Taskbar 6.0 enables a Samsung DeX-like desktop mode experience on some Android 10+ devices

Android 10 has been out for nearly 9 months now, but one of its best features, desktop mode, is still widely unknown. That’s because it’s technically hidden in Android 10, requiring a development flag to be enabled as well as support built-in to the stock launcher app. Thankfully, the developer of Taskbar has figured out a way to make Android 10’s desktop mode far more useful, bringing a Samsung DeX-like experience to some devices.

For some background, Android 10 added a “Secondary Launcher” activity to Launcher3, the AOSP launcher app that Google’s Pixel Launcher and many other OEM launcher apps are derived from. When an Android device with support for display output is hooked up to an external display, this Secondary Launcher activity is shown on the external display. However, because this Secondary Launcher is extremely barebones, it’s not useful to use as a productivity tool. Third-party app developers figured out that it’s possible for their own launcher apps to replace the stock launcher on the external display, and that’s exactly what XDA Senior Member farmerbb has implemented in Taskbar 6.0.

Taskbar is an open-source Android app that puts a floating start menu and recent apps tray on top of any screen. Since it supports launching Android apps in freeform multi-window, it even comes pre-installed on Bliss OS, a popular Android port for x86 PCs. Back in early November, farmerbb released a fork of the open-source Lawnchair launcher with Taskbar integrated into it. This gave us an early look at what Android 10’s hidden desktop mode could look like with some development effort, but there were some glaring issues that needed fixing. The desktop mode user experience needed fixing so that freeform multi-window behavior worked as you would expect, the setup process needed to be cleaned up so you could control the DPI/UI without needing another app, and a better solution had to be found so that you wouldn’t have to change your default launcher. Now, farmerbb has updated Taskbar to version 6.0 to address all of these issues.

Desktop Mode with Taskbar 6.0

Setting up Taskbar’s desktop mode is quite easy:

1. In Developer Options, turn on “enable freeform windows” and “force desktop mode” and then reboot your device. (The latter may be unavailable on some OEM software like ZenUI/ROG UI, but don’t worry if it’s not there.)
2. Install Taskbar 6.0 (older versions won’t work) from Google Play.
3. Open Taskbar’s settings and go to “Desktop Mode.” Enable it and grant the app permission to “display over other apps” as this is required for the app’s floating start menu to appear. Then, set the app as your default home app. Don’t worry, though, as the next prompt will ask you to set your preferred/primary launcher app, so Taskbar won’t be hijacking your home screen. (Note that on some devices, changing the default launcher will disable Android 10’s full-screen navigation gestures.)
4. Next, I highly recommend you follow the instructions to “enable additional settings” for desktop mode. This will allow you to lower the DPI so UI elements aren’t enormous on the external display, to hide the navigation bar, and to even dim the phone’s screen to save battery life while it’s connected to the external display. You’ll have to set up ADB access on your PC and run the following command:

   adb shell pm grant com.farmerbb.taskbar android.permission.WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS

   (If you are using Taskbar’s “Donate” version, replace “com.farmerbb.taskbar” with “com.farmerbb.taskbar.paid” in the above command.)

5. Finally, check to make sure that “usage access” has been enabled for Taskbar. Doing so will allow the app to show a row of your recently used applications in the start menu.
6. Now, simply connect your phone to your external display using a USB Type-C to Type-C cable (if your external display supports Type-C input) or via a USB Type-C to HDMI adapter.

Once connected, you can use the start menu to launch apps, search for apps, add app icons to the home screen, open some system menus, and more. You can tap the icon next to the start menu to add/show widgets. You can launch multiple instances of windows, and in some cases like Google Chrome, have multiple tabs.

There are loads of other options and changes in Taskbar 6.0, so I recommend you read the full changelog available here.

Display Output on Android – Sadly Still Limited

Who might this be useful for? Samsung, Huawei/Honor, and LG offer their own desktop mode experiences, so there’s you won’t find much use out of Taskbar’s desktop mode if you own a smartphone from one of those brands. ASUS, OnePlus, Essential, Google, and Xiaomi don’t offer their own desktop mode experiences, so if you’re on at least Android 10 on a device from one of these brands, then you may find Taskbar’s desktop mode feature to be useful. If you want a desktop mode experience to be more productive, then I recommend you use a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse. If you have a portable external monitor/laptop chassis like the NexDock 2, then you’ll have an even better experience with Taskbar.

Keep in mind that in order to actually make use of this feature, your smartphone must support display output. Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon 800 and 700 series chipsets natively support DisplayPort Alternate Mode over a USB 3.1 Type-C port, but some vendors (like Google) have disabled this functionality on their smartphones. If your device doesn’t support DisplayPort Alternate Mode, then you may have luck using a DisplayLink-certified adapter and the DisplayLink Presenter app to mirror the phone’s display. Screen mirroring using a DisplayLink adapter isn’t as ideal as native desktop mode through a standard connector, but it’s better than not having any display output at all! Fortunately, Taskbar can still be used if you’re just mirroring your phone’s display so long as the app is set as the default launcher, but you’ll have to use the developer’s SecondScreen app to change the resolution and density.

The biggest downside to desktop mode on Android right now is the limited app support. Even though Samsung and Huawei have both offered desktop mode experiences for years and sell millions of smartphones a year, there’s not a lot of demand from users to support desktop mode. That means that a lot of Android apps out there aren’t optimized for larger screens. Google wants to change that because broader Android app support for larger screens will benefit Chromebooks as well, but sadly, there’s still a long way to go before most Android apps support larger screens. Thus, while using Taskbar, you may notice that some apps refuse to run or just look terrible, and there’s not much you can do to fix that.

Download Taskbar 6.0

If you have one of the following smartphones, I recommend giving this app a try:

• ASUS ROG Phone II
• Essential Phone
• OnePlus 7
• OnePlus 7 Pro
• OnePlus 7T
• OnePlus 7T Pro
• OnePlus 8
• OnePlus 8 Pro
• OPPO Reno 10X Zoom

You can download Taskbar 6.0 from the Google Play Store link below or compile the app from its source code on GitHub. The app is totally free to use, but there’s a $1.99 donate version in case you want to support farmerbb’s development efforts.

