If Google wants us to buy PCs running Android, it needs to get serious

If Google wants us to buy PCs running Android, it needs to get serious

Last November, reports started circulating — stemming from a Wall Street Journal article — that Google would kill off its popular Chromebook lineup in favor of making the move entirely to Android by 2017. This maneuver made sense, given the flexibility of Android, something that’s so clearly absent from Google’s other operating system, Chrome OS. It also seemed plausible because of the recently announced, keyboard-equipped Pixel C tablet, which has been available for purchase since mid-December.

Google dismissed those allegations, likely in an attempt to retain the Chromebook’s relevance in the midst of a major product line transition. A response on the Chrome Blog refuted all claims that the company was looking to “phase out” Chrome OS, and instead, asserted that Google was “working on ways to bring together the best of both operating systems,” Android and Chrome OS alike.

The hybrid Pixel C was the first of many PC-esque Android products to come, apparently — but are consumers really interested?

Small things in big packages

I was ecstatic when Google first revealed its $500 Pixel C convertible. Finally, a high-end Android convertible complete with a keyboard — assuming you’re willing to shell out an additional $150 –entered my life.

Taking Android to the desktop was an obvious step for Google. The beloved mobile operating system, while not as stable as Chrome OS, offers a wide range of utilities extending beyond the limits of a simplistic Web browser. But being an operating system intended for mobile means it comes with a fair share of complications, as well. The Pixel C, for example, has no mouse or touchpad.

Although Android offers both keyboard and mouse support, a trackpad was notably omitted from the Pixel C, likely as a result of the heavily touch-optimized software.

As we acknowledged in our review, the Pixel C works better as a companion device than an actual PC. If that sounds familiar, it’s because literally any other tablet on the market can serve the exact same purpose. What it can’t do is deliver an experience like what you would expect from a similarly priced Surface 3 or, to a degree, even a Chromebook.

Android exhibits a deluge of clearcut advantages over Chrome OS. Its Google Play Store, for instance, bears a voluminous catalog of essential apps and games. You could even say Android has a sort of Chrome OS built inside of it, considering the Chromebook’s operating system is, fundamentally, a re-skinned Web browser with a few necessary extras. Unfortunately, one of those extras is a big one. Multi-window support, which Chrome OS does manage to squeeze into its otherwise simplistic package, is notably absent on even the Pixel C’s rendition of Android.

The problem with bringing a mobile OS to the desktop is that it’s been refined by designers and engineers alike to ensure proper optimization on a tiny screen that fits in your pocket, or at least in the palms of your hands. Placing and resizing windows on a phone is a pain in the ass; on a desktop, it’s imperative.

Despite sharing a mutual abbreviation, Pixel C is not a PC

When the Journal revealed Google’s plans to decapitate Chrome OS a few months ago, it also became evident that Google was planning a revised version of Android for its future notebooks. Why the company decided to launch the Pixel C ahead of that revision is curious. Nonetheless, a different company, one called Jide, decidedly beat Google to the punch with its own “Android for desktop” early last month. Jide, the Chinese creatives behind the Ultra Remix tablet and the now-$70 Remix Mini PC, released Remix OS for free to anyone sporting an Intel or AMD-based computer.

Jide maintains a different approach from Google that I respectfully commend. In an email exchange with co-founder David Ko, it became clear that Jide is a lot more serious than Google about formulating a concrete definition for what it means to be a PC operating system, and in turn, what it means to be a PC. In fact, Ko asserted that “there can be no real discussion of what an ‘Android PC’ is without including keyboard and mouse support.”

When it comes to Chromebooks, Google’s stock Android kernel still has something to be jealous over.

“Current mouse and keyboard support on vanilla Android is seriously lacking, and that’s largely down to the mobile interface that Android was built on,” Ko told Digital Trends. “Android was born for touchscreens, but adding keyboard and mouse support is absolutely vital for any version of the Android PC in [the] future.”

Intentionally, I neglected to bring up the Pixel C in our conversations. I wanted to learn about the company’s stance on desktop Android as a whole, rather than pigeonholing the discussion into a specific example. The executive’s responses were a fascinating, if sometimes vague, look into what constitutes as acceptable software on a PC. Unsurprisingly, what he described is a far cry from what Google has achieved thus far.

Drawing influence for the road ahead

In our interview, Ko explained to me that Jide puts a lot of effort into “perfecting the user experience” in its mobile/PC convergence. “What we hope for Google to draw influence from,” he said, “is how regularly you need to iterate and offer support with PC hardware.”

