This is a cool experiment: Jordan Hanzon has gone and taken Pixar’s Inside Out and edited out all of the scenes from Riley and her parent’s heads: the result is a poignant story of a girl adjusting to a new place.
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Last year our reviewers always had something interesting on their hands, but the fun for 2015 is now over. Time to see which of our reviews proved to be the most popular before CES kicks off and pulls the spotlight towards 2016 gadgets.
This year marked a major turnaround for Samsung, which completely rethought its design with the Galaxy S6 and flexed its advanced manufacturing muscle with the Galaxy S6 edge. The S6 review was our most read this year and even then people were curious enough to check out the S6 edge review.
The Galaxy S6 also starred in some of the best-read shootouts this year. Our Intergalactic camera shootout was the peak of the versus articles, but the S6 also brawled with the LG G4, HTC One M9, Apple iPhone 6 and Sony Xperia Z5.
For all of Samsung’s popularity, the Asus Zenfone 2 review breathed down the neck of the S6. That review was published a month later, so maybe with enough time the competitively priced mid-ranger could have taken the crown.
Speaking of, the Motorola Moto G (3rd gen) review wasn’t quite as popular as the Zenfone but it beat out all the rest for third place.
LG’s highlight was the G4, the V10 came too late in the game to score enough hits. At least LG had a flagship make its mark, our most-read Sony review was of the Xperia M4 Aqua. The Xperia Z3+ is much lower on the list and the Z5 isn’t even on it. The rapid fire of Z3, Z3+ and Z5 may have caused some reading fatigue.
Xiaomi did quite well too with the Mi 4i and Redmi 2 reviews garnering a lot of interest, ahead of other Android upstarts.
If in 2015 you decided to take a break from fast-paced world of smartphones, now is a good chance to catch up with the reviews our readers found most interesting.
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Samsung Galaxy S6 review: Subject Zero
The Samsung Galaxy S6 is not the next big thing. It’s “project zero”. The reboot. But was there really anything wrong with the S-line – the standard-setter, the home of the super droids? OK, design needed looking at for sure. But hey, other brands do facelifts – Samsung goes for a complete overhaul.
Asus Zenfone 2 review: A balancing act
World domination was surely on the mind of at least one top exec over at Asus headquarters, when the crew gathered to outline the Zenfone 2 game plan. The smartphone will be sold globally, and the stores in a few lucky countries already have their shelves well stocked. The company is aiming to sell 30 million phones this year, with the Zenfone 2 being a chief contributor to that number.
Moto G (3rd gen) review: Good as gold
It is hardly a surprise that the third generation Motorola Moto G is one of the most anticipated smartphones of 2015. After all, in less than two years after the first iteration of the smartphone (Moto G – Source
The Samsung Galaxy A9 (2016) went official a few days ago, for the first time taking the A-series beyond the Notes’ 5.7 inches. Even though it’s the first of its kind, it also gets the model year in brackets as part of its name to stress its ties to the completely updated premium-built A family.
The 6-inch FullHD display may be a hint at what to expect from future Notes, and also mean the death of the sole even numbered A model, the 5.7-inch Galaxy A8. Whatever the implications, the A9 (2016) is the best-specced smartphone the company has to offer north of the Note5’s diagonal.
Powered by the Snapdragon 652, a top-class performer the A9 must be, despite the 6 in Qualcomm’s chip designation. Dual quad-core CPU with a quartet of Cortex-A72’s in charge, coupled with 3GB of RAM should make even demanding tasks a breeze, and the GPU will appreciate the conservative choice of resolution.
A 13MP sensor behind an f/1.9 lens, together with optical image stabilization makes for flagship grade imaging, at least on paper, and the 8MP front shooter offers plenty of resolution to please selfie enthusiasts. Fingerprint recognition and Samsung Pay mean that you can leave bank cards at home, so you can cut down on the stuff you’re carrying, though obviously that’s not a top concern with a 6-inch 200g phone. And all of this should be able to run for quite a while on a generous 4,000mAh battery, complete with fast charging.