Taskbar Forum Thread on XDA ||| Taskbar Source Code on GitHub

Taskbar - PC-style productivity for Android (Free, Google Play) →

Taskbar (Donate Version) ($1.99, Google Play) →

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LineageOS 17.1 adds support for new OnePlus, Samsung, Xiaomi, and other devices following server hack

LineageOS is the most popular AOSP-based custom ROM out there. Its origin can be traced back to CyanogenMod, which was itself not only the most well-known custom ROM many years ago but also the reason the OnePlus One was so well-received by the community. Over the years, the team behind LineageOS has kept the project updated with new versions of Android for dozens of Android devices. The latest version, LineageOS 17.1, is based on Android 10 and supports a long list of devices. Now, the custom ROM team has added official support for their latest release for a lot of devices from OnePlus, Samsung, Xiaomi, and more. Newly added devices include the Essential Phone, Moto X (2014), Samsung Galaxy A5 (2016), Redmi Note 5 Pro, and more.

The LineageOS team recently decided to cease the development of LineageOS 15.1 and jump to version 17.1 rather than 17.0 after they decided to rebase on top of the updated AOSP release corresponding to the Pixel 4/4 XL launch. With the update, the team also announced Lineage Recovery as the default option to install LineageOS on officially supported phones. 17.1 also added a new ThemePicker, a partial screenshot feature, and a lot more.

You can find the new LineageOS nightly builds for each of the following devices by tapping on “Get the builds here” on their respective Wiki pages. All of the devices listed here except for the Samsung Galaxy Grand 2 Duos are supported by LineageOS 17.1. The newly added Grand 2 Duos is supported by LineageOS 16 based on Android 9 Pie.

Device + XDA Forum Link	Code-name + Wiki Page	Maintainer(s)
Essential Phone	mata	haggertk, intervigil, npjohnson, rashed
Motorola Moto X (2014)	victara	jro1979, linckandrea, npjohnson
OnePlus 2	oneplus2	OzzysCmAcc, aviraxp
OnePlus 7	guacamoleb (mirror)*	AshwinRC
Samsung Galaxy A3 (2016)	a3xelte	danwood76, Stricted
Samsung Galaxy A5 (2016)	a5xelte	danwood76, Stricted
Samsung Galaxy Grand 2 Duos	ms013g (mirror)*	djchittoor
Samsung Galaxy S5 Neo	s5neolte	danwood76, Stricted
Wileyfox Swift	crackling	115ek
Xiaomi Mi A2	jasmine_sprout (mirror)*	mikeioannina
Xiaomi Mi 6X	wayne (mirror)*	Isaac Chen
Xiaomi Mi Note 3	jason	dianlujitao
Xiaomi Redmi 2	wt88047	nicknitewolf
Xiaomi Redmi 7	onclite (mirror)*	Dhina17
Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 Pro	whyred (mirror)*	srfarias, SebaUbuntu
Xiaomi Redmi Note 6 Pro	twolip (mirror)*	DD3Boh
Xiaomi Redmi Note 7	lavender (mirror)*	erfanoabdi

*Some of the download pages for newly added devices return a code 500 “Internal Server Error.” Until this bug is fixed, you can download the official builds from the official LineageOS download mirror. For those devices that require it, the download mirror for LineageOS Recovery can be found here.

Be sure to read the installation instructions for each of the devices as well as the other documentation linked such as for Lineage Recovery. Also, be sure to take a backup of your data before you start with the installation process.

Why the delay?

If you’re wondering why LineageOS has had a delay in getting new builds up, the answer is because LineageOS suffered a hack in early May. According to a statement published by the team on May 3rd, an attacker “used a CVE in our saltstack master to gain access to our infrastructure.” Salt is an open-source framework to manage servers that is used by loads of open-source projects like LineageOS. On April 30th, Cybersecurity firm F-Secure publicly disclosed a vulnerability in Salt that could be used to bypass authorization. Attackers quickly targeted Salt installations that were unpatched, resulting in dozens of servers being hacked.

The LineageOS team identified the attack and then quickly took down its servers. The team confirms that their build signing keys are unaffected (so third-parties can’t sign and distribute official LineageOS builds), the currently uploaded builds themselves are unaffected, and the project’s source code is unaffected.

Around 8PM PST on May 2nd, 2020 an attacker used a CVE in our saltstack master to gain access to our infrastructure.

We are able to verify that:
– Signing keys are unaffected.
– Builds are unaffected.
– Source code is unaffected.

See https://t.co/85fvp6Gj2h for more info.

— LineageOS (@LineageAndroid) May 3, 2020

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Night Vision uses the ToF camera on the Samsung Galaxy S20+, Note 10+, and S10 5G to let you see in the dark

Hardware-backed facial recognition in the Android smartphone world often relies on Time-of-Flight (ToF) sensors. Samsung, for example, utilizes the ToF module on the 5G variant of the Galaxy S10 to power their 3D face unlock mechanism. The ToF camera tracks the distance between two objects based on the constant speed of light. Developers have also used data from this camera to create virtual 3D models with depth data to render the surroundings as a pseudo-night vision mode. We first saw this work on certain Huawei and Honor phones in the past with the help of an app named Night Vision / ToF Viewer, and the same app can help you to turn your Samsung Galaxy S20+, Samsung Galaxy Note 10+, or Samsung Galaxy S10 5G into a somewhat functional, but mostly gimmicky, night vision camera.

Galaxy S20+ Forums ||| Galaxy Note 10+ Forums ||| Galaxy S10 5G Forums

When we first tinkered with the app back in 2019, it wasn’t made to detect the Galaxy S10 5G’s ToF sensor. The developer, Luboš Vonásek, worked hard to gradually expand the list of supported devices with ToF cameras. The Android 10/One UI 2.0 update for the Galaxy S10 5G apparently made it easy to handle the ToF module, albeit the output is still limited to a low resolution of 240×180. On newer Samsung devices, such as the Galaxy Note 10+ and Galaxy S20+, the app can render the surroundings in night vision mode with a better resolution of 320×240.

Night Vision/TOF Viewer on the Samsung Galaxy Note 10+. Image credits: Reddit user /u/toelingus

According to our own Max Weinbach, using Night Vision on Samsung provides better quality, while you can get a better range on Huawei devices. The VR mode in this app is no longer accessible since the last update, though, as the developer removed it completely. There is no complicated prerequisite – owners of the aforementioned phones can straight away download it from the Google Play Store without messing with ADB and/or any kind of system file modding.

Night Vision / ToF Viewer (Free, Google Play) →

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Credits to Reddit user toelingus for the screenshot!

