David Ruddock
Contributing since June, 2010
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3358articles
About David Ruddock
David is the former Editor-in-Chief of Android Police and now the EIC of Esper.io. He's been an Android user since the early days - his first smartphone was a Google Nexus One! David graduated from the University of California, Davis where he received his bachelor's degree, and also attended the Pepperdine University School of Law.
Latest Articles
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra long-term review: Still one of the best
A huge and hugely good phone
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Last year, Samsung released its most ambitious (non-folding) phone to date: the Galaxy S20 Ultra. It didn't go over especially well. A sky-high $1400 price tag and unremarkable camera performance torpedoed the phone outright in our final assessment, a rare miss for Samsung in the premium smartphone segment.
Five great looking cases for your Galaxy S21, S21+, or S21 Ultra
Protect your shiny new investment in style
Samsung may have just launched a duo of hot new foldables for the 2021-2022 season, but the S21 series from earlier this year is still no slouch. Equipped with a Snapdragon 888 chip, impressive camera arrays, and a beautiful display, we even called it “the 2021 smartphone to beat (so far).” Here are just some of our favorite cases that’ll help you keep your S21 in good condition for years to come.
Nobody wants redundant home audio equipment. Speakers take up space, but in the age of near-ubiquitous smart speakers, a lot of them just sit around in our homes doing a whole lot of nothing. Damn lazy speakers. With an upcoming update, your HomePod mini will finally be able to start pulling its weight around the house. Maybe it'll even get a job.Provided you have an Apple TV 4K, you'll be able to set your HomePod minis (HomePods mini?) up as your television's speakers. It's not clear how many HomePods will be supported for output simultaneously, but at least two, obviously.This is pretty cool stuff, and I'd hope to see Google follow suit with its Nest Audio speakers and Chromecast with Google TV.
Apple wants to turn your mom into a 2-factor key
Trusted contacts will make getting back into iCloud easier, but potentially embarrassing
Getting locked out of any account is annoying. Getting locked out of your iCloud account can be downright infuriating. Apple makes resetting your password rigorous if you've enabled its more robust account protections, but today, it announced a new way to avoid a potentially catastrophic loss of digital access to your data.
You'll soon be able to find your AirPods like an AirTag
AirPods Pro and Max get enhanced location support
Finding your AirPods Pro and AirPods Max is about to get a lot easier: Apple has announced at WWDC that both of its premium headphones will get enhanced functionality in the "Find my" app on iOS.With iOS 15, your iPhone will be able to locate your AirPods Pro and Max with the use of a Bluetooth beacon mode. Your headphones will then use that beacon to find other Apple devices that are nearby, which can allow you to triangulate their exact location, similar to Apple's AirTags (minus UWB functionality).
FaceTime is getting Android support, but there's a catch
Apple is bringing FaceTime to Android... via the browser
At WWDC 2021 today, Apple announced that its popular FaceTime video call service will be getting a ton of new features, but one in particular caught our attention: Android compatibility. Sort of.
Google's latest Android ad tracking changes still aren't enough
An updated policy document panders to Apple's "Do not track" functionality, but doesn't go nearly far enough
It's no secret that Google is the world's largest advertising company. It's also clear which way the wind is blowing on ad trackers and cookies (even Google concedes the latter), and Apple has jumped out ahead of most other tech companies in proactively asking users of iOS products if they wish to disable personalized tracking entirely. As part of iOS 14, the company introduced a simple prompt for any app which wishes to track your activity for the purpose of advertising. And, unsurprisingly, the overwhelming majority people have taken Apple up on the opportunity, with over 95% of iOS users allegedly blocking ad tracking when asked by an app for permission.
This $150 wireless charger bridged the iOS and Android gap for me
You'll definitely pay for Nomad's ultra-versatile Base Station, but I think you'll be happy if you do
A $150 phone charger might not be the pinnacle of tech accessory excess, but it surely sits comfortably among the foothills of luxury. A few generic Qi chargers and a USB hub can achieve largely the same goal as Nomad's Base Station, but they won't look or feel nearly as good doing it — and that's what this product, at the end of the day, is really all about.
Polestar 2 Android Automotive review
Google finally gives you a car worth talking to, and it's called Polestar 2
In all likelihood, Android Automotive is a flavor of Google's near-ubiquitous operating system you've never actually used, and probably won't (statistically) for a long time yet. It's also, in my eyes, the most important version of the platform since the original. About two weeks ago, I spent four days with Automotive in the Polestar 2, an EV from the sister brand of Swedish carmaker Volvo, that launched in the United States in 2020. I also drove it last year for a few short hours, and didn't exactly have the time to fully flesh out my thoughts on the car, the software, and how it all works together in a cohesive way. This time, I had the leisure of living with a Polestar 2, anemic charging infrastructure and all, as my daily driver, with Android Automotive as my steadfast copilot. And you know what? The future of Android looks bright.
I've used Android for over 10 years — I'm switching to an iPhone 12 Mini
At least until it drives me crazy, which it might!
Last weekend, I made my way over to the Westfield Century City Mall for a fresh pair of glasses — and an iPhone. I walked over to the Apple Store, talked to the very nice gentleman at the door... and was turned away because I didn't have an appointment to spend nearly $800. I was told I could come spend a whole lot of money, but that I'd have to wait four hours to do so. Then, I did what I should have before I set foot out the door that morning, and opened Chrome to the Apple website on my Galaxy S21 Ultra, bought the iPhone, and set it for pickup at store I'd just turned tail from — for just an hour from the current time. So, I wandered the (exceptionally nice!) mall, bought an overpriced coffee, and then promptly arrived at the Apple Store for my Very Official Pickup Appointment, which entailed someone going to the back of the store, grabbing a phone (which was quite assuredly there and available hours earlier), and handing it to me. I didn't even have to go inside the store. Efficiency! Anyway, I now had an iPhone 12 Mini — a purple one, of course — and it is here I meet you, just a little over a week into my latest Apple journey.
