ANDROID TERRITORY

If you’re new to Snapchat, you should consider taking a look at some of the  tips and tricks  we’ve compiled to get started. Even if you’re familiar with Snapchat, there are some  surprising things  you should familiarize yourself with too. We also have a  list of great Snapchat accounts you should follow . One of the biggest reasons why you might want to use Snapchat is its collection of fun filters and lenses that make your selfies pop. There are plenty of effect choices from the get-go, with the selection changing on a regular basis. But Snapchat also has secret filters and lenses that you must unlock before they’re accessible, and even then, it’s only for a limited time. How do you unlock these hidden filters and lenses? Keep reading. Filters and Lenses: What’s the Difference? In Snapchat, there are two effects that you can apply to your photos and videos:  filters  and  lenses . While they sound like the same thing, there ar...

Apple is ditching Bing in favor of Google. While Bing will still power Image Search in Siri, everything else will now be handled by Google. Microsoft has been keen to point out how popular Bing is of late, but this will be a blow to Bing’s reputation. If Bing actually had a reputation to begin with. Google is the big daddy when it comes to online search engines. There isn’t really any serious competition. Bing is surprisingly popular in some quarters, but most people use Google at any and every opportunity. And now, thanks to Apple ditching Bing, even Siri will be powered by Google. Siri Cheats on Bing With Google Starting today, Google will power all web searches made through Siri, on Search Inside iOS, and Spotlight on the Mac. All three of these have, until now, been powered by Bing. The only part Microsoft will play moving forward is in providing Image Search in Siri. Which is the booby prize. So Apple is almost entirely  ditching Bing in favor of Google . This is...

Although it's proudly announced the  phone's rollout commenced  last week, LG still hasn't unveiled when exactly you can expect the  V30  to reach the United States. We hope that's going to happen sooner, rather than later, but for now there's no official word. What a new leaked promo image reveals, however, is that if you wait for the V30 you will be treated to an interesting freebie. Buying the V30 in the US will apparently net you a free Google Daydream VR headset - but not the one launched last year, mind you. We're talking about the  new, yet to be unveiled 2017 model  which itself got leaked a few days ago. Confusingly, what's depicted in the image above is the 2016 Daydream View, but famed leakster Evan Blass assures us that LG means the new accessory, not the old one. As you can see, you will also receive a "VR Content Package by Google" which is worth around $45 (since the rumored recommended price for the new headset is $99). LG s...

It’s time to get rid of your News Feed. Facebook is a sum of many parts, including Messenger, Events, Games, and a whole lot more. The News Feed is more a distraction than anything else. Here’s how (and why) you can delete it. Why You Should Kill Your News Feed When it first started, the News Feed was actually pretty nice. You got to know what your close friends or family was up to, since you don’t actually call each other every day. And you followed your favorite bands or news organizations to get updates. But over time, the News Feed has grown into an untamed beast, giving you more information than you know what to do with. At some point, you friended the neighbor of someone you went to nursery school with, and now you keep looking at his numerous check-ins. As for news, we all know about the scourge of fake news now. Despite Facebook’s best efforts to fight it, it’s a growing problem with no real end in sight. And then there are Facebook’s “suggestions” littered thr...

Instagram is finally adding comment threads. This should put an end to those disorganized threads where everyone is talking to everyone and no one at the same time. Instagram’s parent company Facebook has offered threaded comments for years, but it’s better late than never. Comments sections are a strange beast. That’s true whether they’re on websites, social networks, or apps such as Instagram. People will say anything. And it’s often naughty, nasty, or nonsense. However, regardless of the quality of comments, threaded conversations are a Godsend. Threaded Comments… Finally! Instagram is now adding comment threads. In a nutshell, this means that the long line of continuous comments which all feed back to the original post are no more. Instead, comments are separated out to actual conversations, with replies to individual comments grouped together. This makes it possible to actually have conversations with other people in the comments. Which is, or at least should be, an in...

HP has launched a new all-in-one PC with a major difference: you can easily switch out the monitor for another one. Easily Upgraded The new PC, called the EliteOne 1000, has a wedge-shaped base containing most of its hardware components. The base can be easily opened to swap components out. But the most unusual feature is clearly the upgradable all-in-one display. If you’re thinking of grabbing that aging 32″ HDMI TV and delicately balancing it on the EliteOne’s stand, you’d be mistaken. Unfortunately, monitor upgrade options are limited to small number of HP-made devices. Regardless, it does allow for a level of customization previously unseen in all-in-one PC solutions. You might start out with a 23.8″ 1080p touchscreen… but then swap that out for 34″ non-touch curved WQHD screen, just because you can. At the time of writing, there are just three screens to choose from, but more variations are set to arrive in the future. Currently available are the afore...

Facebook is preparing to launch its best feature since it allowed unfollowing without deletion. You can now Snooze your friends, family, and other Liked pages for 24 hours, 7 days, or 30 days. Hit the Snooze Button The new feature is likely aimed toward helping busy business and organization pages keep hold of their Like tally. I cannot be the only one that has unfollowed, or even deleted a friend or page due to incessant posting, creating a dreadful amount of noise on your News Feed. Facebook specifically benefits from you keeping your network dense, full of useful links. This works for both advertising (primarily) and for keeping you in touch with friends during their big life moments (it can be utterly terrible for things like this at times). The addition of the Snooze button adds another easy option for News Feed management, too. Facebook have settled on a clear direction here. Remember the now depreciated “See Less” button? The idea was that you selected the See Less op...

