Samsung has revealed that the total number of pre-orders it received for its newest flagships – the Galaxy S7 and S7 edge – in Europe was over 2.5 times more than what it received for previous Galaxy phones in the region.

People standing in line for new Samsung flagships

The revelation, which was made by the Netherlands subsidiary of the South Korean company on its website, came just days after Samsung’s mobile chief Koh Dong-jin said that Galaxy S7/S7edge pre-orders have been stronger than what the company was expecting. Samsung Netherlands also revealed that of the two flagships, the edge variant is more popular, accounting for a total of 61% pre-orders placed in Europe.

In case you missed, the flagships officially went on sale worldwide yesterday.

Source…

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You know this has happened to you before: You are going on a trip which involves staying overnight in a hotel so when you pack you are thinking to yourself: “I should pack my Chromecast too!” So you roll the USB cable up with your Chromecast and stuff it into a suitcase while you think about what a genius you are.

Next, you get to your hotel room, hopefully it has a TV with HDMI ports. Then you plug your Chromecast in and power it up, only to realize that you cannot use it because in order to use your hotel’s Wi-Fi, you need to use a web-based login page to gain access to the internet.

You are like “Daaaamnnnn, I can’t use my Chromecast. UGH! Maybe I can tether to my phone.” But if you don’t have unlimited data, you might hate yourself.

But as it turns out, with the Galaxy S7, (In theory, as I haven’t tried this myself) you’d be able to log into the web-based hotel Wi-Fiwith your phone, accept the terms and blah blah blah (now here’s where it gets interesting). There’s a feature on the Galaxy S7 (and edge) called Wi-Fi sharing. It allows your phone to act as a Wi-Fi repeater to retransmit the signal of another Wi-Fi network.

All you have to do is the following:

Log into hotel Wi-Fi using phone
Turn on Wi-Fi tethering
Factory reset your Chromecast with the app
Set up Chromecast with phone’s hotspot
Mooch off hotel Wi-Fi

To turn the Wi-Fi sharing feature off, you can go to Settings >> Mobile hotspot and tethering >> and tap on the MORE tab.

Now, I don’t have an S7 unit myself, so I cannot confirm if a secondary device is needed to control the Chromecast or if you can use the S7 to control the Chromecast directly. If you have an S7 and would like to try this out, let us know in the comments if you are able to tether your Chromecast to your S7 AND control the Chromecast WITH your S7.

Via |…

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One of the main reasons Samsung has been so successful alongside Apple in the past several years was by matching Apple’s advertising campaigns and promoting the crap out of these phones. Samsung has already been promoting the Galaxy S7 a lot even before it launched today.

Samsung started by throwing in a Gear VR with a pre-order of the new phone. Then, Samsung USA released three new ads a couple of weeks ago, next, a man with a jetpack flew alongside the Dublin River in a stunt coordinated with Samsung Ireland to promote the Galaxy S7.

And finally today, Samsung released three new ads all featuring Lil’ Wayne, the most notable of which shows Lil Wayne pouring a bottle of champagne all over a Galaxy S7 and then dunking it into a fishtank. Samsung really wants to make sure viewers KNOW this phone is fully submersible in water.

Check out the ads released today featuring Lil’ Wayne:

And in case you missed them, check out the other bunch of ads that came out a couple of weeks ago. My favorite ads of the bunch are “Water” and “The Dark”.

I have to say after seeing the previous bunch of ads, they are all really good. The ads do a great job of building up a point and then slapping you in the face with the reality of why you need to get the Galaxy…

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(Also known as the Moto X Style outside the US)

If you’ve been looking for a deal on the Moto X Pure Edition, look no further. Motorola’s last phablet is slimming down its price across multiple retailers both online and brick and mortar.

Best Buy has the phone available either shipped from virtual shelves or you can walk into a store and pick up the black model. Though, it’d be a good idea to check your local store’s inventory before making the trip.

If you don’t feel like going anywhere and would rather let Amazon ship the phone to you with two-day Prime shipping, you can choose between a white and black model. And if you don’t want either black or white, you can even design your own Moto X Pure Edition directly on Moto Maker!

Even Motorola’s official website has slashed the price of the Moto X. So you can customize your Moto X to exactly how you want it to look and still pay the same $300 discount price. That’s a great deal for a great phone.

The Moto X is compatible with all GSM and CDMA networks in the US including Sprint and Verizon. The Moto X features a Snapdragon 808 chipset paired with 3GB of RAM and Adreno 418 graphics. There’s a large 5.7 inch LCD display big enough to enjoy photos taken with the 21MP rear facing camera. There is also a microSD card slot to store up to 128GB of your media library.

Best Buy | Amazon | Moto Maker |…

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Close your eyes and picture the Samsung Galaxy S6, but the way you wanted it to be, not the way it came out. Now open them and look at the Galaxy S7. Better? Let’s see.

