Author: batteryforpc

One of the more jarring experiences you’ll encounter when updating your iPad to Apple’s iPadOS 13 this fall—including having to call it that from now on—are the slightly smaller icons now gracing your iPad’s Home screen and pages.

Like a juice cleanse, this icon diet is only a temporary fad. It appears Apple is going to let you revert back to the beefier icons you’ve been using all this time if you prefer your apps to look like a delicious thicc steak than a lean patty. At least, that’s my impression based on the latest iPadOS 13 beta—version 5!—which now comes with a little setting for adjusting the size of your app icons.

Make your app icons big or small

If you’re currently running the iPadOS 13 beta, or you know smaller icons are going to drive you crazy and you’ll want to change this as soon as iPadOS 13 drops in (probably) September, here’s how to fatten up your icons.

First, pull up the Settings app. You’ll then want to tap on Display & Brightness. Toward the bottom of this section, look for the new option for “App Icon Size.” You can’t miss it, as you’ll see a little graphic that shows you how many icons will fit on a page in “More” and “Bigger” modes:

That’s it! I haven’t reinstalled iPadOS 13 lately, but it makes sense that Apple would alsoask you this preference as part of your device’s initial setup process. If not, now you know where to find it.

It’s been nearly three weeks since AMD’s launch of the new Ryzen 3000 series CPUs and our extensive coverage of the new parts. Among one of the things that didn’t quite go as smoothly is AMD’s BIOS and software situation where as things were still very much in flux following the launch.

One issue that was repeatedly brought up by the community over the past weeks was the new CPU’s idle behaviour both in terms of temperature as well as voltages. In particular, the new parts seemingly looked like they rarely idled at lower performance states and instead looked to remain at high frequencies even when not doing much.

While initially appearing as an issue, it really wasn’t one and rather just a side-effect of AMD’s new CPPC2 fast frequency ramp-up behaviour. Monitoring applications that are badly programmed tend to have a too heavy of a monitoring loop that causes load on the CPU – triggering a frequency ramp-up as the CPU is seeing a larger load. Given the new CPU’s sub-1ms ramp-up this meant that it was very hard to actually catch the machine at the lower frequencies – even though it most likely did idle correctly.

As AMD states in their community brief on the issue, part of the new behaviour change is that the new scheduler settings will now have a much more relaxed ramp-up time compared to the previous versions. In particular, when the chip will be at its base frequency and idling voltage, it will now take a significantly longer load for the chip to ramp up to its boost frequencies.

In our quick A/B testing between the two driver versions, we can see that prior to the update the CPU would ramp up in around 840 microseconds to its boost clocks, whilst on the new power plan in this data-set took it a longer 17.5 milliseconds.

The new behaviour thus should make the CPU ramp-up much less susceptible to smaller transient loads. The new boost duration is still very much adequate and extremely fast – sustained CPU workloads will see largely imperceptible difference, while intermittent workloads such as games also won’t be affected as once the CPU gets over the initial base frequency ramp threshold it maintains the sub-1ms frequency change behaviour.

AMD has also addressed concerns about the reported high temperatures of the chip. The company explains that generally the value that most applications are reading out is the maximum of several sensors on the chip. Essentially this acts as the junction temperature of the chip – whilst most of the die would actually be a different/lower temperature.

A new version of Ryzen Master now includes a different temperature readout algorithm that is meant to better represent the “overall” temperature of the die rather than the absolute maximum a sensor reports. AMD says this is a better representation of the temperature of the CPU. Besides averaging across different sensors, it also averages readouts over a small time-window. In my testing the most affected scenarios are idle and low-load scenarios and the new temperature behaviour isn’t nearly as erratic and spiky.

Apple is being surprisingly open about the iPhone you should buy, and it’s not the iPhone 11. Moreover, this just confirmed it.

In a new report attained by MacRumors, famed Apple insider Ming-Chi Kuo has confirmed that Apple will now upgrade all three of its 2020 iPhones to 5G. Kuo previously revealed that Apple planned to only upgrade its two premium iPhones to the next-gen standard, but that changed after it acquired Intel’s smartphone modem business. And that’s just the start.

Kuo also explains that all three 2020 iPhones will support 5G with mmWave and sub-6GHz spectrum. The former enables cutting edge 5G speeds but only covers a short distance, while the latter still outpaces 4G but sacrifices some speed to cover wide areas – a key factor for rural and suburban coverage. In contrast, a number of Android rivals are expected to only support sub-6GHz 5G.

Interestingly, Kuo also notes that Apple is investigating a sub-6GHz 5G iPhone at a lower price point, but he says it remains uncertain whether the company has the resources to develop four new iPhones simultaneously.

Interestingly, despite Apple’s modem acquisition (and Intel’s willingness to divulge the product roadmaps), Apple is still expected to make use of its April deal with Qualcomm to supply 5G modems in 2020. This is because Apple will not yet have the scale to cater for its own demand next year but, quite brilliantly, it is the Qualcomm deal which facilitated the Intel sale and now Apple has autonomy long term. This is exactly the kind of supply chain mastery Tim Cook specialises in.

And the reasons to wait for a 2020 iPhone don’t stop there. While the iPhone 11 will be more of the same, Apple is completely redesigning (and resizing) the iPhone range next year, upgrading the displays and giving them the all-new camera tech it pulled from the iPhone 11 at the last minute. Touch ID may also make a comeback.

For those who still think the iPhone 11 will be enough for them (and it has some compelling features), there’s also another factor to consider. Kuo states that Apple’s primary motivation to push all 2020 iPhones to 5G is because customers will deem it essential, so trying to sell your 4G iPhone 11 in a few years time is highly unlikely to give you the great trade-in prices normally associated with iPhones.

So yes, there has never been a better time to delay an iPhone upgrade. The choice, as always, is yours but if you do buy an iPhone 11 I suspect you’ll eventually regret it.

Samsung’s Galaxy Note 10 is going to divide opinion. The two new modelsget a lot right and a lot wrong, but a stunning new leak has revealed one area where they will be truly class-leading.

Hugely popular Samsung insider Ice Universe has revealed that the flagship Galaxy Note 10+ will have the highest screen-to-body ratio of any smartphone, thanks to a combination of stunningly thin bezels and a redesigned camera.

Breaking down the details, Ice states that the Note 10 bezels will measure just 2mm (top), 3.7mm (bottom) and 1.5mm (sides) while the all-new central front camera is just 4.2mm in diameter. The result is a screen-to-body ratio of 92.5%. By comparison, the supposedly “bezel-less” iPhone XS and XS Max have ratios of 82.9% and 84.4% respectively, while the OnePlus 7 Pro ratio manages 88.1% with no cut-out and no notch.

Interestingly, the Galaxy S10+ comes closest to the Note 10 with 88.9% but that is largely due to its more heavily curved edge display. Consequently, Samsung has really pulled off something special with its new Note, especially given the inherent problem in the design.

Will this be enough to convince buyers to part with their money? My own source can confirm that all-new 45W charging will be there (with a catch) which may tip the balance, but also that the headphone jack has definitely gone from both models and microSD is on the chopping block, not just for the standard smaller Note 10 but the 5G versions as well.

And, despite their dizzying price tags, initial Note 10 promotions will be superb with buy-one-get-one-free deals available from launch.

So it’s a slam dunk? Not quite. The flipside is Samsung’s next-generation Galaxy S11 is already on the horizon and it is being described as “a new beginning”. Being a tech fan is never easy.