The two things I'd change about Apple Pay after using it for a week
A couple tweaks would make it the ultimate mobile payment platform
I admit it: I was a mobile payment naysayer for years. I always felt that the conversation around tap to pay was a lot of rigamarole — after all, how hard is it to get out your wallet? But, as credit card terminals slowly evolved around the US, so too did my troglodytian attitude about them. I had my phone out when I was in line to check out regardless most of the time, so why not? And then, the whole last year... happened. Mobile payments went from a passive preference to a very active one for me, and many more businesses here in the States that had lagged behind adoption finally ponied up for contactless. Even gas stations — where ancient magstripe readers have remained stubbornly dominant — in my experience, by and large now offer NFC here in California.
Android is about to take over your world all over again
I/O 2021 makes it clear that the search giant has its eye squarely on the ecosystem prize
Every Google I/O, we get to see some impossibly cool shit from Google that, it frequently turns out, actually was impossible (at least in the practical, scalable sense of the word "possible"). That's not to say the company intends to mislead — far from it. I/O is a playground for the incredibly ambitious and often financially untenable experiments from a company that has more money than it is reasonable for a normal person to comprehend in anything but a purely mathematical and utterly abstract sense. The kind of money that could feasibly send not just one, but an entire colony of chimpanzees to space — each in separate rockets — dressed in adorable gold lamé suits with matching limited edition Rolexes and not incur a quarterly balance sheet impact worse than a particularly nasty EU regulatory fine. That kind of money.
Android 12's radical new design, Wear OS brought back from the dead, and more: Every big Google I/O announcement
Here's all the important stuff, and there's A LOT this year
Google I/O day one is just about a wrap, and with it came an absolute tsunami of news. Android is getting its biggest design overhaul in half a decade. Wear OS is being completely pivoted — and merging with Samsung Tizen?! Android Automotive is headed to more cars, and as usual, Google announced a smorgasbord of app updates and changes to apps you use every day. We've got all the big news here, and there's a lot of it, so let's buckle down and get through this stuff!
Google takes a hard left on its latest Discover UI test
More variations of Google's latest Discover redesign have popped up
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Google Discover is one of the search giant's most popular products in recent memory. Even Samsung finally relented and put it on the homescreens of some of its wildly successful Galaxy smartphones — no mean real estate achievement, even for Google. As such, UI tests on Discover are almost as numerous as the dozens of content cards it displays, with constant tests, refreshes, and tweaks coming and going.
The Pixel 4a launched in 2020 to great acclaim (... from me), but it had one rather annoying limitation: color options. Google's barn-burner of a budget phone excelled in almost every way, though at launch you'd have to settle for a fingerprint-prone and rather drab black as your only choice of shade. The limited edition Barely Blue launched later on, but I'd heard from around the Pixel rumor campfire that other hues had been planned and shelved due to pandemic supply chain problems, but I never laid eyes on any such examples myself. It seems Google (or, more likely, the studio Google hired to shoot this spot) kind of forgot about that if this since-pulled Instagram story is any indication.
Exclusive: Qualcomm is planning an Android-powered Nintendo Switch knockoff
Yes, that Qualcomm
Qualcomm plans its first foray into the consumer electronics market in years — with a device that bears a strong resemblance to Nintendo's wildly popular Switch game console. According to a source familiar with the company's strategy, the Android-powered game console will attempt to showcase the company's Snapdragon chipsets in a less traditional form factor.
Free trials for Hulu, Amazon Prime Video, YouTube Premium, and tons of other streaming services
These are the promo and introductory offers for tons of major streaming platforms
It's been a year of pandemic living and that's meant hordes of new viewers jumping on the streaming services — so much so that Netflix, Disney+, and HBO Max have all scuttled their first-party free trial offers. But there are still plenty of content hubs to suit your tastes in live TV, animated series, docudramas, and the like. We've got discount or free offers from 22 streaming service options listed below, and they've all got huge libraries. Some are even free entirely.
Android 12 brings a new way to share Wi-Fi passwords
Nearby share powers the new functionality
As previously rumored, Google has introduced a new way to share Wi-Fi network passwords seamlessly as part of Android 12. The new sharing experience is powered by Google's Nearby Share feature, which rolled out last summer after a long wait. Nearby Share wirelessly discovers other nearby Android devices in use by persons in your contact list who also have the setting enabled.
Android 12's biggest feature should be an easy upgrade to Android 13
Part of growing up is accepting that "boring" features matter
A big focus for Google in recent years when it comes to Android has been updates — specifically, in making them easier for hardware manufacturers to support. The two largest (public) efforts undertaken in service of this initiative to date are Projects Treble and Mainline, both of which have been designed to modularize and simplify the process of updating Android devices by making key portions of the OS less dependent on the underlying platform version. There's also clear evidence these initiatives are having a positive impact: Android 11 experienced the quickest adoption of any version of the OS to date. All of this is encouraging, and all of it is good.
Samsung Galaxy Buds Pro review: You can finally have your AirPods Pro for Android
Samsung comes out swinging with a truly great set of all rounder earbuds
The Galaxy Buds Pro are the biggest update to Samsung's line of in-ear true wireless headphones since the original Galaxy Buds in 2019. The most notable upgrades? Audio comes via a brand-new dual dynamic driver system in each bud (the Buds Pro sound great), and a return to a sealing eartip design combined with multi-microphone ANC deliver seriously effective noise reduction. If you've been waiting for credible noise canceling true wireless earbuds with strong audio chops that aren't the AirPods Pro, Samsung delivers with its latest Buds.