Tech News and Commentary

Dave and the team discuss Google’s new flagship Pixel phone, the new Nest WiFi router, Google Stadia, and more Google news, a telepresence robot, deliveries into your fridge, Microsoft – Taco Bell cooperation, and more.

Mohammad in Qatif, Saudi Arabia listens to the FREE “Into Tomorrow” podcasts and is calling via the FREE new, updated “IT” App and asked: “I have a Xiaomi Mi Pad 4 that I purchased in China, so it came with the Chinese ROM. I would like to flash it with a global ROM so I can connect to Google Contacts and other Google services. Can you tell me where I can download a global ROM for that and how I can flash it?”

Mohammad,

You can find a large variety of different ROMs at the XDA developer forum. The forum has different segments for different devices, you want the forum.xda-developers.com/mi-pad-4/development.

You’ll find quite a few different ROMs with different customizations, one of the most popular types is the Pixel Experience. As you would expect the Pixel Experience does include Google Services. It’s also a ROM that removes unwanted bloatware, which is always a nice feature.

There is one thing to think about when it comes to all of this, these ROMs are put together by someone with development skills and if they wanted to they could add some extra “features”. In particular, we’re thinking of malware or some security hole that you probably don’t want there.

These ROMs are popular and picking an established one may not be very high risk, but as always, it’s something to keep in mind since installing them can take away some of the security put in place by the smartphone software architecture, which we largely take for granted.

Yehuda in Silver Spring, Maryland listens to the podcast and called in with his favorite app

Yehuda said: “I’m calling with my favorite app. One of the most underrated apps is the official Gmail app for Android. I know it used to be available for iOS but I don’t use iOS anymore. Whenever people tell me they are having trouble with Gmail on their phone, it almost always because they’re not using the official Gmail app. If everyone would switch to the official Gmail app, then I don’t think anyone would ever use any other email service anymore. There would be no more complaints from anyone about problems with Gmail on their phones.”

Chris in Tyler, Texas listens on KTBB and called in to help another listener. Chris said: “I just heard Eve in Lewes, with the disabled brother and mother. She said when she has to leave the house her brother and mother are incapable of using a cell phone to contact her. But if they are capable of speech, could she not setup Alexa or whatever that other Google thing is, where they can say ‘call Eve?'”

Chris, that’s a great idea.

Like you said, if they’re capable of speech (and don’t have a southern accent… just listen to hour 2) they should not only make the call by using their voice from anywhere in the room, but they’d also meet Eve’s other requirement, it would be free with no monthly subscription.

There are some very inexpensive smart speakers out there, something like the Echo Dot or the Google Home Mini would be able to handle this task for very little money (a one time fee of $50 for the latest generation, less for the old ones, and you can bet on them being on sale for Black Friday,