The Pixel C, which is basically a commercialized prototype for what lies ahead in the future of the Chromebook brand, is not technically a PC by Jide’s definition. Sure, it’s a sizable tablet with a detachable QWERTY keyboard and some mighty impressive hardware specs, but Google’s failure to include native trackpad support is a clumsy attempt at translating its OS to PC. And despite having been released over two months ago, a long overdue software overhaul is nowhere in sight.

Remix OS brings to PCs what Google left out of the Pixel C.

Approaching the conclusion of our conversation, Ko emphasized the difference in user environments on the PC and on mobile, arguing that on a laptop or desktop computer “you automatically want to have multiple windows and to resize them through a mouse click and drag.” With a phone in your hand, “you’re touching the screen and operating through different gestures.”

Up to this point, Google’s attempts at making this distinction have not cut it. A notebook that requires you to touch its screen to operate is less of an innovation and more of an inconvenience.

Next time Google decides to launch an Android PC, I hope it will run a version of Android that takes PC users seriously.

Also watch: Google’s new VR headset won’t need a smartphone or PC

Read more: http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/Its-Time-for-Google-to-Get-Serious-About-Android-for-PC/#ixzz40LZdHFdQ
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Apple launches second Replacement Program this week, this time for MacBook charging cables

Apple launches second Replacement Program this week, this time for Mac Book charging cables  

If you bought a 12-inch Retina MacBook prior to June of last year, you might be eligible for a free replacement power cord thanks to Apple’s freshly launched USB-C Charge Cable Replacement Program listed on its website. The Cupertino company claims that the cables included with the computer are inclined to fail “due to a design issue.”

While it’s not clear exactly where the issue stems from, the effect is that the cable may charge the MacBook inconsistently or not at all, even when properly connected. Furthermore, Apple points out that the label on the potentially faulty cables and the revised ones differ ever so slightly, as depicted in the image below.

The company notes that the free replacement cable opportunity isn’t limited solely to those that shipped with the MacBook, and that if you bought a USB-C charger as a standalone accessory, you could be eligible for a replacement as well. If you gave a valid address, either when registering your MacBook online or buying it at the Apple Online Store, you can expect to receive your cable automatically. Otherwise, you’ll need to contact Apple Support, locate an Apple Authorized Service Provider, or visit the Genius Bar at an Apple Retail Store in your area.

If you’re one of the many that was likely affected by this manufacturing fluke, you’ll have all the way until June 8, 2018 to get your cable replaced.

This is the second Replacement Program we’ve reported on from Apple in the past week. On Monday, Apple revealed that it would be willing to repair the graphics cards in its late 2013 edition of the Mac Pro. Even more alarming, on January 28, a recall was issued on both Mac and iOS AC adapters after the company discovered that the wall chargers could produce an electrical shock to the user when touched.

Maybe it’s high time Apple considered changing manufacturing partners.

Read more: Tech Crunch

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HANDS ON: HERE ACTIVE LISTENING SYSTEM

                       These smart earplugs will change the way you hear the world

Last month at CES in Las Vegas, we were caught off guard by a unique new pair of wireless earbuds that aren’t earbuds at all. The Here Active Listening System from Doppler Labs allows you to alter the way you hear the world around you — in real time. We’ve called them “smart earplugs,” but you might also think of them as augmented reality for your ears.

Our own sample of the Here system just arrived in the mail, and while we’ve seen our share of Kickstarter catastrophes, these have only impressed. We haven’t had the chance yet to take them along in many real-world scenarios, but even just sitting at your desk, Here offer an extremely impressive sonic experience.

These buds are nothing short of revolutionary.

You control the earbuds through the free Here Active Listening app. It walks you through a quick auto-pairing (one of the most painless pairing experiences we’ve encountered) and then you’re ready to roll. After putting the ear buds in, there’s a slight adjustment to their piped-in sound. But once you’ve taken up the reins of the intuitive app, things really get interesting.

Users can engage active noise cancelling at up to -22 dB, enhance hearing at + 6 dB, use filters to target and extract specific noises, and even add sound effects and real-world sonic environments. Each mode offers its own impressive suite of digital signal processing that allows you to essentially mix the sounds around.

What’s more, the system offers a five-band EQ which allows you to raise or lower the bass, mid-range, and treble of the sound around you — especially useful for rock shows, dance clubs, or other loud events where the (likely underpaid) local sound tech has you at their mercy.

