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    Home Unlabelled Android Saturday APPreciation (Oct 31 2020) - Your weekly app recommendation/request thread!

    Android Saturday APPreciation (Oct 31 2020) - Your weekly app recommendation/request thread!

    October 31, 2020

    Android Saturday APPreciation (Oct 31 2020) - Your weekly app recommendation/request thread!

    Saturday APPreciation (Oct 31 2020) - Your weekly app recommendation/request thread!

    Posted: 31 Oct 2020 04:10 AM PDT

    Note 1. Check out our apps wiki for previous threads and apps curated by the reddit Android community!

    Download the official /r/Android App Store based on our wiki!

    Note 2. Join us at /r/MoronicMondayAndroid, a sub serving as a repository for our retired weekly threads. Just pick any thread and Ctrl-F your way to wisdom!

    Note 2. Join our IRC, and Telegram chat-rooms! Please see our wiki for instructions.

    This weekly Saturday thread is for:
    * App promotion,
    * App praise/sharing

    Rules:

    1) If you are a developer, you may promote your own app ONLY under the bolded, distinguished moderator comment. Users: if you think someone is trying to bypass this rule by promoting their app in the general thread, click the report button so we can take a look!

    submitted by /u/AutoModerator
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    Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 2 Review: Tablet Killer - MrMobile [Michael Fisher]

    Posted: 30 Oct 2020 03:50 PM PDT

    Google's lack of foresight and strategy is stifling Pixel sales in India

    Posted: 30 Oct 2020 10:58 PM PDT

    Telegram: Pinned Messages 2.0, Improved Live Locations, Playlists and More

    Posted: 30 Oct 2020 06:15 AM PDT

    Sundar Pichai teases Google’s deeper hardware investments - 9to5Google

    Posted: 30 Oct 2020 07:13 AM PDT

    Samsung reveals One UI 3 features (Released November 2020 or Later)

    Posted: 30 Oct 2020 06:32 AM PDT

    Google Maps 10.53.1 prepares to add a language changer and Google Assistant driving mode

    Posted: 30 Oct 2020 07:58 AM PDT

    Have you ever dug out your first few Android phones to see how they stack up?

    Posted: 30 Oct 2020 04:59 AM PDT

    I'll describe my Nexus One here:

    Nexus One

    • It's tiny when compared to today's phones. Plus the trackball looks cute; other than that it helps when you select text on a 3.7" screen.
    • Instead of running Stock 2.3.6, it runs CyanogenMod 7.2. Notable differences include the ability to tweak low-level system settings like CPU speed and cache compression.
    • Mine has an SLCD screen. Compared to my A50 it looks... alright? I rarely use the screen as it serves as a music player/FM Radio.
    • On the other hand, the FM radio is quite crackly. Maybe it's because I dropped it into my drawer by mistake. It's still a great way to pass the time.
    • With the 1GHz processor and 512MB RAM, not to mention the ~200MB storage, GApps would choke this device. I opted to leave them off for this reason.
    • The modern web is out of reach of this device. Security certificate warnings EVERYWHERE. Not to mention the security holes from 2.3.x Android...
    • Picking up this phone makes you feel the cold metal.

    Next up, my Galaxy A50:

    Galaxy A50

    • The screen seems huge and crisp. It's marvelous. Perfect for web browsing.
    • This device runs Android 10; it'll get Android 11 come next year. It's a big deal; this was the only device that wasn't already EOL/past the update cycle or a hand-me-down when I got it. In some cases getting un-updated second-hand stuff or two-year-old devices necessitates downloading firmware updates off the manufacturer's site and flashing them manually. Other times, you're SOL.
    • Building on that, I mourn the lack of custom ROMs for this device. They extended the life of my phones, which was important when you've got something from the last two years!
    • I like the inclusion of the 3.5mm jack and SD card slot. They're super useful.
    • 64GB storage, non-expanded. 4GB RAM. I never run anything intensive and enjoy living my life 3 apps at a time, because it's what I always did.
    • 9160 Exynos. Excellent for basic web browsing, calls and texts, plus the simple light games I play.
    • This device has an FM radio, but I haven't tested it yet.
    • A 4000mah battery means I can go days without charging. Non-replaceable isn't too much of an issue. After all my last phone before this had a non-replaceable battery.
    • For a phone camera, if it takes something halfway decent, it's fine. I have no real intention to snap holiday snappers with phone cams anytime soon.
    • The plastic's tendency to reflect light in random patterns is super eye-catching.
    submitted by /u/Extension_Driver
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    I tested the Pixel 4XL against the iPhone 12 Pro and the iPhone 11 Pro in low light. Here are the results.

    Posted: 30 Oct 2020 08:39 AM PDT

    Last year, the iPhone 11 dramatically improved the camera by introducing Night Mode and Deep Fusion and in my opinion, pretty much caught up with Pixel phones. So, I was pretty excited to see if Apple made any drastic improvements to the camera performance, especially in low light. So, I went ahead and bought an iPhone 12 Pro to find out. After shooting a bunch of photos in the city at night, here are my thoughts.

