Software

HMD Global has come up with an official response on the issue of its devices sending sensitive user data to Chinese servers. While the company's reasoning appears sound, it's still a tad appalling that something of this sort is associated with the Nokia brand, especially considering the hardware and software issues the company's devices have been accused of having over the past year.

References to three new Xiaomi devices have been discovered, with two of them being bonafide Android One phones. We could be looking at the Mi A3, A3 Lite, and Mi 7X, perhaps? Interestingly, all three phones will have in-display fingerprint readers and massive 32 MP selfie cameras.

15 years after the release of the original Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, Paradox is finally announcing a sequel to the "cult" RPG game. Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 is set in modern-day Seattle, and the gameplay will include brutal first person melee fights, strong language, and hub-like levels with non-linear progression.

The Closed Beta of Mortal Kombat 11 will debut on March 28 with a roaster of five fighters, namely Baraka, Jade, Kabal, Scarlet, and Scorpion. At launch, the game is expected to come with a lineup of no less than 28 characters, including Cassie Cage, Kano, Sub-Zero, Raiden, and Kano. This new Mortal Kombat title will launch on April 23.

OnePlus has reached an important stage in the development of Oxygen OS 9, which is based on Android Pie (9.0), for its former 3/3T flagships. It now has a closed beta of this build, which can be downloaded following a successful application to the program in question. Therefore, the general, stable release of this ROM is closer than ever.

Switch owners rejoice. Cuphead, the popular side-scrolling run and gun game, is coming to the console next month. You can pre-order the game now on the Nintendo eShop before its worldwide release on April 18. StudioMDHR is also bringing new and free content to all platforms, which will be available on the Switch version on day one.

The first anniversary of PUBG for mobile devices comes with the Season 6 Royale Pass, parties on Spawn Island with fireworks and loot crates with special rewards, randomly spawned birthday cakes, dynamic weather on Erangel and Miramar, a new vehicle (a three-wheeled bus that replaces the Jeep, Dacia, and Mini Bus), and more.

Could a phone establish data connections and load webpages independent of either WiFi or a SIM card? Volk Fi apparently thinks so. This company is currently advertising its first smartphone, the Volk One, which can apparently form part of its own 'mesh network' with every other unit of the same around it.

Reports have just emerged that the European Commission has disciplined Google for anti-trust-related business practices. Coincidentally, the company has issued a new blog post outlining its new measures to ensure that there is "choice and competition" among digital services for users in this region.

Microsoft has become much more open under current CEO Satya Nadella with apps made for macOS, iOS, Android and Linux. The latest step in this initiative is the porting of a version of Microsoft Defender antivirus software for macOS, but in this instance, it is targeted at business users initially.

Yesterday, Sea of Thieves celebrated its first anniversary. During the year that passes, the game received four major updates, and now everyone should get ready for the Anniversary Update, which is set to arrive at the end of April. This massive update — the biggest so far — promises to take Sea of Thieves to a whole new level.

God of War has won another “Game of the Year” title to add to its growing collection. This time, it was the Game Developers Choice Award for Game of the Year that was given to the acclaimed action-adventure game. God of War, which was developed by Santa Monica Studio and published by Sony, was released in April 2018.

The early access software is Intel's next step towards becoming a discrete graphics company. The chipmaker plans to take user feedback seriously by launching the Odyssey program for enthusiasts to share, engage, and collaborate with Intel along the way.

Although handsets like the Oppo F11/F11 Pro and the RealMe 3 have been shipping with it onboard for a while, Android Pie-based Color OS 6 has finally received a proper official launch as well. This piece of code should be rolling out as an update for older Oppo handsets soon, but the roadmap is not available yet.

Apple's latest press release has unveiled the AirPods 2. These new earbuds integrate handsfree Siri activation, faster switching between different devices and wireless charging. However, their design is largely unchanged compared to their preceding generation.

Released at the end of November for the Nintendo Switch hybrid console, RollerCoaster Tycoon Adventures is now finally reaching PC gamers all over the world. However, this release comes with a twist that Steam fans will not enjoy: Atari's new game is exclusively available via the Epic Games store.

Vivo has announced its newest devices in a Chinese event today (March 19, 2019). They are the X27 and X27 Pro. The X27 has 2 variants with either the Snapdragon (SD) 675 or 710, although they both have the same screen and single pop-up selfie camera. The Pro version has a larger display, and a more novel wider pop-up module with a dedicated flash.

