Today, Samsung announced a new self-repair program that will give Galaxy customers access to parts, tools, and guides to repair their own devices. The program is in collaboration with popular repair guides and parts website iFixit, which has worked with manufacturers such as Motorola and Steam on similar ventures. The Galaxy S20 and S21 series phones and the Galaxy Tab S7 Plus are first in line for the spare parts — but not Samsung’s latest S22 family of phones.
“We are working with Samsung to improve their repair guide and DIY parts offerings,” iFixit CEO Kyle Wiens tells The Verge. The new program follows Apple’s recent change of heart in announcing a self-service program and Microsoft’s work with iFixit to manufacture Surface tools. “It is clear that manufacturers are recognizing that they need to embrace repair,” Wiens says.
Consumers who take advantage of the program will get access to “intuitive, visual, step-by-step repair guides” as well as the needed tools, according to Samsung’s press release. Wiens tells us that the Galaxy S20 series guides are already complete and that iFixit is actively working on writing the guides for the S21 series and Galaxy Tab S7 Plus.
We asked Samsung if there are plans to make parts available for newer phones or cheaper ones like the Galaxy A series. A spokesperson responded: “Samsung plans to expand the range of products, parts and self-repair capability as the program matures.” But for the devices confirmed at launch, the initial parts list consists of displays, back glass, and charge ports.
The press release is absent of any mentions of battery replacement options, but Wiens says the Samsung display assemblies would have pre-glued batteries attached to them. This simplifies the repair process for the Galaxy S20 and S21 devices since freeing the battery in those models requires copious amounts of isopropyl alcohol to loosen the battery and careful, strenuous force to pull it out.
Batteries aside, this self-repair program is another step the company is taking toward its sustainability goals. The company recently increased Android software support timelines on its phones, and for the new self-repair program, you can send the old broken parts back to Samsung to recycle for free.
But Samsung has a lot to make up for. You may recall its phone repurposing “upcycling” program that it previously worked on with iFixit. Instead of opening the bootloaders for older Samsung devices to allow for fully reprogrammable re-use of old Galaxy devices as imagined initially, Samsung turned it into a more limited program where some people could turn a Galaxy S9 into a sensor for a Samsung SmartThings smart home system.
“The original Galaxy Upcycling was absolutely fantastic and the ability to install long-lasting operating systems on smartphones is something that the industry desperately needs,” Wiens says. We asked Wiens if this new self-repair program had any link to the Galaxy Upcycling pitch. “I honestly have no idea,” Wiens responded.
It seems that Samsung and iFixit put their previous engagements aside for this venture and look forward to launching the program this summer as another option that helps prolong the usable life of older Galaxy phones. Details remain slim, but a Samsung spokesperson tells us we’ll hear more once it’s available. It’ll bolster Samsung’s growing repair service offerings that include over 2,000 official and authorized repair locations as well as mobile service and mail-in service options.
Apple today released iOS 15.4.1 and iPadOS 15.4.1, minor updates to the iOS and iPadOS 15 operating systems that were released in September. iOS 15.4.1 and iPadOS 15.4.1 come two weeks after the launch of iOS 15.4.
The iOS 15.4.1 and iPadOS 15.4.1 updates can be downloaded for free and the software is available on all eligible devices over-the-air in the Settings app. To access the new software, go to Settings > General > Software Update.
According to Apple's release notes, the update fixes an issue that could cause the battery to drain more quickly than expected after updating to iOS 15.4. It also includes fixes for Made for iPhone hearing devices and Braille devices.
This update includes the following bug fixes for your iPhone:
Battery may drain more quickly than expected after updating to iOS 15.4
Braille devices may become unresponsive while navigating text or displaying an alert
Made for iPhone hearing devices may lose connection within some third-party apps
iOS and iPadOS 15.4.1 fix an AppleAVD issue that could allow an application to execute arbitrary code with kernel privileges. Apple says this exploit may have been actively exploited, so it is a good idea for all users to update as soon as possible.
Apple has also released new tvOS 15.4.1, HomePod 15.4.1, and watchOS 8.5.1 updates to go alongside the iOS 15.4.1 update.
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Nothing has tweeted a photo that appears to be our first look at the Nothing Phone 1.
However, there are hints that it could be an April Fool’s joke.
If it’s real, the phone would have very curvy sides.
Earlier this month, Nothing finally announced it would launch a smartphone. However, it didn’t share much about the phone itself other than its name.
