Google said to arm Pixel 6 with an in-house chip, just like Apple does for iPhones

Posted on by Nadeem Sarwar

In April last year, it was reported that Google is designing its own chip called ‘Whitechapel’ that would go inside its Pixel smartphones and Chromebooks as well. Now, another report from 9to5Google mentions that the Pixel 6 will be among the first phones to come equipped with a chip based on the ‘Whitechapel’ platform. Aside from the Pixel 6, Google is reportedly going to use an in-house chip for the upcoming Pixel 5a as well that was recently leaked in all its glory.

“Whitechapel is an effort on Google’s part to create their own systems on a chip (SoCs) to be used in Pixel phones and Chromebooks alike, similar in to how Apple uses their own chips in the iPhone and Mac. Google was said to be co-developing Whitechapel with Samsung, whose Exynos chips rival Snapdragon processors in the Android space.
Per that report, Google would be ready to launch devices with Whitechapel chips as soon as 2021. According to documentation viewed by 9to5Google, this fall’s Pixel phones will indeed be powered by Google’s Whitechapel platform.”

Google is internally calling its chip ‘GS101’, where GS likely stands for Google Silicon. 9To5Google’s report also corroborates what Axios originally reported last year – Google’s ‘Whitechapel’ chip will be manufactured by Samsung’s semiconductor division. The in-house Google SoC will likely be fitted inside two phones with the codenames ‘Raven’ and ‘Oriole’ which are likely the Pixel 6 and the Pixel 5a.

Google is following  in the footsteps of Apple

The idea is awesome on paper. Let's just hope Google can achieve what it is hoping for!

Now, Google’s partner for its in-house chip ambitions – Samsung – has been at it for a  while now, equipping its phones with a wide range of in-house chips under the Exynos branding. Apple, on the other hand, relies on TSMC to make its A-series processors that go inside the iPhones and iPads. It appears that Google wants the same level of hardware-software control as Apple to milk the maximum performance out of the Pixel phones. The idea is awesome on paper. Let’s just hope Google can achieve what it is hoping for!

View Google Pixel 5 at Amazon

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Pixel phones get Smart Compose for messaging apps with March feature drop

Posted on by Nadeem Sarwar

The latest Feature Drop for Pixel phones is here, and if the name didn’t already make it evident, it brings a host of new features for Google’s Pixel phones. Let’s start with Smart Compose. Originally announced back in 2018, the Smart Compose feature uses AI to suggest words for completing your sentences as you type. After making its way to the Gboard app last year and a host of other Google services, Google is now enabling its magic for a few messaging apps well. 

Smart Compose will now auto-complete your sentences in messaging apps

Google has not revealed which apps exactly, but you can expect the popular ones such as WhatsApp and Telegram to take advantage of it on your Pixel smartphone. Just so you know, Google brought Smart Compose to Gboard back in July last year, allowing users to simply swipe on the suggested word to autocomplete their sentence. And if you enabled it on Gboard, it worked in third-party apps such as WhatsApp. 

So far, Smart Compose has been limited to in-house apps only such as Gmail and Docs,  and users had to manually enable it. However, the AI-driven predictive suggestion trick is limited to the US and supports only English, as per the latest blog post. ‘

You can now share audio clips from the Google Recorder app as web links

Additionally, the March Pixel Feature Drop also brings new wallpapers, and the ability to share the audio clips you’ve recorded using the Pixel-exclusive Recorder app in the form of links. These links will let anyone hear those recordings and read the transcript, even if they don’t have a Pixel phone. This feature comes to life courtesy of a companion web client – recorder.google.com – that we reported about last week. 

You can now share audio clips as links that can be accessed by anyone, even if they don’t have a Pixel phone.

You can enable backup and sync for your audio recordings and access them via this URL on your laptop or tablet. This is quite convenient and will come in handy when you don’t have your phone around or if it ran out of juice However, do keep in mind that all these synced recordings are stored in the cloud and will count towards your Google account storage.

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Pocketnow Daily: Google Pixel 5 and 4a Features LEAKED on Android 11?!(video)

Posted on by Samuel Martinez

On today's Pocketnow Daily, we talk about the new feature that may arrive with Android 11, the possibility of new AirPods Pro Lite and more

The post Pocketnow Daily: Google Pixel 5 and 4a Features LEAKED on Android 11?!(video) appeared first on Pocketnow.

Project Zero: Galaxy, Pixel and other Android devices affected by exploit

Posted on by Anton D. Nagy

Samsung, Huawei, Xiaomi, OPPO, Google, and other Android devices have been exploited with a vulnerability discovered by Google's Project Zero.

The post Project Zero: Galaxy, Pixel and other Android devices affected by exploit appeared first on Pocketnow.

XDA Exclusive: Android Q looks to kill back button, go all in on gestures

Posted on by Jules Wang

If you're a longtime Android user, you may have to suffer one of the biggest design language shifts with Android 10 Q coming soon.

The post XDA Exclusive: Android Q looks to kill back button, go all in on gestures appeared first on Pocketnow.