Articles by Hayato Huseman

Finding the best Bluetooth speaker is a surefire way to ensure that you can play your favorite music when you’re swimming in the pool or out on a camping trip with friends. Bluetooth speakers are compatible with practically every mobile device around and will make sure that as long as your phone, tablet, or laptop is around, your music will be loud! There are so many options available that it can be difficult to choose the best option for your needs. Thankfully, we’ve done the research and have identified what we feel are the best Bluetooth speakers for a variety of cases. Hopefully, your Bluetooth speaker is on this list! If not, it’s time to buy one!

Best Bluetooth Speakers of 2020 at a glance

Ultimate Ears Wonderboom 2 — Best Overall: Balances sound, portability, and durability
JBL Charge 4 — Upgrade pick: Better sound and battery life
Anker Soundcore 2 — Best Battery Life: Rated for full 24 hours of battery life
Ultimate Ears Boom 3 — Best Mid-Sized Bluetooth speaker
Tri…

Best overall

Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra

$1,200 at Samsung

Pros

Improved autofocus with main camera
Dual telephoto cameras for improved clarity and stability
First Galaxy S device with S Pen support
Newer Snapdragon 888 processor
Larger, more reliable fingerprint sensor

Cons

No microSD expandability
No headphones or charger included

The Galaxy S21 Ultra has a distinguished new design, improved cameras, and a stunning 120Hz display. It’s a considerable upgrade over the S20 Ultra, but the lack of microSD support and in-box accessories will put off some potential buyers.

Still a great buy

Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra

$1,100 at Amazon

Pros

Easy to find on sale
Supports expandable storage
Still extremely powerful with Snapdragon 865
Space Zoom cameras still hold up well
Supports up to 45W charging

Cons

Poor autofocus on the main camera
Less reliable optical fingerprint sensor
Can’t support 120Hz and 1440p simultaneously

The Galaxy S20 Ultra is still a fantastic d…

The best Android video cameras come equipped with all sorts of amazing manual video controls, so why not pair those cameras with an equally excellent gimbal that’ll ensure ultra-smooth, cinematic video? With the wide availability of portable, easy-to-use, and best of all, affordable gimbals for your phone, there’s no excuse to shoot shaky cam footage — unless you’re just a huge fan of The Blair Witch Project or Cloverfield. The DJI OM4 is the best smartphone gimbal you can buy, but there are plenty of other options to up the quality of your next vlog.

Best Overall: DJI OM4

DJI has long been a major player in the smartphone gimbal space, starting with the original Osmo Mobile. The OM4 is the latest addition to the lineup, with a dead-simple magnetic design that actually separates the mount from the rest of the gimbal, allowing you to attach your phone in a matter of seconds and get to shooting.

You can rotate or reposition your phone for better balance and varying angles if you…

While you can store your photos on your phone, a great all-in-one printer is great for making photo prints to keep for posterity. But the best portable photo printers make it easy to quickly print photos that you can take with you anywhere. We live in a world where pictures help us express what we’re thinking and feeling. Most of us post them online on social media sites or in cloud services like Google Photos and share them that way, but sometimes you want to preserve those images in a way that you can touch and hang on your wall. That’s where these portable instant photo printers come into play. These will give you speedy prints, with zero hassle.

Instant and rechargable

Canon Selphy Square QX10

Staff Pick

Canon’s Selphy instant printer is easy to fit into your bag or even your pocket and prints 2.7-by-2.7-inch photos that are rated to last up to 100 years using dye-sub technology. The Selphy Layout app lets you add stickers and filters, and the built-in battery means you w…

Few companies offer better values than OnePlus. Its devices pack flagship-tier specs and performance for hundreds less than comparable phones from companies like Samsung and Google — often making them some of the best Android phones you can buy. Luckily, OnePlus also has a good track record for software updates. If you have a OnePlus device, updating your software is easy — here’s how.

How to update the software on your OnePlus phone

Open the Settings app on your phone.
If there’s already an update available, it’ll be displayed at the top of the list.
If not, you can check for one by scrolling down and tapping System.
Tap System updates.

Your phone will automatically check for an update.
Once an update is displayed, tap Install now.
Once the download finishes, tap Reboot.

