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This rugged phone has an 8500mAh battery and a frickin' laser beam rangefinder
The DOOGEE S97 Pro is also surprisingly affordable for such a rugged device
Are you a tough guy? Or a tough gal, or a tough non-binary person, or any kind of being which has integrated the concept of toughness into their identity? Then you want to check out the DOOGEE S97 Pro. Not only is it literally certified tough, it has a bonkers massive battery and a frickin' laser beam attached to its head the upper part of its case thingy. "A laser beam?" I hear you say. But Michael, why would a phone need such a thing? I'll tell you, hypothetical conversant. It's for measuring distances. You know, like this thing, which you can get at a hardware store for surprisingly few dollars. Whelp, the DOOGEE S97 Pro has it built in. It can do a straight distance measurement, say, to the wall you're about to demolish as part of your home renovation, and area and volume calculations, in case your elementary school math is rusty. And it had "Pythagoras modes" for triangle calculations, in case your middle school trigonometry is also rusty. The laser is accurate to a range of 40 meters (131 feet for 'Muricans).
Aside from the frickin' laser beam, the phone is certified waterproof at IP68, and dustproof at IP69K. DOOGEE says the phone has "high-density molecule coating," which is presumably part of the "soft TPU" covering the "aluminum alloy reinforced polycarbonate" (read: plastic and metal with some extra plastic around it). The phone can allegedly withstand up temperatures "between -55°C and -70°C." Maybe that's a typo in the press release, and it means between -55 and +70. DOOGEE notes that the camera modules are completely surrounded by metal. The various ports, including USB-C for charging, come with covers for extra protection.Alright, those are the bells and whistles. What about the guts of this thing? Underneath the 720p 6.4-inch LCD screen, covered in hardy Gorilla Glass 5, you'll find an octa-core MediaTek Helio G95, a mid-range chip equivalent to about the Snapdragon 700 series. It's paired to a respectable 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, plus a MicroSD card. The rear cameras are a familiar mix: 48MP primary, 8MP ultrawide, 2MP macro, 2MP portrait. There must be a factory somewhere punching out those modules by the thousand. The front-facing hole punch camera is 16MP, and mobile speeds are limited to LTE.
But what about that battery I talked about in the intro? Oh, boy. It's 8500mAh, approximately twice the size of even the biggest flagship phone. It charges up at 33 watts, not amazing, but better than a lot of the alternatives. And surprisingly, it includes support for wireless charging at up to 10 watts, something I've never seen on a "rugged" phone before. It'll probably take you a couple of days to actually charge it without a plug, but you can do it if you like!Also, the phone is running Android 11. As well it should, but it's nice to have that spelled out. DOOGEE isn't saying how big or thick the phone is, but based on the specs and the photos, it's safe to say the thing is a chonker.The DOOGEE S97 Pro goes on sale today on AliExpress, with a choice of grey, red, or orange case accents. Though the retail price is $330, it's on sale for $220 until June 25th.
Join the dark side with a rare $80 discount on the latest iPad Air
C'mon, it's not like you were gonna buy another Kindle Fire
A lot of you got upset with me when I waxed poetic on how much better iPads are than Android tablets. Well here's your chance to put your money where your mouth is ... albeit slightly less of your money than usual. As part of Prime Day, Amazon is offering $80 off of the latest generation of the iPad Air. It's a fantastic deal on the "sweet spot" of the iPad lineup. What I mean by that is this: the iPad Air gen 4 has almost most of the plusses of the iPad Pro, including that sleek rounded-and-flattened design, a bit of extra power, compatibility with some of Apple's (admittedly overpriced) keyboards, a slightly bigger screen than the base model, and most thankfully, a USB-C port that works with tons of accessories including video-out cables. And it does all of that while being hundreds of dollars cheaper than the Pro, missing out only on the higher-refresh screen, two extra speakers, and a better camera — features which, I would argue, aren't going to be a big deal for most tablet users.
