Gadgets and Tech in the Philippines

Apple has sent out invitations for its September 9 event where it is expected to announce new iPhones , the Apple iPhone 6s and the Apple iPhone 6s Plus.  The September 9 event is set at 10am PST, that's September 10, 1am here in the Philippines .   The event is titled "Hey Siri, Give Us a Hint", probably pointing to a more useful Siri personal digital assistant with new major features and capabilities. The venue, different from previous Apple events, will be in the Bill Graham Auditorium in San Francisco . Aside from the announcement of the new iPhones, there is a possibility that Apple will announce new iPads too, the large iPad Pro, the updated iPad mini , and the updated iPad Air, which might have very minimal changes. iOS 9 might also be released on the same event, iOS 9 brings true multi-tasking to Apple's latest devices.   One announcement that still might be missing this September is the update to the Apple TV streaming box, which we have be...

A new device is being launched and it's aimed at fixing our Wifi coverage problems at home.  eero, also the name of the company behind the eero device, are trying to fix the dead spots we currently encounter in our homes, and according to the website, the eero is far better than any existing wifi coverage solution. How does eero work? There will be one eero connected to your existing DSL or cable modem, then with the help of the app, you will be directed where you need to position additional eeros around your home, the additional eeros will just need to be plugged into a standard wall outlet. Don't the current wireless extenders do the same thing? The main difference of the eero from the current wireless extenders is that, the eero nodes contain to radios , one radio dedicated to communicating with devices like tablets, phones and laptops, and another radio dedicated to communicating with the other eeros in your network.  Also, eero is capable of automatically c...

The Seagate Backup Plus Slim Portable Drive looks to be the all in one external hard drive backup we've all been waiting for. At 76 mm thick, the Backup Plus might be the slimmest external hard drive existing today.  Despite its slim form factor, the Seagate Backup Plus' highest storage capacity is 2TB.  Add to that, Seagate is also including a 2 year free access to Microsoft's cloud storage, OneDrive, this is an additional 200GB of cloud storage worth $95.  That's a lot of storage for your personal use. The Backup Plus Slim is compatible with both PC and Mac , for Mac, the package contains an NTFS driver so you can access files saved from a PC on a Mac and vice versa. The portable drive is available in the following storage capacities and colors: 1. 500 GB - Black, Silver - $64.99 2. 1 TB - Black, Silver, Red, Blue - $59.99 3. 2 TB - Black, Blue, Silver, Red - $89.99 One thing I noticed is that the 1 TB model is cheaper than the 500GB model, note ...

Google has just launched its own wi-fi router called the Google OnHub.  The new router promises to make wi-fi speeds faster and future proof , with support for 802.11a/b/g/n/ac wi-fi and future technologies like Bluetooth , Smart Ready, Weave and 802.15.4, according to Google, the OnHub will be able to support future Smart Devices . OnHub will be able to have fast wi-fi up to 1900 Mbps by supporting 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz frequencies.  One of the advantages of the OnHub is that it will automatically search for the fastest wi-fi connection.  Also, the OnHub is capable of prioritizing a device so that device will have a faster wi-fi connection, this is good for streaming videos, if you want to watch video without buffering. The OnHub will automatically update its firmware and can do the update without interrupting the wi-fi connection. What's different in the design of the OnHub? There are 13 antennas (six 2.4GHz antennas, six 5GHz antennas, and a congest...

Samsung just concluded the "Everything Galaxy Unpacked" event and there were some pretty amazing announcements made.  It was a short but very interesting event.  Here are the highlights from the event. The event was kicked off by Samsung saying that "Next is now" and that Samsung's philosophy is "Listening to you". The first announcement was the revelation of the Samsung Galaxy Note 5 and according to Samsung, the Galaxy Note started the "Note" category, was the very first phone with this large screen. Samsung highlighted the new S pen which comes with the Galaxy Note 5, the S pen is better than ever, more precise and sensitive.  They even showed a new feature of the Galaxy Note 5 where you can write on the screen even while the phone is locked and even without opening an app.  The Galaxy Note 5 is now constructed with metal and glass, now thinner and stronger but at the same time smaller and lighter than before.  The curved back...

Cherry Mobile has released their latest mobile phone , the G1.  The Cherry Mobile G1 is also the latest member of the Google Android One family. The Cherry Mobile G1 runs on the latest Android Lollipop 5.1 mobile operating system .  The screen is not bad at 5 inches with a resolution of 720x1280 pixels, 294ppi, the screen is also scratch proof thanks to its Corning Gorilla glass 4 technology. The processor is a 1.2 Ghz quad core 64-bit ARM Cortex-A53 and is aided by an Adreno 306 GPU.   RAM is not much at 2GB. The rear camera is quite good at 13MP and with dual LED flash.  The front camera is at 5MP. For storage, the G1 has 16GB internal memory and can be expanded via MicroSD external memory which has a maximum of 32GB. The phone is 4G LTE compliant. The G1 weighs in at 135 grams. All of these features for a suggested retail price of P5,999 only. Related articles Android Lollipop-powered Samsung Galaxy Grand Prime 4G launched in India fo...

Third generation Amazon Kindle, showing text from the novel Moby-Dick. Esperanto: Amazon Kindle de la tria generacio, montranta originan tekston el la romano Moby-Dick. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Amazon has just released its latest Kindle Paperwhite ebook reader .  The latest model in the Kindle line now as a higher resolution at 300 ppi, that's twice the resolution as the previous generation. Amazon is introducing a new font in the Kindle Paper, the new font is called Bookerly, exclusive to Amazon and was specifically designed for faster reading and less eyestrain . Just like previous Kindle models, the new Kindle Paperwhite has a built-in adjustable light which is adjustable for reading either in day or night. Compared to tablets, the biggest advantage of the Kindle screen is that there is no glare even under bright sunlight. Battery life of up to weeks.  Huge library of ebooks , currently more than a million titles.  Can hold thousands of books. Relate...

Xiaomi, the tech company that some people consider as the Apple of China has released their own fitness band , the Mi band. I have been using the Mi band for about 3 weeks now and I am pretty pleased with how it works.  There would be a lot of debate if I would say that the Mi band is the best fitness band out there, but for the price of the Xiaomi Mi band, you can't go wrong with this purchase.  The Mi band sells for about $15 in the Xiaomi website.  A fitness band for that price is definitely a steal.   Fitness wristbands have been coming out a lot recently and the current leaders are the Jawbone , Misfit  and Fitbit .   What are fitness wristbands/fitness bands? Fitness wristbands are wearable technology which monitor your activities like, number of steps walked, calories burned and quality of sleep.  These fitness bands are usually worn on the wrist and track hand movements. The Xiaomi Mi band is packaged as a small chip or sm...