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It’s official: Nothing Phone (2) will use a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 series chipset
11:58 pm | February 28, 2023

Author: admin | Category: Mobile phones news | Tags: | Comments: Off

Nothing didn't want to be left out of the media spotlight this week what with all the announcements happening at MWC in Barcelona, so it started its teaser campaign for the upcoming Phone (2) in earnest. We're expecting to be drip-fed tidbits of information about the new device over the next few weeks or months, since that's a strategy that Nothing CEO Carl Pei loves and has employed many times before, including at OnePlus before founding Nothing. It all starts with the chipset. The Nothing Phone (2) will use Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 series. Nothing Phone (1) Unfortunately the...

Visme review
8:09 pm |

Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets | Comments: Off

Visme serves up an interesting concept: make information interesting and visually engaging. But the platform’s scope stretches far beyond social media-friendly infographics, with graphic design software, a video maker, mockup software, and tools for building attractive documents and presentations that stay on-brand.  

Visme: Pricing & plans

  • Free option, subscription plans with heavily discounted yearly fees

Visme is subscription-based, with tiered plans offering more features as the price rises. All subscriptions are discounted when paying upfront for the year over the monthly charge. 

Basic is the free plan, which gives you more than enough to get a feel for what Visme is about, and what it can do for your business. Even better, there’s no time limit. Use it for however long you need. It offers 100MB of cloud storage, limited access to templates and assets, and what Visme refers to as “regular” support.

The Starter plan is $29 a month (approx. £24 / AU$44) or $147 a year (approx. £122 / AU$219). You get access to all templates and assets, download projects as JPG, PNG or PDF, and receive email and chat support.

Pro is $59 a month (approx. £49 / AU$88) or $297 a year (approx. £246 / AU$442). Storage is increased to 3GB, with the ability to export your work as a PowerPoint presentation, HTML5, video or gif. It also comes with analytics and privacy controls.

Visme for Teams, a strictly commercial offering with bespoke pricing, is geared around online collaboration. .. 

  • Pricing & plans: 4/5  

Visme: Getting started

Visme design app and video maker in use

Visme has hundreds of templates for all kinds of designs and formats  (Image credit: Visme)
  • A vast array of templates, ordered by category, help you find the perfect starting point for your project 

Once you’ve signed up and signed in, you’ll find yourself at the template selection stage. And there’s a lot of them. Thankfully, they’re broken down by category - Presentations, Documents, Social Media, Videos, Web Graphics and more. 

Each category is subdivided into genres. So, infographics are split into Statistical, Timeline, Location, and so on. There’s also a search field at the top to help.

If all this is too much, each category has a blank template for you to use, and ‘Custom Size’ lets you create canvas dimensions down to the pixel.

An interesting function is ‘Branded Templates’. This lets Visme explore your existing website, and extract your logo and current color palette, to base custom templates off of it. It’s a neat idea, but we were sadly unable to get it to work - even pointing Visme towards techradar.com yielded no result, and the PNG logo we tried to upload, wouldn’t work.

  • Getting started: 3/5 

Visme: Online designer

Visme design app and video maker in use

Once in a document, your customisation options are vast  (Image credit: Visme)
  • Extremely versatile, customisable and responsive interface, allows you to do pretty much anything you’d like with ease 

If you’ve used Canva, then Visme's overall layout will be familiar territory. The tools at your disposal will depend on the template you’ve chosen, but on the whole they are very well-organized. All elements you add to your project are easy to customize. You’ll find a template is linked to a particular style and color palette - this is to make it easy to create a consistent look, but of course, this is more a guideline; you have the freedom to create what you like..

The left-hand sidebar contains all your elements, from shapes and stock photos and videos to any media you upload yourself. Replacing an existing image with a similar one is even easier. Select it and choose ‘replace’ from the popup menu, top-left of the canvas. This will take you to the same category where the original was located. That pop up menu is also where you get to change the object’s default color, so it can better match the design you’re creating.