The base iPad Air 64GB is normally $600, down to just $520 today. You can add an LTE modem for $650, bump up the storage to 256GB for $670, or get them both for $800, again, all with an $80 discount on the retail price. These discounts are good for all five colors of the iPad Air. Discounts this deep on iPad hardware are rare, so pick 'em up while you can.Buy: Amazon
Fitbit's top of the line Sense smartwatch is under $200 for Prime Day, lowest price ever
The Fitbit Sense, Inspire 2, and Ace 2 all have dramatic discounts
Among Amazon's smorgasbord of Prime Day deals, a wide swath of Fitbit's wearable devices are on sale. The clear standout is the top-of-the-line Fitbit Sense, normally $300 but today discounted down to 9.95, even cheaper than the step-down Versa 3. It's available in either black or gold, with accompanying silicone bands, and it ships for free. Elsewhere in the Fitbit line you can pick up an Inspire 2 tracker for $56.99 ($33 off) or the kid-friendly Fitbit Ace 2 for just $29.99 (a whopping $40 off). These come in a variety of band colors, sadly lacking the Minions flavor that was recently revealed.
It's worth noting that, technically, this is the rare case of Amazon showing deals on Google-branded hardware, since Google purchased Fitbit lock, stock, and barrel. It's also worth noting that future Fitbit models will run on the improved version of Wear OS, while preserving the company's much-loved current ecosystem. So if you're looking for fitness hardware with a bit of "future-proof" reliability, you might hesitate before pulling the trigger.Buy: Amazon
Texas residents enraged as energy companies remotely raise temperatures on smart thermostats
Remember to read the fine print
It's been only four months since the proudly independent Texas power grid failed under a cold snap, and now it's in danger of a similar fate during the current heat wave. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, sterling public servants that they are, have asked Texans to raise their thermostats to 78 during the hottest part of the day. And for some, they're not asking.
Google's Father's Day commercial runs on your tears
Answer your phone, Jake, I'm not paying to talk to your voicemail!
C'mon Google, you know the traditional way to collect tears from middle-aged fathers is just to play some Harry Chaplin. You didn't have to sit some video editor down and force them to make a minute-long piece of fictional yet relatable one-sided conversations between a dad and his teenage son. But here we are: happy Father's Day, I guess.
Amazon is kicking everyone's butt in the streaming wars
Fire TV has tripled its market share in the last 6 years and is now tied with Roku
When the Chromecast debuted back in 2013, it was a legitimate revolution: an incredibly cheap, incredibly simple gadget that let you send all the streaming video on your phone straight to your TV. But in the years since, Google has steadily lost ground in the set-top box market in pretty much every metric. The big winner at the moment is, indisputably, Amazon.
Google remotely installed a contact tracing app, and people are pissed
The Massachusetts app was automatically installed on some phones — customers say without their knowledge, but Google says they opted in
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As an unfathomably large and powerful international corporation, it makes sense that people are generally wary of Google, in the same way that space truckers are wary of any boss that tells them to land on an alien planet and inspect unknown life signs. Some Massachusetts residents are feeling that way right now, after noticing that the state's official COVID contract tracing app was installed on their phones, allegedly without any alert or permission.
Samsung's affordable Tab A7 Lite and Tab S7 FE make their way to India
You can grab one from June 23
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Samsung seems to be the only Android manufacturer interested in premium tablets. Incidentally, it also had a major hit with last year's Galaxy S20 FE, offering flagship specs with cheaper materials and a few cut corners. So now, after a whole lot of leaks, the Galaxy Tab S7 FE is official. Samsung also announced the Tab A7 Lite, for the less lucrative but far wider market of budget tablets.
Everything is Workspace now, even your free Gmail account
Even you. Look in the mirror. You're Workspace now.
It seems like Google is kind of bullish on its "Workspace" label lately. Originally a replacement for G-Suite, as in the paid upgrade to standard Google services for companies and corporations, the Workspace label is now apparently being applied to everyone that uses Gmail. That's an odd expansion, since previously we've seen that you need to opt into the Workspace interface on Chat and Meet.
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Earlier this morning, the official Philips Hue app listing was briefly taken down from the Google Play Store. Whatever the issue may have been, it has since been resolved, and the app is back up and available on Google's servers. That's good because Philips doesn't allow re-uploads of the app on alternate download sites like APK Mirror, so customers of the company's expensive lighting systems which needed to download the app during its disappearance were out of luck — you can't get it anywhere else.
