Peloton has had a rough couple of years after pandemic restrictions lifted and people returned to working out at the gym and outside. Now, the company has suffered yet another body blow. A voluntary recall has been issued for 2.2 million Peloton Bikes sold in the US between January 2018 and this month because of seat post safety concerns. "The original Peloton Bike seat post can break unexpectedly during use, creating a potential fall and injury risk," Peloton said in a statement.A recall notice on the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) website urges consumers to "immediately stop using the recalled exercise bikes and contact Peloton for a free repair." However, Peloton won't have to eat the cost of returning millions of bikes to its facilities and sending them back out to customers after repairs. The company will send out a free seat post that consumers can install by themselves.According to the CPSC, there have been 35 reported instances of the seat post breaking and detaching from the Bike during use, causing users to fall in some cases. Those incidents resulted in 13 reports of injuries, including a fractured wrist, lacerations and bruises.This is not the first time that there have been reports of injuries related to Peloton products. Earlier this year, the company agreed to pay $19 million to settle CPSC charges that it didn't immediately disclose reports of people, pets and objects being pulled under the rear of the Tread+. The CPSC said that by the time it received a report from Peloton about such issues, there had been more than 150 such incidents, one of which resulted in a child's death. Other people sustained injuries including broken bones, lacerations, abrasions and friction burns.The settlement and Bike recall come after a brutal 2022 for Peloton, in which the company laid off thousands of workers. It tried other tactics to cut costs and increase revenue, including a switch to third-party manufacturing and adjusting prices of its products. However, the company posted a larger loss than expected in its most recent earnings report.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/peloton-recalls-22-million-bikes-over-safety-issues-170641578.html?src=rss
ASUS has finally priced the ROG Ally in the US, and it might be more affordable than you think — if you're willing to wait. The handheld gaming PC is now known to start at $600 for a base version with an AMD Z1 processor and 512GB of storage. At present, though, Best Buy is only taking pre-orders for a $700 version with a Z1 Extreme chip. That model should be available on June 13th.Both configurations include a 7-inch, 120Hz 1080p touchscreen, 16GB of RAM and a microSD card slot. And if the built-in graphics aren't powerful enough, they can also connect to ASUS' external GPUs.The ROG Ally is ASUS' response to Valve's Steam Deck, not to mention offerings from Ayaneo and GPD. It's supposed to be up to twice as powerful as the Steam Deck while delivering a higher-quality display. And since it's running Windows 11 rather than Valve's custom Linux interface, it can run games from a range of stores without a compatibility layer that might limit performance. Theoretically, you're only missing touchpads and more advanced analog sticks.There are still unknowns, such as real-world battery life across a wide range of games. With that said, this might be the handheld to get if you're frustrated by the Steam Deck's limitations but want the support that comes from a major brand like ASUS.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/asus-rog-ally-handheld-gaming-pc-starts-at-600-164810578.html?src=rss
Sonicware is back with another quirky standalone synthesizer in its fairly crowded Liven line. The Liven Texture Lab was unveiled at the SuperBooth expo in Berlin and features a near-identical layout to some of the other Liven products, with that iconic case and button configuration, but that’s where the similarities end.At its heart, Texture Lab is a granular synthesizer, which is when a waveform is sliced and sliced (and sliced) into extremely small pieces, which are called grains. The engine manipulates these grains in various ways to create unique tones. It’s somewhat rare to find standalone granular synthesizers, as the process is CPU-intensive and better suited to software, so Sonicware’s newest entry is entering a rather sparse marketplace. Granular synthesis allows for extremely unique and out-there tones, and the Texture Lab goes a step further by adding four-voice polyphony, a two-octave keyboard and a 128-step sequencer that records notes and minute changes in granular processing parameters. While not a full-fledged groovebox, the Texture Lab includes a sampling engine with space for 32 samples of up to six seconds each, recording mono at 16/32kHz. The device can also sample internally and all of these samples can be chopped up for making more granular soundscapes.Finally, this device is a robust effects processor, with a granular-based shimmer reverb, an envelope generator, filters, tremolo, a stereo width engine and more. Not only can these effects be applied to your various granular creations, but you can connect any external piece of hardware and run it through the same effects.This is truly a standalone piece of hardware, with a built-in battery for on-the-go use and an integrated speaker. Sonicware continues its tradition of attractive pricing, as the Texture Lab will cost just $240 when it launches in June.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/sonicwares-newest-gadget-is-a-granular-synth-an-effects-unit-and-a-sampler-163231008.html?src=rss
New York State is taking companies to task for flooding the FCC with bogus comments supporting the repeal of net neutrality. Attorney General Letitia James has obtained a total $615,000 from lead generating firms Ifficient, LCX and Lead ID for providing millions of fake comments in an attempt to skew the FCC's 2017 proceedings.The broadband industry allegedly asked the trio to attract anti-neutrality input through ads and giveaways, but they instead manufactured fraudulent comments using real identities without permission. LCX and Lead ID directly faked responses for 1.5 million people, James says, while Ifficient served as a go-between that gathered 840,000 false comments from other lead generators. Several of the companies involved in the astroturfing (that is, fake grassroots) campaign had been involved in other attempts to influence regulators and politicians.LCX and principals will pay $400,000 to New York and $100,000 to the San Diego District Attorney's Office. Lead ID and its principal will pay $30,000 to New York, while Ifficiient will pay $63,750 to New York and $21,250 to Colorado. This is the second batch of agreements New York has secured with companies sending fake comments to the FCC.The fines come after a 2021 Attorney General report that found over 18 million of the 22 million comments on the net neutrality repeal were fake. While there were signs of trouble at the time, the FCC under then-Chairman Ajit Pai fought attempts to investigate and address the spam. Pai had long been an outspoken opponent of net neutrality and generally sided with telecoms on key issues.The penalties are relatively tiny, and they won't undo the 2017 decision. Legislators haven't fared much better. A Senate bill that would have restored net neutrality hasn't gone anywhere, and California's neutrality law doesn't do much to help users in other states. The Attorney General's effort is more of a warning to would-be violators: don't expect to emerge completely unscathed.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/new-york-ag-fines-companies-that-spammed-fcc-with-fake-anti-net-neutrality-comments-152249081.html?src=rss
Google Stadia may be gone for good, but one of the game streaming service's few exclusives will soon return from the ether. As promised, Gylt, the very first Stadia exclusive, is coming to Steam, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series and Xbox One. It'll hit those platforms on July 6th.Gylt is a third-person survival horror game from Rime studio Tequila Works. You play as Sally, who has to sneak around her gloomy town and the dark corridors of her school while evading monsters and looking for her missing cousin. I played a few hours of Gylt on Stadia and enjoyed my time with it. Gylt might be a bit too scary for younger kids and it may not be a great fit for those looking for more depth in terms of gameplay mechanics. However, the solid blend of puzzle solving and spooky setting could make Gylt a decent entry point into horror titles for tweens.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/stadia-launch-title-gylt-will-hit-playstation-xbox-and-steam-on-july-6th-145836720.html?src=rss
Folks looking for more sci-fi to sink their teeth into on Apple TV+ after getting hooked on Silo won’t have too much longer to wait. The streaming service has revealed that the second season of Foundation will premiere on July 14th. The show, which is based on a series of Isaac Asimov novels, will return with one episode on that day, and more will follow on a weekly basis.The season runs for 10 episodes and it's set over a century after the first season's finale. It features "a vengeful queen" who aims to destroy the Galactic Empire from within, Apple said. The Foundation, meanwhile, has moved into its religious phase. It's promoting the Church of Seldon throughout the Outer Reach and bringing about the second crisis — in other words, war with the Empire. Alongside the release date, Apple TV+ has released another visually dazzling trailer:This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/foundation-will-return-to-apple-tv-on-july-14th-140038865.html?src=rss
Cuphead isn't the only game banking on vintage animation to catch your eye. Fumi Games has unveiledMouse, a first-person shooter that mimics the "rubber hose" drawing style of 1930s cartoons from Disney and other studios. You play a private detective who has to blast his way through waves of mobster mice as he unravels a "web of deceit and murder." The result is equally charming and disturbing — crooks' heads pop like balloons, and explosions reduce your opponents to ash.Fumi isn't leaning solely on nostalgia. Mouse will offer flexibility in how you play. You can charge in guns blazing, but you can also dodge around or meticulously plan your approach. A "Fantastic-o-Matic" upgrade system lets you boost preferred abilities and weapons through Bioshock-like vending machines. You can also expect activities like safecracking.There's clearly a lot of work left. Fumi hasn't shared a release date, and the early footage shows barebones maps and gameplay mechanics. Still, Mouse shows some promise. Like Cuphead, the artwork is a refreshing break from what you're used to in its genre — it's neither striving for realism nor replicating the modern cartoon look of Fortnite or Valorant. It's just a question of whether or not the gameplay is strong enough to keep you invested after the novelty wears off.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mouse-is-a-first-person-shooter-inspired-by-vintage-disney-134113206.html?src=rss
The same noise-canceling ability and overall clarity that make AirPods a good match for iOS, also make the buds well-suited for video chats and casual listening while you work on your laptop. AirPods are designed to pair automatically with your iPhone, but pairing them with a MacBook usually requires a few extra steps. If you’ve already connected them to your iPhone and you’re using the same Apple ID on your MacBook, your buds may already show up in your laptop’s list of available Bluetooth devices. If so, you can skip down to “How to switch your AirPods.” If you don’t see them listed, follow these steps.How to connect AirPods to a MacBookApple renamed System Preferences to System Settings with macOS Ventura in 2022. That’s where you’ll head first to access your Bluetooth settings.1. Click the Apple icon in the upper left corner of your Mac’s screen and select System Settings. You can also click the System Settings icon in the dock or click on the Control Center icon in the upper right corner, and click on Bluetooth then Bluetooth settings. Once in System Settings, click on Bluetooth in the left panel.Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget2. With your AirPods in the case and the lid open, bring them near your Mac and press and hold the button on the back of the case until the light on the front flashes white.Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget3. Your AirPods should show up under My Devices in the Bluetooth window. Click the connect button to pair them. You may be prompted to enable Siri and select your voice assistant preferences.Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget4. If your AirPods don’t show up in the Bluetooth dialog box, shut the AirPods case, wait 15 seconds and then open the case and press the back button again. You may have to try the pairing process a few times before your AirPods show up on the list. If you still have trouble, make sure the AirPods are fully charged and you have the latest OS version installed on your Mac. Restarting your computer might also help.How to switch AirPods between devicesTo manually switch your AirPods from another device to your Mac, follow these steps. Just keep in mind that these instructions only apply if you’ve already connected your AirPods to your Mac. If you haven’t done that, first follow the steps above.You can go through the Systems Settings application, but I find it’s easiest to go through the through the Control Center:1. Click on the Control Center icon in the upper left corner of your menu bar.Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget2. Click on the text that says “Bluetooth” (not the Bluetooth icon, which toggles Bluetooth on and off).Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget3. Select your AirPods from the list of available devices.Photo by Amy Skorheim / Engadget This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/how-to-connect-airpods-to-macbook-120059919.html?src=rss