Unfortunately, tomorrow is April Fool’s Day. That makes pretty much everything “announced” over the next 48 hours suspect. In fact, in the tweet, Nothing says it has an announcement tomorrow, which would be April 1. Could this be an elaborate ruse? It’s certainly possible.
Regardless, check out the embedded tweet below to see the teaser image.
First look at Nothing Phone 1?
As one would expect, the Nothing Phone 1 appears to have a USB-C port and bottom-firing speakers. This isn’t too surprising as there are very few Android phones on the market without these two design elements.
However, you can also see some of the display glass in the photo, and it appears to be quite curved on the sides. In general, curvy displays appear on premium flagship phones. For example, the OnePlus 9, Google Pixel 6, and Galaxy S22 phones have flat displays, but the OnePlus 9 Pro, Google Pixel 6 Pro, and Galaxy S22 Ultra have curved screens. This strongly suggests the Nothing Phone 1 could be a premium flagship competitor and not a general mid-ranger.
Of course, all those assumptions stem from the idea that this is a real image of the phone. We’ll need to wait and see what the announcement tomorrow tells us about the legitimacy of this image. Nothing did confirm it would make the Nothing OS launcher available in April, so this could all be on the level.
As a final note, Nothing tweeted this out in the middle of OnePlus’ global launch of the OnePlus 10 Pro. Nothing CEO Carl Pei was an integral part of OnePlus’ beginnings, so this tweet is quite the double-whammy.
Way back in 2018 Intel announced plans to develop its own line of discrete GPUs back designed to compete with rival cards from AMD and NVIDIA. And despite several delays including missing its original 2020 launch window, this spring the first batch of Intel's new Arc graphics cards are finally ready for use in retail devices, starting with Samsung's Galaxy Book 2 Pro laptops.
As a quick recap, while Intel's Arc line will eventually cover both laptops and desktops, the first batch of A-series GPUs are lower-power cards intended mainly for ultraportables and thin-and-light notebooks. The company's graphics cards will use a naming scheme similar to its CPUs to help differentiate between various performance tiers, beginning with the new Arc A350M and A370M, before moving on to the more powerful Arc 5 and Arc 7 cards which are due out sometime later this summer.
Intel
Across the entire family of Arc GPUs, Intel's graphics architecture is based on four main pillars: the company's XE cores, XE Media Engine, XE Display Engine, and the XE Graphics Pipeline. All Arc cards will also have the same basic feature set including support for DirectX 12 Ultimate, ray tracing, XE Super Sampling, AV1 hardware acceleration and more.
The Arc's XE cores are based on Intel's XE HPG (High Performance Graphics) microarchitecture, with each core featuring 16 256-bit Vector Engines. 16 1,024-bit Matrix Engines and 192KB of shared memory. The XE Media Engine is designed to support popular video apps with hardware encoding at up to 8K 10-bit HDR and hardware acceleration for a number of popular standards (VP9, AVC, HEVC, AV1). Meanwhile, the XE Display Engine was built to handle video output for up to two 8K displays at 60Hz simultaneously, four 4K displays running at 120Hz, or a single 1440p screen at 360Hz.
Intel
As for the two new cards themselves, both the A350M and A370M are targeting 1080p gaming at 60fps to 90fps across a range of popular games. The A350M is designed to draw between 25 and 35 watts of power and will sport six XE cores, six ray tracing units, a graphics clock of 1,150 MHz (which Intel says is a conservative estimate of the card's typical clock speed) and 4GB of GDDR6 vRAM. Alternatively, the A370M is designed for slightly larger laptops with a power draw of between 35 and 50 watts, eight XE cores, 8 ray tracing units, a graphics clock of 1,550 MHz, and the same 4GB of vRAM. And as you can see in the image above, the upcoming Arc 5 and Arc 7 cards will be significantly more powerful. But again, they won't be out until sometime in early summer.
Intel
Also, alongside its new GPUs, Intel created a software suite called Arc Control similar to NVIDIA's GeForce Experience and AMD's Radeon Software, designed to allow users to more easily monitor performance, install drivers and updates, record game highlights and even connect to live streaming apps like Xsplit. And thanks to a UI that uses a streamlined overlay, Intel's Arc Control should be easy to access in the middle of a battle.
Intel even says it's working more with developers to provide faster and more responsive driver support for new titles, with featured games on the Arc cards including titles such as Elden Ring, Ghostwire: Tokyo, Dolmen and a whole lot more. And as one of the largest chip makers in the world, Intel also created its Deep Link tech which is designed to give its Arc cards an additional performance boost when working in tandem with Intel's onboard integrated graphics.