Google Photos has a new way to show who's looking at your pictures
It's a central hub for all the photos you've shared, or others have shared with you
Google has been pushing a lot more functionality into Photos as of late, even after it sunset its most popular feature by far. Check your app today: if the odds are in your favor, you might see a new entry on the bottom navigation bar. Don't get too excited though, it's just a direct link to some of the app's less obvious social features.
Honor dons novelty mustache, unveils first new phone with Google Apps
The super-sparkly Honor 50 and 50 Pro are the company's first new phones with Google Apps in almost two years
Thanks to the US and other countries' trade sanctions on China-based Huawei, one of the world's biggest phone manufacturers was effectively cut off from Google's proprietary Android software. With few choices remaining, Huawei sold off its Honor sub-brand to a consortium of new owners, effectively making it an entirely new corporate entity. With its B2B relationships restored, the Honor 50 and the 50 Pro are the company's first new Android phones to receive Google apps in almost two years.
The close corporate ties between OnePlus and Oppo have never been much of a secret, at least to anyone who studies the nitty-gritty of the mobile business-to-business world. Despite keeping a very distinct identity, they're both part of the same parent company, and have been more open about the resources that they share for the last six months. Today OnePlus dropped a bit more of the pretense, and said that it's going to "further integrate" with Oppo.
Edge Beta completes Microsoft's trifecta of pre-release mobile browsers
It joins Dev and Canary in addition to the stable release of Edge
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Microsoft is really fleshing out its mobile browser options. Last month the company published a Canary build of Edge to the Play Store, and it's following up with a Dev build today. That's three out of four of the release channels available as an Android version ... oddly, the Beta channel has yet to make its way onto the platform as a dedicated app listing, still relying on the Play Store beta system.
Spammers are flooding Google Meet and Drive with phony invitations
Hey Google, you gonna get on this any time soon?
If you've been seeing Google Meet invitations and shared Google Drive items from people you don't know, only to have them try to sell you something or extort personal information, you're not alone. For the last few weeks some Google users have been getting new invitations for meetings and shared Drive items that inevitably turn into the same kind of annoying crap you're used to seeing in an email spam filter.
Wow, y'all really hate tab groups in Chrome for Android
A new Chromium bug report hopes to bring back an option to turn them off
Any time a developer releases a new feature, the hope is that users will find it helpful. That isn't always the case. For example: the new tab groups feature in Chrome for Android, which is now the default behavior after being introduced in January. While the grouped tabs initially came with a chrome://flags option to turn it off, that option has been removed, and tab groups are now permanently enabled in all current versions of the browser.
Google is a search company. You'd think that it would be focused on the quality of its search over, well, basically everything. But for the last few weeks (at least), a growing number of users are seeing a frequent lack of results in the main Google app when using its search function. It just returns a blank page under the Google logo.
How to pass on (or completely erase) your Google account data after you're gone
Google's built-in Inactive Account Settings tool helps you prepare for the worst
Part of growing up is making sure that your affairs stay in order, no matter what might happen. In the last few decades, the scope of that has expanded to include the digital realm: what happens to all of your online accounts after you're gone? Google has a built-in mechanism for dealing with this called Inactive Account Settings. Unfortunately it's neither as easy nor as straightforward as it could be.
New York state senate passes sweeping right to repair bill
The bill would require manufacturers to provide information, parts, and tools to end users and third-party repair shops
There's a consumerist revolution blooming in the United States, centering around the right to repair and modify the things you buy without the approval of the manufacturer that made them. The latest major victory occurred in the New York state senate, where a sweeping bill making repair information and parts available to consumers passed by a wide margin.
The updated Acer Chromebook Spin 713 with 11th-gen Intel processors is now available
Go get you some of them sweet Xe graphics
Acer's high-end Chromebooks hit an interesting sweet spot in the category. They're nice enough to be head and shoulders above most of the budget stuff (including Acer's own cheaper Chromebooks), but still well south of four figures and sitting comfortably in the "midrange" of the broader laptop landscape. The latest version of the Chromebook Spin 713 is one that eager Chrome OS fans have been waiting on for a while, and it's now on sale at Best Buy.