The age of walking around a home goods store with your fiancé scanning items to upload to your registry has long come and gone. Digital wedding registries have sprung up in its place, with most large companies offering one. Now, Etsy has launched a site-wide wedding registry, joining the ranks of stores like Amazon, Macy's and Pottery Barn. It's a logical step for Etsy, home to seemingly endless products and a section devoted just to "Wedding & Party" filled with gifts and decorations.Wedding registries are available to anyone with an Etsy account and are free to create. When you click the "Create a wedding registry" button, a pop-up asks if you've set a wedding date yet. From there, it opens a personal homepage where you can favorite or add gifts to your registry. It also suggests gifts below and tracks how many items have been added and purchased. You can view your registry or add more options at any time through the registry homepage or on your account dropdown menu.Gift listings can get very specific, with options to include detailed personalization requests. Customization is a feature the makers-centric e-commerce company is known for and one that might set them apart from some of the other wedding registry sites. The company certainly hopes so: It attributes the introduction of its wedding registries to a growing desire for personalized gifts over more standard, mass-produced options. According to Etsy, users' searches for handmade gifts increased by 872 percent in the last three months compared to the same time last year.Guests looking to shop your registry will need to make an Etsy account to buy anything. On the registry homepage, they can click "Find a registry" and search your name to browse items. Once purchased, sellers will receive orders as usual with a note that it's from a registry.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/etsy-launches-its-own-wedding-registry-service-122006896.html?src=rss
Panasonic will not be able to start the volume production of its 4680 battery cells for Tesla before March 2024 like it had originally planned. According to Reuters, the company has delayed the battery's mass production and has decided to kick things off between April and September 2024 instead, so that it would have enough time to improve its performance. "Mass production rescheduled to begin during [the first half of the fiscal year ending in March 2025] to introduce performance improvement measures that will further enhance competitiveness," the company has revealed in its earnings report.The 4680 battery format has the potential to boost the range of electric vehicles by over 15 percent. Nikkei previously said that it could extend the range of the Model S from 404 miles on a single charge to around 465 miles. It's unclear what Panasonic means by introducing "performance improvement measures" and whether that would lead to even longer range capacities for electric cars.Tesla manufactures its own batteries in its Fremont, California facility and at the Gigafactory Texas, and it is expected to ramp up production in the latter. But the company still depends on its partner manufacturers, Panasonic being one of them, to be able to meet its battery needs. At the moment, Tesla is using the 4680-type cell for the base Model Y vehicles produced at Gigafactory Texas. The company plans to equip its other vehicles with it, though, including the Cybertruck, which will enter mass production in 2024.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/panasonic-delays-production-of-its-next-generation-tesla-batteries-121808047.html?src=rss
Games like The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild don’t come along often. The 2017 title came 31 years into the franchise’s history and somehow felt familiar while simultaneously remixing or entirely removing core tenets of the series. To put it mildly, the changes worked. Breath of the Wild is the biggest-selling Zelda game of all time and was an unqualified success with critics and players alike.What in the world do you do for an encore?Internally, Nintendo decided to get right on that, announcing a direct sequel was in development only two years after Breath of the Wild arrived. The result is The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, a game that is not a complete reinvention. Instead, after successfully blowing up the Zelda format, Nintendo is giving players even more – more of Hyrule to explore, and more freedom to dream up how to tackle the many, many challenges the game throws at them.Perhaps even more than its predecessor, though, Tears of the Kingdom demands patience. There’s an overwhelming amount of things to do, locations to see, puzzles to solve and enemies to defeat here. And as I tried to play through it as quickly as possible, to see as much of the world as I could for this review, I ended up more frustrated than satisfied. Fortunately, I then decided to slow down and indulge my curiosity, a decision that made the game far more rewarding and made me eager to explore at my own pace, without worrying about getting to the end.NintendoTears of the Kingdom kicks things off in a fashion that’ll be familiar to anyone who played Breath of the Wild. A quick prologue reveals the dark wizard Ganondorf and a calamity known as the Upheaval – events that leave Link grievously injured and Zelda missing (stop me if you’ve heard this one). The twist comes when Link awakes in a sky kingdom populated by ancient and powerful technology, courtesy of the Zonai clan. Lest you think, like me, that Nintendo just invented a new mysterious culture with a new set of powers to replace the Guardians from Breath of the Wild, the Zonai were actually briefly mentioned in the previous game.The first few hours of the game take place entirely in the sky, a fascinating setting with a host of new challenges and enemies. But here the game retreads the prior entry here as you need to journey to a handful of shrines to get a new set of abilities, just like you did on the Hyrule plateau in Breath of the Wild. Once that’s done, you’re able to descend to Hyrule proper and get exploring.NintendoTears of the Kingdom gently guides you towards a few locations to get you started – but you can go anywhere you want, if you’re intrepid enough to try. The game definitely doesn’t hold your hand, and it took me a surprisingly long time to get my bearings and feel confident against the many monsters you’ll come across. At the start, Link is woefully underpowered, which makes finding the dozens of shrines dotting Hyrule crucial, as this is the quickest way to get more hearts, stamina and learn new fighting techniques.I was also eager to find the numerous towers that dot the land, as those are how you reveal more of the Hyrule map. Six years later, Hyrule still feels positively massive, and navigating it without filling in the map is an exercise in frustration. In retrospect, though, I probably was too aggressive about journeying beyond the first few areas the game reveals to you, as I ran into numerous enemies I was simply not powerful enough to take on. My advice: stick to the game’s script and focus on the first few quests it gives you before going into full explorer mode.In addition to the many shrines, the game will quickly implore you to search out four regions of Hyrule to investigate disturbances affecting the areas. (If you played Breath of the Wild, you can surely guess where those areas are.) This is where you’ll find the game’s four areas that harken back to the dungeons in Zelda games of yore. Just like before, you’ll need to help the citizens of each region before you can advance – but to keep things fresh, all the big dungeons are in the sky.As much as I enjoyed revisiting the vast Hyrule overworld, the different gameplay elements and scenery of the sky areas made this feel novel. These main dungeons feel more similar to the Divine Beasts from Breath of the Wild than the levels found in Zelda games of old, but this time out they’re more visually distinct and connected to the region of Hyrule you’re visiting. The bosses of each are also a lot more creative and interesting than the variations of Calamity Ganon from last time out, too.NintendoAnother thing that will be familiar to Breath of the Wild players is the game’s presentation. As a direct sequel, there’s no noticeable change to how Hyrule and its inhabitants are rendered this time. Obviously, the sky islands and underground caverns were not present in BotW, so those areas gave the designers a chance to come up with impressive new visuals. The sky areas were particularly striking to me, though the underworld has a creepy, alien atmosphere that adds a whole new vibe to the game.Nintendo’s art direction is impeccable, as usual, but six years on from Breath of the Wild it’s fair to say I sometimes wanted a bit more. I’ve been playing the Horizon Forbidden West expansion Burning Shores – that series has a similarly vast open world to these recent Zelda games, and having that in the back of my mind made me imagine what Hyrule could look like on more powerful hardware. I’m not saying I want a fully photorealistic Zelda game; the semi-cartoonish style has always been part of the charm. But it’s hard not to imagine just how spectacular this game could look on more powerful hardware. Of course, that’s not Nintendo’s strategy and it hasn’t been for years – but one can dream.That said, the Switch hardware does show its age in one significant area. Frame rate drops are a bit more common in Tears of the Kingdom than I’d like. To be clear, this isn’t a major issue that renders the game unplayable by any stretch of the imagination. Generally, things run solidly at 30 fps, but the more advanced physics at play here occasionally causes some stutters. You’ll also get some dropped frames if too much is happening on screen, like big battles with multiple enemies in the rain. I never felt like these problems were enough to keep me from playing, but they are noticeable and show that Nintendo is pushing the Switch as hard as it can here.NintendoYou may be wondering what makes Tears of the Kingdom more than just a Breath of the Wild remix. There are two major components that make it stand out. First are the two new areas above and below Hyrule proper. Both the sky islands and underworld add completely new challenges and gameplay elements. For example, one set of sky islands has less gravity than everywhere else in the game, so jumps carry you further. It may sound like a little thing, but it actually changes the way you go about fighting enemies – for example, a jumping slash attack can deliver multiple blows as you slowly float back to the ground. But it also leaves you more vulnerable, since you can’t pull out your shield in the middle of this move. If you time it wrong, you can take serious damage in a counter-attack.The underworld areas are perhaps the most treacherous you can visit in Hyrule. That’s thanks to the persistent gloom enveloping those regions, something that makes the monsters below even more powerful. If you get hit, not only do you lose hearts from your health bar, but those hearts actually “break” – they can’t be refilled unless you use a special elixir or visit particular waypoints scattered throughout the map. Naturally, since it’s pitch-black underground, navigating is a challenge as well. You’ll want to come well-stocked with brightbloom seeds, which can be found in caves throughout Hyrule. Dropping those illuminates the area, and you can also take special potions that make you glow on your own.The underworld quest line provides a second set of tasks beyond the ones found in the Hyrule overworld. There aren’t any dungeons underground as there are up in the sky, but there are still significant quests and enemies to find below the surface. And from what I’ve played so far, these aren’t just side quests – they intersect with the main goal of finding Zelda. It’s easy to forget about the underworld while journeying through Hyrule proper, looking for shrines and helping residents in all corners of the map, but you’ll gain valuable skills and progress the story in major ways by diving underground as well. If you’re getting stuck or running out of steam, delving into the deeps is a good way to change things up.NintendoBut easily the most significant change is in the abilities Link has, thanks to his “Purah Pad” (a new name for the Sheikah Slate from BofW). Two of the abilities, Ascend and Recall, are useful but don’t fundamentally change the way the game is played. Ascend lets you dive straight upwards through roofs or rocks to reach new areas quickly, while Recall rewinds time on specific objects to move them backwards. They can be handy for sure, but you’ll need to master the other two powers to get anywhere in Tears of the Kingdom. One is called “Fuse,” which lets you stick objects you find around the world onto your weapons or arrows to enhance them. This is a requirement, because most of the weapons you find in the world have been decayed by Ganondorf’s emergence.The good news is that you can stick all the monster parts you find around the world onto these weapons to greatly increase their power. For example, you can stick bokoblin horns on to your swords to make them stronger, but you can also fuse the tail of an ice lizard to a weapon and get its freezing power. However, these weapons still break far too often, so you’ll constantly want to be stocking up your inventory and investigating what combos of weapons and additional items work best. This goes for arrows, too: instead of being able to find or buy fire arrows, for example, you’ll need to attach a fire fruit to your arrow to set things aflame.And then there’s Ultrahand. This takes the Magensis power from BotW, which let you move metallic objects around, and supercharges it. Now, you can pick up almost anything you see – and you can stick objects together to build basically anything you want. What really makes your creations useful are the Zonai tools you’ll find around the world, things like fans, wheels, flame-emitting objects and much more. If you have a board and a fan, you can fashion a makeshift hovercraft, for example. Or if you need to reach a far-off location, try building a bridge.As the game