Huawei has launched its premium P50 Pro and foldable P50 Pocket smartphones in international markets even as it continues to face challenges from U.S. sanctions. The P50 Pocket is featured at Huawei’s flagship store in Hangzhou, China.
Long Wei | Costfoto | Future Publishing | Getty Images
Huawei has launched high-end smartphones in international markets despite its diminished global standing as a result of U.S. sanctions.
The Chinese telecommunications firm announced plans on Wednesday to launch the P50 Pro and foldable P50 Pocket to markets outside China. These phones launched last year in China.
Neither phone however has the ability to connect to super-fast 5G internet as a result of U.S. sanctions that continue to bar Huawei from purchasing certain U.S. technology. Instead, the devices sport chips from U.S. company Qualcomm to allow 4G connections.
The P50 Pro has a 6.6-inch display and two large camera modules on the back of the phone. The P50 Pocket is a foldable smartphone designed to slip into pockets and bags. The phones are designed to be able to sync across various Huawei hardware products.
The P50 Pro starts at 1,199 euros ($1,353).
With the release of these handsets globally, Huawei is sticking to its ambitions to continue to have a feasible business in consumer electronics.
But its global standing has declined dramatically since it became the number one smartphone player in the world in the second quarter of 2020. Counterpoint Research estimates Huawei’s worldwide market share to be 1.7% in the fourth quarter of 2021, with China making up more than 90% of that total.
Huawei has officially announced the P50 Pocket, a clamshell-style folding smartphone that has a circular, 1-inch external display for quick access to notifications and widgets. The device launches in China today, though US sanctions (which mean Huawei can’t use key tech like Google’s Android OS) mean the P50 Pocket won’t make any impact in the West.
Huawei teased the handset earlier this month with a photoshoot focused on the P50 Pocket Premium Edition that appeared in Harper’s Bazaar China. This version of the device was created with Dutch designer Iris van Herpen. It has a gold or silver finish, and a 3D pattern on the exterior surface that’s typical of van Herpen’s work, resembling feathers or leaves.
The P50 Pocket is Huawei’s third foldable phone, but its first to use a clamshell design.
Huawei’s sales pitch for the P50 Pocket focuses, not surprisingly, on the pocketability of the device.
When unfolded, the Pocket’s OLED screen is 6.9-inches in size, with a 21:9 ratio and 120Hz refresh rate. The device weighs 190 grams and is just 7.2mm thick (Huawei compared it to the iPhone 13 Pro Max which weighs 238 grams and is 7.65mm thick). It has a Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 4G SoC, a 4,000mAh battery, and runs Huawei’s Harmony OS 2.
The P50 Pocket’s main camera array has a 40-megapixel main sensor, 13-megapixel wide angle lens, and 32-megapixel “super spectrum” lens which Huawei says captures a greater range of color. There’s a hole-punch camera built into the main display, but Huawei notes that the phone’s foldable design makes it more convenient to use the main camera for taking selfies, with the 1-inch cover screen doubling up as a viewfinder.
The P50 Pocket’s external circular screen can be used to display various apps and widgets.
Accessing basic information like turn-by-turn directions can be done more discreetly.
Huawei is positioning that same “cover screen” as a big part of the P50 Pocket’s appeal. As well as showing notifications or the time, the screen can be used for widgets, letting users control music, follow directions, and so on. So, for example, if you’re using your phone to navigate in a new city, the cover screen will show discreet, turn-by-turn directions, rather than forcing you to open up the large 6.9-inch main display to check your position.
The P50 Pocket also has a new hinge which leaves zero gap between the screens when folded. This compares favorably to devices like the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip3, which is another clamshell but has a slight tapering gap when folded. The P50 Pocket also has face unlock on both the main and cover screen, and a side-mounted fingerprint unlock sensor — handy when many people are still commonly wearing masks during the pandemic.
The P50 Pocket folds completely flat, while Samsung’s Z Flip 3 has a slight tapering gap.
A standard edition of the P50 Pocket has gone on sale in China today with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage for ¥8,988 (around $1,400), while the premium version, with 12GB of RAM and 512GB of storage, sells for ¥10,988 (around $1,700). The standard edition is available in black and white, while the premium edition comes in silver or gold.
