Google Play Music update adds machine learning and a fresh new look!

Google has just announced the biggest overhaul of its Play Music streaming service in years. On the face of it, Play Music has moved beyond the card-centric design of old, and now shows an interface built around album art, bright colors and vector graphics. Instead of shaded squares, graphics now expand to fill the entire window. (And there's a lot less orange going on, too.)




But aside from these superficial changes, the way Google recommends music for you is about to get a whole lot smarter, thanks to AI.

Motorola Moto E is now official, costs £89

Motorola Moto E is now official, costs £89

At its dedicated press events in London and Delhi today, Motorola’s latest budget phone the Moto E went official. The Moto E leaked in full a few days ago and there aren’t that many surprises.
The phone is built around a 4.3” scratch resistant display with Gorilla Glass 3 layer on top. It is of qHD resolution, resulting in a pixel density of 256 ppi. Motorola says it has built the phone to last and as a result it is resistant to water splashes.


Under the hood of the Moto E operates a 1.2GHz dual-core Cortex A7 processor that runs Android 4.4.2 KitKat. The company promises timely updates to future versions of Android, which is nice to hear for a phone of this budget nature. There’s 1GB of RAM and 4GB of internal memory, of which just 2.21GB is available. Thankfully, it is expandable with up to 32GB microSD card.

Windows Phone 8.1 to drop on June 24th

Microsoft will begin officially rolling out Windows Phone 8.1 on June 24th. This should coincide with the launch of the Lumia 930, Nokia's upcoming flagship.
Just like other iterations of Windows Phone software, 8.1 will feature the typical 3 years of software support and updates.

Microsoft will make updates available for the Operating System, including security updates, for a minimum of 36 months after the lifecycle start date. These updates will be incremental, with each update built on the update that preceded it. Customers need to install each update in order to remain supported. The distribution of these incremental updates may be controlled by the mobile operator or the phone manufacturer from which you purchased your phone, and installation will require that your phone have any prior updates. Update availability will also vary by country, region, and hardware capabilities.

Windows Phone 8.1 brings a host of new features and seems primed to make Microsoft's mobile OS a much more intriguing option for consumers.

Dual-SIM version of Galaxy S5 mini is undergoing testing

We’ve seen leaks of several Samsung SM-G800 models that are presumably the Galaxy S5 mini (with some variation in name - Galaxy S5 Dx, K Mini).
Indian import and export data site Zauba lists several G800 units entering the country for R&D purposes. They are all listed as having 4.5” screens, matching tips we’ve received.
More interestingly, the SM-G800H version is a dual-SIM phone, while G800A and G800F are not. Multiple rows of the tablet includes “SM-G800F-EUR_XX” suggesting the F will be the European version of the Galaxy S5 mini.
The single-SIM / dual-SIM division could potentially explain the conflicting info about the chipset we’ve been getting. The SM-G800H had a Snapdragon 400 (as detected by GFX Bench), while the SM-G800A has a 2.3GHz processor implying Snapdragon 800 (as per the UAProf).
It seems like quite a stretch that Samsung would cripple the dual-SIM Galaxy S5 mini this much over the single-SIM though.
Can't wait!

Samsung opens new factory in China

Samsung opened a new factory in Xi'an, China, where the South Korean tech giant will produce 3D V-NAND memory chips. Vice Chairman and CEO of Samsung Electronics, Oh-Hyun Kwon along with Chinese and Korean officials, Samsung suppliers and clients were present at the inauguration.


The facility took 20 months to complete and spans 230 thousand square meters. The grounds it's built on are larger than that – 1.14 million square meters – and by the end of the year will also house an assembly facility and a testing complex.


eMMC chips and SSD drives will be made here
China is where 50% of the world's supply of memory chips comes from. With this move, Samsung will have a more secure place in that business and promises a stable supply for its customers.

Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014 Edition) available for $364 today

The Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014 Edition) may no longer be Samsung’s flagship tablet, but it’s certainly one worth considering at the sweet price of $364. You can now have either the black or the white version the slate for that exact price thanks to a promotion held by US retailer Woot!.

You can even grab the 32GB version for just $35 extra or $389 in total. That’s a significant price cut compared to the retail price of the product over at other retailers such as Amazon, which lists the slate for $479 (16 GB) and $529 (32GB).
However, you should know that the Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014 Edition) units involved in the promotion are factory reconditioned . This means that the tablets were either demo units or retail ones that were returned to Samsung for one reason or another. Such units are guaranteed to work as new, but may have minor cosmetic damage and usually come with shorter warranty – in this case just 90 days.
If you have eyed the tablet, now is the time to get it, as the promotion runs out in less than 15 hours. If you are still undecided check out our Galaxy Note 10.1 (2014 Edition) review to know more about the slate.

Huawei Ascend P7 review: Looking strong

Introduction

The Huawei Ascend P7 is the sequel to the ultra-thin P6, the phone that proved, beyond any doubt, Huawei's ability to create visually appealing handsets. The new model builds on the original with a 5" 1080p screen, superior camera and chipset, plus a number of other improvements.


Huawei Ascend P7 official pictures
The defining feature of the Ascend P6 was the 6.2mm thin body (touted as "the thinnest smartphone") and a faux metal back. The new Ascend P7 can claim neither of those things as it's thicker (7.1mm) and has a glass-covered back. But what a double textured finish indeed! One to fall in love with!
There is metal framing, and the whole thing is sandwiched between two layers of Gorilla Glass 3 - especially welcome on the front, where the new 5" IPS screen of 1080p resolution is well worth protecting. Even without having the P6 and P7 side by side, we instantly appreciated the extra clarity afforded by the higher pixel density.


Enough teasing the new specs, here are the other ups (and downs) of the Huawei Ascend P7.

Key features

• Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE; penta-band 3G with HSPA; LTE Cat. 4
• 5" 16M-color 1080p IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen with Gorilla Glass 3, usable with gloves
• Android OS v4.4.2 KitKat with Emotion UI
• Quad-core 1.8 GHz Cortex-A9, Mali-450 GPU; 2GB of RAM; Huawei Kirin 910T chipset
• 13MP autofocus camera with LED flash, 1080p video recording @ 30fps
• 8MP front-facing camera, 1080p video recording, selfie panorama mode
• Dual-band Wi-Fi a/b/g/n, Wi-Fi Direct and DLNA
• GPS with A-GPS and GLONASS
• 16GB of built-in storage (12GB available to user)
• side-mounted microSD card slot, hot-swap
• microUSB port with USB host, USB OTG
• Bluetooth v4.0
• FM radio
• Standard 3.5mm audio jack
• Accelerometer and proximity sensor, compass
• Active noise cancellation with dedicated mic
• 2,500mAh battery

Main disadvantages

• Chipset benchmarks poorly
• Thicker than its predecessor
• Non-exchangeable battery
• Below average loudspeaker performance

The Ascend P7 takes photography seriously, especially selfies. The front-facing camera has an 8MP BSI sensor and features modes like face enhancement and selfie panorama. The camera on the back is sourced from Sony and is a 13MP shooter with 1080p video capture.
Huawei has also popped in a new chipset that brings more processing power and LTE support. Another plus is that the company claims to have fixed the overheating issues thanks to a more advanced manufacturing process. The phone comes with Android 4.4.2 KitKat with the most recent Emotion UI, while its P6 predecessor is still on Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean.

Huawei Ascend P7 at ours
The new chipset is still based on Cortex-A9, which is normally a notch below Qualcomm's Krait-based offerings, never mind the higher clock speed in the P7. Having seen the four Cortex-A7s do well enough in the Moto G though, we shouldn't be quick to judge on core architecture alone.
Follow us through the next pages where we explore the Huawei Ascend P7 in detail.