Overall, the Samsung Galaxy A9 (2016) is a comprehensive package for big-screen lovers. In a way, it’s a larger Galaxy Note without the S-Pen, and that could help rationalize past its $500 price. So what do you reckon, hot or…
Android Wear devices seem to be discounted pretty heavily after their initial retail release, so long as you wait long enough. For example, Motorola’s original Moto 360 sold for around $300 at release, but the daily deal site Woot is offering a Champagne model with a metal band for just $149.99. This is the gold-ish version with a matching band in both large and small sizes.
The same configuration costs about $220 elsewhere, in both the smaller (18mm) and larger (23mm) band options, both of which are available on Woot.
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[Deal Alert] Woot Has The Original Moto 360 (Gold, Large Or Small Metal Band) For $149.99, Today Only was written by the awesome team at Android Police.
A few days ago, Samsung shared a few items that they’d be showing on the floor at CES in Las Vegas. One of them, which barely caused a blip on the radar was the “rink.” It’s Samsung’s motion controllers for the Gear VR, something that is sorely needed for their mobile virtual reality experience. If you remember, Oculus just shared that their own motion… Read More
The U.S. Postal Service is looking to the cosmos for inspiration in its latest collections of stamps.
The agency’s lineup of stamps for the new year includes a collection commemorating the 50th anniversary of the original Star Trek series, a celebration of NASA’s historic Pluto flyby mission last year, a lunar-themed set and stamps featuring all of the solar system’s planets.
See also: 5 sensational space moments that blew us away in 2015
NASA’s New Horizons voyage to Pluto will be honored with two stamps — one featuring the spacecraft itself and another emblazoned with an enhanced image of the dwarf planet. A banner across the top of the stamps reads, “Pluto — explored!” — a reference to a previous set of Pluto stamps issued in 1991 that were titled “Pluto: Not yet explored.” …
More about Space, Us World, and Us – Source
Every week, we share a number of downloads for all platforms to help you get things done. Here were the top downloads from this week.
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Slowly, rumors about the Apple iPhone 7 and the Apple iPhone 7 Plus are beginning to help us piece together the various features that will be available on the device. So far, we expect the next iteration of the iPhone to offer some sort of protection from water, and we also expect the 3.5mm earphone jack to be removed. An accessory for the Lightning port will offer a solution for those who want privacy while listening to audio. Touch ID could be embedded into the display, and the iPhone 7 Plus will sport 3GB of RAM.
Another new rumor can be added to the list, this one also involving the … – Source
If you’re not a Windows Insider, the prospect of updating your Windows Phone 8.1 powered handset to Windows 10 Mobile probably has you excited at the thought of running a brand new OS on the unit. Back in October, it appeared as though the update would take place in December. By last month, it was clear that Windows 10 Mobile wouldn’t see the light of day until early 2016.
Wireless carrier Vodafone Australia said that it is waiting for “bits” of the OS to test, and expects this to happen by the middle of this month. Another mobile operator, Movistar Spain, now expects to push out Windows … – Source
After momentarily introducing the Peek feature in the Android version of its app in the previous beta, Instagram later pulled the feature for unknown reasons. It seems the company is now ready to roll it out again, as some users are now seeing the feature back in the latest v7.14.0 of the app.
For those not aware, the Peek feature is lifted from the iOS version of the app, which makes use of the sophisticated pressure sensitive display on the iPhone 6s to let you press harder on the screen to get a ‘peek’ at the image without actually opening it. This lets you quickly look at the image and then release the screen for the image to pop back. The Android version uses a cruder implementation, with the user having to press and hold on the screen for a while before the image pops up and then release it for it to pop back.
As mentioned before, only some users are seeing the feature even now, even if you have the latest version installed. It seems the feature is enabled server side, so you may have to wait a while even if you get the latest update before you can start using it.
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