HTC has decided to step out of its smartphone comfort zone and announce an action camera. Dubbed simply the HTC RE, the camera boasts a 16MP 1/2.3″ CMOS sensor with an 146° ultra wide angle lens. And since it’s an action camera, the RE is IP57 dust and water resistant (you can optionally bump the certification to IPx8 with an accessory cap).

HTC’s first action camera records 1080p@30 fps video and 720p@120fps slow-motion video. Inside the RE, there’s a grip sensor, which activates the camera as you pick it up. On board there’s a large shutter button, which captures shots on short press and videos on press and hold. Read more »

Samsung has released a second video of the Galaxy Note 4 testing facilities and it shows the phone in a series of comprehensive drop tests. While in the previous video, Samsung focused on bending the Note 4, here the company goes medieval on it with hundreds of drop and tumble tests.

Surprisingly, the Galaxy Note 4 walks out of all of them with the screen intact and working perfectly. The video doesn’t focus on any visual damage that the tests might’ve caused, but having the Note 4 work at the end is impressive. Read more »

At today’s announcement event, HTC is expected to unveil an action camera in addition to a new smartphone. The latest teaser of the upcoming camera (to be called Re judging by the name of the channel) is now out and it’s called “Catching air”.

The teaser is short and sweet and indicates a wide angle lens on the Re camera. The camera in the video isn’t shown, but as we’ve seen before, it looks like a toy periscope. Read more »

The Nvidia GeForce GTX 980M and GTX 970M went official today offering superior performance over the Kepler series of GPU they replace. The GTX 980M and and GTX 970M use the company’s latest Maxwell graphics architecture, which also powers the company’s latest desktop GPU line-up.

Thanks to the Maxwell architecture, the two mobile GPUs are more power efficient and offer greater performance. The GTX 980M and GTX 970M feature 1536 and 1280 CUDA cores, respectively. Naturally, the GTX 980 is the more powerful one with a GPU base clock of 1038MHz, while the 970M is clocked at 924MHz. Read more »

Asus announced the ZenWatch in September and promised it will hit store shelves in Taiwan in November. Sadly, however, according to information obtained by VR-Zone sources, Asus will offer the smartwatch in extremely limited quantities at launch.

If the information turns out to be true, then we wouldn’t keep our breath for Asus to release the ZenWatch outside Taiwan any time soon. There’s no additional information as to what is holding the company back to launch the wearable at this time. Read more »

The Samsung Galaxy Note 4 is currently available for purchase in some parts of Asia, but a more broader launch is yet to happen. Nevertheless, long-time Android developer Chainfire has released a way to root the phablet.

The root method currently works on the following Galaxy Note 4 variants – SM-N910C and SM-N910U with Exynos 5433 and the SM-N9106W launched in China with the Snapdragon 805 chipset. Read more »

HP has officially announced that it is splitting into two companies. Hewlett-Packard is going to spin off its PC and printer division leaving its Enterprise and services unit as separate business.

Dion Weisler will take the wheel of the HP’s new PC and printer business. Sadly, however, the company is going to rise the planned layoffs from 45,000 to 55,000. Read more »

Reuters reports that Samsung is planning to invest the gargantuan $14.7 billion in a new chip-making factory over the next three years. That’s the biggest investment the company has ever made into a single plant.

According to Samsung’s plans, the plant is going to be built in Pyeongtaek, which is 75 km south of Seoul and create 150,000 jobs (about a third of the city’s population). Read more »

Our exhaustive iPhone 6 review is enjoying a lot of attention and now it’s time to take a bit more attention on the phone’s battery performance. The iPhones have always boasted good battery life and users expect the iPhone 6 to be no exception.

The larger size of the iPhone 6 means room for a larger battery and the boost is significant. In comparison to the iPhone 5s, the iPhone 6 flaunts a 250mAh more capacity – 1,810mAh vs 1,560mAh. In addition, the Apple A8 chip inside the iPhone 6 should be more frugal in power usage than its predecessor since its built on the 20nm manufacturing process. Read more »

Hello, Samsung Galaxy Note 4, we meet again. Now that we’re away from the IFA 2014 spotlights and the hectic showroom environment, it’s time to meet the company’s flagship phablet in a more personal setting.

Upon the first glance, we can’t help but enjoy how the Galaxy Note 4 feels in hand. The feel of the phablet, which now shares the metal frame with the Galaxy Alpha, is substantially better. Read more »

Last week we heard Facebook will get the approval of the European Commission for the Whatsapp deal and today this has been officially confirmed. The Commission gave the green light for the $19 billion dollar acquisition of the Whatsapp messaging service after US regulators gave it a thumbs up, too.

The European Commission reasoned that Facebook’s Messenger platform and Whatsapp are not close competitors and that competition is sufficient even after the merger. Read more »

OnePlus has decided to join in on the durability test bandwagon and showcase its stress labs with the OnePlus One being tortured.

If you’ve come here for a bend test, we’ll have to disappoint you, as the video doesn’t show one. OnePlus does test the phone in a scenario where you’re sitting on it. but unlike Samsung’s similar test where the Koreans apply 100kg of force on the Galaxy Note 4, OnePlus does so at just 25kg, though. Read more »

Samsung is planning to start producing chips using its 14nm manufacturing process at the end of the year. It seems the company has managed to secure a deal with Apple and it anticipates a notable sales boost once it begins to deliver on it.

Kim Ki-nam, President of Samsung’s semiconductor business told reporters at the company’s HQ in Seoul that profits “will improve positively” once the deal goes through. Read more »

The Sony Xperia Z3 has been torn apart by MyFixGuide and we get to see what the company’s latest Android flagship is made of. The guide also goes through each step of the disassembly, which is useful if you ever need to take a peek inside.

But since this will void your warranty, we advise you not to. Anyway, the back cover of the phone is easy to pop open with the right tool. Once opened, you can see how Sony has insulated the phone and made able to take diving lessons over 1 meter of water for more than 30 minutes. Read more »

According to a report by Strategy Analytics, chipsets destined for tablets have marked a year-on-year jump of 23% in Q2 2014. According to the estimates, $945 million worth of tablet chipsets have shipped in the last quarter alone.

Standing on top is Apple with its iPad slates, which hold a 26% revenue share. Interestingly, Intel is close by at second place at 19% and Qualcomm is third with 17%. Read more »