Google Play Music makes its way to Canada at last

Here’s another Google-related news update that’s sure to please music lovers out there. Google has finally brought its Play Music service to Canada. It’s been quite a wait but for people looking for an alternative to iTunes or Rdio. You can listen to an ad-free, interactive radio station from artists or songs you love, browse through curated songs by Google’s music team, shop for songs, and store around 20,000 songs for online. There is an offline listening capability for your choice of albums and playlists as well.

If you sign up for the service now, you pay $7.99 a month and get the first 30 days free. But if you wait until after June 30, you will pay $9.99 per month with the first 30 days free as well.  According to Engadget, you will need to clear the cache of the Android app to see the new services. For iOS users, you can download Google Play Music here.

Source: Google Canada

Google Drive update pushes users to download standalone apps to edit files

Google is taking the fight to the mobile version of Microsoft Office with its new update for Drive. The former cloud storage and document editing app now just serves as cloud storage for your documents and files. If you want to edit your files, you will be prompted to download the standalone Docs or Sheets (depending on the file type). A standalone Slides app for presentations will be coming soon as well.

This might inconvenience you at first but the separate editing apps bring the possibility of offline editing and Drive now supports password-protect access to your cloud storage. The update has rolled out on the iOS version of the app and will be coming out for Android soon.

Source: The Verge

Leaks of HTC One Mini 2 emerge

Renders of the mini version of HTC One M8 have surfaced online. What are the differences and similarities with its flagship brother? It will reportedly (and obviously) sport less powerful specs and a lower display. The One Mini 2 will also not have the dual-sensor Duo Camera and dual LED flash and will have a different position for the sensors and power button. It will have the metal body but will have a plastic rim around the screen and on top. The color palette seems to be similar to the One M8, too, with brushed silver, gold, and gunmetal options. Other than that, there isn’t any additional information yet. We’d still have to wait for official confirmation from HTC about this smartphone. What do you think? Will you buy a One Mini 2 if and when it comes out?

Source: Android Central + @evleaks

SanDisk introduces new large capacity SSDs

Solid state drives are known to improve performance but have been limited when it comes to storage capacity. That is about to change with the new 2.5” drives from SanDisk. The company has introduced Optimus Max SSD line with 4TB capacity. And they also intend to introduce an 8TB and 16TB models in the future. According to the company, performance numbers of these drives allow for sequential read/write of up to 400/400 MB/s and random read/write IOPS of 75K/15K. We’re sure these drives won’t come cheap but they do say it would offer the high performance drives “at consumer costs.” We’ll let you know if we find out more information.

Source: Ubergizmo