PUBG Mobile is kicking its partnership with BoBoiBoy into high gear with Phase 2 of an exclusive partnership with the Malaysian IP. The new phase kicked off on 17 February and will end on 1st March 2023. The Elemental vs Shadow in-game event will bring exclusive in-game items and themed battles.
Source: PUBG Mobile
During the event, players will be able to win the exclusive Elemental Burst Set gear. The item set draws inspiration from Boboiboy’s titular character and his ability to control the elements when dealing with baddies. Players will be rewarded with parts of the set as they complete tasks in-game. The headset will be rewarded once they play five matches. However, to get the rest of the set, they will have to place in the top 5 seven times. The in-game event is open to all players for the duration of the event.
In addition to this, players will also be able to get the exclusive Shadow Reign Suit which draws its inspiration from Fang, BoBoiBoy’s rival. To do this, they will need to visit the in-game store. PUBG Mobile will also be bringing the voices from the successful animation to the game through a limited edition voice pack. The voice pack will feature the voices of BoBoiBoy, Fang and Adudu.
Source: PUBG Mobile
If you’re just jumping on the PUBG Mobile bandwagon and missed out on the earlier event featuring BoBoiBoy, you’ll also be able to get the in-game backpack and helmet from the store. All BoBoiBoy event items will be available in the game store until 31st March 2023.
A month after the Samsung Galaxy A14 5G release, Samsung has silently released the 4G version of the same smartphone in Malaysia. The Galaxy A14 replaces the A13 released last year as the entry-level to Samsung’s extensive Galaxy A series.
The A15 4G has a MediaTek Helio G80 processor instead of the Samsung Exynos 1330 that comes with the A15 5G. This is supported by up to 6GB of RAM and 128GB of internal memory. In addition to this, the smartphone continues to support memory expansion through microSD cards. Dual SIM is also supported on the A14.
The smartphone comes with a 6.6-inch HD+ LCD display with a 60Hz refresh rate. It comes with a triple camera setup with a 50-megapixel main camera setup complemented by a 5-megapixel ultra-wide camera and a 2-megapixel macro camera. On the front is a 13-megapixel selfie camera. It has a 3.5mm audio jack with a side-mounted fingerprint sensor.
Connectivity-wise, the smartphone supports 4G LTE, dual-band WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, Bluetooth 5.2, near-field communication (NFC), and GPS. The 5,000mAh battery charges via USB-C and supports 10W charging.
Pricing & Availability
Samsung hasn’t listed an official price for the Galaxy A14 4G just yet but it has listed the device in its Malaysian online store.
The Samsung Galaxy A14 will be available in Black, Silver and Dark Red.
HMD Global has announced a slew of new Nokia smartphones. The most unique of which is the Nokia G22 which is the first smartphone that is launched together with IFixIt. Weird partner for a smartphone right? Well, it begins to make sense when you consider that the Nokia G22 is also the first smartphone from HMD Global to be completely self repairable. The new smartphone is launching with a self-repair kit which will be available via IFixIt in Australia, the United Kingdom and other European Union countries.
The Nokia G22 is another notch in HMD’s line up of affordable, durable and well-supported Android smartphones. It also holds true to the company’s commitment to sustainability with a plastic back made from 100% recycled materials. The new smartphone comes with a 6.52-inch, HD+ display with 90Hz refresh rate and 500 nits brightness. It comes with a quad core Unisoc T606 with 4GB of RAM and up to 128GB of internal memory. It also supports up to an additional 2TB of memory via microSD.
On the camera front, the G22 will be coming with a triple camera setup with a 50-megapixel main sensor. This sensor has an f/1.8 aperture, a 5P lens and is autofocus enabled. A 2-megapixel depth and 2-megapixel macro sensor complete the triple camera setup. On the front is an 8-megapixel fixed focus CMOS sensor with an f/2.0 aperture and 1.12µm pixel size.
