All you need to know about the new 2016 MacBook Pro Series

Apple is out with the MacBook Pro 2016. The Cupertino giant unveiled the new line-up of MacBook Pros on Thursday. According to the company, the new MacBook line-up is the amalgamation of high intensity processing and portability.

Compact Design with a few sacrifices

The new Pro will be is 14-17 percent thinner and nearly half-a-pound lighter than the previous versions of the Retina MacBook Pro and will also occupy lesser volume. Though the device ends up being much more compact, the user will have to sacrifice connectivity due to the lack of ports. The new Pro line-up will only feature 4 USB-Type C thunderbolt ports. Both Touch Bar Notebooks will feature 4 USB-C Thunderbolt 3 ports that are capable of handling power. The Notebooks won't be featuring an escape button but it still features the 3.5mm head-phone jack.

All-new Touch Bar

The new 15-inch and 13-inch Macbook Pros come with an interesting Multi-touch bar which will be replacing the traditional row of function keys. The Touch Bar will change the key set up according to the application running on the screen and will be customizable according to the user's needs. There's no haptic feedback to the keys that can otherwise be found on the main touch pad of the machine.

MacBook's first Touch ID 

Another first for these new MAcBooks will be the TouchID, located right next to the new row of touch-bar. A long-press on TouchID will turn the computer off. The Butterfly keyboard that was found on the MacBook, will be featuring in the new set of MacBook Pros. While this might be an unpleasant addition for many, the company claims that the keyboard will provide better key-travel. 

Brighter and more colourful Retina Display

The notebooks will feature a Retina display, which according to Apple is brighter by almost 67 per cent higher contrast ratio and  a brightness of 500nits. LG built a 5K display specifically for the new Macbook Pro.

Double sized trackpad

Along with that, the notebooks feature a massive new trackpad which according to Apple is pretty adept at palm-rejection. The trackpad is twice the size of the previous MacBook Pro and has a taptic engine underneath. The trackpad will be featuring the force touch functions, similar to what can be found on the MacBook Air.

Marginally evolved performance

In the performance segment, the new 15-inch MacBook Pro will feature a quad-core Core i7 processor, AMD Radeon Pro graphics with up to 4GB of video memory, and up to 16 GB of RAM.  The 13-inch MacBook Pro will feature either an i5 or i7 processor along with an Intel Iris GPU.

Price

The MacBook Pros seem to have updated their prices as well but this might not please the prospect buyers. The 13-inch MacBook Pro without Touch bar will be available at Rs 1,29,000. It is only available in a i5, 256SSD model.

The 13-inch MacBook Pro with Touch Bar will cost around Rs 1,55,900 for the i5 variant and 1,72,900 for the i7 variant.

The 15-inch variant will cost a whopping Rs 2,05,900 for the i5 variant and Rs 2,41,900 for the i7 variant.

Best speakers and earphones you can gift this festive season

Nothing can match up the delight of gifting a speaker or a Bluetooth headset to someone who loves and lives music. Here are some of the best options worth considering.

Bose QC35: A perfect companion for music lovers. This wireless noise cancellation headphone offers a comfortable fit. Its foldable design makes it easy to carry around. Bose QC35 connects over the Bose Connect app on an Apple iPhone as well as any Android device. A single charge can last up to 18 hours in wireless mode. There is also a 3.5-mm jack that can turn it into a wired headphone, minus noise cancellation. Price: Rs 29, 363

JBL Flip 3: Anyone who is into adventure would love the JBL Flip 3. This is a splash-proof portable Bluetooth speaker with 3,000 mAh rechargeable battery. It has a 16W high bass speaker which delivers great stereo sound good enough for a small room as well as for outdoors. It can also be used for answering calls. Available in different colours, it weighs 449 only grams. Price: Rs 7,899.

Samsung Gear IconX: This stylish pair of wireless earbuds can do much more than Bluetooth headsets, which are used for answering calls and listening to music. IconX earbuds, called fitness earbuds, can monitor heart rate, track distances travelled and calories burnt, and store songs in its 4-GB internal space without the need to carry the smartphone. IconX has a touch-sensitive surface that can be tapped to carry out tasks. It connects to a smartphone over Bluetooth 4.1. The accompanying compact case used to store the ear buds bundles up as a charging dock that stores charge as well. Price: Rs 13,490

LeEco Bluetooth Speaker: LeEco's Bluetooth speaker is compact and looks lively. It has a cylindrical shape and boasts bright colours. Made up of plastic, it has speaker grills on all the sides, offering 270-degree surround sound. There is a circular button at the top surrounded by circular LED that indicates the mode of the speaker. The sound output is loud and the speaker can give close to seven hours of music playback. Go ahead and gift it to a music lover. Price: Rs 1,999

Microsoft unveils Surface Studio, Surface Book; continues with the same Surface Pro 4

After some flagship smartphone launches, it time to talk about the computing devices. Microsoft hosted its Surface Event where the company has announced the new hardware as well as the software.

