Mobile Devices

Tech / 15 Sep 2026 / 5 min read

USB Power Delivery PPS Adjusts Charging Voltage

USB-C chargers can advertise several fixed voltage profiles, but some charging systems benefit from finer control. USB Power Delivery includes Programmable Power Supply, commonly shortened to PPS, which lets a compatible sink request output within an advertised programmable range. That changes where part of the voltage regulation can occur. Instead of receiving one fixed supply level for an extended period and converting all of it inside the device, a phone or other sink can ask the charger to move its output closer to the voltage needed by the device’s charging circuitry.

USB-C Charging

Tech / 15 Sep 2026 / 5 min read

Camera Rolling Shutter and Sensor Readout

A fast pan can make a straight lamp post appear tilted. A spinning propeller can look curved or split into strange shapes. These effects can occur even when every individual pixel is working correctly. The cause is often rolling shutter, a timing effect created as an image sensor reads a frame over a finite interval. Many CMOS camera sensors do not capture and read every row at precisely the same instant. Instead, exposure timing progresses across the sensor, commonly row by row. If the scene changes during that interval, different parts of the frame represent slightly different moments.

Cameras Photography

Tech / 14 Sep 2026 / 7 min read

OLED PWM Dimming Controls Brightness With Light Pulses

Lowering a phone’s brightness slider does not always mean its OLED pixels simply emit a weaker, perfectly steady glow. Many OLED displays use pulse-width modulation, or PWM, for at least part of their brightness range. The pixels alternate between brighter and darker states quickly enough that the resulting light is perceived as a lower average level. This behavior is easy to miss during ordinary use because the modulation can happen hundreds or thousands of times per second. A camera with a suitable shutter setting may reveal bands, while measurement equipment can show the changing light output directly.

OLED Displays

Tech / 13 Sep 2026 / 8 min read

Wi-Fi Roaming Keeps Clients Moving Between Access Points

A large Wi-Fi network often uses several access points to cover rooms, floors, or buildings. Those access points can advertise the same network name and security configuration, giving a phone or laptop one familiar network across a wider area. The client still communicates through a specific access point at any moment. As the device moves, radio conditions change and another access point may become a better choice. Roaming is the process that moves the client association from one access point to another while keeping the broader network connection usable.

Wi-Fi Networking

Tech / 13 Sep 2026 / 5 min read

PWM Dimming and Screen Flicker

A screen set to 30 percent brightness does not necessarily emit a steady 30 percent of its maximum light. Some displays reduce average brightness by switching light output on and off rapidly. This technique is commonly called pulse-width modulation, or PWM. The switching can be too fast to look like ordinary visible blinking, yet it still changes the light reaching the eyes over time. The exact behavior varies by display technology, panel, brightness setting, and control electronics.

Displays Screen Brightness

Tech / 13 Sep 2026 / 7 min read

Private Wi-Fi Addresses Limit Device Tracking

Every Wi-Fi interface needs a link-layer address for local network communication. Traditionally, a device used a factory-assigned MAC address whenever it joined a wireless network. That stable value made local identification convenient, but it also gave network operators and nearby systems a persistent identifier that could be observed across different places. Modern operating systems can instead present a private, randomized MAC address. The feature changes an identifier visible on the local Wi-Fi network without changing the device’s account, internet address, or other identity signals.

Wi-Fi Privacy