It comes with the usual connectivity features including Bluetooth, Near Field Communication, GPS, WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac and USB-C connectivity. It’s powered by 5,050mAh battery with HMD’s signature promise of up to 3 day battery life. It supports 20W fast charging.
The smartphone will launch with Android 12 and has been guaranteed 2 years of OS upgrades from HMD global.
Pricing & Availability
The Nokia G22 will be available in two colours: Lagoon Blue and Meteor Grey. It will be available in two variants: 4GB+64GB and 4GB+128GB. The smartphone will be priced from EUR179 (MYR852.44).
At home QickFix Kits will be available on iFixit.com with prices starting from EUR5 (MYR23.82). HMD Global lists the prices for a replacement battery at EUR24.95 (MYR118.83), and the replacement charging port at EUR19.95 (MYR95.02).
Sony’s WH-1000XM5 is one of the benchmarks in the world of mainstream wireless headphones. We regarded it as one of the best options for headphones of its type. It will set you back MYR 1,500 and above though, depending on when you get your hands on the device. In any case, it is not a budget friendly type of device to own. Then again, it is not made to be budget friendly. It is made with the word ‘premium’ in mind, and it shows in a lot of ways.
Still, what if you do not have MYR 1,500 to spend on a headphone? You might have to settle for something that is less powerful than the WH-1000XM5. You might have to compromise on build quality, and even size. With Sony’s latest WH-CH720N and WH-CH520, you might not have to.
Sony WH-CH520
Source: Sony
Source: Sony
Source: Sony
This one is not an over-ear headphone like the Sony WH-1000XM5 or even its brother, the WH-CH720N (which we will talk about later). It is a smaller form factor on-ear headphone that is designed to be the perfect run-around listening tool to fit in your bags. It is designed to be a long-lasting all-round headphone for your daily usage.
The WH-CH520 offers up to 50 hours (music only) in battery life, that is 20 more than the WH-1000XM5, 15 more than the WH-CH720N, and 15 more than its predecessor, the WH-CH510. That also means that you might not need to get it to a USB port in a week, depending on how you use your headphones. Impressive, considering the compact design of the headphone.
Thanks to its mostly plastic construction, it weighs only 147g. That means that adding it into your bag does not add that much weight into your out-of-office or home set up. That also means that your neck and head bears less weight, and with that you might be able to work with the headphones for much longer.
Within the headphone is a 30mm closed unit driver. Alongside the large drivers is a plain microphone for calls and video conferencing if you connect it to your PC. Sadly, you will not find a 3.5mm AUX jack on the WH-CH520 headphone, which also means that you are out of luck when your battery goes flat.
You do get Bluetooth 5.2 connection on the device though, which ensures better stability and low latency connections with your Bluetooth devices. Android’s Fast Pair feature also ensures that you only need to turn on your headphone to quickly get it paired and connected to your devices with as little fuss as possible. There is also Swift Pair for Windows laptops or tablets. Of course, everything about the headphone can be controlled via the Sony Headphone app from your smartphone. If not, there are proper buttons on the earcups for that proper tactile feel. You can control the headphone or music via Voice too if you want with either Google Assistant or Siri.
As with Sony’s latest audio gears, you get 360 reality audio as a standard feature. You get to experience the feature with Tidal and if you connect the headphones with a compatible Bravia XR TV. If you do connect it to your Bravia XR TV, you even get to enjoy Dolby Atmos audio. You get DSEE, not DSEE Extreme upscaling technology. DSEE is still great for upscaling your Spotify music adding all the little details your music might lose in compression.
Sony WH-CH720N
Source: Sony
Source: Sony
Source: Sony
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Source: Sony
Source: Sony
Source: Sony
If you prefer a larger headphone to cover your ears, the WH-CH720N should fit the bill. Like its predecessor, the WH-CH720N is also a noise cancelling headphone. Unlike the previous headphone though, it is cheaper and features a flagship class noise cancelling technology.