During a presentation, the CEO of Huawei’s consumer business group, Richard Yu said the clamshell design offered a more refined take on folding devices. “It’s very delicate and exquisite,” said Yu. “We want to bring elegance to you, on the go.”
If you owned a Game Boy, there’s a good chance the Game Boy Camera was your first digital camera. It was cheap, it was easy to use, and the 2-bit pixelated images it captured had an undeniable charm. For the first time in nearly 23 years there’s finally going to be an easy way to get those digital pics onto other devices—if you’re lucky enough to get your hands on the Analogue Pocket.
The $90 Game Boy Camera debuted back in 1998, and it was roughly the cost of the Game Boy itself. The camera slotted into the back of the handheld console, turning it into a full-fledged digital camera. Compared to even the other digital cameras available at the time, the Game Boy Camera’s specs were crude at best. Inside the swiveling lens that stuck up over the top of the Game Boy was a 128 x 128-pixel CMOS sensor that actually cropped images even smaller, to 128 x 112 pixels in just four shades of gray. That works out to 0.001434 megapixels.
With the ability to add fun effects to photos—decades before that would be a common feature on smartphones—and even basic stop-motion photography tools, the Game Boy Camera was still extremely popular. Even today, lo-fi photography fans do things like photograph the moon with it, or use old film photography tricks to produce color images.
Being a modern day Game Boy Camera photographer isn’t easy, though, with the most challenging workflow issue being actually getting digital copies of your shots off of the accessory, of which the camera can only store a handful. Nintendo’s solution was a link port connected thermal printer that turned Game Boy Camera photos into thumbnail-sized stickers, but getting those shots onto another device has long been a pain. Talented hardware hackers have come up with ways to connect the Game Boy Camera to modern printers, and even elaborate devices that wirelessly transfer those images to a smartphone, but there’s finally a much easier solution.
The Analogue Pocket, which officially started shipping this week, uses a custom chip inside to perfectly play any official Game Boy cartridge in existence, including the Game Boy Camera. The Pocket also features a microSD card slot that facilitates firmware updates as well as the ability to share game save files eventually, but the company has also revealed to Gizmodo that version 1.1 of the Pocket’s operating system, Analogue OS, will allow images from the Game Boy Camera to be easily retrieved through the memory card so they can be transferred to other devices.
It won’t be as effortless as wirelessly transferring images between smartphones—you’ll need to physically sneakernet that microSD card to another device—but it will be a solution that’s considerably more straightforward than what Game Boy Camera enthusiasts have had to rely on so far—custom link port adapters and special software to extract imagery. Currently, our Analogue Pocket review unit is running Analogue OS version 1.0, and while there’s no specific timeline for when version 1.1 will be available, it hopefully won’t be that far off as Pockets start arriving to those who preordered it a year ago.
Analogue is now reopening orders for its highly coveted Pocket handheld console.
Taking to Twitter to announce the news, the company is now going to take fresh orders started December 14, saying “It is our goal for everyone who wants a Pocket to be able to secure an order.” Though you’ll be able to put in orders tomorrow, it’ll still be on a first-come-first-serve basis split into three main groups. Group A will receive their Pockets in Q1 of 2022, with group B getting theirs in Q4 of the same year. Finally, Group C will receive their orders sometime in 2023.
On top of reopening orders, Analogue has also announced a price increase for the device. Originally at $200 USD, the handheld will now go for $220 USD “due to industry-wide component price increases,” although all of its other accessories will remain at the same price.
For those interested, you’ll be able to pre-order your Pocket over on Analogue’s website starting tomorrow at 8:00 a.m. PST (11 a.m. EDT).
Pocket will be available to purchase on December 14th at 8am PST. It is our goal for everyone who wants a Pocket to be able secure an order.
To accomplish this in the context of a global pandemic, we are implementing a fulfillment protocol. pic.twitter.com/jHukRh0R2I
— Analogue (@analogue) December 10, 2021
Elsewhere in gaming, Halo Infinite is getting a dedicated Slayer playlist this week.