The right-hand sidebar is where you create, reorder, duplicate and delete pages and sections. All in all, it’s pretty much everything you’d expect from a document creation tool. What we greatly appreciated though - beyond the creative freedom and customization options - was the platform’s speed and responsiveness. We didn’t see any noticeable lag from adding an object, to moving it around, to editing text - we actually quickly forgot we were working in a web browser. But if you prefer to use a computer or laptop for graphic design, Visme has desktop apps for Windows and Mac 

  • Online designer: 5/5 

Visme: Video maker

Visme design app and video maker in use

A video maker that's surprisingly fully featured (Image credit: Visme)
  • Simple online video maker for rapidly building explainers, promos, and social media ads 

Visme’s video maker is just as straightforward to use. To the top of the screen, you’ll find various formats like explainer videos, adverts, testimonials. It’s a fairly exhaustive list, and clicking into each one opens up a series of associated templates. 

Select the template the best fits your project, choose the aspect ratio - super-important if you’re publishing to mobile platforms, although free users can only opt for the 16:9 or widescreen canvas.

From here, the design process is more or less identical to using the platform’s digital art tools. You’re free to alter (or swap out) text and images to fit your organization’s branding. 

The timeline, a familiar sight to those working with video editing software, is located at the foot of the screen. By default, it’s set to the basic view - ideal video editing software for beginners, as it compounds all elements into a single clip. More experienced creators can switch to advanced view, which lets you see and precisely control each individual element. 

It’s important to emphasize that this is a video maker in the same vein as Canva Video. It lacks the professional toolkit you’ll find in the likes of Adobe Premiere Pro. Having said that, the video maker is surprisingly full featured, letting you work with multiple layers, trimming them and modifying them with ease

Overall, it’s a helpful content marketing tool built to let you make simple videos quickly, to promote your brand, products, and promotions.  

  • Video maker: 4/5 

Visme: Help & support

Visme design app and video maker in use

The guides designed to help you learn features of the platform are built as Visme documents   (Image credit: Visme)
  • Documentation, and tutorials are provided to help you get the most out of Visme 

Despite the ease of creating and modifying a project, it’s always far too easy to get lost in a new service. To that end, Visme has created a series of training guides to help you understand how things work. Most interesting of all, these guides are created as Visme documents which you can not only browse on the platform itself, but also alter. We found this a fun way to learn.

If this isn’t enough, click on the question mark icon in the lower right. This unlocks video tutorials, and documents explaining different aspects of the service. 

And if you’re still lost after that, there’s always the option of chatting with technical support with actual humans (what a novel idea).

  • Help & support: 5/5 

Visme: Share & export

Visme design app and video maker in use

Each category is broken down into numerous genres, showing you Visme's versatility   (Image credit: Visme)
  • Multiple export and download options - for subscribers only 

Your sharing and download options are dependent on your subscription level. They are all available under the Download and Share buttons.

One downside we found - it isn’t obvious which options are allowed and which are restricted until you select one, and face an Upgrade popup. The free plan doesn’t allow any download options, not even JPG.

On the plus side, Visme gives you a lot of information as to what your chosen export option offers. For instance, PNG is “Recommended for projects with logos, illustrations and charts”, while PDFs lets you choose to export your document with bleed marks, showing professional printers the areas that will be trimmed.

The Share options lets you publish your files to Visme’s site. Once that’s done, you can get ready-made code to embed it into another webpage, or just share the link with others. It’s worth noting that this is a public space accessible to all. If you want to make your document private, you need to purchase the appropriate subscription plan.

  • Share & export: 3/5 

Visme: Scoreboard

Should I buy?

Visme design app and video maker in use

If you feel lost, Visme has a wealth of tutorials, and documents to help answer your queries, with online support if you need to talk to a rep (Image credit: Visme)

Buy it if...

You demand design and brand consistency across all designs, you need a simple online design app, or you enjoy versatility and customization features 

Don't buy it if...

You need an industry-standard creative tools for large, complex video and design projects.

Visme: Alternatives

For similar design tools, we recommending checking out our Canva review, Adobe Express review, and Canon Poster Artist review

For a video maker that offers even more, check out our Vimeo Create review and InVideo review.  