The WH-CH720N comes with the same V1 Integrated Processor for noise cancelling that the WH-1000XM5 packs. It is regarded as the best noise cancelling technology to date, so if that is the only thing you care about in your headphones, it is money well spent here. But that also means that you are getting a much better noise cancelling experience than the older WH-CH710N with even better wind noise reduction algorithms when you are outdoors. Thanks to the better processor, ambient noise is also better than ever with the Sony WH-CH720N. The noise cancelling/ambient noise feature can also be set automatically depending on your geolocation via the app.
Within the large earcups are closed 30mm dynamic drivers on each end. The battery pack offers up to 50 hours of battery life if you turn off Noise Cancelling. Of course, you are not going to do that, you get 35 hours of battery life with Noise Cancelling, five more than its premium cousin, the WH-1000XM5. If you run out of battery though, you can still use it with an included 3.5mm AUX jack.
Unlike the premium WH-1000XM5, the WH-CH720N does not come with gesture or touch control. It has physical buttons instead, which we kind of like better than gesture controls. That also means that the headphones, while packing a few mics for better noise cancellation, does not pack a proximity sensor that pauses your songs when you take the headphones off your ears.
You get DSEE still on the WH-CH720N, which adds lost details on compressed audio including Spotify. You might want to get a Tidal subscription though to get into Sony’s 360 Reality Audio. If you have a Sony Bravia XR TV, you even get the full Dolby Atmos experience with the headphones complete with surround sound. For calls, you get the same Beamforming microphones as the WH-1000XM5, which should mean that you get crystal clear voice in all sorts of environments.
While it is not made of premium materials like the WH-1000XM5, the WH-CH720N is not what you call cheap in terms of build quality. There are a lot of plastics, true, but there is a metal piece that holds the headband together with its sliding mechanism. The faux leather earcups is also designed with all-day comfort in mind. It is also Sony’s lightest over-ear headphone in ever at 192g. That also means that you can wear the headphones all day and not feel fatigued.
Price and Availability
The WH-CH520 is available in four attractive colours – Blue, Cream, White, and Black. It will retail at MYR 229, reasonably affordable for what it offers. We think that it will be perfect for those looking to travel light and is looking for a compact audio set-up to go anywhere.
The WH-CH720N is a little more premium at MYR 649. It is MYR 50 less than its predecessor though. It also features flagship level noise cancelling and better mics all around. You can get it in Blue, White, or Black colour options. This one is for the budget conscious audiophiles that appreciates good noise cancelling, we think. More about the new Sony Headphones can be found on their website.
No, we do not mean that we do not love Spotify. The app is the most popular music streaming app in the world, and we actually like our Spotify a lot. We use it everyday at home and even out and about for both music and podcasts. We even publish our podcasts on Spotify (more coming soon, just be patient).
Spotify’s app interface is also one of the most intuitive you can find in the world of music and podcast streaming currently. You can ‘like’ songs and easily add them to your playlist, or create a separate playlist for whatever song you please for your pleasure. To ‘like’ a song or podcast episode, you simply tap the Heart icon beside the song, or at least that used to be the way.
Spotify has announced though that they are going to be losing the Heart icon button to ‘like’ songs or podcasts. That is not such a bad news though. They are simply integrating the ‘like’ function into the other icon that sits beside the Heart icon. They are integrating ‘like’ into the Plus icon.
Before today’s announcement, the Plus button is where you add the song to your favourite playlists or whichever appropriate playlists you think it fits in. If you have not known, playlists are great ways to organize and finding back your favourite songs without going through the entire ‘search’ process again. Now, the Plus button is not just an ‘add to playlist’ button.
Source: Spotify
The Plus button is both your ‘like’, and ‘add to playlist’ button. You tap it once to add the song or podcast to your Liked Songs or Your Episodes. Your Plus button will now turn into a green check instead of a Plus button. You then tap it again to move the liked song or podcast into its appropriate playlist, decided by you.
