The highly anticipated Xiaomi Black Shark 2 gaming smartphone is heading towards its India launch, and it brings a host of features to the table. As per previous reports, the device passed its BIS Certification in India on May 7, 2019, indicating that the smartphone may be released in the same month. Latest reports state that the Black Shark 2 is scheduled for an India launch on May 27. Media invites for the same have confirmed the aforementioned launch date.
Xiaomi Black Shark 2: Specifications, Design & Features
The Black Shark 2 picks up a fair share of design aspects from its predecessor. The smartphone measures 163.61 x 75.01 x 8.77 mm and weighs in at 205 grams. It features a 6.39 inch AMOLED display which is surrounded by thin bezels on all sides. The smartphone’s display has a resolution of 2340 x 1080 px and a pixel density of 403 ppi. The display panel can reach brightness levels of upto 430 nits and has an aspect ratio of 19.5:9. The AMOLED display is pressure sensitive, which can offer a variety of implications while playing games on the device. Biometric security options include an in-display fingerprint sensor.
The right side of the smartphone houses the power button and a “shark slider” which when toggled turns on gaming mode for game-focused performance. The left side of the handset houses the volume rockers. The bottom of the device accommodates the USB Type-C port. Since it is a gaming device, it has a vapour cooling chamber to regulate high temperatures while intensive gaming sessions.
Under the hood, the Black Shark 2 runs on the Snapdragon 855 SoC which consists of an Octa-Core CPU and the Adreno 640 GPU. The smartphone is powered by a 4,000 mAh battery which supports fast charging upto 27 W. Connectivity options on the device include 802.11 ac Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.0, Dual 4G VoLTE and GPS.
The rear of the Black Shark 2 has a unique design with green coloured decals that run along the sides. The rear panel also houses the brand logo and a dual camera setup, which consists of a 48 MP sensor, 12 MP sensor and an LED Flash. The camera can capture 2160p videos at 30 fps. For selfies, it has a 20 MP front-facing camera which is placed in the bezel above the display. The front camera can also capture 1080p videos at 30 fps.
Xiaomi Black Shark 2: Price, Colours And Storage Options
Also Read: Xiaomi Redmi Note 7s With 48 MP Camera Launched In India
The Black Shark 2 is available in two colour variants which includes Frozen Silver and Shadow Black. The price for different variants of the smartphone are listed below:
- 6 GB + 128 GB – ¥3199 (~Rs 32,600)
- 8 GB + 128 GB – ¥3499 (~Rs 35,700)
- 12 GB + 256 GB – ¥4199 (~Rs 42,800)
Note that the prices for the smartphone might differ at the time of launch, since the prices mentioned above were roughly translated from its Chinese counterpart’s prices.
The Thermaltake Tower 900 was a great choice for the build as it has a vertically mounted design, which can easily accommodate two cooling pumps. It is adorned on three sides with Tempered glass, so we can clearly showcase all the components on the build from multiple angles. Plus, the tower has a lot of expansion space, so if we decide to add more components in the future, it won’t be a hassle at all. It has an adequate amount of airflow and cable routing space for management. On top of everything, the white colour looks absolutely gorgeous and goes well with our black and white build theme.
We chose the Intel core i9 9980XE for our build simply because of the sheer magnitude of specifications it offers. The CPU has a total of 18 cores and 36 threads. Out-of-the-box, it operates at a base frequency of 3.0 GHz, but it can be overclocked to 4.50 GHz using Intel Turbo Boost Max Technology 3.0. The processor is compatible with a maximum memory size of 128 GB, which is what we intended to work with.
The X299 was perfect for our build considering the fact that we will eventually convert this build into a Hackintosh setup. The Motherboard features a total of 5 PCIe slots which would accommodate our two Graphics Cards and our RAID arrays. Moreover, it also has 3 M.2 slots to house the extra memory chips that are not being included in our RAID setup. The heat shields were also a nice addition. The motherboard is solidly built and the white accents on the board complement our setup to the maximum. Also, the X299 supports RGB Fusion 2.0 which will help us to seamlessly synchronize our RGB strips and fans using the application. 