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[Update: Delayed] Google will launch the Android 11 Beta on June 3rd, releases Developer Preview 4 today

Update 1 (05/30/2020 @ 01:07 AM ET): Google has announced that the launch and event scheduled for June 3, 2020, has been postponed. Scroll to the bottom for more information. The article as published on May 6, 2020, is preserved below.

Google announced the first Android 11 Developer Preview back in February. The first Developer Preview was released earlier than we expected because Google wanted to give developers more time to adapt to their apps to the new APIs and platform behaviors. Since DP 1, two more Developer Preview builds have been rolled out to the Pixel 2 onward. If it weren’t for the COVID-19 pandemic, Google would have released the first Android 11 Beta at Google I/O event, which was scheduled for May 12th-14th. This delay has impacted the Android 11 release timeline, and the tech giant has now announced that they are pushing back the release of the first Android 11 Beta. The first beta will now be revealed at an online event on June 3rd, 2020. To make up for the new gap between DP3 and Beta 1, Google is releasing Android 11 Developer Preview 4.

Google has aptly titled next month’s online event “#Android 11: The Beta Launch Show.” During this event, Google will release Android 11 Beta 1 which will contain the final SDK and NDK APIs. Google will also open up Play Store submissions for apps targeting the new Android version. Citing this change in plan, Google has also released an updated timeline for the release schedule.

Older Beta timeline

Updated Beta timeline

While Google had initially charted its plan to release only three Android 11 Developer Previews, it is releasing the Developer Preview 4 to fill up the gap caused by the delay in the release of Beta 1. Starting today, the DP4 builds for the Google Pixel 2/2 XL, Pixel 3/3 XL, Pixel 3a/3a XL, and Pixel 4/4 XL will be available for download. You can flash these builds manually to try out the upcoming Android version or wait for an OTA if you’re already enrolled in the Beta program.

Since Android 11 Beta 1 has been pushed back by about a month, Beta 2 will now be released in July instead of June. As with the previous schedule, Beta 2 will be the “Platform Stability” release. Google introduced this milestone with Android 11 to signify the finalization of internal and external APIs, app-facing behaviors, and non-SDK graylisting. According to official communication from Google, Android 11 Beta 3 will be released in August 2020, and this will be the “Release candidate” build. The Final Release is still expected to be available in Q3, which means it shouldn’t be pushed back to October or months after that.

While the exact date for Beta 2 onwards was not released, Flame Group – a company that consults with OEMs and ODMs to help them receive GMS certifications for devices – mentioned in a blog post that the “Final Release Candidate,” which is most likely Beta 2, will be released on July 6th. While Beta 3 is intended to be the Release candidate build, it appears that Flame Group is referring to Beta 2 when it talks about the “Final Release candidate.” Furthermore, the blog post states that Google will publish the Android 11 source code to the AOSP git repository on September 8th, 2020. Our source corroborates the information laid out in this blog post, as it is apparently information that Google shared with its partner OEMs.

Android 11 News on XDA

Android 11: The Beta Launch Show to substitute Google I/O 2020?

At the Android 11: The Beta Launch Show, Google will also be hosting a series of online talks and webinars for topics that were initially supposed to be covered at Google I/O 2020. The talks ranging “from Jetpack Compose to Android Studio and Google Play” will be held following the post-show Q&A session after the announcement launch. You can register yourself to get notified of the event on this page.

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Update: Google postpones Android 11 Beta Launch Show

Google has announced that the Android 11 Beta Launch Show has been postponed.

We are excited to tell you more about Android 11, but now is not the time to celebrate. We are postponing the June 3rd event and beta release. We’ll be back with more on Android 11, soon.

— Android Developers (@AndroidDev) May 30, 2020

The next date has not been announced yet.

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Samsung Access program quietly launches for the Galaxy S20 with Premium Care and Microsoft 365 included

A few years ago, Apple launched its iPhone Upgrade Program. Apple’s program offered a great deal where every year you could pay a low monthly fee to have the option to upgrade your iPhone while continuing those monthly payments. Carriers and other device makers emulated this idea but started to add their own offers to improve upon it. Samsung, of course, was one of the companies that emulated that idea with the Samsung Upgrade Program. Now, Samsung has quietly launched a new program called “Samsung Access” that provides even more benefits at a lower cost.

Samsung Access, which we spotted earlier today on Samsung.com, is a bit different than the previous Samsung Upgrade Program in terms of benefits. Both Samsung Access and the previous Samsung Upgrade Program have you finance a new phone through monthly payments and later allow you to trade in the phone for the value that’s left. For example, if you had the Samsung Galaxy S10 for a year and paid $30 a month for 12 months ($360 total), you would have owed $540 left on the balance on the device. If you wanted to upgrade to the Samsung Galaxy S20 after it launched, you would send back the Galaxy S10 to Samsung so they could void the $540 and allow you to start a new contract for a new monthly fee for the new device.

Samsung Access works the same way for upgrading. If you wanted to keep the device instead of upgrading, you are able to pay off the full balance or just not upgrade and continue your financing which takes 36 months or 3 years.

If you are like me and like to upgrade a lot, that’s also a possibility with Samsung Access. You are able to upgrade your phone for no fee every 9 months. If you wanted to upgrade earlier in the cycle, say for example from the latest Galaxy Note to Galaxy S series or vice versa, you can do so if you pay a $100 fee. In the long run, you would likely save money using this service instead of buying and trading in phones every time a new one launches.

Samsung Access – Other Benefits

What makes Samsung Access better than the Samsung Upgrade Program are the other parts that are included in the monthly subscription. Samsung Access includes both Microsoft 365, which itself includes 1TB of OneDrive storage, and Samsung Premium Care. Microsoft 365 gives you full access to the Microsoft Office suite, including Outlook, Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Skype, and Teams. The 1TB of OneDrive storage, which is included in a Microsoft 365 subscription, is especially useful on Samsung phones. You are able to link your Samsung and Microsoft accounts to use the 1TB of storage for photo backups in the Samsung Gallery app or Samsung Cloud storage for backups. The other benefit, Premium Care, is Samsung’s insurance program. If you break your phone, you are able to get it replaced or repaired for a $99 deductible up to three times in a 12 month period.