The Plus icon does not just work with single songs or podcasts. You can add entire albums with the button. Again, it is a simple tap of the button on the album or playlist to add it to Your Library. You can go into the saved album or playlist and pick out the songs you want to save it to another playlist if you want.
While it might seem a little counterintuitive at first, this is, in our opinion, a more elegant solution to a simple problem. If you are going to add a song into whatever playlist you choose, you clearly like the song (or at least, in most cases). This way, you are technically adding the song into Your Library as a liked song. The next step is really to assign it into whichever playlists the song belongs to in your mind. Instead of clicking on two buttons, you are clicking on one button in one location. In some ways, it cleans up the interface even more. Everything you need is put in one spot. On the other, it sort of helps Spotify’s algorithms to understand your song or podcast better and in turn, recommend more suitable songs, podcasts, and even playlists to you. For more information on Spotify’s new button integration, you can head out to their blog.
Honor took the stage at MWC 2023, to unveil their new flagship series – the Honor Magic5 series which adopts a new “human-centric” approach to its technology. The new approach brings a slew of new features that place their users first and help improve their lives more meaningfully.
The new Honor Magic5 series brings together specifications and features that strike a unique balance with a price that doesn’t break the bank. The new series consists of two devices (for now): the Honor Magic5 and the Honor Magic5 Pro. It goes without saying that the Magic5 Pro leads the duo as Honor’s true flagship with the best in specifications.
Both the Honor Magic5 and Magic5 Pro come with Honor’s new Super Dynamic Display. The display is an LTPO panel which has been enhanced with software to produce images that are more vivid with deeper contrasts. Honor boasts that this technology produces images that are 500% more vivid. It still has a 120Hz refresh rate with a peak HDR brightness of 1800nits. The display is also a Quad-Curved Floating Screen. What this means – essentially – is that the glass of the screen has been curved on all four sides giving it a feel that it’s floating. The Pro comes with a 6.81-inch display while the vanilla Magic5 comes with a 6.73-inch version of the same.
The Honor5 series comes with a triple-sensor setup for its main camera. On the Pro, the sensors are a 50-megapixel wide camera with an f/1.6 aperture and 1/1.12-inch sensor size, a 50-megapixel ultra-wide camera with an f/2.0 aperture, and a 50-megapixel periscope Telephoto sensor with an f/3.0 aperture and 3.5x optical zoom. This setup combined with Honor’s Falcon AI imaging technology enables 100x zoom on the Pro. The regular Magic5, on the other hand, comes with a 54-megapixel sensor with an f/1.9 aperture and 1/1,49 inch sensor size complemented by a 32-megapixel telephoto camera. While comparable, the regular Magic5 will only be able to achieve 50x zoom. On the front, is a 12-megapixel selfie camera.
On the inside, the Magic5 series comes with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 with up to 12GB and up to 512GB of internal storage. Honor is packing the phone with faster LPDDR5X RAM and UFS4.0 storage modules for added performance gains. It’s also coming with an IP68 rating and is powered by a 5,100mAH battery on both variants. Wireless charging is also coming back with the Magic5 series with both supporting 50W wireless Honor Supercharge while, if you plug it in, it can charge using Honor’s SuperCharge at 60W.
Pricing & Availability
The new Honor Magic series will be available in Glacier Blue, Meadow Green, Coral Purple, Orange, and Black. The regular Magic5 comes in at EUR899 (MYR4,254.39) while the Magic5 Pro will be priced from EUR1199 (MYR7,567.038).
Leica is back in the international smartphone arena thanks to its new partnership with Xiaomi. With its initial offering, the Xiaomi 12S Ultra only officially being rolled out in Mainland China, the Xiaomi 13 marks the brand’s return to the ecosystem. The new Xiaomi 13 series crowning feature is the Leica Vario-Summicron 1:19-2.2/14-75 ASPH camera system which comes on the 13 Pro.
