From all the leaks and rumors so far, it looks like the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra could be the biggest phone of early 2022, if not the entire year. And we’re going to find out just how big in a few hours.
As the head of the Samsung Galaxy S22 series, the Ultra will join a standard S22 model and the Plus-sized variant, following the pattern set by the Galaxy S20 and Galaxy S21 ranges.
However, the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra will be the model to watch, as the other two phones are looking like incremental upgrades over their predecessors. (If you’d like to know more about those phones, check out our Galaxy S22 vs. Galaxy S22 Plus comparison.) Rumors have been pointing to the Ultra as the spiritual successor to the Galaxy Note line, which means a Galaxy Note-like design along with an integrated S Pen. And Samsung has all but conceded that it’s drawn heavily on the Note for inspiration.
But don’t think of the Galaxy S22 Ultra as a rehashed Galaxy Note — the new phone could see plenty of other exclusive features. Here’s what we know so far about the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra and why it’s the phone to watch.
Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra news (Updated February 9)
As the rumors correctly predicted, Samsung plans to hold a Galaxy Unpacked event today, February 9, with the show getting underway at 10 a.m. ET/7 a.m. PT. Samsung hasn’t said what’s debuting at the show, but the invitation showing a box with an S inside suggests the Galaxy S lineup should be high on the list of possibilities.
Pre-orders may also open today, followed by the Galaxy S22 rumored release date on the February 25. However, a report from South Korea, citing sources within Samsung, says that the phone ships on February 24. Whoever’s right, it’s clear the Galaxy S22 Ultra is going to be in users’ hands by the end of next month.
And another leak revealed claimed prices in Euros, with the Galaxy S22 Ultra starting at €1,249 for the 8GB/128GB version, €1,349 for12GB/256GB, and €1,449 for the top-end 12GB/512GB.
That’s a lot, even for a flagship phone. And with competition tight, thanks to the likes of the Google Pixel 6 Pro coming in at $899, Samsung would really need to prove why its flagship is worth so much more. To be fair, the Galaxy S22 Plus might be more of a direct competitor to the Pixel 6 Pro, though we have a Galaxy S22 Ultra vs. Pixel 6 Pro comparison to help you see how the phones could measure up.
“You loved the unparalleled creativity and efficiency of the Galaxy Note series, which enabled you to switch from gaming nirvana to high-octane productivity in the blink of an eye,” Roh wrote in a blog post. “You raved about the lifelike S Pen, which many say rivals putting ink to paper. And we haven’t forgotten about these experiences you love.”
Like the Note, the side edges of the display are set to be curved but only gently, which should make the phone comfortable but not too slippery to hold. And in keeping with the Note DNA, the Galaxy S22 Ultra is set to have an S Pen holder, which will be a notable upgrade over the S21 Ultra; that phone had to use an optional case to hold its S Pen.
(Image credit: Yogesh Brar/Twitter)
Another major change that seems very likely is that Samsung won’t use a protruding module for its rear camera array. Rather, the cameras will be integrated into its chassis in a P-shape. These appear to stick out a little from the back of the phone but don’t seem as prominent as a dedicated module.
(Image credit: Evan Blass)
The leaker Evan Blass has posted renders of the Galaxy S22 colors, including the Galaxy S22 Ultra. These include black, white, green and red.
Backing up these design rumors was another leak by Blass, this time of what appears to be Samsung Galaxy S22 marketing material for Italy. They hammer home the design changes as well as shed light on the specs. Do note due to copyright issues, we can’t post the leaked images here so you’ll need to follow Blass on Twitter or subscribe to his email substack to get a glimpse at them.
A punch hole cut-out for the front-facing camera has been shown off in renders and leaked images, likely down to Samsung having yet to perfect the under-display camera for use in its non-folding Galaxy phones.
