iQOO 13 is set to launch in India on December 3, but ahead of it, we got a chance to test out its camera performance. The phone was unveiled last month in China and comes equipped with the Snapdragon 8 Elite SoC, a triple rear camera unit, and a 6,150mAh battery. While most of the specifications of the Indian variant are said to be similar, the battery capacity has been capped at 6,000mAh. The iQOO series phones are not particularly known for their camera performance, but the iQOO 13 is hoping to change that with its triple 50-megapixel rear camera setup.

iQOO 13 camera specifications

The iQOO 13 features a primary 50-megapixel Sony IMX921 sensor with f/1.88 aperture, optical image stabilisation, and electronic image stabilisation. The rear main camera can also shoot videos at up to 8K 30fps resolution.

The phone features a 2x telephoto camera

You get another 50-megapixel ultrawide camera that uses the Samsung S5KJN1SQ03 sensor and offers f/2.0 aperture. Finally, there’s a 50-megapixel Sony IMX816 telephoto sensor with f/1.85 aperture and 2x optical zoom. While the telephoto is a downgrade compared to the iQOO 12, which came with a periscope telephoto sensor, iQOO claims that the new phone uses Vivo’s image processing, which should help provide better results. 

iQOO 13 camera samples

We tested the cameras on the iQOO 13 in Dubai, UAE and captured plenty of photos using all three sensors. While we can’t give our verdict yet, below are some samples from the main, ultrawide, and telephoto cameras you can check out.

First, let’s take a look at some daylight and low-light photos taken using the 50-megapixel Sony IMX921 rear camera. The photos were shot in the default Photo mode.

Main camera daylight samples shot at 1x (23mm)

Next, some low-light photos from the main camera.

Main camera lowlight samples shot at 1x (23mm)

Here are some samples taken from the 50-megapixel Sony IMX816 telephoto sensor in Portrait Mode at four different focal lengths.

Top to bottom: 24mm, 35mm, 50mm, 100mm

There’s also a Snapshot mode on the Camera app that is claimed to take sharp images of moving images. We, obviously, tried this on the fast-moving cars (2nd shot below) at the Dubai Autodrome. Take a look at some of the Snapshot mode shots below. 

The iQOO 13 is set to launch in India on December 3. Stay tuned to our full review to know our final verdict on the camera performance.

*Disclosure: iQOO sponsored the correspondent’s flights and hotel for the event in Dubai, UAE.

The ChatGPT chatbot was reactivated in Italy after its maker OpenAI addressed issues raised by Italy’s data protection authority, the agency and the company confirmed on Friday.

Microsoft-backed OpenAI took ChatGPT offline in Italy last month after the country’s data protection authority, also known as Garante, temporarily banned the chatbot and launched a probe over the artificial intelligence application’s suspected breach of privacy rules.

Garante had given a deadline till Sunday to OpenAI to address its concerns for allowing the chatbot to start operating again in the country.

Last month, Garante said ChatGPT has an “absence of any legal basis that justifies the massive collection and storage of personal data” to “train” the chatbot. 

Garante had also accused OpenAI of failing to check the age of ChatGPT’s users who are supposed to be aged 13 or above, OpenAI said it will offer a tool to verify users’ ages in Italy upon sign-up.

The company said on Friday it will provide greater visibility of its privacy policy and user content opt-out form.

It will also provide a new form for European Union users to exercise their right to object to its use of personal data to train its models, a company spokesperson said.

The form requires people who want to opt out to provide detailed personal information, including evidence of data processing via relevant prompts.

Garante said it recognises the steps taken to combine technological progress with respect to people’s rights and hopes that the company will continue along this path of compliance with European data protection regulations.

Italy was the first western European country to curb ChatGPT, but its rapid development has attracted attention from lawmakers and regulators in several countries.

A committee of European Union lawmakers on Thursday agreed on new rules that would force companies deploying generative AI tools, such as ChatGPT, to disclose any copyrighted material used to develop their systems.

Following Garante’s interest in ChatGPT, European Data Protection Board, the body that unites Europe’s national privacy watchdogs, set up a task force on the chatbot earlier this month.

Garante said it will continue its probe of ChatGPT and will work with the special task force.  

© Thomson Reuters 2023

Consumers just aren’t buying as many entry-level smartphones as they used to. At least, that is what the IDC’s most recent report about the Indian smartphone market dictates. It clearly states that the market witnessed a strong decline of 36 percent year on year with entry-level smartphones. While you will find plenty of entry-level smartphones on sale in the market, most first-time smartphone buyers seem to be reaching out for a budget smartphone (from Rs. 10,000 onwards). And that’s mainly down to the fact that entry-level smartphones over the years have kind of ruined it for themselves. Given the paltry hardware that manufacturers are able to squeeze with such budget restrictions, the overall experience (despite ignoring camera performance) has also been lacklustre at best.