The Xiaomi 13 series comes with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 with up to 12GB of RAM and 512GB internal memory. Of course, the Xiaomi 13 series comes with two entries in Malaysia (for now): the Xiaomi 13 and the Xiaomi 13 Pro. The two entries come with a few differences that distinguish the smartphones from each other. The most significant of which the Leica Vario-Summicron 1:19-2.2/14-75 ASPH camera system.
The Pro comes with a triple camera array for the main camera complete with Leica lenses. The setup consists of the 1-inch, 50.3-megapixel Sony IMX989 with an f/1.8 aperture and 23mm focal length. It equipped with dual pixel phase detection autofocus (PDAF), Laser Autofocus and optical image stabilization (OIS). This is complemented with a 50-megapixel telephoto lens with 3.2x optical zoom and PDAF. Completing the triple sensor setup is a 50-megapixel utlra-wide sensor with autofocus. On the front, the smartphone comes with a 32-megapixel selfie camera.
The vanilla 13 comes with a triple sensor setup with a main 50-megapixel main sensor with PDAF and OIS complemented with a 10-megapixel telephoto sensor and a 12-megapixel ultrawide sensor. On the front is the same 32-megapixel sensor.
Leica isn’t just lending its lenses to Xiaomi for the Xiaomi 13 series, they’re helping with the software. The 13 and 13 Pro both come with the master lens system, a software features which provides better, more granular control to the focal length and depth of field for better portrait photos. In addition to this, the software comes with two distinct photographic styles: Leica Authentic Look and Leica Vibrant Look. These paired with Xiaomi’s own Imaging Engine culminate in Xiaomi’s strongest computational photography flagship.
Of course, with all these photography features, the two smartphones come with powerful displays with up to 120Hz refresh rate.
Pricing & Availability
The Xiaomi 13 Series will be available in Malaysia starting on March 8th 2023.
The Xiaomi 13 will be available in three colours – Black, White and Flora Green. Only one variant will be available in Malaysia 12GB RAM with 256GB of internal storage. Prices start at MYR3,499.
The Xiaomi 13 Pro will be available in two colours: Ceramic Black and Ceramic White. Two variants of the 13 Pro will be avaiable 12RAM with 256GB of internal storage and a special, limited edition 12GB RAM with 512GB internal storage. The former will be priced from MYR4,699 while the limited edition will be on sale for MYR 4,999.
The Xiaomi 13 series will be available for pre-order starting on February 27, 2023 until March 7, 2023. Packages and pricing are as follows:
Technically, as screen sizes go, this is not the smaller Razer Blade you can buy. There is a Razer Blade 14 which featured a smaller 14-inch display. As far as we know, they have made no announcement of the Blade 14 laptop, so we are going to treat the new Razer Blade 15 as the 2023 baby Razer Blade.
Contrary to what the name of the naming scheme of the name suggests, the Razer Blade 15 is not what you want to call entry-level. Far from it in fact, the 15-inch gaming laptop is designed to be as powerful as 15-inch laptops of its class can be. They say that the Razer Blade 15 is designed for those who wants to take their AAA games anywhere in the world while remaining as thin as laptops of this class can be.
As their marketing blurb suggests, the Blade 15 is designed to be uncompromised while remaining as portable as your textbooks. It still weighs about 2kg though, which is not all that light for a laptop this size. Still, you might not be too alarmed by its weight when you know what is within the 17mm (16.99mm to be exact) thick body.
Inside you can find up to 64GB of DDR5-5200MHz RAM. That should be a good indication to what you can expect to find within the all-metal body of the Razer Blade 15. To ensure that the Windows 11 laptop can run DDR5 memory at that speeds, Razer installed Intel’s 13th Generation Core processor. You can opt for Intel’s Core i7-13800H high-performance CPU with up to 14 cores clocking at up to 5.2GHZ (turbo). Alongside a powerful CPU and high-performance RAM, you need a powerful GPU to match too. This one comes with NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 4070 (up to) if you want.
