SpaceX's Third Mission Takes Off For The ISS

Elon Musk's companies have been in the news for a long time, and his two companies Tesla Motors and SpaceX have been in the news several times.

Space X was in the news today also when its new rocket, The Falcon 9, took off for the International Space Station (ISS).

 

The Falcon 9 took off at 3:25 PM EDT, and is said to rendezvous with the ISS on Sunday, the 20th of April.

It will also be making an attempt to return to Earth and estabilish itself as the first re-usable rocket.

 

You can check out more information of the launch from The Verge here. 

 

SpaceX was a venture created by inventor, entrepreneur, visionary Elon Musk. He entered the American market with a vision to revolutionize travel, renewable energies and space travel.

 

He has stated the primary goal of SpaceX as to not only make space travel more frequent, but also affordable for the masses.

 

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Sarthak J Shetty

Editor In Chief

 

Samsung Galaxy S5: Carrying On The Proud Galaxy Tradition

The past few weeks have been absolutely amazing for all of us in the tech community. HTC released the One M8, Microsoft BUILD and also Samsung's very own Galaxy S5 and also the Gear Fit.

So here is our review on the Samsung Galaxy S5.

What's New:

The looks of the S5 is exceedingly like the hybrid of the S4 and the Note 3. The specs definitely place it in the high end phone department.
At a quick glance the phone has a bigger screen (which we will talk about) and also what seems to be much more distinct bezels.
The button orientation is also changed.

The S5 compares like a toy in comparision to the amazingly built HTC One M8.
Its is also made water ressistant (not water proof) and dust proof.
The back feels like the leather backing of the Samsung Galaxy S5, which kind of a dimple finish which I'm not that big of a fan, it also lacks the leatcher stiching of the Note 3.
The S5 also features a finger print scanner just like the iPhone 5S.

The Display:

The super AMOLED 5.1 inch screen has a resolution of 1920x1080, and looks absolutely gorgeous with perfect image and color replication. It has a pixel density of 432 ppi.

The Internals:

The Phone is powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 chipset, with a Quad Core Krait 400 CPU which is clocked in at 2.5 GHz.
The Adreno 330 GPU handles all the graphics and games thrown at it with ease.

A suprising move by Samsung is that they have decieded to include a heart rate monitor. Yes a heart rate monitor, so now you can place your finger on the back of the phone and you can get your heart rate via the Samsung Health app.
The 2 GB RAM handles all the multi tasking as expeccted by any Samsung flagship.

The Camera:

The camera is a slightly bumped up 16 mega-pixel camera, which takes amazing pictures standing on par with the Note 3.
The flash on the back shares its place with the already mentioned heart rate monitor.
Samsung claims that the phone has the fastest autofocus time at 0.6 seconds. The burst mode is also amazingly impressive with the capacity to take around 30-50 shots in 3 seconds.

The camera software is also loaded with a whole lot of perks and softwares updates previously seen on other Samsung phones, along with the ability to shoot 4K video and dual photo mode.

The Operating System And Interface:

Android 4.4.2 running on the S5 is skinned with TouchWIZ.
The TouchWIZ skin makes it laggy at times that it makes you doubt wheter a 5.1 inch super powered chipset is running it or not.

The Samsung Magazine UI is powered by Flipboard is poor in comparision to the BlinkFeed running on the HTC One M8.
Sansung Health app is  a full fledged apo that tells you everything from the number of steps you covered to what you must be eating to watch your calorie intake. It also works in close association with the heart rate monitor.

Battery, Pricing, Colors:

The 2800 mAh, removable-replaceable battery gets the phone through a complete day or maybe 2 with normal usage. And just in case you forget to charge your phone, there is crazy Ultra Battery saver mode that converts your phone to a pretty basic but survivable mode.

The S5 is available for $199 on contract on just about every network provider out there and around $650-$700 off contract for the unlocked version.
The Samsung Galaxy S5 is available in Black, White and an ugly Blue backed, black bezeled variant.

Conclusion:

The Samsung Galaxy S5 is definitely a top of the line high end phone. But its not what I; or many of us expected from Samsung.

Sure there is microscopically bigger screen, a 16 mega-pixel screen, but there is nothing that makes us jump on it and buy it regardless the $700 price range. It lacks the WOW factor that the Note 3 or the HTC One M8 had.

So thats our review on the Samsung Galaxy S5.

Stay tuned for the reviews on the Samsung Galaxy Fit, Microsoft Phone 8.1 and much more.