The system reacts to the sound around you by sourcing audio waves from tiny microphones inside the buds themselves, as well as the mic inside your own smartphone, allowing the system to read and react to your environment, with imperceptible delay (less than 30 milliseconds).

Like other fully autonomous wireless buds we’ve reviewed, the Here Active’s case acts as both a home for the buds, and a charging unit. The buds last for an estimated four to six hours of runtime on a full charge, and the battery inside the case also stores two more full charges when you’re on the go.

Unfortunately, Doppler is currently only filling Kickstarter orders, as well as orders for a few lucky attendees at Coachella 2015 right now now, meaning you’ll have to wait patiently while the new product makes its way to market. Doppler says the goal is to “develop Here into a mass consumer product over the coming months.” The price, if and when the system does make it to retail, is expected to be somewhere around $200.

And it appears this is just the first wave of what the Here Active Listening System can do. In a press release today, Co-founder and Executive Chairman of Doppler Labs Fritz Lanman had this to say. “Here is not a headphone. It’s a computer for the ears – and the first app we built is designed for enhancing live music experiences…This is just the tip of the iceberg of what Here can eventually do.”

We hope the Here Active Listening System will make it to stores sooner than later, as these buds are nothing short of revolutionary when it comes to hearing preservation, augmentation, and enhancement. And it appears this is just the beginning for the buds. You can check out more about the Here Active Listening System at the company’s website.

Read more: Tech Crunch

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Feel is a mood bracelet that wants to make you happier

Feel is a mood bracelet that wants to make you happier  

Mood rings and mood sensing apps have been around for quite a while, but they’ve never really been anything more than unreliable gimmicky fads. Now, there’s a new wearable from New York-based startup Sentio Solutions that doesn’t change color, but wants to help you improve your mood by describing your emotional state, thanks to its bio-signal-tracking sensors.

The Feel Wristband looks like a pretty ordinary, rounded bracelet, but there’s a lot going on inside it. There are four sensors that track galvanic skin response, blood volume pulse, and skin temperature. A proprietary algorithm categorizes the signals into emotions. The data is transferred via Bluetooth to the connected app, which then visually charts your emotions throughout the day. What’s pretty neat is that it shows how your mood is affected by factors, such as who you meet with, the environmental conditions of where you are, and what you’re doing.

If the sensors pick up that you’re feeling incredibly stressed, it will vibrate and the app will offer breathing and meditation exercises to help you relax. Otherwise, the app will offer brief advice to make you feel better, such as “laugh more,” or “meditate.” You can also make an emotional wellness plan to learn and keep healthy habits and stick to long-term emotional goals. The app will track and notify you real-time on how you’re doing.

Will a wristband actually be able to make you feel happier? Is this even real or is it mumbo-jumbo? At this point, it’s hard to say whether the Feel band can actually unravel your emotions with data from its sensors and algorithm. We’ll have to wait and see until we can get a hands on with one of these, which won’t be available until December, according to Wareable. We’ve reached out to the company for more info.

The company first announced the device late last year, but unveiled a prototype at CES 2016 in Las Vegas. The Feel band will come in red, turquoise, black, and white.

Also watch: Genworth R70i Exoskeleton Made Me Feel 70 Years Old

Read more: Tech Crunch

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Sick of your smartwatch? Microsoft offers money if you trade it in for the Band 2

Sick of your smartwatch? Microsoft offers money if you trade it in for the Band 2  

If you’re feeling buyer’s remorse over that shiny new smartwatch or fitness band and wish you’d actually bought a Microsoft Band 2 instead, you’re in luck. Microsoft launched a trade-in program for its Band 2, offering discounts toward the purchase of the band when you trade in your old wearable.

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The program is powered by CExchange, and the website has a wide variety of smartwatches and fitness bands available. Fitbit, Garmin, Samsung, and Jawbone wearables can all be traded in to get a Band 2, though Microsoft is offering quite a lot more trade-in money for those who abandon the Apple Watch.

The 38mm Apple Watch with Milanese Loop is the best trade-in offer, as Microsoft is prepared to front the entire $250 cost of the Band 2. The price drops to $200 for the 42mm Apple Watch with a white strap, and down to $150 for the 38mm Apple Watch Sport with a blue strap.

Fitbit is the other wearable brand that will get you a good trade in offer. Microsoft will hand over $120 for the Fitbit Surge and $75 for the Fitbit Charge HR. The rest of the Fitbit lineup has a trade-in value of less than $15, but the Fitbit Charge is strangely the lowest valued wearable at $7.20.