Once your phone finishes rebooting, it’ll be updated to the latest software from OnePlus. In some cases, your phone may continue updating in the background, displaying a progress bar in your notificatio…

Tablets have seemingly always been on the brink of death, but I’m not counting them out yet.

Everybody’s always trying to predict and proclaim the death of tablets. We’ve seen it since the dawn of the first “phablet” devices like the original Galaxy Note; with a big enough phone, who needs to spend even more money on a bigger, less portable touchscreen device with more or less the same features?

That argument actually holds some merit. I have a few tablets sitting around, including high-end options like the Galaxy Tab S7+, that I almost never so much as boot, because between my phone for casual use and my laptop for work, all of my needs are met with just two devices. There’s just not much reason for me to carry around a third piece of tech that takes up more space in my backpack and, with additional accessories like a keyboard and stylus, can often reach upwards of $1,000.

But tablets have their own advantages that neither phones nor laptops can fully match. They’re con…

Best answer: If your Sony headphones are longer under warranty, you can remove and replace the earpads yourself, though the process can be tricky. Sony now sells replacement earpads for both the WH-1000XM3 and WH-1000XM4 through a partnered supplier, though you may not find the right colors or parts in stock or receive proper install instructions. As an alternative, you can try our favorite third-party WH-1000XM3 earpads, though these may differ in terms of comfort or noise cancellation. We haven’t found third-party WH-1000XM4 earpads yet.

DIY repair: Sony WH-1000XM3 replacement earpad ($25 per earpad at Encompass)
Fix the latest model: Sony WH-1000XM4 replacement earpad ($16 per earpad at Encompass)
Third-party WH-1000XM3 option: SOULWIT Replacement Earpads ($18 at Amazon)
Skip the repair and buy new: Sony WH-1000XM4 wireless headphones ($278 at Amazon)

Why would I need to replace my earpads?

Because nothing lasts forever, you may need some Sony WH-1000XM3 replacement earpa…

Another day, another messaging platform from Google — but don’t worry, this isn’t yet another attempt to make the next best Android messaging app. Instead, Google Photos is making it easier to share and discuss photos with a self-contained messaging section. It works similarly to direct messaging in social apps like Instagram, and no longer requires you to create shared albums. Here’s how it works.

Phone used in this guide

Pure Google: Google Pixel 5 ($700 at Amazon)

How to use Google Photos’ new messaging feature

Messaging in Google Photos is still fairly new and rudimentary, but it’s easy enough to start using with anyone else who uses the app. It uses the same sharing menu that previously required creating entire albums and quickly starts to feel like second nature.

Open Google Photos and tap any image or video in your gallery that you’d like to share.
Tap the Share icon in the bottom left corner.
Under Send in Google Photos, tap the name or email address of the user y…

Computational photography can only do so much with limited hardware.

Smartphone photography has come a long way in the last few years. While professional photographers and videographers certainly aren’t ditching their DSLRs, mirrorless, or cinema cameras any time soon, the cameras on our phones are so advanced these days that the vast majority of consumers don’t even need to consider buying a dedicated point-and-shoot camera. Whether you’re taking selfies with your friends, photos of your kids and pets, or landscape shots on your next vacation, smartphones are more than capable of getting the job done.

The Pixel 5 uses the same tiny sensor Google has been using since the Pixel 2.

In more recent years, we’ve accredited Google’s Pixel line as some of the best Android camera experiences around, offering consistently great imaging under various lighting conditions, particularly excelling in computational photography with AI-powered features like astrophotography and portrait mode….

Tablets have seemingly always been on the brink of death, but I’m not counting them out yet.

Everybody’s always trying to predict and proclaim the death of tablets. We’ve seen it since the dawn of the first “phablet” devices like the original Galaxy Note; with a big enough phone, who needs to spend even more money on a bigger, less portable touchscreen device with more or less the same features?

That argument actually holds some merit. I have a few tablets sitting around, including high-end options like the Galaxy Tab S7+, that I almost never so much as boot, because between my phone for casual use and my laptop for work, all of my needs are met with just two devices. There’s just not much reason for me to carry around a third piece of tech that takes up more space in my backpack and, with additional accessories like a keyboard and stylus, can often reach upwards of $1,000.

But tablets have their own advantages that neither phones nor laptops can fully match. They’re con…