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Tech News
A firmware update pushed through Samsung's SmartThings platform this week caused some Bespoke AI four-door refrigerators, mostly 2024-and-later models, to lose power and stop cooling. Owners in Korea reported their fridges went offline mid-update, with displays stuck on an update-checking message, forcing many to throw out spoiled food. Samsung has not responded to questions about the scope of the issue or a fix.
Leaked marketing renders, reproduced via Gemini from watermarked Samsung materials, show the Galaxy Tab S12 Plus and Tab S12 Ultra in gray with aluminum unibody designs. The Plus reportedly has a 12.6-inch display, dual speakers and a 10,600mAh battery, while the Ultra keeps its display notch, quad speakers, dual rear cameras and an 11,600mAh battery. Both are said to use MediaTek's Dimensity 9500 chip, with US prices reportedly starting at $1,200 and $1,400 respectively.
Samsung paused a SmartThings software update for its smart refrigerators in Korea after owners reported units losing power, screens failing, doors not auto-opening, and internal lights not turning on, leading to spoiled food. A Samsung representative confirmed on the company's forum that an error occurred during testing of the update and that emergency repairs were being handled through service centers. ZDNET Korea reported the faulty update reached users due to a system error, and Samsung said distribution has been stopped.
Samsung has acknowledged a bug in its Home Up Good Lock module where backups fail and get deleted as "broken" if users have set custom folder label colors. A Samsung Community moderator confirmed the issue and said engineers are working on a fix that requires changes to the underlying code, to be released in a future update. In the meantime, users can revert folder label colors to default settings to create working backups.
Samsung has begun pushing the stable One UI 9 update, based on Android 17, to Galaxy S26 Ultra units in the United States. Reports from T-Mobile Galaxy S26 Ultra owners on Reddit show the update carrying a 4.1GB download and the September 2026 security patch, though it's unclear whether AT&T variants are receiving it yet.
Motorola unveiled the Signature 27 at Qualcomm's Snapdragon Summit, marking the first time this Signature phone line will launch in US markets. The device features Qualcomm's newly announced Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6 chip, a 50-megapixel main camera with a 200-megapixel periscope telephoto lens, four rear cameras total, a new ArcticMesh cooling system, seven years of software support, and a Bang & Olufsen audio system.
Amazon is selling Samsung's P9 512GB microSD Express card for $99.99, a $50 discount off its usual $149.99 price and matching its original MSRP before flash memory shortages pushed prices up. The card offers sequential read speeds up to 800 MB/s and is compatible with the Nintendo Switch 2's storage expansion needs.
A study covered by The Conversation had 58 adults cycle while wearing devices from Apple, Samsung, Garmin, and Fitbit alongside a metabolic analyzer that measures actual gas exchange to determine calorie burn. Comparing the watches' estimates to that gold-standard measurement, researchers found substantial inaccuracies, with errors reaching 100% or more in some cases, particularly among people with higher body fat percentages.
ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) announced at the 2026 World Manufacturing Convention that it has begun mass production of its fifth-generation DRAM platform, called G5. The company says the platform uses new self-aligned quadruple patterning with an 11.95nm active-area half-pitch, a 45:1 capacitor aspect ratio, and a high-k metal gate process, delivering roughly 50% more die per wafer than prior generations.
Leaker Ice Universe reports that Samsung's Galaxy S26 Ultra uses four-way baffles to block screen visibility from top, bottom and both sides, while Huawei's Mate XT 2 and Xiaomi's 18 Pro series only block side views. This makes Samsung's privacy screen more thorough, but the tighter light control brings side effects like dimmer off-axis brightness, blurrier images, and reported eye strain or nausea for some users.
According to The Elec, Samsung plans to embed a security chip inside batteries for upcoming mid-range devices, including the Galaxy A series. The chip would let the phone verify whether an installed battery is genuine, mirroring a system Apple has used for years with iPhones.
A hands-on roundup highlights Good Lock modules that let Samsung Galaxy owners customize their phones beyond what One UI offers by default. Key examples include Display Assistant, which sets screen timeout and refresh rate per app, and Sound Assistant, which allows individual volume levels for each app.