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Sarthak J Shetty

Editor In Chief

HTC One M8: The Term Beast Redefined

HTC has been dormant for quite a while. After the success of the One M7 it has been quitely rolling out small products that have not caught the limelight as much as the M7.
Thats gone now for sure with the release of the M8.

HTC One M8: What's New:

First of all the appearence is excedingly like the M7 while you have a quick glance. But on a closer inspection you can see that the new brushed aluminium body is curved at the lateral corners, make it feel more present in your hand, but at the same time makes you feel that the phone will slip at any moment.

The Display:

The display is a Full HD 5.0 inch panel with a resolution of 1920x1080 with a pixel density of 441 ppi.

It may not be the best screen on paper, but its a sure treat for the eyes, with the right amount of image saturation and the best viewing angles that you can find right now in the market.

The Internals:

The CPU running this beast of a phone is the Qualcomm Snapdragon 801. Its a Quad-Core Krait 400 Chipset clocked in at around 2.3GHz.

The Adreno 330 GPU is top of the line and ahandles all the graphics beautifully rendering colors with the right saturation.
The 2 GB RAM doesn't rival the Note 3 on paper but handles multi-tasking just as good.

The Camera:

The camera is the biggest upgrade the M8 has over the M7 .
There are two camera apertures placed one atop the other.
The main camera has a 4 Ultra-Pixel sensor, simillar to that on the M7. Its good but  HTC could've (Should've) improved on this bit as it would have made a huge update over the M7.

The 2nd camera acts as a depth determiner in order to provide better pictures depth wise and also provides an added functionallity simillar to that of a Lytro, which means that you can focus images after they have been captured.
The front camera features a 5 Mega-Pixel sensor, (which functions sometimes BETTER than the back facing shooter).

Storage:

The M8 has an internal storage capacity of 10 GB which can be expanded to upto 128 GB via micro-SD, which again was one of the much required update over last years M7.

Operating System And Software:

The One runs on Google's latest Android KitKat 4.4.2.. Skinning it is Android Sense 6, it appears somewhat bulky but less that last years versions of Sense 5.
HTC Zoe, Blinkfeed feature on it just the same.

The new M8 has been infused with several Motion detecting controls, all of which have been given the name HTC Motion Launch.
Now you can mute your phone,ringer with just a flip.
You can pick up a call just by lifting the phone. Also now the phone judges whether or not it is outside or in your pocket or bag and automatically adjusts the ringer volume.

Colors, Battery, Accessories And Pricing:

The phone is available in three colors, Gun Metal Grey, Glacial Silver and Stealth Black.
The M8 has also been announced with an awesome touch-sensitive Dot Case, stay tuned for its review too.

The 2600 mAh battery provides 20 hours of battery life on paper and 420 hours or so on standby.
The HTC One M8 is avaiable for around $700 dollars in the US.

So thats our review on the HTC One M8.

Stay tuned for the review on Windows Phone 8.1, Samsung Gear Fit and also on the Samsung Galaxy S5.

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Sarthak J Shetty
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Welcome To The New Tech Tonic

Welcome to the new Tech Tonic.
Its completely revamped cosmetically and soon we will be posting at 5 articles a day.

Stay Tuned to Tech Tonic.

Sarthak J Shetty
Editor In Chief

Samsung Galaxy Round-The Beast With Curves

The  Samsung Galaxy Round-Those Curves:

Curved Display's are the new thing in the tech community. Samsung like always is leading the race with the introduction of the Galaxy Round. The Round was introduced in South Korea, and is basically a Note 3 with a curved display. So lets review the Samsung Galaxy Round.

Display:

Of course, the most resounding feature of this device is that screen. You can easily distinguish this device from others by just glancing at it. The screen is curved Super Flexible AMOLED 5.7 inch screen with a resolution of 1080x1920 pixels, with 386 pixels per inch. The curved screen has its perks, since Samsung has infused some certain features which are exclusive to the Round.

For example, if you have the Round placed on a flat surface, you can tilt the phone towards you to wake-up the screen which display's the notifications that you have missed. There are several such small tweaks throughout the ecosystem.

Internal Specs:

The internal specs of the Round can be easily identified to the specs of the Note 3.

The chipset is Qualcomm's popular Snapdragon 800 featuring the Quad-Core 2.3 GHz Krait 400.

The GPU responsible for rendering graphics is the Adreno 330.

The 3 GB onboard handles the multi-tasking and background tasks with a breeze.

Design:

The design is a hybrid between the design of the Galaxy S4, Note 3 and also a bit of neither.

The design of this phone is mostly defined by the curved display. It has its perks like we said, but it also has a lot of downs.