The only prominent player, Xiaomi, seems to be doing something about this. It has now launched its all-new Redmi A4 5G. As its moniker aptly explains, the phone delivers 5G connectivity and is priced from Rs. 8,499 for the 4GB + 64GB option, while the top-end 4GB + 128GB variant is available at Rs. 9,499.

The Redmi A4 5G has a 3.5mm headphone jack

Our Sparkle Purple review unit, despite its polycarbonate frame and rear panel, appears polished and could easily be mistaken for a more expensive budget device. It has flat sides along with flat front and rear panels. The chunky camera module at the back appears to have four camera cutouts and feels out of place on an entry-level device.

The phone has a large footprint but does not feel too heavy at 212 grams. Its plastic design also has an IP52 rating for dust and water resistance, which is good to see in this segment.

The dated display notch at the top of its large 6.88-inch 120Hz, HD+ display is the only giveaway you are holding for an entry-level device. During my brief usage, I took it outside, and it appeared to tackle the outdoors quite well.

The phone has a slightly dated notch at the top of its 6.88-inch display, which has a taller aspect ratio

Unlock the smartphone, and you will be greeted with Xiaomi’s HyperOS software, based on Android 14. As with all entry-level devices, this one is no different. And I was greeted with a ton of preinstalled apps and games. However, my initial impressions are that it all seems well optimised (especially when scrolling), even if launching an app does take an extra second than it would on a budget smartphone.

Back to the cameras, there’s just one rear-facing camera. Despite the four camera cutouts, there’s a primary 50-megapixel camera (f/1.8 aperture) and a second camera for depth sensing (when using the Portrait mode) that users cannot access. So, you are indeed left with a very basic camera experience. The selfie camera is also a basic 5-megapixel unit.

Powering the above hardware and software experience is Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon 4s Gen 2 SoC. Xiaomi has backed it up with LPDDR4X RAM but offers UFS 2.2 storage. The processor is manufactured using the 4nm fabrication process, so it will be able to deliver better performance with better efficiency compared to what’s currently available in smartphones at this price point.

There’s not much in the box, but you do get a 33W charger that charges the phone at 18W

Assisting the new chipset is a 5,160mAh battery. Given the smartphone’s pricing, it is a bit surprising to find a 33W charger in the box. However, the Redmi A4 5G charges at 18W, so I am expecting faster charging speeds despite the slightly higher capacity over the Redmi A3.

The few hours I have spent with the Redmi A4 5G have been enough to convince me that Xiaomi is out to stir up this much-ignored market segment. The segment as such has not been entirely ignored (there are still plenty of choices to pick from) but seems to be deprived of any innovation or sensible hardware choices over the past couple of years. Xiaomi seems to have figured out a winning formula, and the 4nm Qualcomm chipset shows positive signs of delivering a smooth and stable software experience, at the least. Can Xiaomi’s Redmi A4 5G be as good as a budget smartphone? Stay tuned for our detailed review.

The Last of Us Part II might be getting a remaster, as accidentally stated by a developer at Naughty Dog. First spotted by Resetera users, Lead Outsource Artist Mark Pajarillo referenced the version in a now-updated LinkedIn experience post. “Responsible for overseeing the production of all outsourced environment art assets, weapons and interactive props for two iconic titles The Last of Us: Part One and The Last of Us 2: Remastered,” the original post read, proving its existence. Hints of an enhanced PS5 version first dropped in July, when composer Gustavo Santaolalla alluded to some new features being added to the remaster.

Pajarillo himself worked on the original The Last of Us Part II as an Environment Artist, so it only makes sense for him to do the same for the PS5 version. That said, the remaster, as a whole, feels pointless, considering the title launched merely three years ago on the PS4 and has since received a PS5 patch that enabled 60fps on a game that still looks stunning and mechanically current. In fact, one of the key reasons the original Last of Us received a full-blown remake, with new visuals and modernised mechanics, was so it could stand toe-to-toe with the 2020 sequel. From a technical standpoint, besides haptic feedback and adaptive triggers, I wonder what Naughty Dog is going to promise this time. Hope we don’t have to deal with the discourse about the game’s controversial narrative once again.

While the LinkedIn post doesn’t serve as an official announcement, historically speaking, PlayStation has never stopped milking the franchise. Case in point, we have three versions of The Last of Us now: the original 2013 version, a 2014 remaster for the PS4, and the recent remake titled ‘The Last of Us: Part I‘ for PS5 and PC. (Meanwhile, Bloodborne continues to rot on the old-gen PS4, locked to an inconsistent 30fps. sigh) As mentioned before, the Argentine composer for TLOU, Santaolalla, revealed in an interview that players will be able to ‘make [him] play certain songs,’ which I’m guessing would work similarly to how protagonist Ellie Williams plays a range of iconic music with button prompts for notes. For the uninitiated, Santaolalla’s character briefly appeared in The Last of Us 2, just casually strumming away at his banjo at Jackson City.