goes on, it does a great job of nudging you towards building more complex and useful tools. The possibilities are near-limitless, and I’m really looking forward to seeing videos of all the ridiculous things that people try to build. (For example, the hilariously flammable war cart that my colleague Sam Rutherford built.) I was initially worried that I wouldn’t be quite creative enough to fully take advantage of the potential that Ultrahand provides, but totally wild creations are rarely required. Usually, it’s a matter of sticking two or three things together to achieve a goal, and the game makes it pretty clear what you need to do. The quick shrines, most of which you can get through in five or 10 minutes, also are good at showing you what kinds of things are useful to combine.You can also use Fuse to combine Zonai objects together with your weapons and shields. One of my favorite combos is sticking a springboard to a shield – so when enemies hit it, they go flying, giving you a chance to counter-attack or run away. Attaching a fire device to your weapon, meanwhile, lets it spew flames as you swing it. Again, the possibilities are vast, and it’s going to be a lot of fun seeing what kinds of weapons and other contraptions people come up with to suit their own play styles.NintendoThis all adds up to a game that, despite significant shared DNA with Breath of the Wild, feels new and vital. I have fond memories of my time traversing Hyrule in BotW, and I was eager to jump back into the world again. The overworld map may be the same, but plenty of the locations have changed significantly, which provided a distinct feeling of time passing between the games as well as offering new puzzles and challenges. The frequent dips into the sky or underworld, meanwhile, provide plenty of fresh, all-new areas to explore and challenges to overcome.All this said, I also would be remiss if I didn’t mention the difficult, sometimes unforgiving challenge this game can occasionally present. Since there’s minimal guidance as to where you can and should go, it’s easy to find yourself in enemy encounters where you’re totally overmatched. And while most of the shrines are well done, there are some that are absurdly difficult for no apparent reason.My “favorite" so far is one where you lose all your items and armor and have to figure out how to defeat enemies with just the tools provided to you. In this case, there were about eight high-powered machines, and while there were some little war machines to create, there’s also no shield in the shrine. Even with 10 hearts, making two mistakes was enough that I would die and lose my progress. It was incredibly frustrating, and there was no reason for it to be so hard.And the impact of Fuse and Ultrahand cannot be overstated. These new tools make experimentation a hallmark of Tears of the Kingdom in a way it hasn’t been before. Now, in addition to exploring every corner of Hyrule, you’ll also need to try lots of different combinations of tools, weapons, found objects and Zonai devices to find the solution a puzzle demands. Or you can fritter away hours making contraptions from whatever you find laying around. In a lot of ways, Breath of the Wild was already a creative sandbox that let gamers tackle the various adventures it offered in any order and any fashion they chose. In Tears of the Kingdom, that’s even more true.If you want to spend all your time spelunking in the underworld, feel free. If you’d rather hunt down shrines at the expense of all else to maximize your stamina and hearts, that works too. If you only want to engage in building objects with Ultrahand when the game requires it, that’s fine – it makes it clear when you need to build various contraptions to advance. There’s enough guidance to set you on your path when you get started, but you can also ignore that and just roam the wilds. Do so at your own risk, though – it’s rough out there.Tears of the Kingdom isn’t the series reinvention that we got in 2017, but that’s OK. There’s more than enough here to justify revisiting the Hyrule that we first saw with Breath of the Wild — I've "only" put in about 35 hours at this point, and there's no end in sight to my journey. If you’re one of the millions who delighted in that game’s freedom, chances are you’ll love Tears of the Kingdom too.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-legend-of-zelda-tears-of-the-kingdom-review-a-familiar-but-fresh-adventure-120035307.html?src=rss
Teenage Engineering has launched a new field recorder called the TP-7 that was designed to record interviews, music and any kind of audio with, in the company's words, "zero friction in the highest possible quality." It's the latest entry to its "Field" series of interoperable products, which includes the OP-1 synthesizer and the TX-6 mixer released last year. Like the TX-6, the TP-7 is about as big as a deck of cards and can fit comfortably in your hand. It has a motorized "tape reel" at the center that you can use to easily scrub through or pause your recording and to navigate the menu.There's also a rocker on the left side of the recorder that you can also use to scrub through audio, along with a button right below it that quickly changes recording modes. While you can use its built-in microphone to record audio just fine, you can also plug in external mics through its three stereo two-way jacks. Take note that the jacks can accommodate other audio equipment, as well, such as Teenage Engineering's other Field devices.The TP-7 also has a USB-C port that you can use to transfer data or to charge it. If you use the device for interviews, you can connect it to an iPhone through that USB-C port or via Bluetooth and fire up the company's iOS app to get automatic transcriptions. The recorder can last up to seven hours between charges, has a built-in speaker in addition to the microphone and 128GB of internal storage.Teenage Engineering calls the TP-7 "a device engineered in every detail to do only one thing and to do it well," one that's "perfect for... journalists, lawyers and medical professionals." But like most of the company's products, the TP-7 doesn't come cheap. It's listed for $1,499 on Teenage Engineering's website with a note that says it's coming sometime this summer.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/teenage-engineerings-tp-7-field-recorder-costs-an-eye-watering-1499-114007098.html?src=rss
Google’s big developer conference had a lot to get through. That included the Pixel Fold (more on that below), a new Pixel A-series phone for only $500, a tablet, Android 14, a faster, more sophisticated AI language model, and lots more tricks for AI chatbot Bard. Coming soon, Bard will be able to analyze images and integrate into Google apps, like Gmail and GDocs. And if you haven’t dabbled with Bard yet – no more waiting list.GoogleAnd while Google had media and analysts captive, it showed off its holographic meeting experience, Project Starline, two years after it first appeared. Google did not allow Engadget to take pictures or video of the setup – it’s difficult to capture holographs on camera anyway – but our impressions were of an uncanny experience. The prototype uses a light-field display that looked like a mesh window, with multiple cameras to get the visual data to generate the 3D model of the caller. It’s not perfect, but then the system is busy. Sound and images are broadcast to the cloud over WiFi, creating a 3D model of both callers, then sending it down to the light display.The pitch may be the most realistic, detailed teleconferencing experience, but the tech is still far away from our homes and offices. And Google does like to kill its darlings when things aren’t working out. Will Project Starline survive?– Mat SmithThe Morning After isn’t just a newsletter – it’s also a daily podcast. Get our daily audio briefings, Monday through Friday, by subscribing right here.The biggest stories you might have missedMay's PS Plus Extra and Premium lineup includes 'Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart' Roku unveils a $99 smart home monitoring systemGoogle Maps is expanding Immersive View to routes Google's Bard AI is now available without a waitlist in 180 countriesGoogle Photos will use generative AI to straight-up change your imagesGoogle Pixel Fold vs. Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4: Battle of the foldableGoogle Pixel Fold hands-on: A real rival for Samsung Its first foldable phone is here. And expensive.EngadgetWhile the $1,799 Pixel Fold is more expensive than reports suggested, its hardware is mostly what we expected. It sports a 5.8-inch external display and a wide 7.6-inch internal screen when it's opened. It has a new 9.5-megapixel external camera and an 8MP internal shooter, and its rear setup features a 48-megapixel main camera, a 10.8MP ultra-wide and a 10.8MP telephoto camera with 5X optical zoom. In a lot of ways, the Pixel Fold is like last year’s flagship Pixel 7 Pro, but foldable, with the same Tensor G2 processor.Google apparently had to redesign a lot of components to make it into what is a pretty slender widescreen foldable. We got to see one in person (because we’re Engadget), and the screen has a wider aspect ratio than Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold series. The bezels are… chunkier too, but that hasn’t put us off too much. The company hasn’t confirmed a shipping date, but it’ll be "sometime next month." It’s offering pre-orders for the foldable if you’re already sold on the concept.Continue reading.Google Pixel Tablet hands-onA $500 smart display with a detachable screenThough it was initially teased at last year’s Google I/O, the Pixel Tablet is finally ready for purchase. You can now pre-order it for $499, and that includes the speaker base. The Pixel Tablet will likely spend most of its time in your home as a smart display, and you can buy additional docks for $120 each, so you can have stations in multiple rooms to feel like a millionaire.The company doesn’t want you to think of this as a standalone $370 tablet. With an 11-inch screen, a rounded-rectangle shape and a mesh fabric covering the speaker base, the Pixel Tablet looks incredibly similar to the Nest Hub Max. When the tablet is docked, you can use it as an additional screen and Chromecast to it. Google said this is the first tablet with Chromecast built in, but to be clear, the feature is only available when the device is docked and in Hub Mode, not as a standalone slate.Continue reading.Scammers used AI-generated Frank Ocean songs to steal thousands of dollarsIt follows the fake Drake and The Weeknd song that circulated last month.Mario Anzuoni / reutersMore AI-generated music mimicking a famous artist has made the rounds — while making lots of money for the scammer passing it off as genuine. A collection of fake Frank Ocean songs sold for a reported $13,000 CAD ($9,722 in US dollars) last month on a music-leaking forum devoted to the Grammy-winning singer, according to Vice. The fact Ocean hasn’t released a new album since 2016 and recently teased an upcoming follow-up to Blond may have added to the eagerness to believe the songs were real.Continue reading.Vast and SpaceX plan to launch the first commercial space station in 2025The duo will have to compete with Blue Origin and other big rivals.Another company wants to launch the first commercial space station. Vast is partnering with SpaceX to launch its Haven-1 station as soon as August 2025. A Falcon 9 rocket will carry the platform to low Earth orbit, with a follow-up Vast-1 mission using Crew Dragon to bring four people to Haven-1 for up to 30 days. Vast is taking bookings for crew wanting to participate in scientific or philanthropic work. It’ll be racing against Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin, which doesn't expect to launch its Orbital Reef until the second half of the decade. Voyager, Lockheed Martin and Nanoracks don't expect to operate their Starlab facility before 2027.Continue reading.Google Pixel 7a reviewIt’s got everything you need and more for just $499.EngadgetSo maybe we had one piece of Google hardware a little early. With the Pixel 7a, Google seems to have nailed the balance between price and performance. We’re talking a Tensor G2 chip, a 90 Hz display, wireless charging and a higher-res rear cam, all starting at just $499. And when you factor in its design, the Pixel 7a delivers everything I like about the regular Pixel 7 for $100 less. I’ll say this: If you’ve got family members musing on buying a new Android phone, save yourself a headache and recommend the Pixel 7a.Continue reading.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/the-morning-after-the-biggest-announcements-from-google-io-2023-113036746.html?src=rss
The original HomePod arrived in 2018 and was discontinued in favor of the $99 HomePod Mini in 2021, but Apple brought it back earlier this year as a second generation model with upgraded audio and new smart home tools. Now, it's on sale for the first time at B&H Photo Video for $279 in white and $289 in black via an instant rebate, saving you $20 and $10 respectively.The design of the second-generation model is much the same, apart from details like the slightly recessed touch panel, a detachable power cord and a slightly shorter profile. Inside, though, there are a host of changes. Apple reduced the number of tweeters from seven to five, angling them slightly upward instead of side-firing as before. The number of voice microphones was reduced from six down to four and, most importantly, Apple swapped the iPhone 6’s A8 chip for the much more modern S7.The new model cures one of our biggest gripes with the original HomePod, namely Siri's limited abilities. Now, it can recognize multiple users, create recurring home automations without an iPhone and play music from voice commands via services like Deezer and Pandora and not just Apple Music. Most importantly, performance and responsiveness is much improved.Sound quality is outstanding, with excellent clarity, though bass can occasionally be too subdued for certain types of music. It works especially well as a stereo pair, something that's easy to set up via the app. It can also be set up for use with Apple TV and has especially good voice clarity. The best part, though, is the reduced price compared to the previous model, and B&H Photo Video's discount of up to $20 makes it a particularly good buy — just be sure to act by midnight ET on May 14th.Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter and subscribe to the Engadget Deals newsletter for the latest tech deals and buying advice.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apples-2nd-generation-homepod-speaker-gets-its-first-discount-105536878.html?src=rss
