Canadian Reviewer Weekly Roundup 09/03-09/09

Review: Samsung Galaxy Note 8

This animated short shows us what happens when BB-8 and BB-9E meet

Amazon Alexa adds kid-friendly skills, lets your child play with SpongeBob and Elmo

Q&A with Dyson's Paul Dawson on the new Dyson Pure Hot+Cool Link

Apple’s annual Music Festival comes to an end after 10 years

Netflix brings HDR support to the Samsung Galaxy Note8 and Sony Xperia XZ1

‘Star Wars: Episode IX’ loses its director

Rakuten Kobo launches subscription service for audiobooks

11 features coming to iOS 11 this fall

Honda and Waze team up to increase driver awareness in school zones

Benefits of using EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard Free

Adobe and Microsoft aiming to standardize e-signatures and collaboration in the cloud

Microsoft CEO Nadella pens "Hit Refresh," book about corporate transformation

Duolingo to soon offer Korean and Klingon

Forza 7 is complete, ready for September 19 demo

Huawei surpasses Apple as 'world's second-biggest smartphone maker'

Fujifilm launches new X-E3 camera and new 80mm Macro Lens

Spotify tries out new video strategy after head of Original Video leaves company

Disney’s new ‘Star Wars’ and Marvel films to its own streaming service instead of Netflix

RED goes into detail about how the ‘holographic’ display on its upcoming smartphone will work

The Essential Phone is now available through TELUS

Samsung outs Galaxy Tab A (2017)

Samsung just unveiled a new mid-range tablet with a sizable 5,000mAh battery. The second-generation Galaxy Tab A comes with a quad-core 1.4GHz processor, an 8-inch 1,280 x 800 resolution display, 2GB of RAM, and 16GB internal storage that’s expandable up to 256GB via microSD. It runs Android 7.1 Nougat out of the box and comes with LTE support and a single nano SIM slot. Samsung packed in an 8-megapixel rear camera and 5-megapixel front shooter in the Galaxy Tab A (2017). It launched in Vietnam for VND6,490,000, which is around CA$350. There isn’t news yet when the company plans to launch the tablet to other markets.

Source: GSMArena

The Essential Phone is now available through TELUS

If you’ve been waiting for the release of the Essential Phone, the wait is over. Here in Canada, the unit is being offered exclusively by TELUS. It comes in Black Moon and goes for $1,050 if you get it without a plan or for $290 for a $95 per month, two-year plan or $490 for a $95 per month, two-year plan. As GSMArena reports, the Camera app on this device just got an update, which fixes an issue with saving 360-degree videos. It also boosted speed of color/mono image fusion as well as other general stability fixes.

Samsung Galaxy S8 & S8+ tipped to get Android Oreo soon

A new report surfaced online claiming Samsung has begun working on Android Oreo for both the Galaxy S8 and S8+. The firmware version could be G950FXXU1BQI1 on the Galaxy S8, and G955FXXU1BQI1 on the Galaxy S8+. There isn’t word on when these updates will roll out though but hopefully it’ll come in the next few months. Other manufacturers like HTC and Huawei have said they’re going to work on bringing Android 8.0 to select devices before the year ends.

Source: SamMobile