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In case you missed events and exciting news from the world of Android this week, check out this roundup of top stories so you’re all caught up with everything Android.
This week, Samsung pulled the wraps off the Exynos 2200 processor for flagship smartphones. Samsung inadvertently leaked an image of the upcoming Galaxy S8 Ultra tablet with a notch and flagship-tier specifications that leaked just days later via an Amazon listing. This week, Google Nest and Assistant users were in for a rude shock when the search giant changed the white noise sound. Thankfully, the change was rolled back.
Samsung Launches Exynos 2200 with AMD’s RDNA 2 Graphics
This week, Samsung unveiled the Exynos 2200 chip for smartphones. The chip’s standout feature is the integration of console-grade graphics thanks to the AMD RDNA 2 graphics architecture. The technology brings features such as hardware-accelerated ray tracing that were restricted only to desktop computers and consoles such as the PlayStation 5 and the Xbox series. Interestingly, the chip has fewer NPU cores for image processing than its predecessor but Samsung claims the performance has improved two-fold.
The Exynos 2200 chip is an octa-core chip with one Cortex X2 “flagship” core, three Cortex A710 performance cores, and four Cortex A510 efficiency cores. It has an Xclipse 920 GPU with AMD’s RDNA 2 cores. For AI, computational photography, and image processing, the chip also has a dual-core NPU. The chip is expected to power the upcoming Galaxy S22 series in some markets.
Samsung Inadvertently Leaks Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra Images and Specifications
In other news from Samsung, the upcoming Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra’s images accidentally leaked on the company’s own website, albeit on a support page for Bixby. Interestingly, the leaked image was not taken down and seems like an intentional leak for generating hype.
Later in the same week, listings for the Galaxy Tab S8, S8+, and S8 Ultra were spotted on the Amazon Italy website. The listings revealed the full internal specifications, camera configurations, color options, and images. The tab will feature a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 SoC, up to 512GB of storage and 16GB of RAM, sufficient to put most flagship smartphones to shame. The tab will be available with a black S Pen, in Black, White, and Pink color options. The color options are said to vary by model.
Google Rolled Back Nest White Noise Change Following Backlash from Users
This week, Google Nest and Assistant users were in for a rude shock when the company changed the sound for White Noise unexpectedly. The sound helps users relax or unwind and loops every hour. The White Noise sound is one of many other ambient background sounds Google offers. The updated sound annoyingly looped every ten minutes and was deemed “much quieter” by some users.
Understandably, several Nest users took to Reddit and the Google Nest Community to voice their displeasure. After around a day, Google reversed the change and restored the old sound. It blamed the change on an issue that was later fixed. The rollback could take a few days to reach all Nest devices. In the short while that the updated sound troubled users, some came up with ingenious workarounds like casting the old White Noise sound to their Nest speaker from YouTube.
Other Top Android Stories This Week:
- Oppo Find X5 Pro Leak Shows off OnePlus 10 Pro-like Hasselblad Branding, Specifications
- WhatsApp May Soon Let You Transfer Your Chats from Android to iOS
- Pixel Watch Could Release In May Says New Leak
- The Google QR Code Reader Is Sending People To The Wrong Sites
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