Category: Android

The steady and fast climb of LineageOS continues with the latest update bringing several new fixes and support for new devices.  Based on the latest statistics from the company, over 1.3 million installs of the platform have now been installed on a wide range of Android devices.  Just last month they hit the 1 million mark to give you perspective on the growth.  Now the company has released another new update and have added a handful of additional devices that are officially supported.

From a feature perspective, there are two new apps and an improvement on one.  First, there is a new gallery app with easier navigation between timeline, albums and videos view and the app now supports full screen video playback.  Second, there is a new FAB (Floating Action Button) in the Recorder app and you can also choose when the recording actually starts.  As for improvements, the LineageOS Updater has been improved and should no longer break downloads or corrupt them in certain situations.

I’ve been reviewing mobile devices for the better part of 15 years now.  I’m often asked, “What is the best phone to get?”  My answer is always the same:  The phone that works best for you.  For some, that’s iPhones.  For some, that’s Android.  But when it comes to any phone, rarely do you find one that ticks all the boxes when it comes to performance, a solid camera, good battery life and user experience.  I’ve found one of these rare phones in the Huawei P10.  It’s not perfect, but it is close and this 5.1″ phone is once to seriously consider.

I’ve had the opportunity over the past few weeks to use the Huawei P10 as my daily driver and it has not disappointed.  It has the power to get me through the day and the performance to do anything I need it to do – from email, to streaming music and video, to playing a game or two.  It is a device that I have no reservation in recommending.  Yes there are some things to get use to with it, most notably the multi-function fingerprint scanner, but once you get the hang of it, you’ll really unlock this phone.

Like many of you, I have a lot of gadgets around my office that require charging.  It is logical, therefore, that I’m usually hunting around for a cable to charge said gadgets.  In my office, I’ve pretty much got it setup the way I want but when I go on the road, I have to take some of those cables with me.  Inevitably I forget one (or two) at home.  Or, worse, I have one break.  That’s where bundles of cables really become a great value for me personally and I suspect I’m not alone.

Choetech has been making accessories for Android and iPhones for several years now and recently they sent me their 6-Pack of USB-C to USB-A cables to review.  I accepted the review cables because, having reviewed several Choetech items here on the site, I suspected that they would be good quality, solid construction and great performers.  I wasn’t disappointed.  I tested all of the cables in the pack for this review and all of them did exactly as I would have expected.  Considering that you are getting 6 of these cables in the pack for $19.99, they are also  a good value.

After being released on Monday for the unlocked variants, the Android Nougat 7.1.2 update for the Google Pixel and Pixel XL on Verizon has now been released.  The build for the Verizon Pixels is NHG47K, slightly different than the release for the unlocked devices.  That build was N2G47E.  The update is under 500MB in size but it is a good idea to download via Wi-Fi for speed and data plan savings.  Once downloaded, the update will take about 15 minutes to install and your phone will reboot once it is completed.

Th update for the Verizon variants contain the same updates as the unlocked versions of the Pixel and Pixel XL.  This includes improvements around Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, backup improvements to restore data from 1st-party apps like Calendar, and the April 2017 Android Security Patch.

The premium movie service Showtime has released an update for their Android app that gives users the ability to view movies and shows offline.  The new feature allows you to download content to your Android phone or tablet so you can view that content offline.  By default, the app will continue to stream content when you view it but now you have the option to download it and take it with you for situations like car trips or plane trips where you don’t have access to the Internet for streaming.

The new feature is simple to use.  Just find the title you want to view then tap the download button.  This will download that movie to your phone so you can view it later.  There is also a new downloads section in the Showtime app that shows you all of the content you have downloaded to your phone or tablet.  Keep in mind that downloading on your phone will give you a maximum resolution of 720p while on a tablet you can download in 1080p.  This is due to screen sizes and to save a bit on storage space on your phone.

Google’s Internet of Things (IoT) version of Android, Android Things, has been updated to Developer Preview 3.  The platform, built on Android but in a much more stripped down version to work with smaller memory and hardware footprints, has been in Preview mode for well over a year now with the latest update bringing some much needed features for the platform.  The idea behind Things is that, if you are a developer on Android today, you can develop on Android Things and create IoT devices.  In other words, you don’t have to learn another coding language.

Perhaps the biggest new feature is support for Android Bluetooth APIs.  Developers can now write to these APIs, both the Bluetooth classic and Bluetooth LE stacks, just as they can in full Android.  Bluetooth is expected to be a critical part of the development of IoT so having this support on board is great to see for developers.