Already available in China, the Xiaomi Mi Pay mobile payments service has been tested in India in the second half of 2018. In the meantime, the Chinese company obtained the approval of the Reserve Bank of India, and Mi Pay is now ready to take on PayU, WhatsApp Pay, and the other similar services.

After a rather long wait, the French and Italian vehicles are finally joining Armored Warfare as the offerings of a new dealer, named Francine De Laroche. The Arabian Nights campaign is now moving on with new events, but the 0.28 update also comes with Battalion Ranked Battles, new achievements, as well as many tweaks and fixes.

Call of Duty Mobile is now official and should hit Android and iOS handsets later this year. Although there will not be a battle royale mode at launch, Activision has confirmed that this free-to-play title should offer this treat at some point in the future. Obviously, this "unique Call of Duty battle royale experience" will be accompanied by more content.

Nvidia has announced that a number of Pascal-based graphics cards will soon be enabled to utilize DirectX ray tracing (DXR). GeForce GTX 1060 6 GB cards and higher will receive a Game Ready Driver update, which is currently expected in April, to allow their users to enjoy limited ray tracing technology in certain games.

The Xiaomi Black Shark 2 has been launched today (March 18, 2019) in China. As expected, it is powered by the Snapdragon 855 processor, has a 6GB RAM base model and has a 6.39-inch FHD+ AMOLED display. This panel has some interesting HDR features, touted to enhance gaming and media experiences.

Unveiled earlier this year at CES 2019 and still expected to hit the market, the EVGA GeForce RTX 2080 Ti KINGPIN Hybrid graphics card has recently topped the 3DMark Portal Royal benchmark thanks to a massive overclock — 2.7 GHz core and 17 GHz memory — that resulted in a bandwidth of over 750 Gbps.

There have always been rumors that Huawei was working on its own OS. Those have now been confirmed by the company, with Huawei CEO Richard Yu affirming that the Chinese monolith has a working mobile OS all geared up and ready to go, just in case.

Facebook and its subsidiaries suffered a temporary outage of services yesterday leading to inconvenience for users and advertisers alike. The company clarified that the outage was a result of a server configuration change and is not a cyber attack. The downtime resulted in more than 3 million new signups for Telegram with CEO Durov advocating the service's focus on privacy and unlimited space for everyone.

AMD has announced that the Radeon Software Adrenalin 2019 Edition 19.3.2 installation package is ready for download. The package includes various fixes and support for games, and it is currently available for Windows 10 64-bit and Windows 7 64-bit (with SP1 or higher).

Over the past week or so, WhatsApp has taken to enforcing its strict anti-third-party policies. The company considers third-party versions of the messenger a security risk and is now banning users of such apps. GB WhatsApp and WhatsApp Plus are examples.

Going by information released on Xiaomi's official forum, the company plans on sending out the Pie update to a host of devices over the next couple of months. The Redmi Note 5, for one, is expected to get the update before this month runs out.

It's finally here - Q has been released for download and use - albeit only on Pixel-line phones. On the other hand, this Beta 1 form of the OS is mainly meant for development and testing, not daily use. However, it does come with most of the promised and projected new features associated with the next version of Android.

A mobile insurance and device company, Asurion, has announced its findings on a study about missing devices and cases in which their owners managed to get them back. The company reported that having a lockscreen showing a contact number resulted in 3 times the chances of recovering such a device. In addition, the use of a cross-platform browser is a good idea in case of phone loss.

Adobe Shockwave was once the essential plug-in for interactive website elements and functions. However, it has been long overtaken by more up-to-date options. Its maker has announced the cessation of support for this relative dinosaur, with the exception of some business-focused licenses, on April 9, 2019.

A recent post on SlashLeaks shows real-life images of a device with Honor branding. The poster alleges that it is of the brand's 10 line - however, it can't be the pre-existing 10 Lite, as it appears to have triple rear cameras. Therefore, its contributor has dubbed it the Honor 10i.

The latest build of Windows 10 available via the Insider program expands the functions of the Your Phone app on the OS. This service, which formerly gave Android users a more convenient way to move their files on their PCs, now supports screen mirroring. Unfortunately, it only works with some Samsung Galaxy-line devices so far.