A 120Hz LTPO panel is also expected, following on from the one found in the S21 Ultra. It’s also expected to be adaptive, scaling all the way down to 1Hz when a high-refresh rate isn’t needed. There’s no word on whether it’ll use a LTPO 2.0 display like the one on the OnePlus 10 Pro, which offers a smoother overall experience.
Based on rumored specs alone, the Galaxy S22 Ultra’s cameras look like having the same megapixel counts as those on the Galaxy S21 Ultra. If that’s the case, it’ll have a 108MP main camera plus two 10MP telephoto cameras with 3x and 10 optical zoom, and an ultra-wide camera that’s likely to come in at 12MP.
But megapixels aside, these cameras are tipped to have improved sensors and capabilities, including an AI enhancement mode for the 108MP camera which could lead to more detail and brightness from its shots.
The rumored SuperClear Lens has been given more detail in a leak from Evan Blass, which indicate the lens will be fitted to the main 108MP camera and is described in the marketing material translated from Italian as offering “brighter shots without reflections or glare.” Camera lenses can’t help but distort the light that passes through them on the way to the sensor that actually captures the image in front of you, so this new lens that Samsung is using is claiming to reduce or even eliminate this common problem.
Along with that Super Clear lens, Samsung has already begun teasing a “night-breaking” camera that should take exceptional photos in low-light situations.
The selfie camera is expected to come in at 40MP. Again, no step up in specs here, but we can be fairly confident that Samsung will have made some effort to improve the computational photography capabilities across the S22 Ultra’s entire camera suite.
Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra S Pen
As noted above, the Galaxy S22 Ultra is expected to ship with an included S Pen, just like the Galaxy Note of old. This is a departure from Samsung’s approach with the Galaxy S21 Ultra and Galaxy Z Fold where the S Pen was treated as an optional accessory. Presumably, including the S Pen with the S22 Ultra will lead to tighter integration between stylus and phone, though leaks about new S Pen capabilities have been minimal, thus far.
This is where things get complicated; it’s looking likely that the Galaxy S22 Ultra will have two different chipsets.
In the U.S. and China, the Galaxy S22 Ultra has been tipped to use Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 8 Gen 1. That chip has a new Kryo CPU that offers 20% faster performance than the Snapdragon 888 and which sucks up 30% less power. On the GPU side, Qualcomm says the Adreno processor will offer a 30% speed boost while being 25% more efficient than its predecessor. A solid upgrade all around, then, but not exactly needle shifting.
And the Exynos 2200 chip could buck the performance trend even further thanks to its new Xclipse 920 GPU. This graphics processor uses AMD’s RDNA 2 GPU architecture, which is the same tech that underpins the GPUs in the PS5 and Xbox Series X.
(Image credit: Samsung)
Now, we doubt you’ll be running the best Xbox Series X games or the best PS5 games on the Galaxy S22 Ultra with ray tracing enabled. But we can expect a notable boost in gaming performance, perhaps being able to run true console-quality games on the phone with a few tweaks in settings.
Reputable tech leaker Ice Universe posted alleged Wild Life results on Twitter showing the performance of one Exynos 2200 configuration. The graphics benchmark results yielded a score of 8,134 with an average of 50.3 frames per second; very impressive for an Android phone.
Other benchmarks have been less encouraging. Leaked Geekbench 5 results posted to Twitter suggest that the Galaxy S22 Ultra will not be much of an improvement over the S21 Ultra — in fact, the numbers of an Exynos 2200-powered model were worse than the ones for a Galaxy S21 Ultra running on an Exynos 2100. Since benchmarks of unreleased phones don’t always reflect actual performance, we wouldn’t suggest pressing the panic button just yet.
Another round of benchmarks recorded less than a week before the phone’s expected launch show that it’s a close race between the Snapdragon and Exynos versions. However the test used in this benchmark doesn’t take graphical performance into account, which is where the RDNA-enhanced Exynos chip could excel.