It’s been ten years since Fairphone launched with the laudable goal of making a better phone than its competitors. Not better in the spec-list sense, but by building it with greener materials and ensuring that they are easily and comprehensively repairable. More importantly, the company has sought to improve the working conditions of the people building the devices in the first place. That’s by paying fairer wages or offering workplace training and other benefits that major manufacturers might be unwilling to do. All the while attempting to produce gear that can at least stand proud alongside brand-name devices costing two or three times as much.Now, Fairphone is launching its first pair of over-ear headphones, Fairbuds XL, with the same focus on utility and repairability. The company says they’re the “most sustainable headphones on the market,” with almost all of the parts user-replaceable and available to buy. They can’t just be repairable and last a long while, however, they also have to sound good enough that you’ll genuinely want to use these over what else is in the market. Specs-wise, you won’t just get the basics, but active noise cancellation (ANC), multiple audio modes, two-point Bluetooth connection and a two-year warranty that’s likely to include hardware support for a lot longer.The Fairbuds XL are available either in speckled black or speckled green. I was loaned the green model for two weeks, and while the black looks like every other dull-ass pair of cans on the market, the green is utterly gorgeous. I love the orange contrast cabling and the lovely pop of copper on the four-way joystick, and enjoyed walking around in public with these on.The design, with its visible wire connections and fold-in arms, is a generation or two behind the cutting edge. You know, your Sony XM5s and B&W Px7s and Bose QC45s, with hidden wires, hinged earcups and an overall more elegant setup. I don’t think it’s an issue unless you’re suffering from a serious case of status anxiety, but if you are, you’re probably not thinking about buying these.As for the hardware, there’s the aforementioned four-way joystick, a dedicated ANC lozenge button and a USB-C port, and that’s it. This minimalism carries across to what else is in the box: A recycled polyester / nylon carry bag and a little paper manual. There’s no USB-C charging cable, audio adapter or anything else, since Fairphone assumes you already have this stuff, or can just as easily buy it from its store.Daniel Cooper / EngadgetFairbuds XL comes with 40mm dynamic drivers, Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) and an Ambient Sound Mode. It has an 800mAh battery which the company says will last for 26 hours with ANC or for more than 30 hours with it switched off. You’ll get around 320 hours of standby time and, once that’s exhausted, charging from cold is pegged at three hours. Supporting Bluetooth 5.1, Fairbuds XL offers dual-point connectivity, letting you hook up and switch between two paired devices. This switching was mostly reliable, although I found there were some device combinations – like an Android smartphone and my mac OS laptop, that it simply refused to play nicely with. Weighing 330 grams (11.6oz), the cans don’t outstay their welcome on your head, or your ears. The earcups are soft enough that I’m not forced to take them off because they’re uncomfortable.Inside, those 40mm diameter drivers have a frequency response running from 20Hz to 20KHz. That puts it in the same bracket as a number of low and mid-budget sets on the market, of which this probably sits at the higher end, price-wise. Since it lacks any real background in sound, Fairphone sought out help from Sonarworks, a sound calibration company that works with a number of pro audio companies and artists. Its SoundID software will let users calibrate their audio profile to tweak how sound comes out of their headphones for a more personalized experience.Now on the whole, I do rather like the sound that comes out of the Fairbuds XL. I’m not a massive fan of some of the genres which modern audio tests calibrate for, preferring instead something calmer, cleaner and more atmospheric. One thing I’ve always used to test a headphone’s quality is to see how well you can hear the breaths of the horn players during Finale from the Tron Legacy soundtrack, which are really clear here. Or how alive Max Haymer’s piano feels when playing his jazz reworking of Optimistic that you think you’re in the room. London Grammar’s Stay Awake feels urgent, more meaningful here than in some headphones I’ve tried.The ANC, meanwhile, was very reliable at drowning out a lot of the ambient noise in my office, inside and out. It totally eliminated the sound of my own typing, the sound of a vacuum cleaner, the building work a nearby neighbor was doing and a crying baby out in public. The one time I had an issue with it was taking a stroll around my local area and getting a face full of wind, but there’s no strong wind setting in the mobile companion app like you’ll find on other products.In order to offer a greater level of customization, Fairphone is also launching a Fairbuds App for iOS and Android. This will allow you to change the EQ presents – tuned by Sonarworks – for a similar level of tweaking as you could find in SoundID. The app also offers the usual bunch of guides, tutorials and access to customer service, as well as the promise of future software updates. You’ll also be able to order replacement parts directly from the app, which should help prompt you to seek out a fix if things start to go wrong.There are four sound profiles: Amsterdam (standard), Copenhagen (more treble), Tokyo (more bass) and Boston (heavy bass). I’ll be honest, I found that only really Amsterdam and Boston offered much real difference, and even then, the changes weren’t massive. In fact, I’d say that I’d opt for Amsterdam over Boston even if I was listening to something pretty bassy like Low’s More, with its wonderfully teeth-rattling glitchcore overdriven bass. Suffice to say, I feel like the sound profiles need to be more distinct here, but it’s something that Fairphone should be able to improve upon in the coming months.Daniel Cooper / EngadgetOf course, Fairphone’s obligation stretches beyond the idea of simply making the hardware modular and repairable. The company says Fairbuds XL uses 100 percent recycled aluminum, 100 percent recycled tin in its solder paste and 80 percent recycled plastic. It added that it has integrated Fairtrade Gold into its supply chain, and uses 100 vegan leather for both the ear cushions and headband.In terms of working conditions for the people who made them, the company will pay 0.55 USD per headphone made to “fill the living wage gap of production line workers.” And that it is “working with the supplier on improving working conditions based on workers’ needs.” It will also back carbon-reduction projects to help reduce CO2 emissions to ensure the headphones are essentially climate-neutral.These are all laudable, but even Fairphone serially admits that the effort it makes can only make a small difference in the grand scheme of things. Its work is limited both by its size and relatively small market share, which means that it can’t do everything that it would like to. As much as it can say it’s producing the fairest device on the market, it can’t claim ownership of a halo that it doesn’t deserve. The best it can hope for, however, is to try and push the technology world toward approaching a more sustainable approach for its products.(This is a good moment to share a gripe about the company’s True Wireless Earbuds, which it launched alongside the Fairphone 4. These are made with fair and recycled materials, and were dubbed as “e-waste neutral,” but weren’t modular or repairable. Given most TWS earbuds have sealed-in batteries, they become effectively unsalvageable when they break. Fairphone offered replacement cases, tips and buds, but it seemed to join the tide as opposed to swimming against it. With the Fairbuds XL, the focus has moved back toward an audio product that sails closer to Fairphone’s true ethos)Fairphone’s overall ethos is that its products are – with the above exception – user-repairable, and easy enough that anyone should be able to take them apart and keep them going for years to come. The company has already shared a list of parts you can buy from its online store, which includes a new battery, left and right speaker modules, headband assembly and cover, as well as the ear cushions. Prices range from €19.95 (around $22) for the battery all the way to €79.95 (around $88) for a new speaker module, which connects to the setup with an integrated USB-C cable.As for the ANC selection button, four-way joystick and the specific PCBs inside the earcups, those can be repaired, but right now, only at the company’s repair center. This, to me, seems pretty fair, since users probably won’t be comfortable taking a soldering iron to their cans. The deal is that you can swap in modules to keep this thing going for as long as possible, but if you want to keep it going with completely-original parts, you’ll need more expert help.Fairphone customarily ships out its loan units for review with an iFixit #00-size Phillips-head screwdriver in the package. This is because it wants reviewers, and by extension potential buyers, to know how easy it is to take apart its products and put them back together. Imagine if Apple, Samsung, John Deere or any of the other companies that are regularly behind anti right to repair legislation had a similar attitude. As usual, I didn’t start disassembling the Fairbuds XL until I’d spent enough time listening to them, just in case something broke, but I needn't have worried.The easiest repair to make is swapping out the battery, which requires you to pop off the outside cap on the left earcup. If you’ve got strong fingernails, you can lever out the battery and swap in a replacement in half a minute if you’re on the slow side. Removing the ear cushions to replace them is similarly a matter of just twisting them a quarter-turn to unlock them from their mounts. This is easy stuff, which makes it all the more frustrating that most companies won’t let users make these sort of common repairs.Feeling braver, I then opted to detach the speaker modules from the headband in their entirety to mimic the process of replacing one. You just need to pop out the battery, twist off the ear cushions and then you can slide out the USB-C cable sticking up top. After that, you need to unscrew just two small screws which hold the whole assembly to the headband. The process took all of two minutes, and that was probably because I was going slow to avoid messing up.Fundamentally, the Fairbuds XL follow through on the usual Fairphone promise of a modular, almost infinitely-repairable device. It has many of the necessary fundamentals to make them a worthwhile purchase for many people, including good ANC, long life and a comfortable design. What it lacks, for now, is a certain dynamism in its sound profiles that would give users more choice in how tunes are presented. Thankfully, that’s something that could be fixed in a later update, which is something that Fairphone has historically been very good at doing. In fact, if you’re happy with very good sound, and want to help make the world a slightly better place in doing so, then I’d say these are a very solid bet.The name is a bit silly, however.Fairbuds XL will be available to buy in Europe from tomorrow, May 11th 2023, on Fairphone’s website, priced at €249 (around $275).This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/fairphone-launches-a-fully-repairable-set-of-over-ear-headphones-080017046.html?src=rss
Cruise's robotaxis are continuing their push across the Lone Star State. The self-driving car company has announced it plans to begin supervised testing in two more Texan cities, Houston and Dallas, joining its earlier move into Austin (yes, the home of still robotaxi-less Tesla). For now, the expansion is focused on familiarizing the car with the areas, rather than picking up passengers. Residents of the two cities can expect to start seeing Cruise's robotaxis cruising down the streets with a safety driver inside.In a tweet sharing the news, Cruise said supervised testing in Houston should start in a matter of days while Dallas will be "shortly thereafter." Cruise's robotaxis are already available on a limited basis overnight in Austin and Phoenix and all day in certain areas of San Francisco.The speed General Motors-owned Cruise is advancing has brought some concerns. In January, San Francisco's Transportation Authority asked regulators to limit or temporarily pause Cruise and competitor Waymo's expansion, citing repeated cases of their cars inexplicably stopping in traffic and blocking emergency vehicles. As of yet, things have done anything but slow down. Since the request, Cruise celebrated one million fully driverless miles on top of making its robotaxis available at all times in San Francisco — though full access is only for employees.Right now, there's no set date for when the public will have access to rides in Houston or Dallas. Going off the timeline of other Cruise expansions, it will likely take at least a few months until anyone can hail a self-driving car in either city. Even then, it will probably start with a small group of people and only at night. Anyone interested in taking one of Cruise's robotaxis has to sign up for a waiting list and be accepted to create an account. The company says its limited available cars will keep its services invite-only for the time being.