Analogue has announced that preorders for the Pocket – its long-awaited handheld game console – will reopen on December 14 at 8am PT/11am ET/7pm GMT with a higher price.
Analogue announced the news in a blog post, saying that “due to industry wide component price increases, the price of Pocket is now $219. All other Pocket accessories will remain the same price.” Before this price hike, the Analogue Pocket retailed for $199.
Those who are lucky enough to secure a preorder this time around – the first batch sold out in 15 minutes – will fall into one of three fulfilment groups. This is to help ensure that “everyone who wants a Pocket will be able to secure an order.”
Group A currently has an estimated shipping date of Q1 2022, Group B’s is Q4 2022, and Group C’s is 2023. These fulfilment groups are assigned on “a first-come first-serve basis”, and “your order status will be updated a few days after you place your order to reflect what fulfilment group you are in.”
Analogue is limiting orders to 2 Pockets per customer, and it says this “system is put in place due to ongoing global supply constraint.” Additionally, orders may be cancelled at any time for a full refund before they are shipped.
Analogue Pocket – Gameplay Images
All current preorders are still on track to ship out on Monday, December 13, and Analogue has even upgraded all orders to FedEx 2-day so customers will get their orders as “quickly as possible.”
The Analogue Pocket was originally announced in 2019 and allows users to play three generations of Game Boy games and another of other handheld games using adapters. It also can display games at 10 times the resolution of the originals and features its own music and game design software.
Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com.
Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.
Niantic, the studio being the smartphone hit Pokémon GO, has lent its AR platform to payments company Fold to create a new kind of ‘catch ’em all’ adventure – but this time, players are hunting for the cryptocurrency Bitcoin rather than monsters.
Payments company Fold has leveraged Niantic’s AR platform to create an in-app experience where users can earn Bitcoin by exploring a virtual environment based on their immediate surroundings, described by the firm as a “real-world metaverse”.
Users will be able to discover and collect Bitcoin and other prizes around them using the app. Every 10 minutes, a new block containing a fresh prize is dropped in the vicinity of a player. By claiming the block, the user earns ‘Satoshis’, the smallest unit of Bitcoin, alongside other rewards. However, if you collect a ‘s**tcoins’ or ‘Poison Pills’, you could end up losing all of the Bitcoin you’ve collected.
Here’s how Fold describes the experience on its blog – it’s even cheeky enough to use a gif of Mario collecting coins in Super Mario World:
The AR experience acts as a natural extension of the Fold App which already gives you the ability to earn bitcoin going about your daily life: buying coffee, going shopping, paying bills, and even paying your taxes. While the experience is open to anyone, Fold Cardholders can collect extra spins and rewards boosts to increase their rewards on the Fold Card.
The complete experience will drop next year and will enable individuals to find, trade, and hide bitcoin and other rewards throughout the world IRL, and will also give merchants the ability to engage the community with incentives and offers. It all started with someone saying ‘let’s make PokemonGo but for bitcoin’ and ended with ‘let’s build a new way to exchange and share bitcoin with others.’
Image: Fold
Fold CEO Will Reeves also had this to say:
This is the easiest, most fun way to get your first piece of Bitcoin. Anyone can use our [Fold] app to earn Bitcoin and other rewards by exploring the world around them. For us, it’s always been important to make participating in the Bitcoin economy easy for anyone, regardless of education or technical expertise.
What do you make of this venture? Let us know with a comment.
Just four sunrises away from a huge matchup with No. 5 Michigan in Ann Arbor, Ryan Day met with the media on Tuesday to discuss No. 2 Ohio State’s preparations for a game with conference title and national championship implications.
With last year’s contest canceled due to coronavirus issues within Michigan’s program, the anticipation for Saturday’s clash was already through the roof and the fever pitch has only heightened with both teams entering the contest with everything on the line.
You could hear in Day’s voice just how serious and focused he is on readying his team for the challenges Michigan will bring.
Chief among those figures to be a Wolverine pass rush anchored by a pair of defensive ends – Aidan Hutchinson and David Ojabo – that have given opponents fits all season.