A leaker has published which regions will get phones with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 and which will get the Exynoss 2200-powered S22 Ultra. As expected, the Americas are in line to get Qualcomm’s chip while Europe is slated for the Exynos silicon. It’s a mix of chipsets in other regions, according to this source.
Samsung’s Galaxy S22 Ultra is expected to keep the 5,000 mAh size of its predecessor. But one report has the phone set to get a smaller battery measuring in at 4,855 mAh. If this is the case, then we’d suspect Samsung will have worked hard on battery and performance efficiency in order to not see overall battery life compromised.
The Galaxy S21 Ultra endured 11 hours and 25 minutes of web surfing over 5G in our tests in 60Hz mode, and 10:07 in adaptive mode. We’d expect the S22 Ultra to match that or beat it.
The most recent report we’ve seen says that the Galaxy S22 Ultra will offer faster 45W charging. This would be a boost from the 25W charging on the S21 Ultra. We don’t know how quickly you’ll get to 50% or 100% as a result, but we look forward to testing it.
Without a doubt, the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra is the phone we at Tom’s Guide are most excited about right now. Not only do the rumors point towards an impressive specs sheet, but the addition of a new Exynos chip with literal game-changing graphics is tantalizing. For the two lower-tier models, here are the top 5 rumored Samsung S22 and S22 Plus upgrades we want to see.
And that’s before we consider that the phone will almost certainly be a successor to the Galaxy Note 20 Ultra in all but name. It could be the handset to show that Samsung is still the king of big flagship phones, despite having placed a lot of its focus on foldables recently.
As such, we’d be relatively confident that the Galaxy S22 Ultra will be one of the most exciting phones of 2022 and a likely contender for a spot on our best phones list.
Although no one likes a know-it-all, they dominate the Internet.
The Internet began as a vast repository of information. It quickly became a breeding ground for self-proclaimed experts seeking what most people desire: recognition and money.
Today, anyone with an Internet connection and some typing skills can position themselves, regardless of their education or experience, as a subject matter expert (SME). From relationship advice, career coaching, and health and nutrition tips to citizen journalists practicing pseudo-journalism, the Internet is awash with individuals—Internet talking heads—sharing their “insights,” which are, in large part, essentially educated guesses without the education or experience.
The Internet has become a 24/7/365 sitcom where armchair experts think they’re the star.
Not long ago, years, sometimes decades, of dedicated work and acquiring education in one’s field was once required to be recognized as an expert. The knowledge and opinions of doctors, scientists, historians, et al. were respected due to their education and experience. Today, a social media account and a knack for hyperbole are all it takes to present oneself as an “expert” to achieve Internet fame that can be monetized.
On the Internet, nearly every piece of content is self-serving in some way.
The line between actual expertise and self-professed knowledge has become blurry as an out-of-focus selfie. Inadvertently, social media platforms have created an informal degree program where likes and shares are equivalent to degrees. After reading selective articles, they’ve found via and watching some TikTok videos, a person can post a video claiming they’re an herbal medicine expert. Their new “knowledge,” which their followers will absorb, claims that Panda dung tea—one of the most expensive teas in the world and isn’t what its name implies—cures everything from hypertension to existential crisis. Meanwhile, registered dietitians are shaking their heads, wondering how to compete against all the misinformation their clients are exposed to.
More disturbing are individuals obsessed with evangelizing their beliefs or conspiracy theories. These people write in-depth blog posts, such as Elvis Is Alive and the Moon Landings Were Staged, with links to obscure YouTube videos, websites, social media accounts, and blogs. Regardless of your beliefs, someone or a group on the Internet shares them, thus confirming your beliefs.
Misinformation is the Internet’s currency used to get likes, shares, and engagement; thus, it often spreads like a cosmic joke. Consider the prevalence of clickbait headlines:
You Won’t Believe What Taylor Swift Says About Climate Change!
This Bedtime Drink Melts Belly Fat While You Sleep!
In One Week, I Turned $10 Into $1 Million!
