Rugged smartphone maker Bullitt Group has licensed the Motorola brand for a new range of rugged phones. The UK-based company has signed an exclusive brand partnership with Motorola to develop and market Moto-branded drop-proof and shockproof phones globally.
For the unaware, Bullitt Group is the company behind the unique Cat, Kodak, and Land Rover smartphones we’ve seen in recent years. It entered the rugged smartphone sector back in 2009 and has since designed, manufactured, and distributed several of its Cat and Land Rover-branded smartphones in over 50 markets worldwide. Now, the company plans to bring a new range of drop-proof and shockproof Motorola phones to the market later this year.
In a statement regarding the partnership, Bullitt Group’s co-founder, Dave Floyd, said, “This is a unique strategic alliance, as it allows Bullitt to apply its expertise to the Motorola portfolio of products. Motorola invented the mobile phone and remains one of the most iconic brands in the world. To be entrusted by Motorola to create a portfolio of Motorola branded rugged phones, bears testament to the exceptional business we have built at Bullitt over the last 11 years.”
The new range of Moto-branded rugged smartphones will hit the market sometime later this year. Bullitt plans to release details about the upcoming devices later this quarter. It’s worth noting that this isn’t the first time we’ll see a ruggedized Motorola smartphone. In fact, I started my Android journey with a rugged phone from the company — the Motorola Defy — all the way back in 2010. It was one of the first mainstream Android smartphones to feature IP67 dust and water-resistance, and it also packed an impact-resistant screen. Funnily enough, it was also the reason why I first landed on the XDA Forums. While Motorola hasn’t released all that many rugged phones since then, it has launched a couple of drop-resistant devices with shatterproof screens, like the Moto Z Force and Moto Z2 Force.
Mid-range phones are getting cheap, and cheap phones are getting good. This is a trend that has taken a few years to really set in, yet it is becoming truer every year. The Redmi Note 9T is one of Xiaomi’s latest mid-range smartphones to release outside of China (where it’s known as the Redmi Note 9 5G). Powered by the MediaTek Dimensity 800U, the Redmi Note 9T is one of the phones I was most excited to get my hands on. For years, MediaTek has generally been known to offer lower-tier chipsets compared to its competitor Qualcomm. In fact, for a long time, MediaTek did not make any high-end chipsets. MediaTek’s Dimensity line of chipsets has really turned things around, though, and I’m very impressed by its performance on the Redmi Note 9T, among other things.
About this review: Xiaomi loaned me a Redmi Note 9T global unit but did not have any input regarding the content of this review.
Redmi Note 9T: Design
The Redmi Note 9T’s design is pretty unique, though it borrows some elements from the POCO X3 NFC. The back camera takes the shape of a circle with the top and bottom cut off, where the three back cameras and the flashlight reside. The back is hard, textured plastic, with the Redmi logo and regulatory information at the bottom. It’s not the most premium design, but it’s practical, functional, and sturdy. There’s also a clear gel case in the box, which offers extra protection for your new device and raised edges above the screen, along with a pre-applied screen protector.
The all-screen front is impeded only by a small chin and a hole-punch cutout for the selfie camera in the top left. The Redmi Note 9T has a Full HD+ resolution IPS LCD panel that refreshes at 60Hz and reaches brightness levels that are perfectly adequate for outdoor viewing. It’s not the best display, but it’s good quality for the price and serviceable for browsing the web, watching YouTube videos, and other general media consumption. There’s nothing that stands out about the Redmi Note 9T in terms of design, but at its price point, there doesn’t need to be. It has a pair of stereo speakers (though the bottom-firing one is a lot louder) and a 3.5mm headphone jack on the top. Finally, the Redmi Note 9T also has an IR Blaster that can be used for controlling infrared devices nearby from the Mi Remote app. The speakers are perfectly apt to listen to music or watch videos, though don’t expect premium audio performance. The microphone is good too, and I could be heard and understood clearly enough on phone calls.
The buttons on the side are clicky and functional, though they’re not the highest quality. The power button also doubles up as a fingerprint sensor, which feels slightly cheap but is completely functional and quick to unlock. Left-handed users beware: The power button/fingerprint scanner sits on the right side of the Redmi Note 9T, so you’ll either need to unlock it with your right hand or wrap your left hand around to reach it.
Redmi Note 9T: Camera quality
The camera quality of Xiaomi’s Redmi Note 9T actually impressed me, especially since I didn’t expect much from a budget device. Generally speaking, budget devices tend to cut corners when it comes to the camera in ways that it’s almost not worth using in certain situations. I didn’t really have that experience with the Redmi Note 9T, though, as I found the camera apt for many situations. As cheaper smartphones get good, including their cameras, we’re starting to see good cameras trickle down to even the cheapest of smartphones.