Samsung Access is available for the Samsung Galaxy S20 series only. When financing the Galaxy S20 series, it costs $37 a month for the Galaxy S20, $42 a month for the Galaxy S20+, and $48 a month for the Galaxy S20 Ultra. In my view, this is actually a great deal. If you were to sign up for Samsung Financing, Premium Care, and Microsoft 365 separately, it would cost you an extra $9 per month. That might not seem like much, but over the 36 months of the contract, you would save $324. That’s ignoring the money you can save from the upgrade program. If you want to cancel, you are also able to return the phone for free after 3 months. If you want to cancel before those 3 months, though, you will owe a $100 fee.

These programs are actually really good for those early adopters who love to upgrade (like me). It makes upgrading easy and painless along with not having to worry about accidental damage since it’s covered under Premium Care. All around, this is a pretty great upgrade deal. For a visual overview of what’s offered in Samsung Access, check out the video below that Samsung uploaded to their YouTube channel today. Otherwise, hit up the Samsung Access page and read the FAQs to get all the nitty-gritty details.

Samsung Access for Mobile ||| Samsung Access FAQs

Oh, and Samsung Access is also available for Samsung TVs, in case you’re interested.

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Realme 5 and Realme 5s start getting Android 10 with Realme UI

Launched back in August 2019, the Realme 5 was one of the first phones from the Chinese brand to feature the mid-range Qualcomm Snapdragon 665 chip. The affordable quad-camera phone comes with a 12MP primary camera and runs ColorOS 6 on top of Android 9 Pie. Within a few months, Realme refreshed the device with a 48MP Samsung ISOCELL Bright GM1 sensor and launched it as the Realme 5s. According to the update roadmap shared by Realme India’s CEO Madhav Sheth, the phone duo is scheduled to receive a taste of Android 10-based Realme UI in May. The company has kept their promise as it has now rolled out the stable Realme UI update with Android 10 to the Realme 5 and the Realme 5s.

Realme 5 XDA Forums

Earlier this month, Realme started an initiative called “Realme UI Early Access” for the owners of the Realme 5/5s, which served as a pilot open beta testing before the actual rollout. The current stable Android 10 build is tagged as RMX1925EX_11_C.39, and it brings in several new features such as Focus Mode, optimized three-finger screenshot, and a revamped camera UI. It is worth mentioning that the Realme 5 and the 5s share a common firmware due to their internal similarities.

Thanks to Realme Community user mmmllL for the screenshot!

The combined changelog for the Realme UI 1.0 update for the Realme 5/5s is as follows:

Realme UI 1.0 (Android 10) update changelog for the Realme 5/5s

• Visuals
  • Updated UI to realme UI
  • Brand new Real Design makes visuals more attractive and operation more efficient.
• Smart Sidebar
  • Optimized user interface and improved one-handed operation.
  • Optimized Smart Sidebar: Replaced File Console with File Manager; removed OSIE Visual Effect and No Notification Alerts.
  • Drag an app out of Smart Sidebar to open it in Split-screen Mode.
  • Added two new features: “Assistive Ball Opacity” and “Hide Assistive Ball on Fullscreen App”.
  • Optimized the Floating Window feature for more apps.
  • Added Bubbles: A bubble is displayed when you open an app in a floating window from the Smart Sidebar. Tap the bubble to collapse or open the app.
• Screenshot
  • Optimized 3-Finger Screenshot Gesture: Use 3 fingers to touch and hold the screen, and swipe to take a screenshot of the selected part of the screen (partial screen capture). Use 3 fingers to touch and hold the screen, and swipe your fingers outwards to capture a long screenshot.
  • Added screenshot settings: You can adjust the position of the screenshot preview floating window and set the screenshot sound.
  • Optimized screenshot preview floating window: After taking a screenshot, drag it up and release to share it, or drag it down and release to take a long screenshot.
• Navigation Gestures 3.0
  • Optimized gestures: All gestures are supported in landscape mode.
• System
  • Added Focus Mode: Minimizes outside distractions when you are learning or working.
  • Added whole new charging animation.
  • Optimized the Quick Settings user interface for easier one-handed operation.
  • Added pause feature for screen recording.
  • Added a floating window and settings for screen recording.
  • New sounds added for file deletion, calculator key touches, and compass pointer.
  • Optimized system built-in ringtones.
  • Added TalkBack floating prompts for Accessibility.
  • New management feature for recent tasks: You can view memory of recent tasks and locked apps.
• Games
  • Optimized visual interaction for Game Space.
  • Optimized loading animation for Game Space.
• Homescreen
  • Added new live wallpapers.
  • Added artistic wallpapers.
  • Added option to open Global Search or the notification panel when swiping down on homescreen.
  • Added option to customize the size, shape, and style of app icons on homescreen.
  • Optimized the graphic design of password unlock to facilitate one-handed operation.
  • Support for animated wallpapers on the lockscreen.
  • Added a Simple Mode for homescreen, featuring larger fonts, icons and a clearer layout.
• Security
  • Random MAC address Generator: When your phone is connected to Wi-Fi network system generates a random MAC address to avoid targeted ads and protect your privacy.
• Tools
  • In Quick Settings or Smart Sidebar, you can open Calculator in a floating window.
  • Added the trim feature in Recordings.
  • Added the Weather (dynamic) ringtone, which automatically adapts to the current weather.
  • Added weather-adaptive animations in Weather.
• Camera
  • Optimized the Camera UI for better user experience.
  • Optimized the Timer UI and sound.
• Photos
  • Optimized the Album UI for a clearer structure and photo thumbnails.
  • Added Album Recommendations that recognize more than 80 different scenes.
• Communications
  • realme Share now supports sharing files with OPPO, Vivo and Xiaomi devices.
  • Optimized the Contacts UI for a more efficient experience.
• Network
  • Added Airtel and Jio VoWiFi feature
• Settings
  • Search Settings now supports fuzzy match and contains a search history.

Users interested in downloading this update should expect an over-the-air update to arrive on their phones soon. If it’s not available for your device yet, then you can enroll yourself in the “Application Channel” (Realme 5, Realme 5s) to bypass the standard staggered rollout scheme. We will update this article as soon as we get the manual download links.

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Source: Realme (1, 2)

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The Samsung Galaxy A71s 5G UW may launch on Verizon with support for the carrier’s Ultrawide Band network

Flagship smartphones have become really expensive this year, with many at or beyond the $1,000 mark. The Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 is apparently a really expensive chip because it doesn’t come with a modem and also 5G is just really complex. Fortunately, there’s the cheaper (but less powerful) Qualcomm Snapdragon 765 which includes an integrated 5G modem. We earlier found evidence that the U.S.-bound Galaxy A71 5G will feature this chipset when it lands on Verizon. There was some doubt about whether the Verizon model will support the carrier’s Ultrawide Band network when it launches, but now, we’ve spotted evidence that the device will indeed support Verizon’s mmWave network.