As we mentioned before, we had support for 128 gigs of RAM in our setup, so that’s what we did. We went for the Vengeance Pro 32GB modules, which had 2 sticks of 16GB RAM each. The memory modules are themselves quite aesthetically pleasing, with a white casing and RGB support. They have DDR4 memory and a clock speed of 3200 MHz per stick. The RGB lighting of the modules can be regulated with the help of Corsair’s iCUE application. 
Since we were planning to put together a RAID array setup for our build, we got 10 sticks of the 1TB Samsung 970 EVO SSDs. RAID storage uses multiple disks in order to provide fault tolerance and improves the overall performance of the system. Eight of our 10 sticks were included in our two ASUS Hyper M.2 x16 cards (four SSDs per card) whereas the rest of the two 970 EVOs were used independently in the setup. 
The ASUS Hyper M.2 x16 cards support 4 NVMe M.2 (2242/2260/2280/22110) SSDs each. They are specially designed for Intel VROC and AMD Ryzen Threadripper NVMe RAID setups. Moreover, it has an additional cooling fan inside the bay to ensure that the storage sticks don’t overheat. 
Owing to the sheer number and wattage of components being used in our build, we went for the Corsair AX1600i, which is titanium plus rated modular power supply unit. Its transistors are made out of Gallium Nitride instead of silicon, which ensures a lower resistance and faster switching. The fan speed of the PSU can be regulated with the help of the Corsair Link desktop application (users will have to connect the PSU to the system via a USB cable). Plus, the AX1600i claims to be one of the most silent PSUs in the market as of now. For the sake of our Black and White PC build, we decided to go for custom white Corsair cable sleeves. 
In order to make our beast build resilient for times to come, we decided to go for two of the absolute flagship GFX cards from NVIDIA, the 2080 Ti. Each video card has 11 GB of GDDR6 memory and 14Gbps memory speed. Since we render 8K Red Camera footage for our videos, a dual 2080 Ti setup will provide the VRAM memory required to render the aforementioned videos in real time. Moreover, playing the most demanding games on the planet would be a breeze with the dual card setup. Both the 2080 Ti cards are linked with the EVGA NV Link bridge. 
We wouldn’t want our beast build to overheat at any point in time, so we chose to hard-tube the entire system. The kit we used was the Thermaltake Pacific M360 Plus Cooling Kit. It includes a water block, the D5 pump, 3x120mm fans, 360mm radiator, clear coolant and 8 C-Pro compression fittings along with 2 adapter fittings and 4 PETG hard tubes. We are also using the Thermaltake Pacific 12mm bending kit for hard tubing. However, we came upon a decision to not install the hard tubing until all the components are completely installed, so to suffice until then, we chose the Antec C400 Glacial CPU cooler. It has a PWM silent fan and pure copper heat pipes. 
As mentioned previously, the build will be used to edit and render high-resolution videos as well as to play graphics intensive games. To fulfil both the purposes, we chose the Samsung 48.9 inch Ultra-wide curved monitor which has a response time of 1ms and a refresh rate of 144 Hz. With a resolution of 3840 x 1080 px, the display features AMD’s FreeSync technology. 
In terms of peripherals, the Razer Black Widow X really stood out as a build-compliant keyboard. Firstly, it is white so it complements the setup really nicely, and secondly, it features Razer’s top-of-the-line tactile Green mechanical switches. The keyboard has programmable keys and N-Key rollover to prevent any ghosting instances. Plus, it boasts of really solid build quality.
We chose the White Razer Lancehead as it has an ambidextrous design, along with rubber grips on either side. It has a 5G optical 16,000 dpi sensor and is claimed to be optimized for 50 million clicks. Users can customize various sensitivity profiles in the Razer Synapse application. Using Razer Chroma, a multitude of colour schemes can be synchronized between both the mouse and the Keyboard. 
The Steelseries Arctis 7 is one of the most comfortable and good-sounding pair of headphones in the market. The two sweetest perks were the facts that they are wireless as well as white in colour. They connect via a 2.4GHz receiver so that latency loss is eliminated. The headphones are quite comfortable and have a battery life of almost 24 hours (as claimed by Steelseries after the latest firmware update). 
