ASUS Republic of Gamers launched its newest AMD Ryzen 6000-powered gaming laptops, including the ROG Zephyrus G14, ROG Zephyrus 15, and ROG Zephyrus Duo 16.
In addition, the brand also announced new models of the TUF Gaming A15 and A17, and the ROG Strix G15 and G17.
ZEPHYRUS G14
ASUS ROG packed the Zephyrus G14 with an AMD Ryzen 9 6900HS processor and up to an AMD Radeon RX 6800S Mobile GPU. Gamers can also expect outstanding performance, as it comes with high-speed DDR5 4800MHz RAM and a TB PCIe SSD.
Other notable features include its Nebula Display with a 120Hz refresh rate, Dolby Vision HDR, and a custom vapor chamber.
The Zephyrus G14 is available in Eclipse Grey or Moonlight White, featuring a Prismatic Logo nameplate with a holographic, reflective hue.
Consumers can also get it in the Philippines starting Q3 2022. The Zephyrus G14 has a starting price of Php119,995.
ZEPHYRUS G15
Powered by the same processor, ASUS ROG paired it with up to an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 GPU. The Zephyrus G15 also features a DDR5 RAM, PCIe 4.0 SSD, a QHD 240Hz refresh rate, and a 180-degree Ergolift hinge.
The Zephyrus G15 will arrive in the Philippines in Q3 2022 with a starting price of Php129,995.
ZEPHYRUS DUO 16
On the other hand, the Zephyrus Duo 16 sports ROG ScreenPad Plus, which users can set at a 13-degree angle or maximum ergonomics and airflow. ASUS ROG powered it with up to AMD Ryzen 9 6900HX processors and an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti.
Consumers can buy the Zephyrus Duo 16 in the Philippines starting in late June 2022 from as low as Php254,995.
NEW MODELS OF STRIX G15 AND G17
The new models of the ROG Strix G series come with up to a Ryzen 6900HZ CPU and up to an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 GPU with MUX Switch.
Gamers can get the ROG Strix G17 starting at Php114,995, while the ROG Strix G15 has a Php69,995 starting price.
NEW MODELS OF TUF GAMING A15 AND A17
Just like the ROG Strix G series, the TUF Gaming lineup also gets a new reinforcement with the launch of the TUF Gaming A15 and A17.
The two models offer improved performance compared to the previous generation. It has the latest AMD Ryzen 7 6800H CPU and up to a 140W RTX 3070 GPU with MUX Switch, super-fast DDR5 RAM, and up to a Full HD 300hz Adaptive Sync display with 100% sRGB.
The two new models are now available and are tagged at Php67,995 and above.
MOONTON Games announced its partnership with Malaysia for the upcoming Mobile Legends: Bang Bang Southeast Asia Cup (MSC) 2022.
With the partnership, MOONTON teams up with Malaysia’s Ministry of Youth and Sports and Esports Integrated (ESI) to ensure a vibrant and inclusive tournament.
MOBILE LEGENDS: BANG BANG SOUTHEAST ASIA CUP (MSC) 2022
The Mobile Legends: Bang Bang Southeast Asia Cup 2022 will be held at Malaysia International Trade and Exhibition Centre (MITEC), the biggest exhibition center locally. It is located at Kompleks MITEC, No. 8, Jalan Dutamas 2, Kuala Lumpur.
Fans can buy the Gold and Silver tickets for MYR 35-40 and MYR 25-30, respectively. Those who have Gold tickets will get access to the event hall and meet with the teams. Nevertheless, both tickets are eligible for amazing in-game chests.
In addition, there will be on-ground activities waiting for fans during the event.
MSC 2022 FORMAT
MOONTON divides the tournament into two phases: the Group Stage and Playoffs.
Three (3) points will be given to the team for winning the best-of-two (BO2) series.
Meanwhile, one (1) point will be given to each team should they encounter a tiebreaker.
If the top two teams from each group cannot be determined from the points system, no tiebreaker match will be held. It will be settled with each team’s head-to-head record that includes time of the match, kill counts, and golds acquired.
The top 2 teams from the groups will fight to qualify for the Playoffs scheduled on 14-19 June. Qualifying teams will once again be drawn randomly and will undergo a double elimination process.