In some regulatory documents that were recently published, we spotted the marketing name of the device corresponding to model name SM-A716V. SM-A716V, if you’ll recall, is the model name we spotted last week on the Bluetooth SIG that appeared alongside the product name “Galaxy-A71-5g US VERIZON.” Today’s regulatory filing indicates this device may actually be marketed on Verizon as the Samsung Galaxy A71s 5G UW.

This name is important for a few reasons. First, it tells us that Verizon may carry the phone under the “Galaxy A71s 5G” branding which has yet to be announced. However, we expect the phone overall to be very similar to the other U.S. Galaxy A71 5G models. The “UW” part of the name tells us the phone will support connecting to Verizon’s Ultrawide Band network which operates in mmWave frequencies. Verizon has appended the “UW” branding to the name of several 5G devices they carry such as the OnePlus 8 5G UW, Galaxy S20 5G UW, LG V60 5G ThinQ UW, and more.

As we reported last week, the United States version of the Samsung Galaxy A71 5G should use the Qualcomm Snapdragon 765 chipset. The 765, 765G, and 768G are the only chipsets from Qualcomm with integrated 5G modems. That modem is the Snapdragon X52, and like the Snapdragon X55 modem paired with Snapdragon 865 devices, the X52 supports both mmWave and sub-6GHz 5G networks. While we’ve seen other Snapdragon 765-powered devices with support for sub-6GHz 5G, the Galaxy A71s 5G UW would be the first Snapdragon 765 device to support mmWave 5G. It would also be the first mid-range smartphone to support Verizon’s 5G network if you exclude the Moto Z3 and Moto Z4 which required a $350 Moto Mod.

While Verizon’s mmWave network has proven to be very fast, the coverage isn’t great. You would need an uninterrupted direct line of sight with the broadcast antenna. Verizon has claimed to be launching a low-band 5G network later this year but the carrier hasn’t given any specific locations yet. The Galaxy A71s 5G UW should support the current mmWave network and the upcoming low-band network when it launches.

Keep in mind that although the information in this article comes from an official regulatory filing from Samsung, there’s a possibility that there’s an error in the filing. We will have to wait for the official launch from Verizon for more information about the phone and network compatibility.

Featured image: Samsung Galaxy A71 in pink

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OnePlus 8 series camera updates will bring color filters to portrait mode, improved white balance, and more

The OnePlus 8 has been in the news recently for its camera, but not in the way you might expect. People discovered that the OnePlus 8 Pro’s camera could use the Photochrom filter to see through certain things, including thin clothing. OnePlus made the decision to disable the feature and rework it. But that’s just one part of the OnePlus 8 series’ camera capability, and the company is continuing to work on it.

OnePlus 8 XDA Forums || OnePlus 8 Pro XDA Forums

Last week, the folks at OnePlus had an online Open Ears Forum about the OnePlus 8’s camera technology. During the meeting, some new features for the OnePlus 8 series were floated to users for feedback. Those features haven’t been revealed yet, but the company has shared some actions they will be taking based on feedback:

• Continue improving white balance consistency across all lenses
• Reduce the haloing seen on some HDR portrait shots
• Improve UX for AE lock
• Add more color filters and bring them to portrait mode
• Show visual cue when tripod mode is triggered
• Keep optimizing post-processing strategy

These things seem like pretty basic camera functions, but they’re also things that generally can always use improvement in smartphone cameras. White balance consistency across lenses is especially important in the day and age of multi-camera devices. The visual cue for tripod mode is also a welcomed addition as there’s no way to manually enable it.

We have no idea when these changes will come to the OnePlus 8 series. We’ll keep an eye out for these changes in a future OxygenOS update.

Thanks for XDA Senior Member Some_Random_Username for the tip!

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Source: OnePlus

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Samsung Galaxy Book S announced with Intel Lakefield chipset and LTE

Last summer, Samsung launched the Galaxy Book S, its first laptop powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx processor. Samsung is back with the Galaxy Book S, only this time it’s powered by the Intel Lakefield chipset. This is essentially the same laptop as before, but now it has the shiny “Intel Inside” sticker. The Galaxy Book S is also the first laptop to use Intel’s Lakefield generation.

Lakefield is the first “hybrid” CPU from Intel. That means it combines the company’s Atom and Core CPU cores into a single unit. This is something we commonly see in ARM chips on smartphones, which offers high-performance and low-power cores to maximize efficiency. There’s a lot more going on, but the gist is this should help the new Galaxy Book S compete with the Snapdragon model in terms of battery life.

Samsung doesn’t give a ton of details about the CPU, other than “Intel Core processor with Intel Hybrid Technology.” The other big detail is LTE connectivity, which is also something the ARM model has. Other specifications include Intel UHD Graphics, 8GB of LPDDR4x RAM, and 256GB or 512GB of eUFS storage. There is also a microSD card slot for up to 1TB of extra storage.

The Galaxy Book S has a 13.3-inch FHD LCD display with touchscreen capabilities. There are 2 USB-C ports, a headphone jack, fingerprint scanner, quad stereo speakers with Dolby Atmos, and a 1MP camera. The battery is 42Wh and it has WiFi 6 and Bluetooth 5.0. Samsung ships the device with Windows 10 Home or Pro.

We don’t know how much the Intel Galaxy Book S will cost or when it will launch, but it will be available in Mercury Gray and Earthy Gold colors.

	Galaxy Book S
OS	Windows 10 Home / Pro
Display	13.3″ FHD TFT LCD Display with Touch Screen Panel
Dimension	305.2 x 203.2 x 6.2 ~ 11.8 mm
Weight	950g
CPU	Intel Core processor with Intel Hybrid Technology
Graphic	Intel UHD Graphics
Memory	8GB RAM (LPDDR4x)
Storage	256/512GB eUFS, MicroSD slot (up to 1TB)
Camera	1MP
Battery	42Wh (typical)
Connectivity	Wi-Fi 6 (Gig+) 802.11 ax 2×2, LTE (Cat 16), Bluetooth v 5.0
Ports	2 USB-C, 1 Headphone out/Mic-in Combo, MicroSD Multi-media Card Reader
Sensors	Fingerprint Sensor, Ambient Light Sensor (Keyboard Backlit on/off), Hall Sensor
Authentication	Windows Hello sign in with fingerprint
Audio	Quad Stereo Speakers: Sound by AKG Immersive sound with Dolby Atmos technology

Source: Samsung | Via: SamMobile

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Samsung’s Exynos 850 is an 8nm chip for budget Android smartphones

Samsung has been designing its own Exynos chipsets for several years now. The Korean smartphone maker normally uses both Qualcomm Snapdragon and Exynos processors for their flagship and upper mid-range devices, but they usually use their own in-house Exynos chips for their budget smartphones. Samsung has recently (and quietly) published a product page for a new entry in their Exynos lineup of processors: the Exynos 850.