    I only shot handheld and didn't use any third party apps. Also, in most places, I took the same photo with my iPhone 11 Pro and my Pixel 4 XL to see how it compared to the older generation. It's possible to get much better photos on a tripod as shutter speeds are slower at night, but most of us aren't walking around with tripods on a normal night, so I just wanted this test to reflect the normal experience.

    Here are the photos for reference. (video with side by side comparison)

    Here is a Google Drive folder with all original photos.

    When shooting with the main wide angle camera, in most cases, the photos from the 11 Pro looked identical to the 12 Pro and I had to double check the folders multiple times because I myself was getting confused while going through everything. The photos on the 12 Pro are generally a bit brighter with slightly more details in the shadows. But you could easily fool me by increasing the exposure slightly on the 11 Pro. When comparing with the Pixel 4XL. I noticed the Pixel tends to take slightly cooler shots with a bit more contrast, and in my opinion it's a bit better. Both the 11 Pro and the 12 Pro lean a bit more towards warmer tones overall.

    The ultra wide camera is where the differences start to become more apparent. The 11 Pro doesn't have night mode on the ultra wide, which leads to almost unusable photos in low light unless you use a longer shutter with a third party app. The 12 Pro has the same camera, but due to night mode, the difference is night and day. Because the sensor isn't as big as the main camera, even with night mode, the photos are pretty mediocre. I'd say use this lens in low light with a stand or if you have no other option. The Pixel 4XL doesn't have an ultra wide camera, so no comparisons here.

    Apple is being very sneaky with the night mode on the 2x lens. I was under the impression that the telephoto camera also had night mode. But when I looked at the metadata, I saw that the aperture was at 1.6 on the 12 Pro and 1.8 on the 11 Pro, which means the iPhones use the primary camera and then digitally zoom in for the 2x zoom in most cases. This is pretty misleading on Apple's end. While the Pixel 4XL also switches back to the primary camera in extreme cases, it still uses the 2x camera most times. The photos from the iPhone 12 Pro and 11 Pro at 2x are usable and the quality is quite close to the Pixel as the primary camera has a bigger sensor. But, when I take photos at 5x, things become pretty clear. The Pixel outperforms both iPhones by quite a bit margin.

    In the iPhone 12, Apple also introduced night mode to portrait mode. I tested this in a controlled setting on all three phones. The Pixel zoomed in when switching to portrait mode and had a lot of noise in the photo. The edge detection was fine, but not that impressive, especially around the hair. The iPhone 11 Pro did a pretty good job, but because it doesn't have night mode in portrait mode, the photos aren't as bright. Also, I noticed that edge detection was not as good as the iPhone 12 Pro. The iPhone 12 Pro did a fantastic job in this department. Even though I was backlit, it was able to fill the light thanks to night mode and the slightly bigger aperture. The bloom from the lights behind me was reflected in a pretty realistic way and the edges also looked pretty natural thanks to LIDAR.

    When I switched to the front camera, the differences got much smaller. Both the 11 Pro and the 12 Pro look almost identical in terms of quality and edge detection as there's no LIDAR sensor on the front. The Pixel did pretty well here and I prefer the wider angle of the Pixel. Edge detection isn't perfect here either, but I like the cooler colours. None of the phones are perfect when taking portraits using the front camera in low light and it really comes down to personal preference.

    One big issue I have with Apple's cameras is the lens flare I got in almost all my photos with lights directly facing the camera. It led to a lot of dots where there were multiple lights, which can be pretty distracting. I hope Apple fixes this in the future generations either through hardware or software improvements.

    Final Thoughts

    I was pleasantly surprised by how well the Pixel 4XL kept up with both iPhones. Photos from the Pixel are amazing in low light and in a lot of cases, better than the iPhone. Also, while the Pixel also gets lens flares, it's not nearly as bad as the iPhone.

    Google has done wonders with computational photography and I am really looking forward to new camera hardware next year fingers crossed.

    submitted by /u/imzaeem
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    Android should allow us to have transparent status bar for all apps

    Posted: 30 Oct 2020 02:15 AM PDT

    We should be able to set the bar transparent for all apps. It wouldn't change how the app works, the app would optimize itself for the slightly taller display anyways. Its such a waste of precious screen estate. What do you think?

    submitted by /u/GodShaz
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    One thing YouTube Music does better than Play Music

    Posted: 30 Oct 2020 11:11 AM PDT

    I am not happy about switching from Play Music and have been putting off the switch for as long as possible. But this week my Play Music would no cast from my phone to my speakers so I decided to just give in and make the transfer. While I still miss Play Music I do like one thing.

    I can connect to the queue from multiple devices. If I cast from the YouTube Music app on one phone I can connect to the speaker group on another phone and it will pull up the currently active queue and I can manage it from both devices at once without having to go to the Google Home app.

    You do have to make sure there is no current queue on that second device though, whether active or inactive. You can just swipe down and it will close out that queue. Otherwise the second device's queue will take over the cast.

    Everything else sucks though.

    submitted by /u/obsidianfirefly
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