So, who’s excited?
Let us know what you think in the comment section below!
Earlier this year, Samsung has unveiled their flagship smartphone to the market – the Samsung Galaxy S22 series and alongside with that is the release of their biggest flagship Android tablet to date – the Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra. It’s a 14” Android tablet and it’s running on the latest and most powerful chip inside.
Design and hardware
One of the things that makes this Samsung tablet a premium one is its build quality. It combines both the beauty and premium feel of the metal body along with its thin and sleek 5.5mm body but of course, this one is still big as we got here a 14.6” display, a tablet that you can compare to the size of a typical notebook that you have in the market.
Unlike other tablets, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra 5G is best used with its keyboard and touchpad. You can snap in a case at the back of the tablet and use it as a kickstand for the tablet as well. You can also snap in your S-Pen at the back so you can charge it and bring it anywhere and because of the thick size of the pen, it’s best fit at the back of the tablet.
Entertainment is one of the best reasons why you should buy this tablet. Why? Because of its quad-speaker setup. The Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra has by far, the best speaker that I’ve tried on a tablet and watching movies on Netflix with this tablet is way better with the built-in speaker compared to bluetooth speakers that I have right now. The large display of the tablet is another plus too.
For the ports, yes, there’s no 3.5mm audio jack for your headset or for your speakers but again, the speakers on this one is already enough and syncing my Samsung Galaxy Buds 2 between my Samsung smartphone and the Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra was seamless. There’s a USB-C port on the tablet as well and you can plug in a dongle so you can use an external display and when it comes to charging, the tablet does support up to 45W of fast charging.
The Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra 5G is best used in landscape mode as you can magnetically attach the keyboard cover of the tablet and it does connect via POGO pins below. The keyboard cover of the Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra 5G does offer a full size keyboard without the numpad and there’s a decent size for the trackpad as well.
Typing on the keyboard doesn’t have the best travel distance and it does have a soft tactile feel. It took me a while before I got used to it but I do get a lot of errors when typing on the keyboard of this tablet. As for the touchpad, it’s large enough for my usage and it’s very responsive when I’m using it in DeX Mode.
At the top of the display is the notch. It’s smaller than I initially thought and I barely noticed it when I was using it. Surprisingly, the dual 12MP selfie camera of the tablet produces really good quality especially when I was using it for Zoom or Microsoft teams. It’s better than most webcams on laptops in the market right now and combined that with its mic, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra 5G is a good tablet for video calls and conferences.
Display
The display of the tablet is large. It’s enormous for a tablet but do I find it reasonable? definitely. It feels more like a Surface Pro competitor rather than an iPad Pro because of the screen size and again, watching movies on the tablet is really enjoyable because of the quality of the Super AMOLED Display and also the colors on this one. Using it in a cafe was great as well as it can produce amazing colors and the display is still bright even when I’m using it outside.
Some of you might notice the notch at the top but in my everyday use, I barely notice it. You’ll notice it at first but after a while of using it, you would barely remember that the tablet does come with a notch at the top. And again, the AMOLED display of the tablet is not only gigantic but it’s also gorgeous. Unlike the other tablets out there, this one has the best one in the market when it comes to the display and it’s perfect for its 2-in-1 form factor.
Software and Performance
Inside the tablet is a Snapdragon 8 Gen1 Processor along with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of internal storage. But of course, the memory variants will depend on the unit that you’re getting. Aside from that, there’s 5G as well and I managed to use my Smart Rocket SIM for this one to take advantage of the unlimited 5G on the tablet.
As for the performance, without a doubt, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra 5G performs really well. It might not be the highest performing in terms of numbers but I’m pretty confident that this one will be future-proof for your gaming needs. Playing games such as Apex Legends and Call of Duty Mobile is a piece of cake for this tablet while Genshin Impact can be played without problems as well. We noticed that the tablet does heat up when playing games but it doesn’t overheat that much. This is probably because of the throttling that Samsung uses to protect the hardware.