This Exynos 850 processor can already be found in the recently-announced Samsung Galaxy A21s, a smartphone on the lower-end of Samsung’s Galaxy A lineup. Thus, we already expected this processor to be geared towards decidedly-budget smartphones. According to the specifications listed on the product page, the Exynos 850 has an octa-core CPU comprised of two clusters of ARM Cortex-A55 cores which are clocked at up to 2.0GHz. The SoC also features ARM’s Mali-G52 GPU. It also supports LPDDR4X RAM, eMMC 5.1 storage, Cat.7 LTE, Full HD+ (1080p) display panels, and more. The chipset is fabricated using Samsung’s fairly modern 8nm LPP process.

For imaging, the Exynos 850 apparently supports up to 1080p60 video recording, 21.7MP image processing from a single camera or 16MP + 5MP from dual cameras (presumably with ZSL), and encoding in HEVC/h.265.

As we said before, the Galaxy A21s is the first smartphone to sport this processor, and we know it has a 48MP quad rear camera setup, an HD+ Infinity-O panel, up to 6GB of RAM, and up to 64GB of storage, so we already knew those are things this processor supports. It is possible that we’ll see this SoC on other Samsung budget Android smartphones soon. Budget smartphones are improving at a surprising rate, and we can thank the incredible competition in markets like India and China for that.

h/t @kuma_sleepy

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StrandHogg 2.0 Exploit Explained – Why Users and Android App Developers should care

It’s 10:00 PM. Do you know where your Activities are? There’s a new vulnerability that can be exploited on millions of Android devices, and it’s a pretty nasty one, too. In a nutshell, this design flaw allows an attacker to present their own Activity (page) on top of another app’s, potentially confusing the user into giving away their private data. The vulnerability has been dubbed StrandHogg 2.0 and was recently disclosed by Promon, a Norwegian security firm.

The StrandHogg 2.0 vulnerability theoretically affects all Android devices running Android versions as old as Honeycomb (3.0) and up to Android 9 Pie (9.0). Based on the latest Android version distribution statistics, that means that approximately 91.8% of all Android devices are vulnerable to StrandHogg 2.0. The vulnerability was assigned CVE-2020-0096 and was given a severity level of “critical.” It doesn’t require any special permissions to work and can function almost entirely without user interaction. All a user has to do is open an app with malicious code hidden away in it, and then they’re vulnerable to exploitation.

Promon was kind enough to send us their proof of concept app and its source code so we could best explain how the exploit works, why it matters to users, and how developers can protect their apps against it.

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How It Works

Say you’re using Gmail and you click a web link. If you go to your recent apps screen, you may notice that the web page appears to be “inside” Gmail. The preview shows the website, but the app icon and name are still from Gmail. This is something that happens when an app/Activity launches another app/Activity in the same task. Now imagine that you didn’t purposely open that link. To you, it looks like it’s just part of the Gmail app. This is the behavior that StrandHogg 2.0 exploits.

We’re going to have to leave out some details here, but here’s roughly how this exploit works. For the following, let’s assume the attacker wants to get the user’s Gmail login.

1. The user downloads a malicious app (of course, without knowing it’s malicious) and opens it.
2. In the background, the app opens Gmail, puts a look-alike login Activity on top of it, and then launches another Activity.
3. The user opens Gmail and sees what looks like Gmail’s login screen but is actually the attacker’s phishing Activity.

The final Activity launched in step 2 can be anything that avoids suspicion. The app could fake a crash and go back to the home screen, or it could just open to its main Activity as if nothing happened. The only suspicious thing the user might see is a bunch of opening animations as all the Activities launch. The worst part: It won’t even look like Gmail was opened.

Source: Promon

Of course, an attacker can do more than just showing a fake login screen. A malicious app could present a permissions prompt instead, tricking the user into granting unwanted permissions. While requesting any special permissions like Accessibility might make the user suspicious, it’s possible to do a lot of damage with something like Storage Access.

---

The Technical Bits

This next section is a high-level overview of how StrandHogg 2.0 works. Promon won’t release the full details for another few months, so we can’t share exactly how this exploit is implemented. There are some technical details that we can talk about, though.

In a nutshell, StrandHogg 2.0 hijacks Android’s Context.startActivities() API method, using three Intents.

• The first Intent is the one that launches, in our example’s case, Gmail. It’s flagged with Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK.
• The second Intent is the malicious one. In our example, it’s for the look-alike login Activity. This Intent has no flags.
• The third Intent is the distraction. It makes sure the user isn’t suspicious of Gmail just randomly opening instead of the app they tapped (i.e. the one launching the attack). It’s flagged with Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK.

All of these Intents are then passed in an array to the startActivities() method.

The second Intent’s lack of flags is the key here. By doing so, we’ve basically just replicated the Gmail example from above. The task is technically Gmail’s, but the topmost Activity is the attacker’s. When the user then clicks Gmail’s home screen icon, the attacker’s Activity displays instead of Gmail’s.

---

Proof of Concept

With the information that Promon sent us, we were able to replicate their proof of concept. Here’s a screen recording from a Samsung Galaxy Note8 running Android 9 Pie showing it in action.

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Mitigation Techniques and Issues

Now, simply replicating the above in code won’t actually work. It’s not a complete example, and there are a few other things that an attacker has to do to make it work, which we can’t share. But they’re not particularly hard to guess on your own, and that’s part of what makes this attack so dangerous. StrandHogg 2.0 is a relatively easy exploit to implement, and difficult to mitigate.

Mitigation can’t just involve blacklisting all apps that use startActivities(), since there are plenty of legitimate uses for it. It’s also really difficult to automate a detection algorithm for it. Malicious developers can employ all sorts of tricks to make their implementation of StrandHogg 2.0 effectively invisible to services like Google Play Protect. StrandHogg 1.0 required the attacker to add an attribute in the malicious app’s AndroidManifest.xml, which was relatively easy to detect. StrandHogg 2.0, on the other hand, functions entirely in Java/Kotlin.