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Last week, Xiaomi announced the roll-out of version 7.2 of its MIUI ROM, revealing that the update will hit devices in batches. The first batch that got the update included the Mi 5, Mi 4S, Mi Note Pro, Mi 4c, Mi Pad 1, Redmi Note 4G (Single SIM), and Redmi 1S.

The good news is that the update has started hitting the second batch of devices, too. These should include the Mi Note, Mi 3, Mi 4, Mi 4i, Mi 2/2S, Mi Pad 2, Redmi 3, Redmi Note 3, Redmi Note 2, Redmi Note 4G (Dual SIM), Redmi Note 3G, Redmi 2A, and Redmi 2.

If your device falls in the second batch, you’ll soon received an OTA notification, if not already. Alternatively, those feeling impatient can also download the update package from official MIUI website (head to the MIUI link below).

Via |…

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Samsung has launched yet another promotional offer hoping to help the adoption of its mobile payments service. This one is aimed at fresh owners of the Galaxy S7 and S7 edge duo, handsets which only became available today (though pre-orders have been shipped three days ago).

It’s simple, really. Set up Samsung Pay on your S7 or S7 edge, make an in-store payment using the service, and you’ll receive a free $30 gift card. If you use Bank of America debit cards or private label cards to complete that first transaction though, you won’t be eligible for the gift card.

As for the gift cards themselves, you can choose one from the following merchants: Best Buy, eBay, Whole Foods, Nike, or Regal Cinema. After you’ve made the aforementioned qualifying transaction using Samsung Pay, you’ll see a pop-up informing you about the gift card offer, which is when you choose one of these merchants.

The pretty obvious caveat is that the promo is US-only. Also, it’s only going to be valid until March…

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If you’ve wanted to pick up one of Samsung’s huge, 18.4-inch Galaxy View tablets but for some reason decided to make your purchase from a carrier, then this is for you. The tablet which was initially announced back in October of last year is now up for grabs from Verizon.

You can get it using a device payment plan, in which case you’ll shell out $24.99 per month for two years. Or if you want to just pay the whole sum upfront, that will be $599.99. On the other hand, if you sign one of those old-fashioned two-year service agreements, the tablet will be yours for $499.99. You can add the Galaxy View to an existing Verizon plan for an amount that starts at $10 per month.

The tablet comes with 4G LTE support, of course, as well as an 18.4-inch 1080p touchscreen, the Exynos 7580 chipset (with a 1.6 GHz octa-core Cortex-A53 CPU), 2GB of RAM, 64GB of expandable storage, a 2.1 MP front-facing camera, and a 5,700 mAh battery. It runs Android 5.1.1…

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Well, that didn’t take long. Just yesterday Microsoft said availability details for the Lumia 650 in the US would be coming later this week, and here we are one day later and the phone is already up for pre-order.

That’s right, if you live in the US (or Canada) and insist on being among the first people in North America to sport a Lumia 650, you can pre-order one now for $199 (or CAD 199) straight from Microsoft’s online store. The “ships by” date is the same for both countries – April 1 (and hopefully not a joke).

That price obviously nets you an unlocked device, and one that even comes with dual-SIM functionality (which isn’t something usually seen in North America).

The Lumia 650 has a 5-inch 720p touchscreen, an 8 MP rear camera with LED flash, a 5 MP selfie cam, the Qualcomm Snapdragon 212 chipset at the helm (featuring a 1.3 GHz quad-core Cortex-A7 CPU), 1GB of RAM, 16GB of expandable storage, LTE, and a 2,000 mAh battery. It runs Windows 10 Mobile.

Source 1 • Source 2 |…

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It is a question that seems to bother most smartphone users at one point or another – what happens to an app once its closed and is it eating away at that all-important battery life. It is a pretty valid concern and you can easily hear pretty convincing arguments on both sides, so it is quite understandable that one iPhone user decided to take it up with Tim Cook himself.

We are far from the idea that this is the first such question to arrive on Apple’s email servers, but it is one of those rare occasions when the person actually got a response. It wasn’t from Tim Cook, but rather from Apple iOS chief Craig Federighi, who is arguably even more qualified to provide an answer. The response itself was short and straight to the point, leaving no room for hesitation – a resounding NO.

This is probably the firmest somewhat official stance Apple has ever taken on the issue and the reply does fit nicely with previous examples of such email responses, like the ones Steve Jobs used to send out quite frequently. Plus, the email headers have already been verified for authenticity and everything checks out.

The only thing missing from the response, however, is any form of clarification. We won’t dig too deep into the matter, but we do feel it is necessary to mention that background tasks and services are very much a thing on iOS. That being said, a closed app is pretty much suspended and not using any notable resources on your device, but any app that has background syncing of any sorts, still uses up resources, battery and data, just take Facebook for instance. Thankfully, iOS has the Background App Refresh menu to help you with managing such activities, so you can generally mend any such drainage yourself, assuming the lack of app bugs that is.

And as for forcefully closing Apps, Apple suggests you only reserve that as a drastic measure when something hands or misbehaves in any…

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