Tecno Phantom V Fold in for review
8:00 pm |

Author: admin | Category: Mobile phones news | Comments: Off

Today, Tecno announced the Phantom V Fold - the company's first foldable smartphone, and it's a big one. Here's a key features video to get us started. The Tecno Phantom V Fold arrives in a generous package. You get a cool Aramid Fibre case for the rear panel with a built-in kickstand - an integral part of any folding phone case. You also get a 45W charger, which is more than you'd get with a Samsung folding phone these days. Tecno went with a book-style design for its first folding phone. But the rear panel stands out among the foldables thanks to a unique...

ZTE announces nubia Pad 3D with glasses-free 3D viewing
7:40 pm |

Author: admin | Category: Mobile phones news | Tags: | Comments: Off

Remember the 3D craze from around ten years ago? TV and smartphone manufacturers were all racing to announce some sort of 3D viewing capabilities on their devices but the technology ultimately got pushed away. ZTE used MWC to announce an interesting take with its nubia Pad 3D – the company’s first Android tablet to offer glasses-free 3D viewing. nubia Pad 3D display The nubia Pad 3D is jointly created with Leia Inc – a company that focuses on 3D display hardware and content services. nubia Pad 3D brings a 12.4-inch IPS LCD with 2560x1600px resolution, a 120Hz refresh rate and a...

ZTE announces nubia Pad 3D with glasses-free 3D viewing
7:40 pm |

Author: admin | Category: Mobile phones news | Tags: | Comments: Off

Remember the 3D craze from around ten years ago? TV and smartphone manufacturers were all racing to announce some sort of 3D viewing capabilities on their devices but the technology ultimately got pushed away. ZTE used MWC to announce an interesting take with its nubia Pad 3D – the company’s first Android tablet to offer glasses-free 3D viewing. nubia Pad 3D display The nubia Pad 3D is jointly created with Leia Inc – a company that focuses on 3D display hardware and content services. nubia Pad 3D brings a 12.4-inch IPS LCD with 2560x1600px resolution, a 120Hz refresh rate and a...

Most Realme phones this year will support 33W charging or faster
7:20 pm |

Author: admin | Category: Mobile phones news | Comments: Off

Realme is a leader in smartphone charging tech – in 2022 it became the first to unveil a phone that can do 150W and it followed that up with the first 240W phone this year. But these triumphs in the high end shouldn’t overshadow the work that the company is doing to bring fast charging to the masses. The goal for 2023 is to have at least 90% of Realme models available globally support charging at a rate of 33W or higher. The company already hit that mark in the $250-$399 segment, but this will cover the more affordable phones too. According to stats from Counterpoint, Realme is...

Realme GT3 hands-on review
7:09 pm |

Author: admin | Category: Mobile phones reviews | Comments: Off

Realme GT3 unveiled: first phone with 240W charging goes global
7:02 pm |

Author: admin | Category: Mobile phones news | Comments: Off

Weeks after its debut in China, the world’s first phone with 240W charging is ready to get on the global stage. The Realme GT3 will be available in multiple markets and will spread the joy of getting a full charge in under 10 minutes wherever it goes. As suspected, this is the global version of the Realme GT Neo 5 240W. This moves the hardware into a more premium category (the Neos are typically mid-rangers), but the pricing remains well below flagship levels – the Realme GT3 will have a starting price of $650 for an 8/128GB model. This will make it one of the cheapest Snapdragon 8+...

Tecno Phantom V Fold announced – new blood in the foldables market
7:00 pm |

Author: admin | Category: Mobile phones news | Comments: Off

This is Tecno's first foldable - the Phantom V Fold. Right off the bat, this is a big folding phone. At 299g, it's nearly the biggest. It can justify that heft with at least three good reasons - display, even bigger display, and battery. When closed, you'll use the Tecno Phantom V Fold's cover display, which is a regularly wide 6.42-inch LTPO AMOLED of 1080x2550px resolution. It caps off at 120Hz. Open the Phantom V Fold up, and you're greeted by a bigger 7.85-inch 2000x2296px folding screen, this one also a 120Hz LTPO panel. It's quite a bit bigger than the Samsung Galaxy Z...