It’s a long way off from a genuine flagship competitor, though. Still, I feel confident in saying that most people will be happy with the Redmi Note 9T’s camera quality from both the selfie camera and the primary rear-facing camera. The images below are compressed and resized thanks to WordPress, but they give you an idea of the overall camera quality and dynamic range.
The Redmi Note 9T is a great example of how budget smartphones are getting better and better cameras. There’s no real shutter lag, either; this device is just point and shoot without any major lag or delay to note when taking photos. If you’re looking for a smartphone with a great camera and nothing more, there are certainly better options if you can spend a little more, such as the Google Pixel 4a. However, you won’t be disappointed by the Redmi Note 9T if you’re on a budget and only need to take the occasional photo.
A quick tip: Make sure to switch off the watermark in your camera settings. I left it on just for the photos above, but you can switch it off in the camera settings. If you want to leave it on for some reason, you can add a time-stamp and your own text beside the device name.
Redmi Note 9T: Performance
This is a solid and competitive mid-range device
This is one of the most interesting aspects of the Redmi Note 9T, primarily thanks to the MediaTek Dimensity 800U onboard. I didn’t really know what to expect as I’ve never used a Dimensity-powered smartphone before. I obviously wasn’t expecting a revolutionary smartphone experience, but what I did get was rather impressive for the price. I could play PUBG Mobile at HD quality, generally between 30 and 60 FPS at all times. There were occasional dips, but none that lasted too long or made the game unplayable, and you can drop the quality if you want to squeeze more FPS out.
When it comes to performance, the Redmi Note 9T isn’t the best — nowhere near it, in fact, as shown by its Geekbench score. These scores come very close to the scores produced by the Snapdragon 732G which powers devices like the POCO X3 NFC. I also ran a CPU throttling test, which showed fully sustained performance when pushed to the limit for just over 5 minutes. Past that, it throttled to around 78% of its maximum performance — not great, but not terrible, either.
This is decidedly a mid-range budget smartphone, but ultimately my experiences have shown that the Redmi Note 9T is a solid and competitive mid-range device. If you’re looking to pick up a smartphone to emulate devices more powerful than a Nintendo DS, then forget about it. The MediaTek Dimensity 800U is not made for that. If you’re looking to pick up a smartphone for basic gaming, general web browsing, social media usage, and watching TV shows or movies, then you can’t go wrong here.
MIUI 12 based on Android 10
If I’m honest, MIUI 12 is one of my favorite variants of Android. MIUI is incredibly smooth and packed full of genuinely useful features. While MIUI had a bad reputation a few years ago, I find that it now looks good and performs well. It also enables the Redmi Note 9T to have fantastic battery life, and it took me through the day easily with 5-7 hours of screen on time every day. I tend to use my phone a lot when I’m at home, though I’m also aware that being on Wi-Fi is a lot less taxing than being on mobile data when moving about throughout the day. As a result, these results aren’t the most accurate, but I’m confident in saying that the Redmi Note 9T’s 5,000 mAh battery coupled with a budget-oriented chipset has no trouble getting through the day no matter what you throw at it.
Although MIUI is as fast as ever, there is sadly still a lot of pre-installed bloatware. Facebook, TikTok, WPS Office, and Agoda all came pre-installed. Six games are also preinstalled: Block Puzzle Guardian, Crazy Juicer, Dust Settle, Tile Fun, Bubble Story, and Bubble Shooter with Friends. All pre-installed apps and games can be removed, fortunately, though it’s annoying to have to remove all of them.
Overall, this is the same MIUI you’ve come to expect in recent times, but with a few new additions. The MIUI launcher now has an app drawer, so you don’t need to install a third-party launcher for an app drawer if you want one! Still, I recommend you check out a third-party launcher to tinker with your new smartphone. I set up Niagara Launcher on my Redmi Note 9T, for example, which recently came out of beta! In any case, if you didn’t like MIUI a few months ago, you wouldn’t like it now. Though if you liked it before, you’ll definitely like it now.
Having said that, there are still a few software quirks here and there that have bothered me. For example, I discovered that a blue light filter was enabled at all times at night and was unable to be switched off. This appears to have happened because I restored a Google backup when I set the phone up, as I found that it was the AOSP blue light filter that was enabling at night automatically. In case anyone else runs into a similar issue on their unit, it’s quite easy to fix using ADB. You need to run two commands after enabling “USB debugging” and “USB debugging (security settings)” in developer options.
adb shell settings put secure night_display_activated 0
adb shell settings put secure night_display_auto_mode 0
Once I ran both of those commands, the problem went away, and MIUI’s blue light filter (dubbed “reading mode”) works fine now. I don’t understand why these values were not reset when I restored my backup, considering that you cannot enable or disable these through normal means.