Google's excellent Pixel 7a just hit the market for an already solid price of $499, but you can now save more thanks to a deal at Amazon. If you order now, you get a free $50 Amazon gift card that can be used for other purchases, effectively bringing the price down to $449 if you plan to order other things from Amazon.The Pixel 7a not only received praise in our Engadget review, but instantly became the best midrange Android smartphone in our latest roundup. Google has nailed the balance between price and performance, offering the same Tensor G2 chip as the Pixel 7, along with a 90Hz display, wireless charging and a higher-resolution rear camera.The two big changes over the Pixel 6a are a new high-res 64-MP main cam in back, along with a front 13-MP selfie camera can record videos in 4K. The Pixel 7a beats other smartphone cameras in its price range so handily for photography and video that it actually needs to be compared to flagship devices like the Pixel 7 Pro and Samsung's S23 Ultra.The extra resolution goes a long way to eliminating any concerns about the lack of a telephoto, as you can zoom in four times and still get a 16-megapixel image. And Google's Night Sight mode remains the best in the business, even though it does add a little more noise than we expected.In sum, the Pixel 7a delivers 95 percent of what you get from the regular Pixel 7, but for $100 less. The deal gives you a $50 Amazon card on top of that, which could be spent on accessories like a protective case. More importantly, you get a rare thing — a deal on a Google Pixel phone that just entered the market.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/amazon-includes-a-50-gift-card-when-you-order-the-google-pixel-7a-091023063.html?src=rss
A "one-app experience" that combines Disney+ and Hulu content will launch in late 2023, Disney CEO Bob Iger has announced during the company's latest earnings call. He said the company will continue offering Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+ as standalone options, but combining services "is a logical progression" of its direct-to-consumer offerings "that will provide greater opportunities for advertisers, while giving bundle subscribers access to more robust and streamlined content..."Since Comcast still owns 33 percent of Hulu, this announcement suggests that Disney could be thinking of buying the cable TV and media company's stake. Iger didn't elaborate on the company's plans, though, and only said that Disney has had "constructive" talks with Comcast about the future of Hulu.In addition to announcing the combined streaming app, Iger has also revealed that Disney+ is getting another price increase after adding $3 on top of its ad-free streaming tier's monthly fee in December. He didn't say when the company is raising the service's prices, but when it does, the ad-free and ad-supported tiers will cost more than $11 and $8, respectively.While Disney reported (PDF) a 26 percent decrease in operating losses for its streaming business, a $659 million loss is still massive. The price hike's announcement didn't come out of nowhere, seeing as the company promised investors that the business will be profitable by the end of the 2024 fiscal year. The question is whether the combined Disney+ and Hulu app could convince new users to pay for a subscription — or for old subscribers to come back. Disney+ lost 4 million subscribers in the first quarter of 2023 after shedding 2.4 million users in the previous quarter.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/disney-and-hulu-will-merge-into-a-single-app-later-this-year-083536664.html?src=rss
Yes, Sony is still making smartphones, and its latest is the flagship Xperia 1 V designed for both photographers and vloggers. It features a new stacked, backside-illuminated (BSI) sensor along with features aimed at content creators found in its Alpha-series cameras.The Xperia 1 V has a new image sensor called "Exmor T for Mobile" designed to be faster and work better with computational (AI) photography, while offering "approximately double" the low-light performance of the Xperia 1 IV, Sony said. As you'd expect in a flagship, it offers other high-end features like a Snapdragon 8 Gen2 Mobile Platform, a 6.5-inch 4K 120Hz OLED HDR display, a 5,000 mAh battery that allows for up to 20 hours of continuous 4K playback, up to 12GB of RAM and more.With that, Sony is promising "best in class" gaming performance, thanks to a Game Enhancer function that provides visual and auditory support. It also lets players livestream their gaming directly to YouTube.The key feature is clearly the camera system, though. The main 24mm f/1.9 equivalent 52-megapixel camera features a Type 1/1.35-inch (about 12mm diagonally) Exmor T sensor that's 1.7 times larger than the Xperia 1 IV's sensor, Sony said. It also comes with an ultrawide 12-megapixel camera and an 85-125mm 12-megapixel optical telephoto zoom, like the one on the Xperia 1 IV. The front 12-megapixel camera has a Type 1/2.9-inch sensor.Purists will be able to shoot video and photos using the professional modes that allow for full manual control. Chief among those is the Photography Pro mode designed for creative control. It also allows live streaming while letting creators see viewer comments in real time.SonyIf you set it to Basic mode, though, you'll get a good dose of computational imaging seen in other Android phones. Those include a Night mode and color settings for subjects like flowers and a blue sky. It also delivers real-time eye autofocus and tracking, along with high-speed continuous shooting of up to 30 fps with auto-exposure and AF enabled.For vloggers and content creators, it now features the same Product Showcase setting found on Sony's vlogging cameras like the ZV-E1. The new sensor also promises improved skin tones, thanks to extra saturation available on the sensor. It also has a new voice priority mic placed near the rear camera that can pick up voices even in busy outdoor locations.SonyOne cool feature that might justify the price alone for many video shooters is the ability to use the phone as a monitor for select Sony Alpha cameras. The Xperia 1 IV could do that as well, but the new model offers multiple display options with waveforms, gridlines, and zebra lines normally only found on professional field monitors. You can also control settings and record content to phones, features that weren't available before. Meanwhile, the phone's microphones can capture sound while monitoring audio via the Xperia 1 V's headphone jack.As with past Xperia models, the catch here is the price. The Xperia 1 V starts at $1,400 (in khaki green or black) with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage (upgradeable via an microSD slot). That's a lot of money for most smartphone users (even flagship buyers) but might make sense for content creators, avid photographers and others.Along with the Xperia 1 V, Sony also unveiled a far more mainstream smartphone, the Xperia 10 V. It's powered by a Snapdragon 695 chipset and offers a 6.1-inch 1080p OLED display that's 50 percent brighter than before, but only refreshes at 60Hz. The camera system features a main 48-megapixel Type-1/2.0-inch sensor with a wide lens, along with a 2x telephoto and an ultrawide. Other features include a 5,000 mAh battery and up to 6GB of RAM. It's priced at €449 in Europe, with sales set to start in June. US pricing/availability is not yet available.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/sonys-xperia-i-v-phone-is-a-photo-and-video-powerhouse-074625053.html?src=rss
by Terrence O'Brien,Terrence O'Brien on (#6BNEZ)
Last year during Superbooth Roland unveiled the Aira Compact series – its first true competitors to Korg’s wildly successful Volca line. Now, the company is back for Superbooth 2023 with a new addition to the family, the S-1 Tweak Synth. Like the T-8 and J-6, the S-1 uses Roland’s Analog Circuit Behavior (ACB) technology to recreate the sound of an iconic instrument from its past, the SH-101. While the core of the S-1 is ultimately quite familiar, in true Roland fashion there’s a lot of modern features packed in as well. And in even truer Roland fashion, many of them are buried in a bewildering array of indecipherable menus and button combinations.I’m going to get this out of the way right now, because it’s a recurring theme in almost every review I write of a Roland product. The interface here is truly mind boggling once you get beyond the immediate hands-on controls. Almost every knob and button has at least one shift function. Many of them aren’t labeled. And the only visual feedback you’re given for anything is via a four-character, seven-segment LED display. A seven-segment LED display in 2023! I dare anyone to tell me what the hell “Nod.d” means without looking it up in the manual. And what about the D-Motion button suggests that this is where the probability and substep options are located? I’m not trying to suggest that I should be able to figure out every feature on an instrument right away without reading a manual. But I also shouldn’t feel like a lost ball in the tall weeds. Especially not when we’re talking about an entry level $200 synth.The clunky interface here is particularly frustrating because the S-1 is otherwise kind of great. It actually has a decent amount of hands-on controls. It offers far more depth than any of the previous Aria Compact entries, even if you never touch the shift button. There’s an LFO with six different waveform options, including random. The oscillator section allows you to blend together a saw and square wave with pulse width modulation, as well as a sub oscillator and noise source. And, unlike the original SH-101 which was monophonic, the S-1 is polyphonic so you can play actual chords (up to four notes).And the oscillators sound great. I’m not always the hugest fan of Roland’s ACB sound engine, but it shines here. Thick bass, acid leads and 16-bit JRPG arps are all easily attainable and satisfying. This is easily the best sounding member of the Aira Compact family.The filter is excellent too. It stops just shy of self oscillation, but still gets pretty sharp and can certainly endanger your eardrums if you have your headphones up too loud. But at the lower end of the cutoff spectrum you get a surprising warmth and silkiness from this dirt cheap emulation of a classic analog circuit.Photo by Terrence O'Brien / EngadgetRoland even threw in a delay, seven reverbs and four chorus options. The reverbs are merely ok, but the delay is a perfectly solid digital effect. You can even set the delay time to 1/128 and crank the … Anb(?) reverb model to get howling metallic textures that are out of this world. The choruses, pulled from the Juno and JX-3P are truly excellent. It’s just a shame they’re buried in the arcane menu system because I want to turn them on for almost every patch I make.There’s a solid arpeggiator, and you can even record directly from the arpeggiator into the 64-step sequencer. That’s pretty handy for laying down glassy high notes then going back in and overdubbing some bass to accentuate the chord changes. I will say though, I haven’t quite figured out how to get to 64 steps. By default sequences are 16 steps, there is no obvious way to go beyond that and I was not provided a manual with my review unit.Roland also added motion sequencing to S-1, so you can tweak settings as you’re recording to slowly increase the amount of delay over the course of a pattern. Or even go into the menu and turn on and off the chorus, or change the sub-oscillator tuning on a per-step basis. It really opens up a lot of possibilities on an instrument this small and affordable. You can ratchet notes, set per step probability, and there’s even Step Loop for quickly mangling your sequence into new riffs on the fly, though that is far more useful on a drum machine.Photo by Terrence O'Brien / EngadgetIf the feature list for the S-1 ended here, that would be perfectly fine. But Roland added more. So. Much. More. Maybe too much more.There’s a draw and chop function, which allows you to create custom waveshapes for even wilder tones. Then use the multiplier on your freshly drawn waveshape, or the comb on your chopped wave for hard-synced and dissonant metallic noises. You can also turn the noise source into a sort of pulsing riser effect. Though, I was unaware of this when I accidentally activated it while messing around one afternoon and couldn’t for the life of me figure out what was going on. This is one of those many unlabeled features hidden behind a seemingly arbitrary button combination. (For the record, you hold down shift then press 1 and 2 simultaneously to cycle through a few different riser modes.)The one last feature worth mentioning (I think), is a bit of a head scratcher. D-Motion allows you to change parameters by picking up the synth and tilting it about. It’s a fun novelty for a few minutes, but it doesn’t feel practical. Though, at least it makes more sense on the small, battery-powered and portable S-1 than it does on the SH-4d.Photo by Terrence O'Brien / EngadgetBeyond that the S-1 resembles the rest of the Aira Compact line. It’s plastic, has a rechargeable battery built in and weighs next to nothing. There are 3.5mm MIDI, sync and audio jacks for connecting other gear. And USB-C for charging, but also for sending audio and MIDI to computers, phones and tablets. My one other minor gripe, physically at least, is that the mushy keys are painfully small. Playing chords on this thing is a bit of a headache. But not much more so than on any other instrument of this ilk, like the Modal Electronics Skulpt or a Volca Keys.Photo by Terrence O'Brien / EngadgetThe S-1 Tweak Synth is both the most compelling and most frustrating member of the Aira Compact series. It has plenty of hands-on controls, sounds great and is deceptively powerful for the price. But it is also, perhaps, too complex. It tries to do too many things and ends up feeling cluttered and confusing. Which is the exact opposite of what you want from what is essentially a $200 music toy.What made Korg’s Volcas so successful wasn’t their laundry list of features, it was their simplicity. They sounded good enough, were affordable, and unintimidating. Roland seems to have gotten the first two parts of the equation down. Now it just needs to work on the last ingredient.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/roland-s-1-tweak-synth-is-the-most-compelling-member-of-the-aira-compact-family-070014423.html?src=rss
