simply don't light up the associated pixels, meaning virtually no power is used. Since black pixels use little to no power on an AMOLED screen, more black pixels means lower battery consumption.
When it comes to getting your computer and smartphone to work well together, there's no service more robust and capable than AirDroid. For years, it's been the go-to tool for users looking to transfer files between their devices or access contact lists and call logs from their computer.
After a few unforeseen delays, the Android Lollipop update is finally here for Google Play Edition HTC Ones. This means that if you have an official GPE M7 or M8, or if you have simply converted your HTC One from a carrier-specific, Sense-based model to a Google Play Edition, you should be receiving an OTA notification shortly indicating an update.
Google's latest Nexus device is big, bold, and beautiful—and now it's got root. Thanks to some quick work by legendary Android developer Chainfire, the Nexus 6 already had a clear-cut root method before most stores even had it in stock.
Audiobooks are great because they require little-to-no effort on your behalf. When driving in traffic, why not listen to George R.R. Martin's lengthy A Feast for Crows instead of repetitive, commercial-laden radio? Maybe it harks back to prepubescent bedtime readings, but having things read to me is a very satisfying experience.
It's pretty logical for your MacBook to sleep when you close its lid, but under certain circumstances, you may not necessarily want this feature to kick in.
Welcome back, my hacker novitiates! A short while ago, I introduced you to regular expressions. Regular expressions are a language that is particularly useful for finding complex text patterns in streams of data.
These days, phone calls aren't always the best way to communicate with others. Maybe you need to reach people out of the country, or you simply want to have a more visual conversation. Either way, there's a reason why video calling has become so popular.
The Master System, more popularly referred to as the Sega Master System, or SMS for short, is a video game console that was released in the mid-1980's as a direct competitor to the original Nintendo (NES).
I have never been a morning person, and that's a trait that I don't think is going away. Combine my distaste for early hours with being a heavy sleeper, and it adds up to a lot of alarms being dismissed in a haze, with no real intention of ever waking up.
As soon as third-party keyboard compatibility was announced for iOS 8, Apple loyalists and the newly curious both looked to the popular Android third-party keyboard developer, SwiftKey, to see if they'd be offering their services to iOS.
BlinkFeed completely changed the way I access new updates from Facebook and Twitter, but when I switched to the Google Play Edition of the HTC One, I lost access to the launcher. BlinkFeed is available in the Google Play Store, but HTC has not opened it up yet for all devices yet. While there are ways to port BlinkFeed over to other devices, it's reliability is dependent on the ROM, sometimes causing bugs and crashes.
It's been a long-rumored feature, but today, VoIP calling has finally started rolling out to users of Google's Hangouts service. Essentially integrating Google Voice into the popular messaging platform, Google has given Android (as well as iOS) users an easy way to make calls without eating up their plan's minutes.
Arcades have long faded away from popularity, but their legacy is being kept alive thanks to emulators and the avid fans who grew up loading quarters into all of those coin-op games. Although nothing beats an actual arcade environment, my favorite emulator from the early 2000s has found a new home on Android, and with it a second life.
Being healthy and active will help you live longer, but finding the strength to work out? That's hard. What does it do for me right now? I mean, here I sit, writing this article, thinking about going for a run, and I feel good just for thinking about running. But will I do it? Nah, I'm too lazy.
Last week's tech roundup featured iPhone 6 clones, an all-in-one sleep tracker, Xbox One updates, and other cool gadgets. This week, there's a lot more to show off, and a bunch of stuff that I need to get my hands on! Everything from app updates to putting stickers on your favorite items, I can't help but squeal at how much the "future" is right now.
It's really amazing how much you can do with root access on an Android device. From various themes to porting exclusive funtionality from other devices, the power of Superuser privileges is truly awesome.
Believe it or not, but people are actually texting less than they did before, and that's all thanks to Facebook Messenger, Snapchat, WhatsApp, and other split-second communication services. However, one communication method that is still going strong—and dominating—is email.
A huge chunk of my life revolves around my computer, and whenever I'm on my laptop and get a text message notification on my phone, I find it extremely distracting to stop whatever I'm doing to hunt it down. That's why I'm a big fan of text messaging via my computer.
Welcome back, my hacker novitiates! When we are trying to find vulnerabilities in a website to attack, we need a solid web server vulnerability scanner. Internet-facing web apps can open enormous opportunities for us as they are often riven with vulnerabilities and can often offer an entire point to the internal network and resources.