Screenshot 20220308 233744 PCMark scaled
Screenshot 20220309 000033 Geekbench 5 scaled
As for the UI, it comes with OneUI 4.1 inside based on Android 12 and honestly, I still find the default UI of Androids to be unoptimized and too unwieldy for big screen users which is why thankfully, Samsung has included Samsung DeX on the tablet so you can have a desktop-like interface on the tablet. Actually, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra 5G won’t be as fun and as usable as it is when it doesn’t have a Samsung DeX inside.
With Samsung DeX, I find the apps more productive and more intuitive to use as I can use multi-window and also open two windows of the same app at the same time. This makes my productivity become better and combined with 5G inside, I can work anywhere with the Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra 5G. I really didn’t have any problems running anything as well as I was able to run multiple apps at the same time on the tablet.
Verdict
The Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra 5G is definitely one of the best Android tablets out there. Some of you might not like the size of this tablet but it does make sense after using it with Samsung DeX and after watching a few episodes of Netflix series. The speaker, the display, and the power of the Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra 5G is something that you would definitely love on this one however, despite everything that we praised on the tablet, there’s one thing that you might not like in here and that’s the price. It’s pricey at Php77,990 but again, this tablet has some unique and premium features that you can only find here.
Finally, the feature that we’ve all been waiting for the iPads is coming and it’s the better multitasking and also the support for external display but unfortunately, these features will be available only on the newer M1 iPads. Only the iPad Pro M1 and the iPad Air M1 will get these features.
Apple has also introduced better collaborations on the iPad OS. You can now collaborate directly from files, keynote, numbers, pages, notes, reminders, safari and other apps via messages. You can easily send a link that lets other people collaborate with you in these applications. Aside from that, there’s the Freeform as well that lets you have a digital whiteboard for collaboration with your colleagues. Just like iOS 16, you can also now access the new iCloud Shared Photo Library that lets you share photos seamlessly with your family members in the iCloud.
With Stage Manager, that is available on the iPad Pro and iPad Air with M1 chip, you can now do multitasking on the iPad. You can now have overlapping windows on the iPad and you can adjust it into different sizes for better multitasking and the other windows are on the left-hand side for easy access. The Stage Manager also lets you connect to an external display with resolution support of up to 6K so you can run four apps on the iPad and four apps on the external display.
Other new features includes the Weather app, better game center, Metal 3, playing together with Shareplay, and more intelligent features. iPad OS 16 will be available on all iPad Pro models, iPad Air 3rd Gen and later, iPad 5th Gen and later and iPad Mini 5th Gen and later.
Finally, the long wait is here. The MacBook Air M2 is finally official and it’s just a new processor because we’re also getting a redesigned on this one with a design language similar to the Macbook Pro and yes, we’re getting a notch in here on the new notebook.
The new Macbook Air features a more squarish design like the Macbook Pro but unlike the Macbook Pro, this one will only have a 2 USB-C port along with the MagSafe Port. The new Macbook Air M2 will also feature a full heigh function row key similar to the Macbook Pro and it will now take advantage of the Magic Keyboard for a tactile feel.
Again, there’s a notch on the new Macbook Air and it will now come with a 13.6-inch Liquid Retina Display with thinner borders. The notebook will also come with 11.3mm thin and the webcam of this one now comes in 1080p.
The new M2 processor promises to bring better performance. It promises 40% faster in Final Cut Pro than the M1 and up to 20% faster on Adobe Photoshop vs M1 processor. This will also give you a better performance in gaming. The new Macbook Air M2 will also come with 67W Fast Charger that can just your smartphone up to 50% in just 30 minutes.
The new Macbook Air M2 will come in Space Gray, Starlight, Silver, and Midnight colors
Macbook Air M2 Price in the Philippines
For the pricing, the Macbook Air M2 comes in two variants:
The Macbook Air M1 8C CPU/8C GPU/256GB SSD will still be available for Php57,990 making it the most affordable Macbook Air in the lineup.
The Macbook Pro 13″ also got a new update with the Touchbar still present on the notebook. It will have no updates on the aesthetics but it will have an M2 processor inside.
Macbook Pro 13″ M2 Price in the Philippines
For the pricing, the Macbook Pro M2 comes in two variants:
Apple has finally unveiled the iOS 16 and it will bring a lot of new features including a brand new lockscreen customizations, updated messages, new CarPlay, and more.