Original Band customers can trade-in the older version of the wearable for a $35 discount code.

The Samsung Galaxy Gear 2 and Gear S are the only two other wearables with more than a $25 trade-in value — the Gear S2 is not available for trade-in. If you have any other wearable, we would recommend checking out other recycling or auction services before using Microsoft’s trade-in service.

All the wearables need to have the factory charging device and be fully operational to receive approval. You need to send off your wearable to CExchange for review before you receive the trade-in value.

Microsoft launched its first wearable before the Apple Watch, but has not managed to gain the same market success. It is not even in the top five wearable manufacturers, below Fitbit, Xiaomi, Garmin, and Samsung in sales according to the latest results.

Read more: Tech Crunch

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HANDS ON: CASIO WSD-F10 ANDROID WEAR SMARTWATCH

Casio’s first Android watch can take a hike, and survive for a month

Android Wears is no longer just for tech brands. Mechanical and digital watch-making companies are using the operating system to muscle their way into the smartwatch world. The latest to do so is Casio with the WSD F10. It’s not the catchiest name we’ve heard, but the watch does a fantastic job of differentiating itself from the competition, by offering two highly desirable features — a super tough body, and a long-lasting battery mode.

The F10 is an activity watch, primarily made for cyclists, hikers, and fishermen. Anyone with a fondness for massive wrist wear is bound to love it.  The chunky body is huge, but it’s very lightweight at 93 grams with the strap, which is made from hard wearing urethane plastic. The F10 has been engineered to meet MIL-STD-810 standards, which means it withstands shock, humidity, radiation, vibration, high and low temperatures, plus ice and water. These features are common across Casio’s range of regular watches, but unseen in the Android Wear world, making the F10 instantly stand out.

There are three buttons on the side, one for the power, and the other two for activating the app on your phone or cycling through data from the F10’s sensor array. The widgets look fantastic, with an almost military style that suits the watch’s build perfectly. You get a compass, air pressure and altitude readout, activity data, and even information on tides and sunrise times. Inside the Casio app on your phone, it’s possible to tailor alerts so you don’t miss ideal conditions for your favourite activity.

Two screens and 30-day battery

Sadly, GPS is missing from the sensor list, and the watch requires your phone to pinpoint location. However, GPS on a smartwatch comes at a cost — battery life, which just happens to be another strong point of the Casio WSD F10. There are two screens, a color LCD that’s almost completely round, and a second monochrome LCD. Activate the second screen with Timepiece mode, and the watch shuts down Android Wear and all the smart features, leaving a cool retro digital watch face. Suddenly, the 24 hours of battery life estimated with Android Wear active turns into 30 days of use.

It’s a stroke of genius. Hikers out in the middle of nowhere may not have phone connectivity, so notifications aren’t going to be common; but the Casio’s features lend themselves to the situation in other ways. With Timepiece mode, the F10 stays up and running as a watch until the smarter features are needed. On the technical side, the screen measures 1.3-inches and has a 320 x 200 pixel resolution.

Masculine, chunky build

Casio has made the F10 for men. It’s a bare-chested, hairy brute of a smartwatch, and utterly unsuited to female wrists. The Casio representative whose wrist you see in some of the pictures told me she didn’t mind the size, which meets with fashion in women’s watches, but would prefer something smaller when out exercising. That was the understatement of the year. On my wrist, it still looks large, but not ungainly, a testament to Casio’s excellent design.

Andy Boxall/Digital Trends

There is absolutely no way the Casio WSD F10 will be mistaken for any other Android Wear smartwatch, and that’s a good thing. It’s obviously a Casio design, totally apart from any other, and with a focused set of features that will appeal to people who like wearing watches like this. It’s a niche product, but then so are smartwatches in general. This type of traditional watch fills a need already, so why not make a smartwatch version? It looks awesome, and has genuinely unique functionality that is useful. We don’t ask for much more from such a device.

You’ll have to dig deep to buy one, though. It’s $500, and that’s more than almost all Android Wear smartwatches, except for TAG Heuer’s effort, and some of the flashier Huawei Watch models. If you’re happy with the price, you’ll almost certainly be happy with the watch. It goes on sale in April in the United States, and although a global launch hasn’t been confirmed, we’re told it’s highly likely.

Highs

• 30-day battery life in one mode
• Useful extra features for outdoorsy folk
• Extra outdoor tracking features are unique
• Cool military-like design

Lows

• Expensive at $500
• Not suitable for women or small wrists

Read more: Tech Crunch

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