Tranya T3 Bluetooth fully wireless earphones review

Bluetooth headphones have increasingly grown in popularity over the last couple of years. It partly has to do with newer phones increasingly dropping the physical headphone jack and partly due to the incredible popularity of the AirPods, which just happen to be the highest selling earphones on the market today. However, not everyone has the budget for a $149 pair of AirPods and most people don't even have an iPhone to use them with. Certainly then there is a market then for an affordable pair of truly wireless earphones that work well with more smartphones. The Tranya T3 is one...

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Top 10 trending phones of week 44

After three weeks in the top spot, the Redmi Note 8 Pro is no longer the most interesting phone in our database. The upcoming Mi Note 10 dethroned it, its teased penta camera clearly gathering a lot attention. Those two are followed by the Redmi Note 8 and the Mi Note 10's Chinese version - CC9 Pro, making it an all-Xiaomi Top 4. The highest-placed phone from a different brand is the Realme X2 Pro in fifth, which managed to keep the Samsung Galaxy A50 behind it. Another Realme - Samsung couple follows with the 5 Pro taking seventh ahead of the Galaxy M30s. The Apple iPhone 11...

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nubia Red Magic 3s in for review

nubia released its Red Magic 3 gaming-centric phone in May but quickly delivered its replacement Red Magic 3s with nearly-identical specs in September. The one important (for a gaming phone and promo materials, at least) change is the Snapdragon 855+ - Xiaomi was slightly faster than nubia, announcing its Black Shark 2 Pro with the Snapdragon 855+ in July and releasing it in August, a full month before the nubia Red Magic 3s. But now that the latest from nubia is here, let's see what's new about it. To answer that we have to see what the Snapdragon 855+ adds over the regular Snapdragon...

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Week 44 in review: In anticipation of Xiaomi Mi Note 10/CC9 Pro, Mi Watch

Xiaomi dominated the tech world's attention this week with devices set for announcement on November 5 next week. One of the week's biggest stories was a video of Xiaomi's upcoming Mi Watch. It's an Apple Watch-esque device that will bring the Snapdragon Wear 3100 SoC, GPS, NFC for payments, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and eSIM. Xiaomi also has a Mi TV ready for the event. The other huge story is the Xiaomi Mi CC9 Pro, which will be globally known as the Mi Note 10. The device will be announced on November 5, will have 5 cameras (including the 108MP unit meant for the Galaxy S11 and a 5x optical...

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Flashback: Samsung Blue Earth and the short story of solar-powered phones

As concerns over global warming rise, the topic of recycling and renewable energy sources are commonly in the news and social media. This brought back memories of a phone that encapsulated both - the Samsung S7550 Blue Earth. The most distinctive feature of the phone was the solar panel on its back. It was a cool look and more importantly, it had a practical application - an hour in the sun charged the battery enough for a 10 minute phone call (on a 3G network) or two extra hours of standby. The solar panel was integrated into the back cover and connected to the phone using pogo pins....

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Weekly poll: face recognition vs. in-display fingerprint readers

There are two kinds of people in the world - those who use biometric authentication on their phones to keep their private data private and those who just use it as a quick way to unlock their phone. There are two kinds of smartphone makers - those who think fingerprint readers have a place on phones and those who go all-in on face recognition. Today we wanted to ask you about the two most popular flavors of each authentication method. In-display fingerprint readers have replaced the old capacitive kind in all but entry-level applications (and the occasional "lite" flagship). Proponents...

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Oppo Enco Q1 wireless noise cancelling headphones review

Long before Oppo's smartphones rose to prominence it was a company specializing in premium audio equipment. Now that part of it is gone, but the company still strives to deliver nicely sounding audio accessories and the latest product is called Oppo Enco Q1 Wireless Noise Cancelling Headphones, or simply Enco Q1. It sells for INR7,990 in India and translated to a Western currency, that's a bit over €100/$110. We got a pair of headphones in the office to see are they worth it and how much exactly. Connectivity The Enco Q1 has Bluetooth 5.0 and connects to any paired device almost...

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Weekly poll results: when it comes to zoom, more is better

While they are exceedingly rare, it's the telephoto cameras with 5x optical zoom that people want. That option was the clear favorite in last week's poll. 2x optical zoom was declared nearly useless as 48MP cameras are pretty common in the mid-range and up, plus there are already a number of phones with 64MP cams. These high resolution sensors can do 2x digital zoom (usually the fancier "hybrid zoom") while maintaining decent quality. Keep in mind that zoom cams typically have narrow apertures and small sensors, so "optical" zoom isn't always a mark of quality - especially in the...

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