Intel
So while we're only getting two new Arc cards right now (and relatively low-power ones at that), today marks an important moment as Intel finally becomes the true third horse in the discrete graphics space. The first retail device to feature one of Intel's A-series cards is Samsung's Galaxy Book 2 Pro, which goes on sale next month. However, Intel promises that there will be a slew of even more laptops featuring Arc GPUs coming soon from big names including Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, MSI, Lenovo and others.
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YouTube is rolling out a picture-in-picture mode for YouTube TV on iOS devices running iOS 15 or newer, the company announced Wednesday. YouTube chief product officer Neal Mohan promised on The Vergecast that the feature was on the way, and now it’s finally here.
With picture-in-picture, you’ll be able to keep watching YouTube TV when you navigate away from the YouTube TV app. The feature could come in handy if, for example, you’re watching a sports game but want to scroll through Twitter to see reactions to what just happened on the field. It’s a feature that’s been available on Android for years, so it’s good to see that Google has finally brought it over to Apple’s iOS devices.
That said, we’re still waiting for Google to launch picture-in-picture for all users of the standard YouTube app on iOS, no YouTube Premium subscription required. That feature is in testing if you do have a Premium subscription, and YouTube’s Labs page currently says you can try it out until April 8th.
In a statement given to MacRumors in February, Google said that it’s “still planning to launch PiP for all users without a YouTube Premium subscription in the US” but that “We have no other updates to share at this time.” In a statement to The Verge on Wednesday, Google spokesperson Allison Toh said that the company is “still testing picture-in-picture on iOS with Premium members and hope to make it available to all iOS users (Premium and non-Premium) in the US in the coming months.”
Update March 30th, 6:05PM ET: Added comment from Google.
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Technology
WhatsApp announced on Wednesday that it will roll out some improvements to voice messages over the coming weeks, including the ability to listen to a message while reading other chats and play messages at 1.5 or 2 times speed (yes, please, put this feature everywhere).
The experience of recording messages is also improving. WhatsApp now lets you pause and resume your recording, so you don’t have to leave large gaps of silence if you’re thinking of what to say next or redo a recording if you need to have a brief conversation in real life. You’ll also be able to listen to a message before you send it to make sure you didn’t accidentally get cut off or include something you didn’t want to.
There’s also a slight aesthetic improvement. Instead of just using a line to show your voice message playback progress, WhatsApp will now use a waveform of the actual message. Plus, WhatsApp can remember where you were when you paused playback and let you start playing back from that point again so you don’t have to re-listen to an entire message.
These improvements will likely get a lot of use — WhatsApp says that users send an average of 7 billion voice chats a day. While some similar features were already available in other apps (Telegram, for example, has let you listen to messages outside chats for a while), it’s definitely nice to see WhatsApp’s version getting some attention.
YouTube TV is testing support for Dolby 5.1 surround sound on Google TV, Android TV, and Roku devices. In a tweet, the platform said 5.1 audio will “launch on those devices next” if “everything runs smoothly” during the test.
If you were hoping to get surround sound while watching YouTube TV on your Apple TV, Fire TV, Xbox, or PlayStation, however, you’ll have to wait a bit longer. The platform says it’s still working “internally and with partners” to get 5.1 support on these platforms.
We’re still working internally and with partners to enable 5.1 on Apple TV, Fire TV, and game consoles. We don’t like keeping you waiting, but we’re excited for you to hear 5.1 audio soon. Our current compatible devices can be found here: https://t.co/kfARTipLUG
YouTube TV currently supports 5.1 surround sound on Samsung, LG, and Vizio TVs, as well as on traditional Chromecast streaming devices. For it to work, you’ll need Cobalt version 20 or later, which you can check by selecting your profile photo in the YouTube TV app, clicking About, and then hitting App Version. It also requires a speaker system that supports 5.1 audio.
Last June, YouTube TV announced that it would bring 5.1 surround sound to “select devices.” It seems the service is following through on its promise, although it’s taking quite a bit of time to roll the highly anticipated feature out.
Most would agree that Sonos offers some of the best speakers and soundbars currently on the market. That’s because Sonos makes speakers that — more often than not — boast great sound quality, support for all the major streaming platforms, and simple multi-room functionality. Unfortunately, however, all of those perks often come at a high price. Sonos products aren’t cheap, and, outside of the occasional rogue discount, they rarely go on sale. However, that doesn’t mean there aren’t ways to save at least a few dollars on Sonos gear.
