More categories in this year's ST Digital Life Awards

The Straits Times Digital Life Awards are back for the third year.

Readers who vote for their favourite gadgets and games stand to win over $40,000 worth of prizes, including the top prize of a 65-inch Samsung ultra high-definition TV set and complementary sound bar, worth more than $10,000.

The annual awards to recognise the year's best gadgets and games have been expanded from 24 to 30 sub-categories this year with new entries in the Best Made-In-Singapore Games and Best Digital Advertising fields.

As in previous years, there are two types of awards, with the finalists for each shortlisted by the Digital Life editorial team.

The winners of the Editor's Choice awards will be selected by the DL editorial team while the Readers' Choice awards will be decided by readers of The Straits Times.

All winners of DL Awards 2014 will be published in the Feb 12 issue of Digital Life.

The other product categories in this year's awards are smartphones, tablets, PCs, audio, games and cameras. Several changes have also been made to the awards in these existing categories, in line with the shift in the industry over the last year.

For example, the Best LTE smartphone award has been removed as they are now the norm where before they were still nascent. A Best Phablet award has been introduced this year as every major phone brand now has a big-screen smartphone.

The rise of full-frame mirrorless cameras, such as the Sony Alpha 7 and 7R, has blurred the traditional distinction between DSLR (digital single-lens reflex) and mirrorless cameras. As a result, we now just call them "interchangeable lens cameras", and divide them into three sub-categories based on sensor size.

The coming of age of the smartphone camera has made regular compact cameras almost obsolete, so the Best Mainstream Compact Camera award has been replaced with the new Best Smartphone Camera.

The list of sponsors for this year's awards has been expanded. Courts returns as the main presenter for the second year while StarHub, Microsoft, Alienware and the Media Development Authority are our new sponsors for the Best Smartphones, Laptops, Games and Made-in-Singapore Games categories respectively.

To vote, go to www.straitstimes.com/2014DigitalLifeAwards

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