The Surface Book laptop looks has got the same look and design with improved innards and has got double the graphic performance with 30 percent more battery life. Claimed to be the most powerful Surface Book, this laptop is powered by Intel i7 processor. Microsoft has redesigned the cooling system with an additional fan. The battery life has been increased to 16 hours from 12 hours. It has also got a detachable display that transforms it into a tablet. The Surface Book will be available with 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB configurations for $2,399, $2,799, and $3,299, respectively.  

The Surface Studio All-in-One touchscreen desktop PC comes with a starting price tag of  $2,999 and offers a 28inch screen with 13.5million pixels. It is the world's world's thinnest LCD monitor at 12.5mm. It's powered by Intel's 6th generation processors and has got Nvidia GTX 980M GPU in the premium model, with a 965M in the lower-priced configurations. The screen can be adjusted to 20  degree, making it convenient to draw  on. It supports various peripherals including the Surface Pen and the new Surface Dial. 

While Microsoft has announced an upgraded version of the Surface Book laptop and a Surface Studio, the company has decided not to update its popular Surface Pro 4. There hasn't been any specifications update either. The Surface Pro 4  continues to retail starting at $899 with a Core m3 processor, 4GB of RAM and 128GB of storage. The higher-end models continue to have the same specifications.

Other than the hardware, Microsoft has a lot more to talk about. The company talked about the next release of Window 10, which is free - Windows 10 Creator. Microsoft is now focusing on 3D and believes anyone should be able to create 3D content. It has launched Paint 3D, which makes 3D creation easy for everyone. Microsoft has also introduced affordable Virtual Reality accessories to the Windows 10 PC starting $299.

Apple unveils new MacBook Pro with OLED strip 'Touch Bar' and 'Touch ID'

Marking the 25th anniversary of Apple's first notebook on October 25, Apple took the stage to announce its new, redesigned Macbook Pro at At the 'Hello Again' event in Cupertino, California. The new MacBook Pro comes with a thinner design and as appeared in the leaks has got the 'Touch Bar' with Retina Display above the keyboard. The all new 'Touch Bar' replaces the existing function buttons with on-screen keys. It is more than just a regular function key as the virtual buttons on the strip are changes based on the apps being used. The Touch Bar places controls right at the user's fingertips and adapts when using the system or apps like Mail, Finder, Calendar, Numbers, GarageBand, Final Cut Pro X and many more, including third-party apps. For example, the Touch Bar can show Tabs and Favourites in Safari, enable easy access to emoji in Messages, provide a simple way to edit images or scrub through videos in Photos and more.
Apple has also integrated the Touch ID into the power button. Once the fingerprint is enrolled in the Touch ID on the new MacBook Pro, one can quickly unlock the Mac, switch user accounts and make secure purchases with Apple Pay (abroad) on the web with a single touch. Touch ID enables a quick, accurate reading of your fingerprint and uses sophisticated algorithms to recognise and match it with the secure element in the new Apple T1 chip.
The new MacBook Pro features bright and colourful Retina display , has a larger Force Touch trackpad and an audio system with double the dynamic range. The 13-inch MacBook Pro At just 14.9 mm thin, which is 17 percent thinner and 23 percent less volume than the previous generation, and weighs 1.37kg. The new 15-inch MacBook Pro, at just 15.5 mm thin, is 14 percent thinner and 20 percent less volume than before, and weighing just 1.83kg. The new lineup is powered by sixth-generation dual-core Core i5 with eDRAM, dual-core Core i7 with eDRAM and quad-core Core i7 Intel processors to deliver pro-level processing performance while conserving energy. The new 15-inch MacBook Pro features powerful Radeon Pro discrete graphics delivering up to 2.3 times more performance than the previous generation; while the 13-inch MacBook Pro comes with Intel Iris Graphics. All models feature SSDs with sequential read speeds over 3Gbps and Thunderbolt 3 which consolidates data transfer, charging and twice the video bandwidth in a single port - allowing users to drive a 5K display and power their MacBook Pro with a single cable. Apple has retained the 3.5mm jack, however, the USB ports are replaced with four Thunderbolt 3.0 ports.
13-inch and 15-inch models are set to be available within three weeks in the US, starting at $1799 and $2399. Apple had revealed the India pricing in a press released but later issued an updated press release with no India specific pricing and release date. The earlier email received stated the 13-inch MacBook Pro with Touch Bar and Touch ID will be priced starting at Rs. 1,55,900 while the 15-inch model will start at Rs. 2,05,900.