EarFun Air Pro 3 review: the best cheap noise-cancelling earbuds you can get
6:55 pm |

Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets | Tags: , | Comments: Off

EarFun Air Pro 3: Two-minute review

The EarFun Air Pro 3 are the latest affordable noise-cancelling buds from a company that makes some of the best budget wireless earbuds around. EarFun has released several pairs of earbuds that we rated highly, including the original EarFun Air Pro and EarFun Air S, all delivering decent sound and fantastic value.

The EarFun Air Pro 3 build on this further, all for under $100 / £100. In terms of design, they're more elegant-looking than their predecessors, and although they feel a little cheap, that means a light and comfortable fit that stayed put throughout the day when I tested them… with one notable exception that I'll come to. 

The EarFun Air Pro 3's ANC (active noise cancellation) isn't on par with the best noise-cancelling earbuds available today, but they cost less than half as much as most, and the decent level of quiet offered here should be good enough to focus at work or keep most sounds dampened down when you’re travelling. It's impressive for the price. 

The same goes for audio. If you’re after detailed and audiophile-grade sound, look to rivals instead. The EarFun Air Pro 3 won’t beat the top-performing buds in our best wireless earbuds guide, but I liked their punchy sound and found them fun to listen to. 

There’s a great battery life on offer here – nine hours from the buds and an additional 36 from the case – as well as multipoint pairing. There are also some next-gen features available that we couldn’t test yet, but may soon make these buds even more special, including support for the highly-anticipated Bluetooth LE Audio tech. 

No one feature stood out when I was testing the EarFun Air Pro 3. Instead, these buds are brilliant all-rounders, delivering everything most people would need from a pair of true wireless earbuds today all for well under $100/£100. But there are other options that may tempt you: the Cambridge Audio Melomania 1 Plus are better sounding, but with no ANC; the JBL Live Pro 2 feature better noise cancellation, but cost a little more.

Earfun Air Pro 3 buds held in a hand above a wooden table

There's a lot of tech packed into the affordable EarFun Air Pro 3. (Image credit: Future)

EarFun Air Pro 3 review: Price & release date

  • Released in January 2023
  • Costs $99 / £99 at launch but discounted already
  • No Australian availability at time of writing

The EarFun Air Pro 3 true wireless earbuds were launched in January 2023. They originally cost $99 / £99, but they’ve been reduced to $79 /£79 on the Earfun website and other third party retailers at the time of writing, so that's clearly a price to expect them to hit regularly. As we publish, there’s no news on Australian availability.

Their sub-$100/£100 price tag puts the EarFun Air Pro 3 at a similar price as some of our favorite budget earbuds, like the ​​Audio-Technica ATH-SQ1TW. But although we rated the sound of the Audio-Technica buds, there are more features on offer from the EarFun Air Pro 3, most notably ANC. 

Having spent a few weeks testing them, I'd say that the EarFun Air Pro 3 are similar in terms of sound, ANC, specs and even design as the JBL Live Pro 2, but at $149 / £129 / AU$199, the JBL are significantly more expensive.

EarFun Air Pro 3 review: Specs

Earfun Air Pro 3 case closed on wooden table

The EarFun Air Pro 3 case isn't as small as some, but is reasonably compact. (Image credit: Future)

EarFun Air Pro 3 review: Features

  • Great battery life 
  • Multipoint pairing and active noise cancellation
  • Bluetooth LE Audio support could be a game-changer

For the price, there are a lot of features on offer here. I like that the EarFun Air Pro 3 have multipoint pairing, allowing you to listen to music on your laptop and then easily switch to say taking a call on your phone. During testing, this worked well and was seamless most of the time. 

In terms of controls and customization, the EarFun Air Pro 3 buds come with an app that’s minimal but has everything you need. There are also controls at the top of the stems. At times, these touch controls required a slower, more deliberate press to work. That’s fine, but not ideal given they’re there to be used intuitively. I did like that you can customize their actions from within the app. 