Taking into account obfuscation, reflection, and even just different coding styles, it seems impractical to automatically properly detect an app making use of this exploit. What’s more is that if a user is the subject of a StrandHogg 2.0 attack, they may not even know. If you open Gmail and you see its login screen, you might just think your session expired and enter your login details without a second thought.

When we contacted Google for a response, a spokesperson offered the following statement:

“We appreciate the work of the researchers, and have released a fix for the issue they identified. Additionally, Google Play Protect detects and blocks malicious apps, including ones using this technique.”

This sounds good, and hopefully it has at least some effect against StrandHogg 2.0 attacks. It’s worth noting, though, that Google Play Protect did not detect our proof of concept app as malicious, even after performing a manual scan.

Promon says that they “have not observed any real-life malware utilizing the StrandHogg 2.0 vulnerability,” but there’s no guarantee that this is the first time the exploit has been discovered. For that reason, Promon recommends that developers go ahead and protect their apps by setting their launcher Activity’s launchMode flag to either singleTask or singleInstance. Either of these flags will prevent task injection, which is what StrandHogg 2.0 relies on. However, having your Activity use one of these flags can cause issues with certain app flows, so it’s not always desirable.

Promon is also promoting its own “In-App Protection by Promon SHIELD” product which sounds like a library that app developers can implement to monitor the tasks in your app’s process to check for irregular insertions. Because there’s no truly effective developer or user mitigation strategy, it’s pretty important that manufacturers implement the patch to fix this ASAP.

Thankfully, Promon followed responsible disclosure guidelines before making this exploit public (and it’s still not fully public—Promon is waiting 90 days before fully disclosing how StrandHogg 2.0 works). Google has since backported patches for this exploit to Android 8.0 Oreo, Android 8.1 Oreo, and Android 9 Pie with the May 2020 Android Security Patch Level (SPL). Users on Android 10 and above aren’t vulnerable, though we’re not entirely sure why that’s the case. It likely has something to do with Android 10’s new restrictions concerning launching Activities and how Google integrated that into the task stack. Promon says that “on Android 10 the attack is entirely ineffective, and the activities are split into different tasks and into separate task stacks according to adb shell dumpsys activity activities.”

If your device manufacturer is still providing security updates (you can read more about how the security patch process works here), you should pester them for an update as soon as possible. Otherwise, you’ll just need to be careful about which apps you download and run (although you should be doing that anyway).

For more details and use-cases of StrandHogg 2.0, check out the official announcement on Promon’s website. For custom ROM developers, you can find the relevant AOSP commits for preventing StrandHogg 2.0 attacks here and here.

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Disclosure Timeline

Here is the disclosure timeline that Promon shared in its StandHogg 2.0 document:

• Dec 4, 2019 – Reported issue to Google
• Dec 4, 2019 – Shared a PoC «malicious app» and video with Google
• Dec 4, 2019 – Google confirmed receiving the report
• Dec 9, 2019 – Google set the severity of the finding as «Critical»
• Dec 9, 2019 – Google confirms that they are able to reproduce the issue
• Feb 14, 2020 – We inform Google the 90-day disclosure is nearing in the beginning of March, and ask for status on their side
• Feb 14, 2020 – Google responds that April is the soonest they can roll out a fix
• Feb 14, 2020 – We inform Google we are working on mitigations
• Feb 14, 2020 – Google responds. They are working on remediations, and ask if we can share what mitigations we are recommending
• Feb 17, 2020 – We inform Google that we can hold back the disclosure until April. We request the CVE number
• Feb 17, 2020 – We share our mitigation strategies, as well as how we envisage a platform mitigation
• Mar 23, 2020 – Google responds with the CVE ID (CVE-2020-0096)
• Mar 23, 2020 – Google responds that general availability of the fix for Android will be available in May
• Mar 23, 2020 – Google asks if we will consider delaying disclosure to May
• Mar 27, 2020 – We respond that we will delay disclosure until May
• Apr 22, 2020 – Google informs us that the May Security Bulletin is scheduled to contain a patch for the vulnerability

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Nintendo 3DS emulation: Official Citra for Android performance testing on the Snapdragon 865, 855, and 845

Citra, the most popular Nintendo 3DS emulator, was officially released for Android onto the Google Play Store last week, and its performance has been at the forefront of the conversation. I’m sure anybody who saw its release wondered whether they could play their favorite Nintendo 3DS games on their Android smartphone or tablet, so I’ve spent the past few days playing games on various different devices powered by multiple different SoCs to see what kind of performance you can expect to get from your device.

I tested the following popular Nintendo 3DS games:

• Animal Crossing: New Leaf
• Mario Kart 8
• Pokemon X/Y
• The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds
• Fire Emblem: Fates
• Super Mario 3D Land

…on the following Android smartphones:

• Realme X50 Pro (our review) – Qualcomm Snapdragon 865
• OPPO Find X2 Pro – Qualcomm Snapdragon 865
• OnePlus 8 Pro (our review) – Qualcomm Snapdragon 865
• OPPO Reno 10x Zoom (our review) – Qualcomm Snapdragon 855
• OnePlus 6 – Qualcomm Snapdragon 845
• Realme 6 Pro (our review) – Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G
• Honor 20 Pro (our review) – HiSilicon Kirin 980

…and the results were rather mixed. I tested each of these 3DS games with the unofficial Citra MMJ version as well as the official Citra 3DS emulator that was just released on the Google Play Store. Some of the results were surprising. Note that all of these tests were done with audio stretching disabled as I found that it had a pretty significant performance hit for little benefit when enabled. Keep in mind that different GPU driver versions may also affect performance, and so one device with a particular chipset may not perform the same as another device with the same chipset.

Nintendo 3DS emulation using the official Citra for Android port. Left to right: OnePlus 8 Pro, OnePlus 6, Realme 6 Pro.

Note: You can legally acquire 3DS ROMs for your smartphone by dumping and decrypting your own Nintendo 3DS games. For this, you will need a hacked Nintendo 3DS and a legally purchased copy of the 3DS game that you want to play.