Mainly you can't text the normal way on this display. You can't read something on it while its placed on a flat surface, despite it having this amazing screen. The characteristic metal band of the Galaxy Range is prominent.

The back has this sort of matte finish and the positioning of the flash and the camera is just like the arrangement seen on the S4.

Operating System:

The TouchWIZ interface is built atop Android 4.3 "JellyBean".

Camera:

The camera is also very similar to the camera of the Note 3 since both of them have a 13 mega-pixel sensor without Optical Image Stabilization. HDR, Panorama and face detection and the regular features are prominent.

It is capable of shooting 1080p video @ 60 frames-per-second.

The 2 mega-pixel shooter on the front can also shoot 1080p @ 30 frames-per-second.

Memory And Connectivity:

The Galaxy Round is only available in a 32 GB variant. However the memory can be expanded with the use of the microSD which is provided.

The regular connectivity options are available including 3G, 4G LTE and Wi-Fi.

Battery, Color And Price:

The battery and the price are the key points ehere the buyer has to comprise.

The Li-Ion phone only has a 2800 mAh capacity. Talking about the low capacity battery comes another comprise, the price.

The Samsung Galaxy Round is retailing for about $1000 dollars, which is crazy considering that your high speced phone only has a 2800 mAh battery which is capable of providing only 16 hours of talk time and 74 hours of music playback.

The reason why the battery has a low capacity is because even though the display is curved the rest of the components are solid, they cannot be made curved, hence it would not be possible to facilitate a large battery in a device that is curved because there would be no place to accommodate it.

It is currently available in only one color that is, Brown.

Conclusion:

We personally think that this is a sort of "experiment" by Samsung, very similar to what they tried with the Galaxy Mega lineup. They want to see how well people receive this product and to determine if people like it.

But for the time being, we think that this is a leap in display technology and we hope to see more kinds of these devices, but which less compromise of other components.

Stay tuned for the review on its competitor The LG G Flex.

So that's our review on the Samsung Galaxy Round.

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Sarthak J Shetty

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Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1-The Super Speced Tablet

Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 2014 Edition-The Beast Of A Tablet:

The Note series from Samsung has been highly successful since its introduction with the Note 1 all the way through to the Note 3.

Samsung has also started the Note 10.1 series which include high performing tablets, mainly to rival Apple's iPad. The Note 10.1 2014 is no exception to this clause.
So here is the review of the New Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1.

Display:

As the name suggests the Note 10.1 features a 10.1 inch scree.
The display is Full HD with a resolution of 2560x1600 pixels with an average pixel density of 299 ppi.

The screen's have been greatly emphasized upon by Samsung and it always strives to make them such that hey always stand out. The Note 10.1's screen is no exception. It provides brilliant eye popping colors which seem to be hard to find in most tablets on the market.

Internal Specs:

The chipset running the 10.1 is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800, featuring a Quad-Core 2.3 GHz Krait 400 CPU in the LTE model and a Quad Core 1.9 GHz Cortex A15 and a Quad-Core  GHz Cortex A7 CPU for the 3G model.

The Adreno 330 GPU handles the graphics.
The 3 GB RAM onboard is more than sufficient for handling any kind of processes or multi-tasking.
The Note 10.1 also features an IR blaster, which gives you the ability to control your TV.

Operating System And Connectivity:

The Note 10.1 features Samsung's TouchWiz skin which is built on top of Android 4.3 "JellyBean".
Bluetooth 4.0 with A2DP on the Note 10.1 allows you to connect with Samsung's Galaxy Gear.
Wi-Fi and 3G bands are also present.
4G LTE is available in select markets depending on the country in which you live.

Built Quality:

The Note 10.1 appears to have a premium built, but its still Samsung and as a result most of the device is made of plastic but it is still feels like a premium tablet when you hold it in your hands.

There is a metal band that runs throughout the body on the sides.
The back has a similar finish as the Note 3 which looks like stitched leather but it too is plastic.

Camera:

The primary camera on the back has an 8 mega-pixel sensor which auto-focusing.
Its a camera on a tablet, but it is a bit disappointing that it lacks Optical Image Stabilization in such a heavy speced device.

he secondary camera on the front has a 2 mega-pixel sensor which can facilitate video calling.
Both the camera can shoot 1080p video @ 30 frames-per-second but the primary camera on the LTE model can shoot 1080p camera at 60 frames-per-second.

Memory:

The device is available in 16, 32 and 64 GB on basis of memory. The memory can be expanded upto 64 GB with the help of a microSD card.