It’s a shame there are no sensors that know when you take out the buds and pause the audio. That feature isn’t a dealbreaker, but it is one you don’t realize is incredibly handy until it’s not there.

The battery life of the EarFun Air Pro 3 is among the best you’ll find from a pair of true wireless buds. EarFun promises nine hours from the buds and a further 36 from the charging case. That’s a mega-impressive 45 hours in total. Of course, that’s with ANC off. With it on, we’re talking seven hours in the buds and 37 hours in total. I got 6.5 hours with ANC on at a high volume, which I still found impressive.

This is a similar battery life to some of our favorite buds, like the Cambridge Audio Melomania 1 Plus, although they don’t have ANC. It’s also just a little less than our current mid-range favorites, the JBL Live Pro 2, which offer up 40 hours of battery life in total. So considering the EarFun Air Pro 3 are budget buds with ANC, they outperform much of the competition. 

The EarFun Air Pro 3 feel like a truly modern pair of buds in terms of specs, and one feature is so cutting edge I couldn’t even test it: next-gen Bluetooth LE Audio technology. This is a new Bluetooth standard that promises to upgrade the way we listen to music, including improved sound quality and battery life. The problem? No smartphones are compatible yet. 

There’s also support for a feature called Auracast. This allows you to jump between audio playing from different devices, so you can seamlessly listen to what your friends are listening to or what’s playing in a public space – again, though, there's no support in the wild yet.

That’s not all. The buds also support Qualcomm’s apt-X Adaptive audio codec, which is capable of delivering CD-quality 16-bit.44.1kHz audio over Bluetooth. This also provides low-latency performance when streaming from devices that support the Qualcomm standard.

  • Features score: 4.5/5

Earfun Air Pro 3 close up in case on wooden table

With aptX and Bluetooth LC3 support, the EarFun Air Pro 3 are all set for Hi-Res audio. (Image credit: Future)

EarFun Air Pro 3 review: Sound quality

  • Fun but not fantastic sound
  • Adjustable EQ
  • ANC is good

The EarFun Air Pro 3 buds were powerful and punchy right out of the gate. I listened to Stevie Nicks' Edge of Seventeen and For What It’s Worth, and the signature sound was spot on, perfectly suited to these iconic tracks with big, booming vocals. 

I found this to be the case across any genre that was all about the power and the bass, these buds handle the lower end well most of the time. Other tracks felt a little muddied or just didn’t suit the boom and the energy these buds excel in. Don’t get me wrong, they were still an enjoyable listen, but I couldn’t pick out the details or hear the precision of certain vocals or instruments as much as I can with higher-performing rivals. 

I felt this acutely with Hildur Guðnadóttir and Jóhann Jóhannsson’s Good Night, Day. This beautiful strings piece builds power and energy throughout, but I didn’t hear that instrumental distinction with the Air Pro 3 quite as much as I'd really like. 

At times there’s also a noticeable boom and even a rattle on the bass when you push to high volumes which, after listening for more than an hour straight, can be a bit too much. I found this to be particularly the case with ANC on.

If you want powerful sound, you’ll love them. If you like to appreciate the details of a mix, you might find them lacking. There is an equalizer on offer here that you can customize to a degree. There are also some presets, like bass boost. But I didn’t notice much of a difference when I tried them and preferred the signature profile for the most part. 

You won’t get that silent cocoon of sound type of ANC that’s typical of more expensive earbuds from these EarFun buds. But you get a sufficient level of ANC. The buds block a decent amount of bass range sounds, like the rumble of traffic. I tested them in a busy coffee shop and although all chatter wasn’t silenced, a noisy conversation next to me was significantly dampened down so as not to be annoying. You’d need to bump up in price to get noticeably better ANC.