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Current performance issues with Nintendo 3DS emulation via Citra for Android (and potential fixes)

Before going into detail of the performance of the aforementioned Nintendo 3DS games on various Android smartphones, it’s worth mentioning that currently, the Citra 3DS emulator port for Android does not support a shader cache. A shader cache is simply a cache of files that keeps track of compiled shaders that are shown in-game, and having one greatly reduces CPU and GPU load. When new shaders are encountered in Citra, they are then compiled and aren’t saved to the storage. This means that they can’t be cached, and instead must be recompiled once encountered every time. This is why currently, Citra on Android can be quite stuttery when playing some 3DS games. Citra on PC supports a shader cache, and it’s quite common for users to want to download a precompiled shader cache to avoid slowly and painstakingly generating their own. Also, I found that disabling audio stretching helped performance a little bit.

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Nintendo 3DS Emulation Performance – Qualcomm Snapdragon 865, 855, 845, 720G, and Kirin 980

Qualcomm Snapdragon 865

Animal Crossing: New Leaf – OnePlus 8 Pro

Official Citra

• Mostly 60 FPS
• Drops frames frequently, particularly when shaking trees to drop fruit
• Audio hangs for a second or so often, and when audio hangs, the game hangs for a second too

MMJ/Unofficial Citra

• 30 FPS to 45 FPS with occasional spikes to 60 FPS
• No audio hangs
• More consistent experience overall, though slower
• Attempting to sell items will freeze the game, which does not happen on the official Citra build

Mario Kart 7 – OnePlus 8 Pro

• Runs perfectly at 60 FPS
• Occasional audio cues cause slight stuttering
• No difference in performance between Official and MMJ build

Pokemon X/Y – OnePlus 8 Pro

• Not a very intensive game, runs perfectly at 30 FPS (this game runs at 30 FPS in the overworld)
• Battles run perfectly
• Audio sounds great, music is in AAC format and can now be decoded
• No difference in performance between Official and MMJ build

Note: The flickering as seen in the above video only occurred when I was screen recording.

The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds – OPPO Find X2 Pro/OnePlus 8 Pro

• Runs perfectly, no slowdowns
• Audio is great
• Occasional stutters in combat
• Cutscenes work
• No difference in performance between Official and MMJ build

Fire Emblem Fates – OPPO Find X2 Pro

• Some slowdowns when entering combat
• Some audio stuttering in battles
• Audio works great
• Cutscenes work
• The game mostly runs at full speed, which it didn’t on the MMJ build

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Qualcomm Snapdragon 855

Animal Crossing: New Leaf – OPPO Reno 10x Zoom

Official Citra

• Runs nearly flawlessly
• Very few stutters
• Virtually no audio lag

MMJ/Unofficial Citra

• Anywhere from 30 to 60 FPS, though mostly towards the higher-end
• Very few stutters
• Virtually no audio lag
• Attempting to sell items will freeze the game, which does not happen on the official Citra build

Mario Kart 7 – OPPO Reno 10x Zoom/OnePlus 7 Pro

• Runs nearly flawlessly
• Pretty much no audio lag
• Pretty much no stutters
• No performance difference between Official and MMJ build

Pokemon X/Y – OPPO Reno 10x Zoom

• Not a very intensive game, runs perfectly at 30 FPS (this game runs at 30 FPS in the overworld)
• Battles run perfectly
• Audio sounds great, music is in AAC format and can now be decoded
• No difference in performance between Official and MMJ build

The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds – OPPO Reno 10x Zoom

• Runs nearly flawlessly
• Pretty much no audio lag
• Occasional stutters in combat
• No performance difference between Official and MMJ build

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Qualcomm Snapdragon 845

Animal Crossing: New Leaf – OnePlus 6

Official Citra

• Mostly 50-60 FPS
• Drops frames very frequently, particularly when shaking trees to drop fruit, but also in many other situations too
• Audio hangs for a second or so often, and when audio hangs, the game hangs for a second too

MMJ/Unofficial Citra

• Around 30-60 FPS, sticking somewhere around 45 FPS for most of the time
• Drops frames less frequently
• Audio stutters occasionally

Mario Kart 7 – OnePlus 6

• Stuttering when navigating menus
• 50-60 FPS in races, though fluctuates wildly and sometimes dips as low as 30 FPS
• Occasional audio stutters

Pokemon X/Y – OnePlus 6

• Not a very intensive game, runs perfectly at 30 FPS (this game runs at 30 FPS in the overworld)
• Battles run perfectly
• Audio sounds great, music is in AAC format and can now be decoded
• No difference in performance between Official and MMJ build

The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds – OnePlus 6

• Consistent in the 40-60 FPS range
• Lots of stutters in combat
• Marginally better performance in the MMJ build over the Official build

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Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G

Animal Crossing: New Leaf – Realme 6 Pro

Official Citra

• Mostly 50-60 FPS
• Drops frames occasionally, particularly when shaking trees to drop fruit, but also in many other situations too
• Audio hangs for a second or so often, and when audio hangs, the game hangs for a second too
• MMJ and Official build more or less perform the same here

Pokemon X/Y – Realme 6 Pro

• Runs mostly perfectly at 30 FPS, though occasionally dips in performance
• Battles run perfectly
• Audio sounds great, music is in AAC format and can now be decoded, minimal stuttering
• No difference in performance between Official and MMJ build

The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds – OnePlus 6

• Consistent in the 40-60 FPS range
• Lots of stutters in combat
• Marginally better performance in the MMJ build over the Official build

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Kirin 980

The Honor 20 Pro with its HiSilicon Kirin 980 was unable to run any of the Nintendo 3DS games that I tested at any playable framerate. The official and unofficial Citra 3DS emulators don’t really support devices with non-Snapdragon chipsets due to driver issues, and as such, this means that Samsung smartphones with Exynos processors will also likely face issues playing any of the 3DS games listed here.

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Conclusion – Nintendo 3DS Emulation is very viable (for most flagships)

Oddly enough, I found the best performance to be not with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 but rather with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855. It’s possible that Citra was developed primarily on Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 devices as the Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 is a relatively recent release, but this is only speculation on my part. The Snapdragon 855 found in both the OnePlus 7T Pro and the OPPO Reno 10x Zoom handled pretty much all Nintendo 3DS games I threw at it perfectly, which greatly impressed me, and the games themselves were very much playable. The Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G also fared incredibly well, with more or less identical results to the Snapdragon 845.

Citra (Nintendo 3DS emulator) website

Citra Emulator (Free⁺, Google Play) →

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Prepare for 9 Top IT Certification Exams With This $39 Training Bundle

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