Google's I/O event this year was jam-packed with new product launches and an in-depth introduction to its new generative AI offerings. The star of its new set of device was, perhaps, the new Pixel Fold, a veritable rival to Samsung's foldables powered by a Tensor G2 chip. Like the Samsung Galaxy Fold, it opens like a book so you can fully use its 7.6-inch display, though it also comes with a 5.8-inch external display. It's now available for pre-order and will set you back $1,799 when it starts shipping in June.The company has also unveiled its new mid-range phone, the Pixel 7a, that will cost you $499. In addition, the Pixel Tablet is now available for pre-order for the same price. You can use the 11-inch tablet as a smart home display with Google Assistant and Chromecast when it's attached to its speaker dock. On its own, it can last for 12 hours, and while it doesn't come with a stylus, it does support third-party pens.But the most important and relevant unveiling of the event was the company's PaLM 2 AI language model, which is the technology behind its Bard AI chatbot and which will power new features across its products. Bard will soon have the ability to decipher images in your queries and respond with images in turn — it's now available without a waitlist in 180 countries. Gmail will have the ability to craft responses to emails for you, while Photos is getting a Magic Editor that can move objects in your pictures. You can get a glimpse of all Google announcements in a condensed version of its I/O keynote above.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/watch-the-google-io-2023-keynote-in-under-18-minutes-052059113.html?src=rss
Twitter is beginning to roll out its long-promised encrypted direct messaging feature. However, the initial rollout comes with some major limitations that could make it less than ideal for privacy-conscious Twitter users.Of note, the feature is currently only available to verified Twitter users, which includes Twitter Blue subscribers and those part of a “Verified Organization.” It’s not clear if this is just for the early rollout or if encryption will be added to the growing list of exclusive features for users with a checkmark. For now, an encrypted chat requires both users to be verified, according to the company.There are also some significant limitations to the feature itself. It doesn’t support group messages, or any kind of media other than links. The company also doesn’t allow users to report an encrypted message directly, advising on a help page that users should report accounts separately if they “encounter an issue with an encrypted conversation participant.”TwitterFinally, the level of encryption appears to be less secure than what other apps offer. For one, message metadata is not encrypted. Furthermore, Twitter notes that “currently, we do not offer protections against man-in-the-middle attacks” and suggests that the company itself is still able to access encrypted DMs without the participants knowing. “If someone–for example, a malicious insider, or Twitter itself as a result of a compulsory legal process—were to compromise an encrypted conversation, neither the sender or receiver would know,” the company explains on a help page. It added that it’s working on improvements that would make such exploits more “difficult.”That’s particularly notable because it falls far short of the standard Twitter owner Elon Musk has described when expressing his desire to add encryption for Twitter DMs. He has said he wants it to be impossible for the company to access users’ encrypted messages even if “someone puts a gun to our heads.”In a tweet, Twitter security engineer Christopher Stanley acknowledged the shortcoming. “We’re not quite there yet, but we’re working on it.”For those who are verified and want to try out the feature anyway, encrypted messaging can be accessed via the info menu (that’s the same menu you use to block or report a conversation) within a particular DM. Once encryption is enabled, the encrypted messages will appear as a separate message thread with labels at the top of the chat to indicate that the conversation is encrypted.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/twitters-encrypted-dms-are-here--but-only-for-verified-users-234934842.html?src=rss
More AI-generated music mimicking a famous artist has made the rounds — while making lots of money for the scammer passing it off as genuine. A collection of fake Frank Ocean songs sold for a reported $13,000 CAD ($9,722 in US dollars) last month on a music-leaking forum devoted to the Grammy-winning singer, according toVice. If the story sounds familiar, it’s essentially a recycling of last month’s AI Drake / The Weeknd fiasco.As generative AI takes the world by storm — Google just devoted most of its I/O 2023 keynote to it — people eager to make a quick buck through unscrupulous means are seizing the moment before copyright laws catch up. It’s also caused headaches for Spotify, which recently pulled not just Fake Drake but tens of thousands of other AI-generated tracks after receiving complaints from Universal Music.The scammer, who used the handle mourningassasin, told Vice they hired someone to make “around nine” Ocean songs using “very high-quality vocal snippets” of the Thinkin Bout You singer’s voice. The user posted a clip from one of the fake tracks to a leaked-music forum and claims to have quickly convinced its users of its authenticity. “Instantly, I noticed everyone started to believe it,” mourningassasin said. The fact that Ocean hasn’t released a new album since 2016 and recently teased an upcoming follow-up to Blond may have added to the eagerness to believe the songs were real.The scammer claims multiple people expressed interest in private messages, offering to “pay big money for it.” They reportedly fetched $3,000 to $4,000 for each song in mid to late April. The user has since been banned from the leaked-music forum, which may be having an existential crisis as AI-generated music makes it easier than ever to produce convincing knockoffs. “This situation has put a major dent in our server’s credibility, and will result in distrust from any new and unverified seller throughout these communities,” said the owner of a Discord server where the fake tracks gained traction.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/scammers-used-ai-generated-frank-ocean-songs-to-steal-thousands-of-dollars-222042845.html?src=rss
Last Friday was the final day for PS5 owners to claim Sony’s PlayStation Plus Collection, a bundle that came with nearly 20 free games, including Bloodborne and God of War (2018). When Sony announced at the start of February the collection was going away, the company said it would instead focus on growing the PlayStation Plus library of monthly games. Unsurprisingly then, May’s PS Plus lineup is chockful of titles you can download to your console, provided you subscribe to PS Plus Extra or Premium. In all, Sony will add 19 titles to the service this month.
Expect to see better looking Android TV apps, as well as more offerings from developers, in the future. At Google I/O today, the company announced the alpha version of Compose for TV, a framework that will make it easier to build attractive Android TV apps with less code and more intuitive tools. Google says developers will be able to bring over their existing code, and by moving to Compose it should be easier to update apps moving forward. The framework has direct access to the Android APIs — which most devs are already used to — and will support code from existing Android mobile and tablet apps. Google is also unveiling a set of TV design guidelines to help developers optimize their apps for big screens.Google has certainly come a long way when it comes to home entertainment. Its first Google TV platform, released in 2010 before the rise of streaming services, fizzled and died. It bounced back with the cheaper and far more popular Chromecast, which eventually led to Android TV, a platform that now houses a revived "Google TV" interface.When it comes to streaming platforms, Apple still has more tools for developers to build attractive TV apps, but it's nice to see Google making an effort. It's not like there's much competition from Roku or Amazon's Fire TV devices. Android TV's true power is its ubiquity, much like Android itself. According to Strategy Analytics, Android TV shipped on more devices than any other streaming platform last year. (Even my Formovie projector has Android TV built-in.)Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/android-tv-compose-for-tv-ui-framework-210056293.html?src=rss
It’s been two years since Google introduced its Project Starline holographic video conferencing experiment, and though we didn’t hear more about it during the keynote at I/O 2023 today, there’s actually been an update. The company quietly announced that it’s made new prototypes of the Starline booth that are smaller and easier to deploy. I was able to check out a demo of the experience here at Shoreline Park and am surprised how much I enjoyed it.But first, let’s get one thing out of the way. Google did not allow us to take pictures or video of the setup. It’s hard to capture holographs on camera anyway, so I’m not sure how effective it would have been. Due to that limitation, though, we’re not going to have a lot of photos for this post and I’ll do my best to describe the experience in words.After some brief introductions, I entered a booth with a chair and desk in front of the Starline system. The prototype itself was made up of a light-field display that looked like a mesh window, which I’d guess is about 40-inches wide. Along the top, left and right edges of the screen were cameras that Google uses to get the visual data required to generate the 3D model of me. At this point, everything looked fairly unassuming.Things changed slightly when Andrew Nartker, who heads up the Project Starline team at Google, stepped into frame. He sat in his chair in a booth next to mine, and when I looked at him dead on, it felt like a pretty typical 2D experience, except in what felt like very high resolution. He was life-sized and it seemed as if we were making eye contact and holding each other’s gaze, despite not looking into a camera. When I leaned forward or leaned closer, he did too, and nonverbal cues like that made the call feel a little richer.What blew me away, though, was when he picked up an apple (haha I guess Apple can say it was at I/O) and held it out towards me. It was so realistic that I felt as if I could grab the fruit from his fist. We tried a few other things later — fist bumping and high fiving, and though we never actually made physical contact, the positioning of limbs on the call was accurate enough that we could grab the projections of each other’s fists.The experience wasn’t perfect, of course. There were parts where, when Nartker and I were talking at the same time, I could tell he could not hear what I was saying. Every now and then, too, the graphics would blink or appear to glitch. But those were very minor issues, and overall the demo felt very refined. Some of the issues could even be chalked up to spotty event WiFi, and I can personally attest to the fact that the signal was indeed very shitty.It’s also worth noting that Starline was basically getting the visual and audio data of me and Nartker, sending it to the cloud over WiFi, creating a 3D model of both of us, and then sending it down to the light display and speakers on the prototype. Some hiccups are more than understandable.While the earliest Starline prototypes took up entire rooms, the current version is smaller and easier to deploy. To that end, Google announced today that it had shared some units with early access partners including T-Mobile, WeWork and Salesforce. The company hopes to get real-world feedback to “see how Project Starline can help distributed workforces stay connected.”We’re clearly a long way off from seeing these in our homes, but it was nice to get a taste of what Project Starline feels like so far. This was the first time media demos were available, too, so I’m glad I was able to check it out for myself and tell you about it instead of relying on Google’s own messaging. I am impressed by the realism of the projections, but I remain uncertain about how effectively this might substitute or complement in-person conversations. For now, though, we’ll keep an eye on Google’s work on Project Starline and keep you posted.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/googles-project-starline-booths-gave-me-a-holographic-meeting-experience-205804960.html?src=rss