  • Sound quality score: 4/5

Earfun Air Pro 3 buds on wooden table

The shiny stem on the EarFun Air Pro 3 helps them look more premium. (Image credit: Future)

EarFun Air Pro 3 review: Design

  • Long stem design
  • Look fancier than they are
  • Very light

When you first pick up these buds you’ll notice they feel plasticky – by which I mean: cheap – but that’s kind of good news as they’re also incredibly light at 52g for both buds and case. This is subjective, but I find the lighter the bud, the more comfy the fit. 

I achieved a good seal from the tips that came with the buds and chose the smallest size. They stayed secure and in place most of the time, but I did experience a bit of slipping when I wore them for a long time and when I took them on a run. To be fair, that’s pretty decent considering these aren’t workout buds. I only had to adjust them a few times and they do have an IPX5 rating, which makes them sweatproof and worth considering if you’re looking for a spare pair of buds for the gym.   

They have a shiny black plastic design on the back, which I didn’t like, but that’s the bit that sits against your ear. What sticks out is a long, mirrored stem with gesture controls at the top end and the EarFun logo at the button. This shiny finish is subtle and makes the buds look much more premium than their price tag suggests. 

However, the stem is long, and although the seal of the tips was great ,the stems affected it several times. This was particularly the case with long hair. When I wore my hair down around the buds, then pushed my hair out of the way, it got caught on the stems and the buds came loose. Not everyone will have this problem and I learned to be careful, especially outside. But I've tested a lot of true wireless earbuds at this point and never had this problem in the past. 

  • Design score: 4/5

Earfun Air Pro 3 buds close up on wooden table

As all-rounders, the EarFun Air Pro 3 are hard to beat. (Image credit: Future)

EarFun Air Pro 3 review: Value

  • Possibly the best sub-$100/£100 buds I’ve tried
  • You have to pay at least $50/£50 more for comparable features
  • You’d need to be sure about the design

The EarFun Air Pro 3 buds perform well in every respect, but in terms of value they’re fantastic. Although their inner shiny plastic finish may give away that they’re cheap, as does their weight, the simple mirror design of the stems makes them look much more premium than they should when you wear them. 

The ANC might not be the best, but I think it’ll suit most everyday scenarios and it’s often rare to get solid ANC with a sub-$100/£100 price tag. Just look at two of our current budget favorites, the ​​Audio-Technica ATH-SQ1TW and Cambridge Audio Melomania 1 Plus, which excel in some areas more than the Air Pro 3, but don’t have ANC. 

Battery life is fantastic, multipoint pairing is handy and the Bluetooth LE Audio support will hopefully make these buds even more of a no-brainer proposition as the tech rolls out more widely. 

All in all, these buds won’t beat higher-end buds and sound is only fine, but in terms of what you get for what you pay in total, they're pretty much unmatched.

  • Value score: 5/5

Should I buy the EarFun Air Pro 3?

Buy them if...

Don't buy it if...

EarFun Air Pro 3 review: Also consider

How I tested the EarFun Air Pro 3

Earfun Air Pro 3 worn in the ears of a woman outdoors on wooden table

(Image credit: Future)
  • Tested for 10 days
  • Used in home office, working at a coffee shop, the gym, countryside walk, public transport in a busy town
  • Mostly tested with Apple Music and iPhone 13 Pro

In order to put the EarFun Air Pro 3 buds through their paces, I used them in a range of different environments as I went about my daily routine over the course of 10 days. I took them to the gym when I worked out, on a walk through the countryside, while travelling by both train and bus, and out on lots of walks around suburban areas at all times of day.

These are true wireless earbuds designed to be worn for long periods, so I kept them on when transitioning from a walk outside to working back at my desk again. This was a good opportunity to try out multipoint pairing, moving from listening to a podcast and taking calls on my phone to watching videos on my laptop. 

I mostly listened to Apple Music, but also streamed podcasts, audiobooks and watched videos too – I also used them as I caught up on the latest episode of The Last of Us.

I’ve been testing audio products and wearable tech for around a decade, particularly focusing on the devices that can accompany you on walks and workouts, as well as general ease of use and comfort.

Read more about how we test

  • First reviewed: February 2023
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