Juggling several email inboxes can be a hassle. Luckily, all the main email providers — Gmail, Outlook, and Yahoo — let you combine your email accounts into one single inbox, to send and receive email all from one place on the web. This will come in particularly handy to those of you who don’t like the idea of using a desktop client. Are you wasting too much time by checking several inboxes every morning? Stop it! Follow our step-by-step guides for Gmail, Outlook, or Yahoo, and you’ll have all your emails in one unified inbox. Gmail With Gmail, getting all of your other email accounts into your Gmail inbox couldn’t be easier. The feature is built into Gmail’s native settings. Head to your settings and follow these steps… Under  Accounts and Import > Check mail from other accounts , click  Add a mail account . A pop-up window will open up where you can enter your other email address. Gmailify With some email platforms, the proce...

At its annual fall event for 2017, Apple unveiled the iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus. These two phones were, however, somewhat overshadowed by  the unveiling of the iPhone X . The latter is the new, forward-looking, premium product Apple thinks is worthy of a whopping $999 price tag. The iPhone X isn’t being released until November, with pre-orders starting in October. Which means tech reviewers are focusing first on the iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus. The first reviews have been published online, so we thought we’d digest the juiciest details from the early iPhone 8 reviews. Reading iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus Reviews The Verge  reminds us that this IS an iPhone, and a very good one at that. However, the iPhone 8 isn’t the iPhone X, and therefore “it’s not the future, and it’s not the cutting edge”. It is, instead, “just the default”. Therefore, Nilay Patel “can’t think of a single compelling reason to upgrade from an iPhone 7”. Engadget  describes the iPhone 8 and iPhon...

Apple is finally releasing iOS 11 to the general public. And this isn’t the buggy beta version that has been available since the end of June. No, this is the real deal, the official release,  the final version of iOS 11 . And all you need to download iOS 11 is to own a compatible Apple device. Apple first unveiled iOS 11 at WWDC in June. The company then released iOS 11 as a beta. Now, it’s being officially released to all compatible devices, and, as always, it’s completely free to install. So if you own an iPhone, an iPad, or an iPod Touch, you should download iOS 11 as soon as you can. How to Install iOS 11 iOS 11 is compatible with all iPhones from the iPhone 5s upwards, all iPads from the fifth generation upwards, and the iPad mini 2, 3, and 4. It’s also available on the sixth generation iPod touch. To install iOS 11 just go to  Settings > General > Software Update , and your device will do the rest. There are two things you should do before you try to upd...

By now, you know that YouTube isn’t only for watching cat videos and smartphone voyeurism. If you’re smart, it can be your go-to place for learning new skills and finding gems for research. But one of the best uses for YouTube is as a source of free music that you can legally download for free and use for all kinds of projects and endeavors. Grab Royalty-Free Music for Any Use The  YouTube Audio Library  launched in 2013 with 1,000+ free musical tracks. Thanks to our growing smartphone video production skills, we need quality downloads for background music, right? Whether you’re uploading to YouTube or creating a private video, good background music makes a difference. The channel now hosts more than five times that initial number. All are high-quality 320 Kbps audio tracks and sound effects with a royalty-free license. You can also log into the channel with your Google ID for a better categorized view of the collection via the  Creator’s S...

Browsers have made it easy to  mute sites  on individual tabs that autoplay video or audio content the minute you load the page. If you find yourself visiting a lot of pages with intrusive autoplaying videos and simply want to put a stop to it, these tools can lend a helping hand. Chrome Silent Site Sound Blocker  gives you complete control over what sounds come out of your Chrome browser. Once you install the extension, all tabs are automatically muted. Right-click the extension’s button in your browser to bring up a context menu. From this menu you can whitelist and blacklist sites, and you can temporarily unmute sites by clicking  Allow this time only . When you open a new site that is playing sound, a popup will appear prompting you to choose from four ways you can handle the audio: always allow, allow once, reject once, and never allow. You can also disable this prompt if you prefer not to see it every time you load a site. The extension...

We’re all familiar with the typical drive letters in Windows. C: is your hard drive. D: is your CD drive. E: and upwards are used for removable media. A: and B: were used for floppy disks (now mostly defunct). However, did you know you’re not tied to those letters? It’s easy to swap them around, and you can give them whatever letters you want. (Although changing the C: drive might not be worth the hassle). Perhaps you want to keep your flash drives organized at the tail end of the alphabet, or you want to give a network drive a particular letter that’ll be free on all the Windows machines on your Wi-Fi. No matter the reason, here’s how to change a drive letter in Windows. Using Disk Management To change the drive letter of a drive which  does not  contain your Windows installation, you need to use the  Disk Management  tool. To get started, right-click on the  Start Menu , and select  Disk Management . On the main page of the app, you’ll se...