Google doesn't have a direct equivalent to Apple's AirTags, but it might come close. Chipolo has teamed up with Google to introduce One Point (shown above) and Card Point (below) item trackers that work exclusively with Android's Find My Device network. They take advantage of the phone platform's ubiquity to not only increase the chances of locating your gear, but to find unknown trackers that might be used to spy on your whereabouts.Both trackers support Android's Fast Pair to speed through setup, and are water-resistant. The differences extend beyond their shapes. The One Point is the loudest with a 120dB ring, and lasts a year on its replaceable battery. The Card Point is quieter at 105dB and relies on a renewal program when the battery wears down, but it also lasts for two years.ChipoloChipolo is taking pre-orders for both devices now. The One Point sells for $28, and the Card Point is available for $35. Four-packs for each respectively cost $79 and $112, and you can get a One/Card bundle for $77. Orders should ship by the second half of July. You'll need a phone running at least Android 9 with Google Play Services. That covers many phones released in North America and Europe over the past five years.The Point trackers are really counterparts to Chipolo's iPhone-oriented One Spot and Card Spot. However, they also reflect Google's broader effort to flesh out the Android ecosystem. You don't have to rely on a third-party tracking network like Tile's or Samsung's to find missing items. Of course, this also locks you into Android — you'll have to replace your trackers if you ever switch platforms.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/chipolos-new-item-trackers-are-basically-airtags-for-android-204801185.html?src=rss
You won't have to install Android apps on your Chromebook when you need them in a pinch. After a preview at CES last year, Google has enabled app streaming through Phone Hub in Chrome OS Beta. You can quickly check your messages, or track the status of a food order without having to sign in again.Once Phone Hub is enabled, you can stream apps by either clicking a messaging app notification or browsing the Hub's Recent Apps section after you've opened a given app on your phone. Google doesn't describe certain app types as off-limits, although it's safe to say that you won't want to play action games this way.The feature works with "select" phones running Android 13 or newer. The Chromebook and handset need to be on the same WiFi network and physically close-by, although you can use the phone as a hotspot through Instant Tethering if necessary.Google is ultimately mirroring the remote Android app access you've had in Windows for years. However, the functionality might be more useful on Chromebooks. While app streaming won't replace native apps, it can save precious storage space and spare you from having to jump between devices just to complete certain tasks. This approach is also more manufacturer-independent where Microsoft's approach is restricted to Samsung and Honor phones.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/you-can-now-stream-android-phone-apps-to-your-chromebook-202830500.html?src=rss
AI-generated music has been in the spotlight lately, between a track that seemingly featured vocals from Drake and The Weeknd gaining traction to Spotify reportedly removing thousands of songs over concerns that people were using them to game the system. Now, Google is wading further into that space as the company is opening up access to its text-to-music AI, which is called MusicLM.Google detailed the system back in January when it published research on MusicLM. At the time, the company said it didn't have any plans to offer the public access to MusicLM due to ethical concerns related to copyrighted material, some of which the AI copied directly into the songs it generated.The generative AI landscape has shifted dramatically this year, however, and now Google feels comfortable enough to let the public try MusicLM. "We’ve been working with musicians like Dan Deacon and hosting workshops to see how this technology can empower the creative process," Google Research product manager Hema Manickavasagam and Google Labs product manager Kristin Yim wrote in a blog post.As TechCrunch points out, the current public version of MusicLM doesn't allow users to generate music with specific artists or vocals. That could help Google to avoid copyright issues and stop users from generating fake "unreleased songs" from popular artists and selling them for thousands of dollars.You can now sign up to try MusicLM through AI Test Kitchen on the web, Android and iOS. Google suggests that you can try prompts based on mood, genre and instruments, such as “soulful jazz for a dinner party” or "two nylon string guitars playing in flamenco style." The experimental AI will generate two tracks and you can identify your favorite by selecting a trophy icon. Google says doing so will help it to improve the model.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-opens-up-access-to-its-text-to-music-ai-202251175.html?src=rss
At I/O 2023 today, Google shared a few updates for both Android Auto and Android Automotive OS. Perhaps the biggest news is that Google is working with Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Cisco Webex to bring those virtual meeting apps to Android-equipped vehicles. If the thought of joining a video call in your car sounds like a driving hazard, don't worry: the meetings will be audio only with simplified controls on the infotainment display.Google is also rolling out Waze in the Google Play Store for all vehicles with Google built-in. This means the popular navigation app will be available outside of just Android Auto and beyond Volvo and Polestar models. What's more, the company is allowing developers to integrate the instrument cluster with their navigation apps. As you might expect, this will put turn-by-turn directions in the driver's line of sight. Plus, developers can access vehicle data like range, fuel level and speed to give drivers even more insight on their trips.Waze in the Chevrolet Blazer EVGoogleGoogle has added new app categories to the Android for Cars App Library. That repository now allows developers to add IoT and weather apps for use in vehicles. For example, The Weather Channel app will be available alongside existing software like Weather and Radar later this year. The company is also making it easier for media apps (music, audiobooks, podcasts, etc.) to port their software to Android Auto and Android Automotive OS.Additionally, the company has new categories for video and gaming apps in its library, with the goal of expanding to browsing apps soon. These are specifically designed for use when the car is parked or by passengers. YouTube is now available for all automakers to add to cars with Google built-in. Google says Polestar, Volvo and other "select partners" have committed to adding the video-streaming app via over-the-air updates. In terms of games, the initial slate includes Beach Buggy Racing 2, Solitaire FRVR, and My Talking Tom Friends. What's more, Google plans to add multi-screen support to Android Automotive OS 14, which will allow "shared entertainment experiences" between drivers and passengers.YouTube inside a Polestar vehicleGoogleGoogle says Android Auto will be available in almost 200 million cars by the end of 2023. The company also says that the number of cars with their infotainment systems powered entirely by Android Automotive OS with Google built-in should nearly double by the end of the year. That latter figure is spurred by adoption by automakers like Chevrolet, Volvo, Polestar, Honda, Renault and more. In March, GM announced it would phase out Android Auto and CarPlay in its EVs in favor of Android Automotive.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-is-bringing-zoom-teams-and-webex-meetings-to-android-auto-200029169.html?src=rss
To say the Google I/O 2023 keynote was packed would be an understatement. Google unveiled a flurry of new Pixel devices as well as the latest versions of Android and other platforms. It also won't surprise you to hear that AI was everywhere — this was Google's big chance to compete with OpenAI's ChatGPT. Don't worry if you missed something during the event, though, as we've got all the biggest announcements from the event.Pixel FoldPhoto by Sam Rutherford/EngadgetThere's no doubt that the (previously confirmed) Pixel Fold was the star of the show. Google's first foldable phone features the same Tensor G2 chip as the Pixel 7 Pro, but opens like a book to reveal a 7.6-inch display. There's a 5.8-inch external display, and the cameras are only a slight step back between the 48-megapixel main camera, 10.8MP telephoto and ultra-wide lenses and an 8MP internal shooter. This is also one of the thinner foldables at 0.48in when closed. It's available for pre-order today and will sell for $1,799 when it arrives in June.Pixel 7aPhoto by Sam Rutherford/EngadgetGoogle's budget (really, mid-range) phone just got a significant upgrade. The Pixel 7a sports the same Tensor G2 as its pricier Pixel 7 counterparts while adding features that were sorely missed on earlier A-series models, such as a smooth 90Hz display, a 64MP main camera and wireless charging. You can order it today for $499, or $50 more than its predecessor.Pixel TabletPhoto by Sam Rutherford/EngadgetGoogle first teased the Pixel Tablet a year ago, and it's finally ready to ship its return to Android-powered slates. As mentioned last fall, this is really a hybrid 11-inch smart display. It can sit in a speaker dock to serve as a Google Assistant hub and Chromecast device, but detaches when you're ready to watch videos or check your social feeds. It's powered by the same Tensor G2 as the Pixel 7 and offers a healthy 12 hours of battery life. You can expect pen support, too. It's available to pre-order today for $499.Android 14GoogleGoogle fully unveiled Android 14 at I/O. The major revision includes upgrades you saw in the previews, such as custom sharing features as well as stricter security, but also adds iOS 16-style lock screen customization complete with "cinematic" wallpaper that makes subjects stand out. You'll see likewise see AI-generated wallpapers that are cued to images and art styles. Google will release the new OS late this summer, and is expected to deliver the upgrade to Pixel users first.Wear OSGoogleGoogle is still committed to improving its Wear OS smartwatch platform following last year's overhaul. At I/O, the company introduced long-sought native watch apps for Gmail and Calendar that let you manage your messages and schedules from your wrist. WhatsApp is coming to Wear OS, too. Google also released its first developer preview for Wear OS 4, a major update that promises improved battery life and performance, simple watch backups and more accessibility. All the new software arrives later this year.PaLM 2 AI modelREUTERS/Dado RuvicIn some ways, the most important announcement at I/O is for tech that sits behind the scenes. Google has unveiled a PaLM 2 AI language model that will underpin more than two dozen of the company's products, including Bard. It's faster and more efficient, and can run locally on mobile devices. It's more adept at handling multiple languages and can generate JavaScript and Python code.Search