Day made no bones about how important it will be to neutralize the combo, along with the rest of the Michigan pass rushers.
“Very big challenge for our tackles and our whole offense. These guys do a great job off the edge and the two inside guys are very powerful too. It’s going to be a big challenge for our guys in protection, C.J., and for everybody.”– Ryan Day on Michigan’s pass rush
Digging a little deeper into the maize and blue pass rush, Michigan ranks No. 35 in the nation with 29 total sacks, good for 2.64 per game.
Of those, Hutchinson and Ojabo – with 10 each – account for 20, or 69% of the team total. Their respective 0.91 sacks per game sit atop the Big Ten. Taylor Upshaw has 2.5 sacks but no other Wolverine has more than one.
You might find it interesting Michigan’s sacks seem to come in bunches. Seventeen of the 29 sacks on the season (59%) came in three games. The Wolverines recorded a ridiculous seven sacks against a Penn State squad currently ranked 91st in the country surrendering 2.55 per contest. Michigan had six against Wisconsin and the Badgers currently ranked sixth nationally giving up only 1.36 sacks per game. Finally, Jim Harbaugh’s squad recorded four sacks against a Washington offense currently slotted No. 51 allowing 2.00 sacks per outing.
Looking at Ohio State’s pass protection, the Buckeyes rank No. 12 among FBS schools allowing 13 sacks on the season, or 1.18 per four quarters.
The Buckeyes gave up seven sacks across the first five games and six over the last six outings. Michigan State’s 14th-ranked pass rush recorded two sacks, both by defensive linemen, last weekend. Nebraska’s 103rd-ranked pass rush also logged two with both coming from blitzing linebackers.
Indiana’s lone sack came from linebacker Micah McFadden in the third quarter of a 54-7 blowout and Maryland’s No. 35 ranked defense in sacks per game picked up just one and it came against backups when Kyle McCord went down late in the fourth quarter of a 66-17 spanking.
Penn State and Purdue, ranked No. 77 and No. 91 in sacks per game respectively, failed to record a sack against the Buckeyes.
Over the last six games, Stroud has been sacked five times against 222 pass attempts.
By the numbers, Ohio State’s pass protection versus Michigan’s pass rush is indeed a strength-on-strength scenario and whichever wins the battle up front will likely move on the Big Ten championship game next weekend and keep its playoff hopes alive.
Astronomy is a bit different from many sciences because you only have a sample size of 1. The cosmos contains everything we can observe, so astronomers can’t study multiple universes to see how our Universe ticks.
But they can create computer simulations of our Universe. By tweaking different aspects of their simulation, astronomers can see how things such as dark matter and dark energy play a role in our universe.
Now, if you are willing to spring for a fancy hard drive, you can keep one of these simulations in your pocket.
The Uchuu simulation is the largest and most detailed simulation of the Universe ever made. It contains 2.1 trillion ‘particles’ in a space 9.6 billion light-years across. The simulation models the evolution of the Universe across more than 13 billion years. It doesn’t focus on the formation of stars and planets but instead looks at the behavior of dark matter within an expanding Universe.
The detail of Uchuu is high enough that the team can identify everything from galaxy clusters to the dark matter halos of individual galaxies. Since dark matter makes up most of the matter in the Universe, it is the main driver of galaxy formation and clustering.
Dark matter distributions from the Uchuu simulations at different scales. (Ishiyama et. al, MNRAS, 2021)
It takes a tremendous amount of computational power and storage to create such a detailed model. The team used over 40,000 computer cores and 20 million computer hours to generate their simulation, and it produced more than 3 Petabytes of data.
That’s 3,000 TB or 3 million GB for us mortals. Using high-density compression, however, the team was able to compress their results into a mere 100 TB of storage.
That’s still a tremendous amount of data, but it can be stored on a single drive.
For example, the Exadrive from Nimbus is a 100 TB solid-state drive in a standard 3.5-inch form factor. Granted, it will set you back US$40,000, but if you have that kind of change hiding between your couch cushions, why not use it to keep a universe in your pocket.