If and when it does drop, we can expect it to be available to existing owners as a $10 (about Rs. 830) upgrade, as seen with other PlayStation remasters. Reports from last year also suggested that Naughty Dog was working on a ‘director’s cut’ for The Last of Us Part 2, which would likely make its way onto PC, akin to Horizon Forbidden West: Complete Edition. The studio itself remains tight-lipped about the remaster and its upcoming projects, which include a ‘brand-new single-player‘ experience and a multiplayer game set within TLOU’s post-apocalyptic universe. The latter has been put ‘on ice‘ for now, due to concerns about longtime viability, and we also saw 25 employees getting laid off.

The Last of Us Part II is available on the PS4 and playable on the PS5 via backwards compatibility.

As recently as February, generative AI did not feature prominently in EU lawmakers’ plans for regulating generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies such as ChatGPT.

The bloc’s 108-page proposal for the AI Act, published two years earlier, included only one mention of the word “chatbot.” References to AI-generated content largely referred to deepfakes: images or audio designed to impersonate human beings.

By mid-April, however, members of European Parliament (MEPs) were racing to update those rules to catch up with an explosion of interest in generative AI, which has provoked awe and anxiety since OpenAI unveiled ChatGPT six months ago.

That scramble culminated on Thursday with a new draft of the legislation which identified copyright protection as a core piece of the effort to keep AI in check.

Interviews with four lawmakers and two other sources close to discussions reveal for the first time how over just 11 days this small group of politicians hammered out what could become landmark legislation, reshaping the regulatory landscape for OpenAI and its competitors.

The draft bill is not final and lawyers say it will likely take years to come into force.

The speed of their work, though, is also a rare example of consensus in Brussels, which is often criticised for the slow pace of decision-making.

Last-minute changes

Since launching in November, ChatGPT has become the fastest growing app in history, and sparked a flurry of activity from Big Tech competitors and investment in generative AI startups like Anthropic and Midjourney.

The runaway popularity of such applications led EU industry chief Thierry Breton and others to call for regulation of ChatGPT-like services.

An organisation backed by Elon Musk, the billionaire CEO of Tesla and Twitter, took it up a notch by issuing a letter warning of existential risk from AI and calling for stricter regulations.

On April 17, the dozen MEPs involved in drafting the legislation signed an open letter agreeing with some parts of Musk’s letter and urged world leaders to hold a summit to find ways to control the development of advanced AI.

That same day, however, two of them — Dragos Tudorache and Brando Benifei — proposed changes that would force companies with generative AI systems to disclose any copyrighted material used to train their models, according to four sources present at the meetings, who requested anonymity due to the sensitivity of the discussions.

That tough new proposal received cross-party support, the sources said.

One proposal by conservative MEP Axel Voss — forcing companies to request permission from rights holders before using the data — was rejected as too restrictive and something that could hobble the emerging industry.  

After thrashing out the details over the next week, the EU outlined proposed laws that could force an uncomfortable level of transparency on a notoriously secretive industry.

“I must admit that I was positively surprised on how we converged rather easily on what should be in the text on these models,” Tudorache told Reuters on Friday.

“It shows there is a strong consensus, and a shared understanding on how to regulate at this point in time.”

The committee will vote on the deal on May 11 and if successful, it will advance to the next stage of negotiation, the trilogue, where EU member states will debate the contents with the European Commission and Parliament.

“We are waiting to see if the deal holds until then,” one source familiar with the matter said.

Big Brother vs the Terminator

Until recently, MEPs were still unconvinced that generative AI deserved any special consideration.

In February, Tudorache told Reuters that generative AI was “not going to be covered” in-depth. “That’s another discussion I don’t think we are going to deal with in this text,” he said.

Citing data security risks over warnings of human-like intelligence, he said: “I am more afraid of Big Brother than I am of the Terminator.”

But Tudorache and his colleagues now agree on the need for laws specifically targeting the use of generative AI.

Under new proposals targeting “foundation models,” companies like OpenAI, which is backed by Microsoft, would have to disclose any copyrighted material — books, photographs, videos and more — used to train their systems.

Claims of copyright infringement have rankled AI firms in recent months with Getty Images suing Stable Diffusion for using copyrighted photos to train its systems. OpenAI has also faced criticism for refusing to share details of the dataset used to train its software.

“There have been calls from outside and inside the Parliament for a ban or classifying ChatGPT as high-risk,” said MEP Svenja Hahn. “The final compromise is innovation-friendly as it does not classify these models as ‘high risk,’ but sets requirements for transparency and quality.”

© Thomson Reuters 2023