Battery, Color and Price:

The Non-Removable Li-Polymer battery has a capacity of 8220 mAh.
It provides 2230 hours of standby time, which is pretty decent. But we have to test and review the device to give the actual hours that it will provide on standby.

Its available on White and Black. Pink is not an option in the 10.1 which was available in the Note 3.
The Note 10.1 is retailing for about $547.99 for the 16 GB white model from Amazon, and you can purchase it from here.

Conclusion:

The Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 is an amazing device which performs like a beast. The specs are amazing on paper and in usage.
Its main competitor in the tech community is obviously Nokia's Lumia 2520 and the Apple iPad Air, both of which are equally speced and powerful.
However we think that Samsung should have paid more attention to the built quality of the 10.1, especially when the price goes upto $600.

You can check out the review on the Samsung Galaxy Note 3 here.
You can check out the review on the Nokia Lumia 2520 here.
You can check out the review on the Apple iPad Air here.

So that's our review on the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 2014 edition.
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Sarthak J Shetty
Editor In Chief

Nokia Lumia 2520-Surprising Move By Nokia

The Nokia Lumia 2520-Nokia's Entry Into The Tablet Industry:

This week has been an outing for Nokia and Windows 8 users, with the release of three brand new Nokia Windows 8 devices.
The released Devices include the Lumia 1520, 1320 and the Lumia 2520. The first two are large screen smartphones, while the third is a full fledged laptop or tablet functioning just like Microsoft's Surface.

We have already reviewed the 1520 and the 1320 and now it is time to review the 2520.

Display:

The 2520 features an absolutely beautiful 10.1 inch Full HD screen, with a resolution of 1080x1920.
It has a pretty awesome pixel density of 218 ppi. It's form factor is similar to that of Samsung's Galaxy Note 10.1 which; as the name suggests, also has a 10.1 screen.

The screen is protected by Corning's Gorilla 2 and also features Nokia's ClearBlack display technology which first debut in the Lumia 920.

Internal Specs:

The chipset onboard is Qualcomm's Snapdragon 800 which features a Quad-Core 2.2 GHz Krait 400 CPU which looks amazing on paper.
It also an Adreno 330 to handle graphically intense games and apps.

The RAM has a capacity of 2 GB.
On paper, this is an excellent device which amazing specs, which appear almost identical to the best of the best tablets out there.

Operating System:

This device is a Lumia; so there is no surprise that this one runs Windows 8.
But there is a catch. It is not the full-fledged Windows 8 that we can see featuring on the Surface 2 or Surface Pro; but it is the less advance Windows RT 8.1.

It still performs amazingly well, but there are certain aspects which you will miss if you are a regular user of Windows 8.

Keeping that fact aside, the Operating System just flows.

No hiccups no hangs or lags. We know that the Windows ecosystem never required great specs to run it, but hey they most certainly do help it a lot.

Compatibility With Other Lumia Devices:

Nokia has incorporated a unique feature into the 2520 which allows you to stream your content on either of your devices, if you happen to own a Lumia phone. This allows cross-platform syncing of music between your phone and your tablet.

Camera:

The primary camera has a 6.7 mega-pixel sensor with Carl Zeiss optics. It has the capability of shooting full HD video.

The secondary camera on the front has a 2 mega-pixel sensor, which can capture 720p video.
We are not yet sure about the quality of the camera as this device has not yet reached markets, for us to review.

Connectivity:

The 2520 features all the regular connectivity options with Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0 etc.
An interesting point to be noted is the fact that, the 2520 also is one of the first device to feature USB 3.0 just like Samsung's Galaxy Note 3.

It features 4G LTE and Nokia is offering the LTE model, there will be no Wi-Fi only variant for this device,

Memory:

The 2520 is available only in one model on that is the 32 GB model, on basis of memory. But, you also have the option to expand the memory with the help of a microSD card slot.

Battery, Colors and Price:

The Non Removable 800 mAh can offer a maximum standby time of 25 days, which is excellent.

The device is available in Red, Black, White and everybody's favorite Nokia Color Cyan.

The price is about $499 in US, UK and Finland without considering the local taxes and subsidies.

Conclusion:

The Nokia Lumia 2520 is designed absolutely beautifully, like all other Nokia phones. It also has amazing specs on paper. We just have to review the device to tell you how well those specs perform in day to day activities.

The price of this device is also not placed ridiculously high like most of the tablets that you can find in the market right now.

So that's our review on the Nokia Lumia 2520.
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You can check out more information on the Lumia 2520 at Nokia's website, which you can get to by clicking here.
Stay tuned for the review on the Nokia Lumia 2520's biggest competitor the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1.

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Sarthak J Shetty
Editor In Chief