If you’re comfortable buying refurbished, for example, you could save a decent amount. We also occasionally see sales on Sonos’ collaborative series with Ikea and discounted bundles that include Sonos products, which makes it easier to set up an entire home audio system while saving money. And, if you’re a student, Sonos offers a program you can join to get a 15 percent discount when you spend up to $2,500 on full-priced speakers and accessories.
Regardless of their existence, these discounts can be hard to find. That’s why we’ve curated this list of the best Sonos deals you can currently take advantage of. Here, we’ll guide you through the best sales available right now to help you get the best bang for your buck.
Both Sonos and Best Buy test and clean all of their certified refurbished products before reselling them. Sonos also includes the original accessories and cables, along with a one-year warranty and a 45-day money-back guarantee. Best Buy’s Geek Squad-certified refurbished products, meanwhile, come with a 90-day warranty unless otherwise noted. You also have 15 days to return or exchange them, though, Best Buy Elite and Totaltech members are elgiable for an extended return window.
Sonos Roam deals
The Sonos Roam is one of the clearest, most pleasant portable speakers we’ve ever used, and we’d recommend it as a personal speaker for small gatherings. It offers a rugged design, a relatively durable build, wireless charging, and support for both Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant. It’s also compatible with Apple’s AirPlay 2, which lets you stream music from an iPhone, iPad, or Mac over your home network. Plus, it’s the first Sonos speaker with an IP67 dust and water resistance rating, which means you could use it in the bathroom or near pools.
Note, however, Sonos won’t let you pair two in stereo when listening over Bluetooth, unlike other similar speakers, though you can play Bluetooth audio over your entire Sonos system. It also only offers around 10 hours of battery life, which isn’t that great, and it can be challenging to use the speaker’s Wi-Fi features outside of your home.
The Sonos Five replaced the Play:5 music speaker in 2020 but is actually nearly identical to its excellent-sounding predecessor. It shares the same six custom-designed drivers inside, so it should offer the same high-quality listening experience as the Play:5, which was ideal for large rooms or parties. Other than that, however, there aren’t many noticeable differences. Compared to the Play:5, Sonos says its successor offers increased memory and processing power, as well as a new wireless radio. There are also all-black or all-white options. Note, however, that the Sonos Five lacks a built-in microphone and support for Alexa and Google Assistant — something every other speaker in the current Sonos lineup offers.
The Sonos Five starts at $549, but you can currently pick up a refurbished model for $494.99 at Best Buy, an additional $5 off the speaker’s traditional refurbished price. If you want a pair, you can also buy a new set of two for $1,049 instead of $1,098 from Sonos and B&H Photo. Sonos is additionally selling a Turntable set, which includes the Sonos Five and a Pro-Ject T1 Phono SB Turntable, for $949, a $49 discount.
Sonos Beam (first-gen) deals
Sonos’ entry-level soundbar, the first-gen Sonos Beam, functions as both a smart speaker and a soundbar for smart TVs equipped with HDMI ARC. We praised how well it improves TV sound quality in our 2018 review, as well as how simple and easy it is to set up and use. It’s not as great as other standalone speakers in the Sonos lineup for just playing music, but as a general-purpose speaker, it’s a good buy overall, especially if you’re adding it to an existing Sonos setup. The entry-level Sonos Beam also offers touch controls and support for Apple’s AirPlay 2, Amazon Alexa, and Google Assistant, allowing for hands-free voice controls. And while it lacks the second-gen Beam’s support for Dolby Atmos and an eARC HDMI port, it remains a competent soundbar.
The Sonos One is a small smart speaker with a good microphone for voice control. It emits balanced, full-bodied sound that’s impressive for its size while integrating well with existing Sonos products. The 2017 speaker also works with a range of music services and supports both Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa, however, the process for setting up voice assistants can be complicated. The One offers touch controls, too, as well as support for AirPlay 2 thanks to a post-launch software update.
The Sonos One typically retails for $219, and while there are currently no deals available on the standalone speaker to speak of, you can buy a two-room set for $419 instead of $438 from Sonos and B&H Photo. Read our review.
Sonos Immersive Set with Beam deals
The Sonos Immersive Set has everything you need for a surround sound setup. First off, it contains a second-gen Sonos Beam, which offers better performance than its first-gen predecessor, supports Dolby Atmos, and comes with HDMI eARC. The package also comes with two Sonos One SL speakers that are similar to the Sonos One smart speaker — minus the microphone — and the apt-titled Sonos Sub, a subwoofer that takes care of the low-end bass while you watch TV shows and movies. Normally $1,596, you can currently buy the entire set in either black or white with delayed shipping at B&H Photo for $1,499 ($97 off).
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