Herein lies the problem. High-performance parts fitted into the Razer Blade 15 needs a lot of cooling. There is not a lot of space in the a body that is 25% smaller than the next best thing, the Razer Blade 16. They enhanced their vapor chamber cooling solution and put their exhaust fins on a diet to save space. That the same time, they made everything more efficient to ensure there is sufficient cooling within the svelte body of the Blade 15.
It is a laptop, so they need to ensure that it still has all the right qualities to make it as portable and mobile as possible. From its 80Wh battery, they say the Blade 15 can extract up to 6 hours of battery life. Its display offers a mobile viewing experience like no other with up to QHD in 16:10 aspect ratio goodness, and up to 240Hz in fluidity. When the mood takes you, 2.5ms in response time should keep you competitive no matter where you are seated. If cinematic games is what you care about, the 100% DCI-P3 colour gamut should take you to another world. You can kit your Razer Blade 15 with up t 4TB of storage too to ensure you have enough space for all your games, your movies, and your work documents as well.
Source: Razer
Source: Razer
Source: Razer
Source: Razer
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Source: Razer
Source: Razer
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Source: Razer
Source: Razer
The Razer Blade 15 is now available in select regions globally. There are no colour options for the Razer Blade 15, just the usual all-black. Alongside the Razer Blade 15, the Razer Blade 16 and Razer Blade 18 will also be available with NVIDIA’s latest GeForce RTX 40 series for laptops. The Razer Blade 15 will set you back US$ 2,499.99 (MYR 11,084*) onward. There are no confirmations as to whether the Razer Blade 15 will be available in Malaysia officially. It is available in Singapore though, so you can technically pop by and get your hands on one if you really want one. For more information on Razer’s latest Blade 15, you can visit their website.
*Approximately based on exchange rate of US$ 1 = MYR 4.43 as of 24/02/2023 on xe.com
We quite liked ASUS’ Zenbook 14X OLED from last year. Its powerful internals are perfect for our line of work and our requirements. Its good looks is a huge bonus for our interaction with it too. That was last year though, and there is a new processor on the block. That also means that the ASUS Zenbook 14X OLED from 2022 is now outdated.
No matter, ASUS has a new Zenbook 14X OLED for 2023. This time it comes packing Intel’s latest 13th Generation Core processor. In fact, you get to fit up to an Intel Core i9 in the new Zenbook.
The 2023 Zenbook 14X OLED is one of the most powerful thin-and-light notebooks in its class. As mentioned, you can opt for Intel’s latest Core i9-13900H processor that clocks at 2.6 GHz and turbos up to 5.4 GHz. You can settle for Intel’s Iris Xe graphics, or you can opt for NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 3050 laptop GPU for all your heavy duty workloads. You can even opt for 32GB of LDPDDR5 RAM if you really want to go crazy.
The display is a little larger than before at 14.5-inch. As the name suggests, it is an OLED display. The expansive display offers up to 2.8K in resolution for your viewing pleasure and offers up to 120Hz smoothness. For the best colour grading experience you can get out of a mobile workstation, the OLED panel also offers DisplayHDR True Black 600, 100% DCI-P3 colour gamut, and is even Pantone validated. For better productivity, the display is at as 16:10 ratio.
To keep everything powered up an entire day is a 70 Wh battery with fast charging technology via USB Type-C. That also means that you can even use the bundled charger to charge your smartphone with little issue. You technically can use any 5-20V chargers with Power Deliver certification too for even more convenience and flexibility in remote working.
All of this goodness is wrapped in a familiar all-metal chassis. It is thin too at 16.9 mm but features all the right full-sized I/O ports for even more flexibility. It is not even that heavy at 1.5kg, even with all the metal.
Source: ASUS
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Source: ASUS
The new ASUS Zenbook 14X OLED for 2023 is now available for purchase from ASUS’ authorized dealers and stores nationwide. It is available in either Inkwell Gray or Sandstone Beige colour options. Prices starts at MYR 4,999 for an Intel Core i5-13500H variant and up to MYR 6,999 for the top-of-the-line Core i9-13900H with NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 variant. More on the 2023 ASUS Zenbook 14X OLED can be found on their website.