Another issue I had with MIUI was that it required me to disable dark mode individually for every app. Enabling dark mode enables dark mode individually for apps that may not necessarily support it, as a workaround for apps that don’t actually have a dark mode. This can change an app’s colors and make apps look ugly, but you’ll need to turn it off individually for each app that you don’t like the look of. It’s fine for most apps, but I ran into a couple I had to switch it off for. The biggest offenders were Spotify and Facebook Messenger, where UI elements clashed, and white text was hard to read against a light gray background. It’s a useful feature for apps that don’t have a built-in dark mode, but it’s not perfect.
Conclusion: The Redmi Note 9T offers great value-for-money
The Redmi Note 9T is a fantastic budget smartphone with a powerful (for the price) chipset. It’ll satisfy the needs of the average user interested only in using their phone to watch movies, browse social media, capture a few photos, and play a few games, all on a single day’s charge. The battery life is great, the device feels good in the hand, and the display is also more than adequate at this price point. Overall, I don’t really have any complaints about the Redmi Note 9T that won’t seem like nitpicking given its price, and the biggest issues that I do have are all fixable in software.
You can pick up the Redmi Note 9T in Europe at €229 for the 4GB + 64GB variant or €269 for the 4GB + 128GB variant. In the UK, the Redmi Note 9T costs £229 for the base 4GB + 64GB model, while the 4GB + 128GB storage model costs just £249.
At a starting price of £229/€229, there's little room for complaints about Xiaomi's Redmi Note 9T. In fact, I like almost everything about it considering its price.
Google has begun testing a dark mode for Google Search on Windows 10 and macOS. As is usually the case with Google’s feature rollouts, this one too seems to be part of an A/B test, and as such, it’s not available for everyone just yet.
Many users on Windows and macOS are receiving a notification (via Windows Latest) inviting them to try out a new dark theme, which, once enabled, turns the Google Search pages to dark gray for a comfortable nighttime reading experience. Users will have the option to set the theme to Light, Dark, and System Default. Setting the option to System Default will match the current theme of your operating system. Notably, the dark mode has been available on Google Search for Android for months now but it’s only now that Google is bringing it to desktop users.
Google has been testing the dark theme on Search since late last year, with many users reporting to have their Search pages turned dark gray out of nowhere. At the time, Google experimented with the new dark theme with a tiny subset of users and even reverted it in a few days. But this time around, the testing seems to be broader. I received the dark theme notification in Microsoft Edge last evening, but I accidentally clicked on “No thanks” and couldn’t trigger it again.
If it’s not available on your desktop yet, you always have the option to use force dark mode (if you’re using a Chromium-based browser) or use an extension like Dark Reader, which lets you apply a dark theme to any website.
The dark theme for Google Search on desktop comes as part of Google’s broader push to add a dark mode to its every app and service. Over the last year, we have seen many Google products gaining a native dark mode, including the Google Pay app, Google Translate, Google Docs, Google Chrome on desktop, and many more.
Google has been experimenting with the in-app browser implementation in the Google app for well over a year now. The company first removed the Chrome Custom Tab implementation in favor of a new in-app browser back in April last year. However, the in-app browser was pulled soon thereafter as it wasn’t particularly well-liked. A few months down the line, the Google app received the new in-app browser once again with a couple of tweaks.
Earlier this year, Google redesigned the in-app browser yet again and moved its controls from the top-right corner of the app bar to the bottom for easier access. Now, according to a recent report from 9to5Google, the redesigned in-app browser is getting yet another update that brings a significant new feature.
The new feature is rolling out with version 12.4 beta of the Google app. It adds a new “People also view” page within the in-app browser that can be accessed by swiping up on the bottom bar. The page features the Google logo at the top and it shows a feed of articles and videos related to the Discover or Search link you opened in the browser. As you can see in the attached screenshots, the page contains both full-width cards and carousels.
The People also view page is a useful addition to the in-app browser in the Google app, as it will let users easily learn more about a topic while staying in the same browser window. 9to5Google speculates that custom features like this page are probably why Google ditched the Chrome Custom Tab implementation in favor of the new browser experience for the app.
As mentioned earlier, the new feature is only available on the Google app v.12.4 beta at the moment. We’ll update this post as soon as the feature starts rolling out to more users in the stable channel.