Lockscreen customization might not be a new thing on other smartphones, but Apple has refined their own lockscreen and this time you can have customizable fonts for the time, change its colors, add complications, and add some live activities which lets you have live widgets on the lockscreen and gives you live updates instead of flooding you with updates.
They’ve also updated the messages app and they finally let you edit messages and unsend messages on iMessage. This is a cool feature that is already present on other messaging apps. This will help you have clear messaging and conversations with friends. They’ve also updated the dictation which lets you use the keyboard and dictation simultaneously.
They’ve also brought better live text in video and even quick actions to live text. You can also do quick cutouts and drag them to messages to send them to your friends which is cool. They’ve also updated the parental controls on iOS and the CarPlay that got a big rehaul with more features including control and info and even gauge of your car. Here are the major updates made for the iOS 16:
Maya teamed up with Smart Communications, Inc. (Smart), offering instant cashback to all Smart Prepaid, Smart Bro, and TNT subscribers who will buy a load via the e-wallet app.
With this partnership, subscribers can get up to 100% cashback or up to Php200 if they purchase load for the first through the Maya app. Aside from getting instant cashback, new Maya users also get Php20 worth of credit in their Maya wallet upon registration and an additional Php80 worth of credits when they upgrade their Maya account.
In addition, users can spend their cashback ad bonus credits immediately to buy load or data promos. They can also use it when paying through QR codes in Maya-powered stores nationwide.
Meanwhile, customers may also use GigaPay with Maya, allowing subscribers to link their Maya account to the GigaLife app for a smarter way to pay when buying load and subscribing to data promos.
So, have you downloaded the Maya app?
Let us know what you think in the comment section below!
POCO Vietnam has launched the POCO C40 ahead of the Global unveiling and yes, the smartphone aims to target the affordable market as this one is only priced at 3.5 million VND (Php7,976~).
As expected, the smartphone will come in black, blue, and yellow and it comes with JLQ JR10 SoC which is the first we’ve seen and it comes with a 6.71-inch HD+ Display with a Gorilla Glass for protection. It also features a 13MP main camera along with 2MP depth sensor and then there’s the 5MP front-facing camera as well.
For the software, it runs on Android 11 and the battery comes in with 6000mAh battery with support for 18W Fast Charging.
The smartphone is priced at VND 3,490,000 to be exact in Vietnam. It should be available in other markets soon as well.
WIKO, a french mobile tech brand has entered the Philippine market with presence in more than 30 countries. Finally, it enters the Philippine market with the WIKO T10 and the WIKO T50 with both smartphones targeting the entry level and mid-range market respectively.
WIKO T10 Specs
6.5-inch HD+ IPS Display
Mediatek Helio A22 Processor
2GB RAM
64GB Internal Storage expandable via MicroSD
13MP rear camera
5MP front camera
LTE
WiFI, Bluetooth
5000mAh battery
10W Charging
Android 11 Go Edition
WIKO T50 Specs
6.6-inch Full HD+ IPS Display
Mediatek Helio G85 Processor
6GB RAM
128GB Internal Storage expandable via MicroSD
13MP rear camera + 8MP Ultra-wide + 2MP depth cameras
16MP front camera
LTE
WiFi, Bluetooth
40W Wired Charging
Side fingerprint scanner
4000mAh battery
Android 11 Edition
The WIKO T10 is priced at Php4,990 while the WIKO T50 is priced at Php11,990. Both smartphones are available now at Shopee and Lazada.
Looks like B&H Photo and Video store can’t wait for the official announcement of these new devices for this week’s WWDC 2022 event. We spotted two new unannounced devices at their website and these are the Apple Mac Mini with M2 processor and the Mac Mini Tower with the M1 Pro processor.
The details are still scarce and it looks like it’s just a placeholder but it’s nice to see that the Mac Mini is getting an M2 upgrade as well and then there’s the Mac Mini Tower which is still new to us but this time, it has the M1 Pro processor which we haven’t seen on the Mac Mini Series. We can only get the M1 Pro on the Macbook Pro while the Mac Studio starts with M1 Max so the Mac Mini Tower is positioned to be between the Mac Mini and the Mac Studio.