If you ask any photographer about their preferred lenses, or what lens you should start with as an enthusiast, most will respond with one lens length in particular. They will always tell you that you should get a 50mm lens. There is a good reason for that.
The 50mm prime lens is one of the most versatile lens you can find in your arsenal of lenses. In the right hands, it is an excellent portrait lens that is meant to capture everything from candid photos to magazine quality headshots. It is perfect for street photography, since 50mm is narrow enough for you to get portraits of people in their everyday lives without getting into their personal spaces. In open spaces, landscape photos can look good too. There is also the fact that they say that the frame you get with 50mm lenses is the closest to what you actually see with your own eyes. Whatever it is, you get the idea.
Sony already has two 50mm lenses in their stables. They have the SEL50F25G lens. It is a rather compact, budget-friendly 50mm lens with F2.5 aperture. It weighs only 174g and is only 45mm long.
They also have the super-premium FE 50mm F1.2 G Master lens that offers a lot of lens for three-folds the price of the 50mm G lens. It is not as compact at 108mm in length. It is also much heavier at 778g in weight. It offers F1.2 aperture though for beautiful bokeh. The F1.2 aperture means that it is amazingly fast and especially excellent video work. There are 11 aperture blades for smooth, round bokeh effects. The weight is also a direct contribution o the amount of glass elements within the lens, about 14 of them.
Source: Sony
So why do Sony need to introduce another 50mm lens? Because the new Sony 50mm G Master lens is meant to be a modern take of what a 50mm lens is supposed to be.
In terms of minimum focus distance and magnification, it is similar to the older lens. The minimum focus distance is at 0.41m and autofocus allows the lens 0.16x magnification for beautiful and detailed close-up photos. These are not the improvements made on the new lens though.
It features a slightly smaller maximum lens opening than the existing lens at F1.4 vs F1.2. But that does not mean that it is not a fast lens, it is still faster than most 50mm lens you can find in the market. It also weighs quite a little bit less than the older lens at 516g, which also means you might get more use out of the lens in one sitting. At 96mm length, it is also slightly more compact than the other 50mm G Master lens.
How they got the lens to go on a diet is by fitting a new high-thrust XD (extreme dynamic) linear motors which is smaller than lighter than ever before. You still have 11 aperture blades, but they are new more compact units compared to before, so the lens can be made shorter than before.
The new linear motors are not just to reduce weight and make the lens smaller though. The XD Linear motors goes along with a new algorithm for smoother and more responsive focus control. That also means that your autofocus is faster than before. Thanks to smoother motors, the autofocus mechanism is also quieter than before. The faster, smoother operations means that it is perfect for shooting high frame-rate videos. To make it even better for videos, the lens offers focus breathing compensation to reduce the image distortion when the lens changes focus.
The new lens offers a Linear Response MF focus ring that directly responses to subtle controls when you work with it manually. There is also a new iris lock switch, first in a prime lens from Sony. There are now two custom programmable buttons on the lens. Sony has also coat the glass with a fluorine coating that is supposed to repel fingerprints, dust, water, oil, and other contaminants from the exposed glass elements to ensure that the lens is still as excellent as it can be in any shoot conditions.
Source: Sony
Source: Sony
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Source: Sony
Source: Sony
Source: Sony
The Sony FE 50mm F1.4 G master (SEL5014GM) lens will be available in Malaysia at the end of March 2023 onward. They have not mentioned the price for the lens just yet. The previous 50mm lens from Sony’s G Master line-up sets you back MYR 9,499. With that as an indication, you might want to ensure you have anywhere between MYR 8,000 to 10,000 to spare to get the upcoming lens. It is just an educated guess though; we could be wrong. More information on the Sony FE 50mm F1.4 G Master lens can be found on their website.