Arguably Chromecast's biggest feature since its launch, screen mirroring functionality started rolling out to select devices earlier this week, and in a word, it's awesome.
The level of customization that Android has to offer is insane. You can replace the stock keyboard and home screen with any third-party app of your choosing, allowing core experiences to be tailored to fit your needs.
I regularly use iTunes on my home laptop and my work desktop forty-five traffic minutes away. I'm ashamed to admit it, but until recently, I'd been saving my iTunes library on a USB and transferring it back and forth, over and over again, between the two computers.
Most variants of the Galaxy S5 come with the gesture-based Swype keyboard preinstalled. If you're into gesture typing, you probably already switched to this input method from the default Samsung keyboard (whose gesture service is nice, but it's no Swype).
There are over one million apps in the Google Play Store, and many of them are restricted to certain device types, brands, and Android systems.
Welcome back, my hacker novitiates! In previous guides, we have used one of the most powerful hacking platforms on the planet, Metasploit, to perform numerous hacks. They ranged from exploiting Windows XP and Windows 7/8 vulnerabilities, to installing a keylogger and turning on a webcam remotely. We have even been able to save the world from nuclear annihilation, see if our girlfriend is cheating, spy on suspicious neighbors, evade antivirus detection, and more.
While AT&T and Verizon may not have had a chance to screw Note 2 owners with unrootbale devices—mainly because they've screwed us over by not issuing KitKat updates—it's safe to say that they can in the future. And while Sprint and T-Mobile subscribers have been able to root, the various methods can make the process somewhat confusing, especially for first-timers.
Unlike the Galaxy S4 and other Samsung devices, the Nexus 7 doesn't have a Clear All option in the recent apps menu. It's a highly requested feature, as it cuts down the time required to go one-by-one swiping each individual app (you can't swipe away multiple ones at the same time).
Sprint and T-Mobile have agreed to a $31.6 billion deal that, if it gets through federal regulators—which is far from a sure bet—would create a formidable carrier to really compete against AT&T and Verizon. The deal comes packaged with a $1 billion "breakup" fee that Sprint would have to pay T-Mobile in the event the deal does not go through. After the deal, Deutsche Telekom, which owns about 67% of T-Mobile, would maintain a 20% ownership stake.
HTC claims to have improved the One M8's battery life by 40% over its predecessor, but there is always room for improvement.
If you've ever seen one of those Samsung commercials from about a year back, you know that the Galaxy S series of phones come with a feature that allows you to do certain things by making gestures in front of your screen. They call this feature Air Gesture, and it enables you to perform certain functions without even touching your phone.
Sense 6 is great, don't get me wrong, but sometimes I start to miss the vanilla Android experience that comes with Nexus devices. You can always convert your M8 to the Google Play Edition, but then you'd have to ditch all the Sense exclusive features, and we wouldn't want that.
HTC pulled out all the stops when designing the HTC One M8. From it's sleek body, to it's incredible sound quality, this thing just oozes sophistication. While all of these add-ons are great, they can be incredibly taxing on the CPU, in turn causing some serious lag.
This week, Google sidestepped their usual "Update Wednesday" strategy by dropping a huge update to their Maps app for both Android and iOS. We're accustomed to seeing new features and bug fixes to their stable of apps on Wednesdays, but today's Maps update was presumably big enough to get its own release day (it's Tuesday, folks).
Once you unlock your bootloader and root, you're left with one more hurdle to overcome, and that's getting S-Off.
Welcome back, my greenhorn hackers!
Have you ever been called a "noob" or "eZ" after some person kills you? have you ever said "you hack" or "you suck" after getting your butt kicked by another player? this wont ever have to happen again. It is actually possible to be very good at PvP in Minecraft, and you can also be good at it. Now, it is your turn to win in every battle you fight in Minecraft PvP.
You've unlocked your bootloader and rooted your HTC One running KitKat, but there's still one lingering aspect of security you've yet to rid yourself of—S-On—the extra security measure HTC implemented into Sense.
Recently, I offered a guide detailing how to run two separate windows on a Nexus 7 tablets for better multitasking. While extremely useful, that mod was limited to only two windows, and you also needed root access to use it.
Rock-hard ice cream is the bane of my culinary existence. If I try and scoop it out with a spoon, the spoon invariably bends. If I use a traditional ice cream scooper, I end up with a torqued wrist and one or two pathetic curls of ice cream for my efforts.