Reports state that the South Korean company will test out the updated Galaxy Fold models with three US mobile carriers in the month of June. Furthermore, launch date in the same month will be confirmed by Samsung itself in the upcoming days. This will be a relieving piece of news for those who had pre-booked the smartphone and wanted to get their hands on the Galaxy Fold earlier than other consumers. 
The first reports of the underlying issues with the Galaxy Fold’s display surfaced around 17 April 2019. Thereafter, many noted reviewers had stepped forward and reported that the inner display of the foldable device has stopped working. The major cause for the issue was later found out to the removal of the outer screen protector over the inside display. The South Korean company had bundled instructions along with the device indicating that the removal of the screen protector can lead to malfunction in the display. However, some devices still faced the same issue even without the removal of the screen protector. 
Yes, a toaster exists that can customize your slice of bread with an image of your face. Even though it’s requirements may be very controversial, there is a reason why the US company “Burnt Impressions” still ships these novelty appliances for $75 per unit. Users can get the toaster to imprint their selfies onto a slice of bread via a custom laser-cut metal grilling plate, that is also made by the company. However, buyers have to upload their photograph at the time of purchase, which means that you will be stuck with staring at one image on a bread slice.
There are times when some unwanted gadgets from sci-fi movies make their way into the real world, making you wonder if they actually are meant for the same. Such is the case with the “MoodMetric”, which is a ring that measures the body’s signals to determine the state of the mind of the wearer. The data is then relayed to the wearer’s smartphone, where he/she can gain insights regarding his/her mood. However, it is very unclear why a person will need a gadget to find out what their mood is like.
After the iPod hit the market and took it by storm, a lot of companies (including Sony) started experimenting on portable music players to hit the right chord. The aforementioned Japanese company made its entry with the launch of the Sony Rolly, which was a portable music player with a twist, literally. The music player was shaped like a football, and the best part was the fact that it danced to music. Costing at about US$ 399 at the time of launch, Rolly could twist, turn, roll and perform a host of other moves in sync to the music, all while flashing multi coloured lights. However, it didn’t even have a headphone jack at the time. Almost an year later, Sony discontinued the Rolly music player.
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The study was co-led by a researche from the Boston University of Public Health (BUSPH). The study unearths that protein truncating variants in the aforementioned apolipoprotein B (APOB) gene are directly linked to lower triglyceride and LDL cholesterol levels, which significantly lowers the risk of coronary heart disease by almost 72 percent.
automatically when the crosshair is focused on the enemy, whereas in advanced mode, the player has to fire the weapon manually. Moreover, players can choose how they hold each weapon by default. For instance, shotguns can be set to hip-fire by default, while rifles can be set to ADS (aim down sights) by default. Apart from tweaking the HUD, players can customize their aiming sensitivity via a total 17 different sliders.
After the launch of the Oppo Reno with the unique shark-fin design, the company has been granted a patent which depicts a smartphone with a rotating camera system. The patent was filed by Guangdong Oppo Mobile Telecommunications in the end of the year 2018 with the WIPO (World Intellectual Property Office). The design was titled as a “Mobile Terminal” and was published on May 16, 2019. As mentioned previously, the patent exhibits a camera module design that can rotate 180 degrees around a pivotal axis. 
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Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania and Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) in Chevy Chase have put forward evidence that suggests that a category of viruses known as “bacteriophages” can be the solution to antibiotic-resistant bacteria. These bacteria-eating viruses target and kill a variety of strains of bacteria that cause infection. An interesting fact to note is that there are an estimated 1031 bacteriophages on this planet, and different phages target different bacterial strains.
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Known as the Blue Moon, the lander will be capable of autonomous space navigation. It will be able to perform soft landings on the surface of the moon while carrying payloads weighing between 3.6 and 6.5 metric tons. This implies that the Blue Moon will be able to carry a total of 4 large rovers simultaneously. This is a small part in a much larger plan to analyze the resources and the surface of the moon.
The richest man on the planet plans to instate American astronauts on the South Pole of the moon in the next 5 years. The 
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The lead director of the game, Mike Bethell has previously worked on a multitude of Indie games such as Thomas Was Alone and Volume. The upcoming game is called “John Wick Hex“, and is scheduled to release on a variety of platforms, including Windows PC, Mac and Consoles. However, the director has made it clear that the game will make its first appearance on Windows PC and Mac, with consoles following suit. 
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