Google Pixel, Pixel XL to go on sale in India from October 25

Google's Pixel and Pixel XL smartphones will go on sale starting October 25 in offline as well online portals. "The future is exciting. And by future we mean 3 days from now. #Pixel will start reaching stores on 25th October #madebygoogle," the official Google account tweeted on Saturday.

While announcing the launch of the smartphones in San Francisco earlier this month, Google had revealed that India will be amongst the first six countries to receive the new devices by the end of October.

Innovation at a Price

Motorola created a flutter in the smartphone market with the announcement of Moto Z with Moto Mods - a modular phone - in June this year. It promised that adding a new feature, or module, would be as easy as snapping on a rear cover. We tested the Moto Z using the projector mod to see how it worked.

The display of the Moto Z is stunning. With its 5.5-inch display and 1,440 x 2,560 pixel resolution protected by Gorilla Glass 4, watching videos on it was a delight. It is sleek - has a thickness of 5.2 mm and weighs 136 gms only. The power and volume controls are placed on the side, and the Type C charging port is at the bottom (the 3.5-mm jack is absent). Its specifications don't disappoint - Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 processor paired with 4 GB of RAM, 64 GB of internal storage, and Android Marshmallow operating system. The 13-MP rear camera captures good images. The phone was able to handle basic tasks as well as heavy graphic games with ease.

My Moto Z review unit came with a wooden rear cover and an Insta-Share projector mod. The projector mod, made of plastic and weighing 125 gms, is like a thick cover that instantly snaps to the rear of the device. It packs in a 50 lumen projector lens that can project as far as 70 inches on any flat surface at a maximum resolution of 854x480p. The projection mod has a kick-stand that can rotate up to 180 degrees - this means it can be comfortably used to project on a wall or a ceiling. The automatic keystone adjustment setting comes handy here. Snapping the projector mod onto the phone and pressing the power key turns the projector on. There is a slider to adjust the focus of the projection.

It lived up to the claims of '70-inch projection', but the viewing experience was disappointing. While it is understandable that the clarity and the colour reproduction cannot match with that of the phone's display, the colours looked completely washed out when projected. For instance, the green colour in the video on the phone appeared greyish green when projected. The Projector mod heated up within a few minutes of projection. Instead of projecting videos, I ended up watching movies on the phone itself, using the mod as a stand (a very expensive one at that!). Motorola has packed in a 1,100mAh battery to the mod, which gives close to one hour of projection time.

Google announces its latest Android's name and it's called Nougat

Sorry Nutella enthusiasts. Android has finally settled for Nougat.

Google on Thursday has finally announced the name of its latest Operating System, Android N. The next version of Android, likely to be Android 7,  will be called Android Nougat. Google officially made the announcement on Snapchat and Twitter and also, posted a video unveiling the look of the latest Android mobile software.

As the Android naming history goes by, it was widely speculated that the latest version, too, will be named after a sweet treat, following the league of Kitkat, Lollilop, and Marshmallow. So, the new flavour turns out be Nougat.

Google had first displayed Android N in March through a developer preview. At Google I/O in May, the company said that the latest version of its Android OS will be named with the help of user suggestions. The name, thus, was intended to be crowdsourced and Google received millions of submissions from all over the world.

The Android Nugget comes with a host of new features. It supports multi-window mode, has a better notification system and comes with a newly added VR mode, which will give an extra edge to virtual reality viewers.

The users will be able to get its hand on the new Android version in the coming few months. Till then, wait for the treat.

Google launches Chromecast Ultra, 4k video streaming dongle

Google has announced the launch of an all new Chromecast device at the Pixel smartphone launch event in San Francisco. Claiming to have sold 30 million Chromecast devices, Google has launched a new dongle Chromecast ultra that supports 4k video streaming. Equipped with a powerful hardware, Google claims it to be the fastest Chromecast ever.

It has got improved Wi-Fi connectivity and can load videos 1.8 times faster than the standard Chromecast.

The Chromecast Ultra continues to have the same circular design as the previous model and has got the 'G' logo instead of the 'chrome' badge. The Chromecast Ultra has been priced at $69 and go on sale in November. Google will be launching Chromecast Ultra in 16 counties around the world.