Titles that make outrageous claims are how the content creator gets reads and views, which generates revenue via affiliate marketing, product placement, and pay-per-click (PPC) ads. Clickbait headlines are how you end up watching a TikTok video by a purported nutrition expert adamantly asserting you can lose belly fat while you sleep by drinking, for 14 consecutive days, a concoction of raw eggs, cinnamon, and apple cider vinegar 15 minutes before going to bed.
Our constant search for answers that’ll explain our convoluted world and our desire for shortcuts to success is how Internet talking heads achieve influencer status. Because we tend to seek low-hanging fruits, we listen to those with little experience or knowledge of the topics they discuss yet are astute enough to know what most people want to hear.
There’s a trend, more disturbing than spreading misinformation, that needs to be called out: individuals who’ve never achieved significant wealth or traded stocks giving how-to-make-easy-money advice, the appeal of which is undeniable. Several people I know have lost substantial money by following the “advice” of Internet talking heads.
Anyone on social media claiming to have a foolproof money-making strategy is lying. They wouldn’t be peddling their money-making strategy if they could make easy money.
Successful people tend to be secretive.
Social media companies design their respective algorithms to serve their advertisers—their source of revenue—interest; hence, content from Internet talking heads appears most prominent in your feeds. When a video of a self-professed expert goes viral, likely because it pressed an emotional button, the more people see it, the more engagement it receives, such as likes, shares and comments, creating a cycle akin to a tornado.
Imagine scrolling through your TikTok feed and stumbling upon a “scientist” who claims they can predict the weather using only aluminum foil, copper wire, sea salt and baking soda. You chuckle, but you notice his video got over 7,000 likes, has been shared over 600 times and received over 400 comments. You think to yourself, “Maybe this guy is onto something.” What started as a quest to achieve Internet fame evolved into an Internet-wide belief that weather forecasting can be as easy as DIY crafts.
Since anyone can call themselves “an expert,” you must cultivate critical thinking skills to distinguish genuine expertise from self-professed experts’ self-promoting nonsense. While the absurdity of the Internet can be entertaining, misinformation has serious consequences. The next time you read a headline that sounds too good to be true, it’s probably an Internet talking head making an educated guess; without the education seeking Internet fame, they can monetize.
TORONTO – A new survey says a majority of software engineers and developers feel tight project deadlines can put safety at risk.
Seventy-five per cent of the 1,000 global workers who responded to the survey released Tuesday say pressure to deliver projects on time and on budget could be compromising critical aspects like safety.
The concern is even higher among engineers and developers in North America, with 77 per cent of those surveyed on the continent reporting the urgency of projects could be straining safety.
The study was conducted between July and September by research agency Coleman Parkes and commissioned by BlackBerry Ltd.’s QNX division, which builds connected-car technology.
The results reflect a timeless tug of war engineers and developers grapple with as they balance the need to meet project deadlines with regulations and safety checks that can slow down the process.
Finding that balance is an issue that developers of even the simplest appliances face because of advancements in technology, said John Wall, a senior vice-president at BlackBerry and head of QNX.
“The software is getting more complicated and there is more software whether it’s in a vehicle, robotics, a toaster, you name it… so being able to patch vulnerabilities, to prevent bad actors from doing malicious acts is becoming more and more important,” he said.
The medical, industrial and automotive industries have standardized safety measures and anything they produce undergoes rigorous testing, but that work doesn’t happen overnight. It has to be carried out from the start and then at every step of the development process.
“What makes safety and security difficult is it’s an ongoing thing,” Wall said. “It’s not something where you’ve done it, and you are finished.”
The Waterloo, Ont.-based business found 90 per cent of its survey respondents reported that organizations are prioritizing safety.
However, when asked about why safety may not be a priority for their organization, 46 per cent of those surveyed answered cost pressures and 35 per cent said a lack of resources.
That doesn’t surprise Wall. Delays have become rampant in the development of tech, and in some cases, stand to push back the launch of vehicle lines by two years, he said.