Xiaomi has already released official Android Pie-based builds for a number of its 2018 devices. Recent rumors that may emanate from the Chinese MIUI community indicate that the Mi 6X will soon join their ranks. This phone, which is a twin of the Android One phone, the Mi A2, is a solid mid-ranger with the Snapdragon 660 processor.

Although Windows 7 still controls a noticeable share in the desktop market, many gamers were forced to upgrade just to fully enjoy various DirectX 12 titles. However, the latest update for World of Warcraft: Battle for Azeroth — patch 8.1.5 — is the first title to bring full DirectX 12 support to Microsoft's outdated operating system.

Samsung is now sending out the stable Pie update to its Verizon and Unlocked models in the US. Unlocked Samsung models are usually the last to receive updates, so this means that all Note 9 users in the US have now received the Pie-based One UI update.

Google has quietly launched a breakthrough on real-time voice recognition technology via its AI blog. Using AI technology and tapping into the neural processing capabilities of its Pixel phones, Gboard users can now offline real-time speech recognition.

The Samsung Galaxy Note 8 received the Pie update in certain regions last month and Samsung is also now sending the March security to those models. Note 9 users in certain markets are also getting the security patch, interestingly, even ahead of the new Galaxy S10 phones.

A Huawei device with the model name VOG-L29 has surfaced on Geekbench today (March 12, 2019). It has exhibited 2019 flagship specs and the scores to go with it. They have beaten up-to-date entries for the P20 Pro on the same database by a considerable margin.

War Thunder 1.87 "Locked On!" is a massive update to Gaijin Entertainment's popular vehicular combat title and — just like its predecessors — has a suggestive name. The game now features French helicopters, new cruisers, rank VII ground vehicles, advanced supersonic jets, complex radar systems, and more.

Motorola promised Oreo for the Moto G4 Plus when it launched in 2016 and went back on its word a year after. Media outcry over that betrayal forced the company's hands, making them promise Oreo as initially agreed. It's been eighteen months since then, though, and the Moto G4 phones are only just starting to receive the Android Oreo OTA.

The Twitter account @NTAuthority has posted a video in which a Pixel 3 XL appears to boot into Windows. The OS' logo shows up at the start of this process, which is followed by not much more than a blue screen with what appears to be a command window. Should the claim prove true, it appears that Windows can run on yet another device not intended to do so.

The Galaxy S10 flagship series may have already demonstrated that it is having no trouble with its sales. However, Samsung has arranged a few perks to ensure that the new phones keep flying off shelves. They involve YouTube Premium and Spotify deals; on the other hand, their availability is region-dependent.

Early adopters can keen to get their hands on the Android Q beta will have a wider range of devices from which to choose this time around. Android developer Illiyan Malhev has revealed the even more OEMs will be on board for the Android Q beta testing program expected to launch at Google’s I/O 2019 developer conference in May.

Microsoft has recommended that Windows 10 users suffering from problems with graphics or mouse performance degradation in certain games should uninstall the latest update for the ubiquitous operating system. KB4482887 was rolled out for “quality improvements” but has ironically affected quality in a number of crucial areas.

The Xiaomi Mi Max 3, like all Mi Max devices, is sold with the unique feature of having a huge screen. This generation has a 6.9-inch FHD display, which is matched by few other phablets. Units of this model worldwide are now eligible for an official update to the Pie-based MIUI 10.

The 6T is the first OnePlus flagship to be sold through a US carrier: T-Mobile. These units are now receiving a notification for a new update that confers RCS messaging. This new form of messaging on Android brings expanded features and capabilities compared to the old one.

After the March security update, users of the Pixel 3 phones are reporting stability issues with their camera apps. The app apparently lags heavily and tends to completely glitch out during use. This, of course, begs the question of what exactly the Pixels are good for if their cameras are unreliable.

The South Korean Ministry of Science and ICT has warned that South Korea is likely to miss the current approximate deadline at which 5G should be available in the country. This was estimated to be at the end of March, but now may be pushed back until later in the year. The authorities have cited costing disputes with providers as one factor in this delay.

Microsoft is open sourcing the code of Windows Calculator on GitHub in a bid to encourage developers learn more about Microsoft technologies by reviewing the code used in the app. Developers can now use Windows Calculator functionality in their own apps and participate in code review and feedback via GitHub. Microsoft will continue to finally test and flight the app in Windows builds as usual.