Waze has introduced convenient integration with services like Spotify, YouTube Music, and Amazon Music. Now, the navigation app is introducing integration with Audible, so road warriors can keep the story going when traveling to their next destination.
The new integration is thanks to the audiobook service joining Waze’s Audio Player Program, giving users easy access to the Amazon-owned service’s over 600,000 originals, audiobooks, and podcasts.
“We are very excited to kick off 2021 by welcoming Audible into the Audio Player family,” said Adam Fried, Head of Global Partnerships at Waze. “Audible is such a beloved brand with a huge catalogue of content and we’re thrilled to be able to bring it straight to their drives. Our users have already driven over 100 billion kilometers while listening to content from streaming services on our Audio Player, and we can’t wait to bring this experience to even more users thanks to our collaboration with Audible.”
To access your Audible content from Waze, tap the music note icon to select the service as the audio player. That’s pretty much it. Waze will also integrate within the Audible app, so you have an audiobook open, you’ll still see notifications when you’re navigating.
“We’re delighted to be able to offer our members around the world a new way to access Audible,” said Derek Murphy, VP, Business Development at Audible. “Whether you’re listening to the latest Audible Original or catching up on a recent best-seller, Audible on Waze allows you to seamlessly enjoy audio content that entertains, inspires and informs you.”
As we mentioned, Waze has welcome integration with a host of streaming services already. As far back as 2019, services like Pandora, Deezer, iHeartRadio, NPR One, and TuneIn were all integrated with Waze’s Audio Player Program. People may be driving less thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, but it’s still nice to see more options continue to be added. The latest integration with Waze should be available now.
Google has made the web version of YouTube Music available as a Progressive Web App (PWA) in the Play Store for Chromebooks. The move comes after Google did the same for apps like YouTube TV, Google News, and Twitter.
The release of the music streaming service as a PWA comes with a few interesting caveats, as noted by ChromeUnboxed. First, finding the app is difficult if you don’t know what to search for. The report says users must type in “YouTube Music for Chromebook” in the Play Store for the right result to appear.
“Searching only for YouTube Music will deliver the standard app version,” according to Chrome Unboxed. “If you fail to include the ‘…for Chromebook’ part, the Play Store will simply route you to the standard version with no other options.”
That being said, there are some differences between the PWA and Android app. The PWA apparently looks a little nicer and is more reliable. However, it doesn’t offer offline, downloadable content. For people who rely on those features, you’ll want to skip the PWA of YouTube Music for now. That’s why Google appears to be leaving up two listings.
The listing of YouTube Music for Chromebook is described as “the recommended YouTube Music experience for Chromebook.” Users will still have access to more than 70 million songs, including curated playlists, and all their personalized and custom playlists that have previously been created.
Unfortunately, Casting isn’t native in the application, which means if you’re casting music from your Chromebook and a notification comes in, your music will dip in volume. That could get really annoying if you have constant notifications streaming in.
It’s a bit confusing, but Google tries to make it crystal clear which version you’re downloading. We’ve also included a link to YouTube Music for Chromebook down below.
Clubhouse is the latest social network to take the world by storm, which can only mean one thing: Facebook is going to clone it.
According to the New York Times, Facebook is developing an audio chat app similar to Clubhouse, but the project is in the very early stages. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg actually appeared in a Clubhouse room over the weekend to talk about AR and VR, so he must have really enjoyed the experience. Apparently, Zuckerberg has been interested in audio communication for some time.
“Facebook executives have ordered employees to create a similar product, said the people, who were not authorized to speak publicly,” the New York Times wrote.
Facebook has never been shy about cloning features from competitors. And if it can’t beat the competition, it simply buys them, like in the case of Instagram and WhatsApp. Since purchasing Instagram, Facebook has introduced features like Stories and Reels, which were inspired by Snapchat and TikTok. Facebook also cloned Zoom after the video conferencing app shot up in popularity.
Since launching in beta, the invite-only Clubhouse app has become a phenomenon. Essentially, people can join a room where hosts can chat about any topic they want, from activism to sports to photography. It’s like a modern chatroom, but you’re using audio instead of text. Needless to say it’s the hot new thing, with the social network already garnering 2 million weekly users, according to NYT.
What makes Clubhouse so popular is it allows people to get advice and exchange information about important topics. You can get advice from experts in business, for example, or learn about photography from people who have spent years in the industry.
Facebook isn’t the only social network with its sights on Clubhouse. Twitter has also started testing a Clubhouse-like feature called Spaces, which will allow like-minded individuals to chat together.