“We have to make sure that people don’t compromise on safety and security to be able to get products out quicker,” he said.
“What we don’t want to see is people cutting corners and creating unsafe situations.”
The survey also took a peek at security breaches, which have hit major companies like London Drugs, Indigo Books & Music, Giant Tiger and Ticketmaster in recent years.
About 40 per cent of the survey’s respondents said they have encountered a security breach in their employer’s operating system. Those breaches resulted in major impacts for 27 per cent of respondents, moderate impacts for 42 per cent and minor impacts for 27 per cent.
“There are vulnerabilities all the time and this is what makes the job very difficult because when you ship the software, presumably the software has no security vulnerabilities, but things get discovered after the fact,” Wall said.
Security issues, he added, have really come to the forefront of the problems developers face, so “really without security, you have no safety.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 8, 2024.
As online shoppers hunt for bargains offered by Amazon during its annual fall sale this week, cybersecurity researchers are warning Canadians to beware of an influx of scammers posing as the tech giant.
In the 30 days leading up to Amazon’s Prime Big Deal Days, taking place Tuesday and Wednesday, there were more than 1,000 newly registered Amazon-related web domains, according to Check Point Software Technologies, a company that offers cybersecurity solutions.
The company said it deemed 88 per cent of those domains malicious or suspicious, suggesting they could have been set up by scammers to prey on vulnerable consumers. One in every 54 newly created Amazon-related domain included the phrase “Amazon Prime.”
“They’re almost indiscernible from the real Amazon domain,” said Robert Falzon, head of engineering at Check Point in Canada.
“With all these domains registered that look so similar, it’s tricking a lot of people. And that’s the whole intent here.”
Falzon said Check Point Research sees an uptick in attempted scams around big online shopping days throughout the year, including Prime Days.
Scams often come in the form of phishing emails, which are deceptive messages that appear to be from a reputable source in attempt to steal sensitive information.
In this case, he said scammers posing as Amazon commonly offer “outrageous” deals that appear to be associated with Prime Days, in order to trick recipients into clicking on a malicious link.
The cybersecurity firm said it has identified and blocked 100 unique Amazon Prime-themed scam emails targeting organizations and consumers over the past two weeks.
Scammers also target Prime members with unsolicited calls, claiming urgent account issues and requesting payment information.
“It’s like Christmas for them,” said Falzon.
“People expect there to be significant savings on Prime Day, so they’re not shocked that they see something of significant value. Usually, the old adage applies: If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.”
Amazon’s website lists a number of red flags that it recommends customers watch for to identify a potential impersonation scam.
Those include false urgency, requests for personal information, or indications that the sender prefers to complete the purchase outside of the Amazon website or mobile app.
Scammers may also request that customers exclusively pay with gift cards, a claim code or PIN. Any notifications about an order or delivery for an unexpected item should also raise alarm bells, the company says.
“During busy shopping moments, we tend to see a rise in impersonation scams reported by customers,” said Amazon spokeswoman Octavia Roufogalis in a statement.
“We will continue to invest in protecting consumers and educating the public on scam avoidance. We encourage consumers to report suspected scams to us so that we can protect their accounts and refer bad actors to law enforcement to help keep consumers safe.”
Falzon added that these scams are more successful than people might think.
As of June 30, the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre said there had been $284 million lost to fraud so far this year, affecting 15,941 victims.
But Falzon said many incidents go unreported, as some Canadians who are targeted do not know how or where to flag a scam, or may choose not to out of embarrassment.
Check Point recommends Amazon customers take precautions while shopping on Prime Days, including by checking URLs carefully, creating strong passwords on their accounts, and avoiding personal information being shared such as their birthday or social security number.
The cybersecurity company said consumers should also look for “https” at the beginning of a website URL, which indicates a secure connection, and use credit cards rather than debit cards for online shopping, which offer better protection and less liability if stolen.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 8, 2024.