Fortunately, if you don’t have that much spare change, you can access the data online. The Uchuu team has their raw data on skiesanduniverses.org, so you can explore their virtual universe all you want.
In addition to being a detailed cosmic simulation, the Uchuu simulation can be used by researchers working on scientific data mining. As large sky surveys and more simulations are created, the data will become so large data mining will play a crucial role in astronomical research.
Until that data becomes available, data miners can hone their skills on a pocket universe.
This article was originally published by Universe Today. Read the original article.
And judging by what’s happening all around us today, it seems like the ’80s are in again, albeit with a 21st-century twist. I don’t know about you, but I’m a big fan of the ’80s. We’ve seen quite a few cool projects being launched recently, and today I stumbled upon another interesting one. This is the second time I’ve been gauging a Renault 5 Turbo this year, with the first one being a rotary-swapped machine that was being auctioned off on Bring a Trailer.
But now, we’re looking at the rebirth of the legend. Many people have wept over the fact that Group-B rallying was banned. But now we’re getting those legendary machines back with updated technology. A German company just recently announced that they’re building an electric hommage to the Audi Quattro. And now Legende Automobiles Los Angeles is launching their take on the Renault 5 Turbo, which they’ve dubbed the Turbo3.
The Turbo3 is more than a restomod. The Renault 5 Turbo was a childhood hero for French car designer Alan Derosier, and he wanted to build something to match the brilliance of companies like Singer, Guntherwerks, and Canepa. As soon as Alan published some teasers of the concept online, several other people wanted in on the whole thing, and a crew was assembled. Their goal was clear: they were going to make the former Group-B icon more desirable than ever before.
They wanted to create a car for people that are as passionate about driving as they are, and you’ll be delighted to hear that this car will come with a third pedal. Packing a turbocharged 4-cylinder engine, the Turbo3 will have more power than any of its predecessors. Exact weight figures have not been mentioned, but with 400 horsepower on tap, this thing should provide an insane driving experience, to say the least.
According to the builder “Every single detail has been refined, updated or redesigned to make this machine as timeless as possible and to deliver the most unique experience from the inside out.” This translates to the fact that the Turbo3 will feature a bespoke, hand-made, carbon fiber body kit, among other things! Night-time driving won’t be a problem like before, as this car will also be fitted with LED headlamps.
The car will be rolling on 16×8 rims in the front and 17×11 ones in the rear, and customers can choose between two different designs. This is, by all means, a car that was born in the ’80s, but it feels like it’s perfectly in tune with today’s trends. I get a feeling that this is going to weigh less than 2,204 lbs (1,000 kg), just like the original vehicle.
The cabin looks clean yet futuristic at the same time, and it looks as if you may get dual-climate controls, alongside a huge digital dash upfront. There’s no word about how much it will cost you to get your hands on one of these, but I imagine that it’s not going to be cheap. A 1980 Renault 5 Turbo can go for as much as $180,000, and if you consider the upgrade costs, you may end up paying Aventador money for the Turbo3. But then again, if you’ve always dreamed about this car, you might as well inquire about the product.
Back in March, SNK surprised fans with the digital release of the Neo Geo Pocket Color Selection Vol.1 for Switch.
It contains the following 10 games – SNK Gals’ Fighters, Samurai Shodown! 2, King of Fighters R-2, The Last Blade: Beyond the Destiny, Fatal Fury First Contact, SNK vs. Capcom: The Match of the Millennium, Metal Slug 1st Mission, Metal Slug 2nd Mission, Dark Arms and Big Tournament Golf / Neo Turf Masters.
If you’ve been holding out for a physical release, Limited Run Games has now announced a physical version of this ten-in-one collection. Pre-orders will open on 22nd April and are open for a total of four weeks. In addition to a standard copy of the game, there’ll also be a collector’s edition – which comes with the game, a retrospective book, two-sided poster, steelbook and classic Neo Geo Pocket-style packaging.
It seems physical publisher Pix’n Love Publishing will also be offering a European physical release. Pre-orders open on the same date as the LRG one:
Will you be adding this physical collection to your Nintendo Switch library? Leave a comment down below.