Labs GoogleAmong Google's many, many AI-related introductions are three test features available through Search Labs. A Search Generative Experience provides automatically-generated overviews, exploration pointers and follow-ups. Code Tips will even offer programming snippets and advice. Add to Sheets, meanwhile, lets you plug search results into spreadsheets.BardMojahid Mottakin on UnsplashGoogle is rapidly expanding Bard's capabilities. On top of using PaLM2, the generative AI chatbot will soon let you include images in your queries, and bring pictures into its responses. It will also integrate Google apps (such as exporting to Docs and Gmail) as well as partner products like Adobe Firefly (for turning ideas into images). More importantly, it'll be much easier to use Bard in the first place — Google is dropping the waiting list and making Bard available in English to more than 180 countries, along with support for Japanese and Korean.AI in Photos and WorkspaceGoogleLike it or not, Google is putting generative AI in many of the apps you use. To start, Photos is getting a Magic Editor that can move subjects, add content and even replace the sky. The experimental feature will be available on some Pixel phones this fall.Generative AI will also be available across core Workspace apps through Duet AI. Gmail on mobile will help you write messages. Slides will help you create background images using text descriptions. AI in Sheets will analyze your data, while Docs will offer "assisted writing." Even Meet will use the technology to create unique video call backgrounds.Everything elseGoogleThere were numerous important updates across Google's other products. Project Tailwind is an AI-driven personal notebook. The redesigned Home app is now available to everyone, with Matter support coming to iOS users in the weeks ahead. Find My Device will soon support a wider range of hardware, and detect unknown trackers to help catch stalkers. Google Maps, meanwhile, is bringing Immersive View to routes.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-io-2023-everything-announced-at-the-event-193758196.html?src=rss
Generative AI really is everywhere. It's used to make social media avatars. It can help debug code. It can even ask nosey neighbors to be a little more polite to each other. Now, Google is hoping to use it to encourage app developers to expand their use of custom store listings on the Google Play store. New features announced at Google I/O will give developers will access to AI-powered tools that will help them create new listings and convert their existing app listings into multiple languages.App developers could already create up to 50 custom store listings, but Google hopes these new tools will make managing them easier. To start, it's introducing a store listing groups feature that allows developers to craft a base listing for their app, and then modify specific elements to tailor it to a specific audience demographic or event. Potential users visiting your app's store listing from YouTube might see one set of screenshots, while visitors from another country might see a different series of images, as well as an app description in their native language.The new AI-powered features seem designed to make that easier. The AI helper, for example, can take developer prompts highlighting a key feature or marketing theme, and spit out ready-made text to help a user craft a targeted Google Play Store listing. There's also a new machine translation tool that can help developers quickly list their app in 10 different languages.Although most of these new features were built to help developers find and expand their audience, there's at least one new tool being rolled out to average users: AI-powered review summaries. Google says the feature should "help users learn from each other" about what makes an app "special at a glance." Even this is designed to help apps gain more reach, however: At launch it will only help summarize positive reviews in English.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-play-developers-can-now-use-generative-ai-to-create-store-listings-193011363.html?src=rss
After confirming its existence last week, Google has formally introduced the Pixel Fold, its first stab at a foldable phone. Like past foldables, the new Pixel has a vertical hinge that lets it unfurl like a book. When it's folded, you get a more traditional form factor with a 5.8-inch display. Open it up, and you get a wider 7.6-inch screen for multitasking or watching videos. Both OLED panels have 120Hz refresh rates, and the device runs on the same Tensor G2 chip found in last year's Pixel 7 line. Google is pushing the phone's thinness (12.1mm folded, 5.8mm when not), battery ("over 24 hours") and weight (10 ounces) in particular as selling points. It also claims that the near-gapless hinge is built to last over time.We'll have to review the Pixel Fold before we can speak to that. For now, though, we've laid out how the Fold compares on paper to the most prominent book-style foldable on the market today: Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold 4. No, specs can't tell the whole story with a form factor like this, and both Samsung and OnePlus are expected to launch new foldables in the coming months. But if you want a sense of what the Pixel Fold's $1,799 starting price will get you, here's a quick rundown. The phone is available to pre-order now and will ship in June. For more impressions, check out our initial hands-on.Google Pixel Fold vs. Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4Google Pixel FoldSamsung Galaxy Z Fold 4Pricing (MSRP)$1,799 (256 GB), $1,919 (512 GB)$1,800 (256 GB), $1,920 (512GB), $2,160 (1TB)DimensionsFolded: 139.7 x 79.5 x 12.1mm (5.5 x 3.1 x 0.5 inches)Unfolded: 139.7 x 158.7 x 5.8mm (5.5 x 6.2 x 0.2 inches)Folded: 155.1 x 67.1 x 14.2-15.8 mm (6.11 x 2.64 x 0.56-0.62 inches)Unfolded: 155.1 x 130.1 x 6.3mm (6.11 x 5.12 x 0.25 inches)Weight283g (10 oz)263g (9.28 oz)Screen sizeExternal cover: 5.8 inches (146.7 mm)Unfolded: 7.6 inches (192.3mm)External cover: 6.2 inches (157mm)Unfolded: 7.6 inches (195mm)Screen resolutionExternal cover: 2,092 x 1,080 (408 ppi)Unfolded: 2,208 x 1,840 (380 ppi)External cover: 2,316 x 904 (402 ppi)Unfolded: 2,176 x 1,812 (374 ppi)Screen typeOLED (up to 120Hz)External cover: 17.4:9 aspect ratio, up to 1,550 nits peak brightnessUnfolded: 6:5 aspect ratio, up to 1,450 nits peak brightnessAMOLED (up to 120Hz)External cover: 23.1:9 aspect ratioUnfolded: 21.6:18 aspect ratio, up to 1,200 nits peak brightnessBattery4,821 mAh4,400 mAhInternal storage256 GB / 512 GB256 GB / 512 GB / 1TBExternal storageNoneNoneRear camera(s)Main: 48MP, f/1.7Ultrawide: 10.8MP, f/2.2Telephoto: 10.8MP, f/3.05, 5x optical zoom, 20x Super Res zoomMain: 50MP, f/1.8Ultrawide: 12MP, f/2.2Telephoto: 10MP, f/2.4, 3x optical zoom, 30x Digital zoomFront camera(s)9.5MP, f/2.210MP, f/2.2Inner camera(s)8MP, f/2.04MP, f/1.8Video captureRear camera: 4K at 30 fps, 60 fpsFront camera: 4K at 30 fps, 60 fpsInner camera: 1080p at 30 fpsRear camera: 8K at 24 fps, 4K at 60 fpsFront camera: 4K at 30 fps, 60 fpsSoCGoogle Tensor G2Qualcomm Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1CPUOcta-core (2x 2.85 GHz Cortex-X1, 2x 2.35 GHz Cortex-A78, 4x 1.80 GHz Cortex-A55)Octa-core (1x 3.19 GHz Cortex-X2, 3x 2.75 GHz Cortex-A710, 4x 1.80 GHz Cortex A-510)GPUARM Mali-G710 MP7Adreno 730RAM12 GB LPDDR512 GB LPDDR5WiFiWiFi 6EWiFi 6EBluetoothv5.2v5.2NFCYesYesOSAndroid 135 years of security updatesAndroid 12L, upgradeable to Android 13, One UI 5.14 years of OS updates5 years of security updatesColorsObsidian, PorcelainGraygreen, Phantom Black, Beige, BurgundyOther featuresUSB-C 3.2 Gen 2, Qi wireless charging, 30W charging, Titan M2 security chip, IPX8 water resistance, 1-year warrantyS Pen support, USB-C 3.2 Gen 1, Qi wireless charging, Reverse wireless charging, 25W charging, IPX8 water resistance, Samsung DeX, 1-year warrantyFollow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-pixel-fold-vs-samsung-galaxy-z-fold-4-battle-of-the-foldables-191551908.html?src=rss
Google is hosting its first full-on in-person I/O developer conference since the pandemic and we expect the company to announce a biblical amount of news at breakneck pace. Engadget is here at the show and will bring you a liveblog of what's happening at the keynote as it happens. The show kicks off at 1pm ET today and we'll be starting our commentary as early as noon. Keep your browser open here for our coverage of everything from Mountain View, CA today!Google I/O 2023 in-depth coverage
Google is ready to give Android tablets another go. Nearly five years after launching the ill-fated Pixel Slate, the company has fully taken the wraps off its latest large-screen device, the Pixel Tablet. Google had teased the device a couple of times over the past year, but now it's official: This is a 10.95-inch tablet that doubles as a Nest Hub-style smart display with an included speaker dock. That dock also charges the tablet, and the slate itself runs on the same Tensor G2 SoC you'd find in a Pixel 7 phone.The Pixel Tablet starts at $499 and is available to pre-order starting today, with shipping starting in June. We'll have a full review in the future, but for now, we've laid out how the device compares on the spec sheet to a couple popular alternatives in Apple's 10th-gen iPad and Samsung's Galaxy Tab A8. The $599 iPad Air and $630 Galaxy Tab S8 are notable options here, too, but since the Pixel Tablet is really two devices in one, we've stuck to sub-$500 options below. You can read our initial hands-on for more impressions.Google Pixel TabletApple iPad (10th gen)Samsung Galaxy Tab A8Pricing (MSRP)$499 (128 GB), $599 (256 GB)$449 (64 GB), $599 (256 GB)$230 (32 GB), $280 (64 GB), $330 (128 GB)Dimensions258 x 169 x 8.1mm (10.2 x 6.7 x 0.3 inches)248.6 x 179.5 x 7mm (9.79 x 7.07 x 0.28 inches)246.8 x 161.9 x 6.9mm (9.72 x 6.37 x 0.27 inches)Weight493g (17.4 oz)477g (16.8 oz)508g (17.9 oz)Screen size10.95 inches (278mm)10.9 inches (277mm)10.5 inches (267mm)Screen resolution2,560 x 1,600 (276 ppi)2,360 x 1,640 (264 ppi)1,920 x 1,200 (216 ppi)Screen typeLCD, 16:10 aspect ratio, 500 nits brightness (typical)IPS LCD, 23:16 aspect ratio, 500 nits brightness (typical)TFT LCD, 16:10 aspect ratioSoCGoogle Tensor G2Apple A14 BionicUnisoc Tiger T618RAM8 GB LPDDR54 GB LPDDR4X3 GB / 4 GBBattery27 Wh28.6 Wh (7,606 mAh)7,040 mAhInternal storage128 GB / 256 GB64 GB / 256 GB32 GB / 64 GB / 128 GBExternal storageNoneNonemicroSDXC up to 1 TBRear camera(s)8MP, f/2.012MP, f/1.8, 5x Digital zoom8MPFront camera(s)8MP, f/2.012MP, f/2.45MPVideo captureFront camera: 1080p at 30 fpsRear camera: 1080p at 30 fpsFront camera: 1080p at 25 fps, 30 fps, 60 fpsRear camera: 4K at 24 fps, 25 fps, 30 fps, 60 fps; 1080p at 25 fps, 30 fps, 60 fps, 120 fps, 240 fpsFront camera: 1080p at 30 fpsRear camera: 1080p at 30 fpsWiFiWiFi 6WiFi 6802.11acBluetoothv5.2v5.2v5.0OSAndroid 135 years of security updatesiPadOS 16.1, upgradeable to iPadOS 16.4.1Android 11, upgradeable to Android 13, One UI 5.1ColorsPorcelain, Hazel, RoseSilver, Blue, Pink, YellowGray, Silver, Pink GoldOther featuresComes with Charging Speaker Dock for 15W wireless charging, external speakers and smart home control; Google Cast support (in Hub Mode), stylus support, USB-C 3.2 Gen 1, Titan M2 security chip, 1-year warrantyApple Pencil (1st gen) support, Cellular models available, FaceTime, Center Stage, iMessage, landscape-oriented front camera, USB-C 2.0, 1-year warranty3.5mm headphone jack, Dolby Atmos tuning, 15W charging, USB-C 2.0Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/pixel-tablet-vs-the-competition-googles-latest-stab-at-making-android-tablets-a-thing-191008603.html?src=rss
Prior to today's I/O keynote, Google confirmed the leaks and rumors about the existence of its first foldable smartphone with a teaser video on YouTube. Now we know the full specs and pre-order details for the $1,800 handheld. Starting today, you can pre-order the Google Pixel Fold through Google's storefront, and units should begin shipping sometime in June. And when you pre-order, Google will thrown in a free Pixel Watch too.Like the Pixel 7 series, the Pixel Fold will feature Google's Tensor G2 SOC and come with 12GB of RAM and either 256 or 512GB of storage. The claimed battery life extends beyond 24 hours and supports both wireless charging or 30W fast charging. Google says it's the thinnest foldable phone on the market, measuring a half-inch thick when folded.The exterior features an always-on, 5.8-inch OLED display with up to 1550 nits of brightness and 120Hz refresh rate. It's covered in the same Gorilla Glass Victus as the Pixel 7 and 7 Pro — but it's the interior screen that's getting most of the attention. The 7.6-inch, 120Hz folding display is facilitated by a custom, dual-axis steel hinge and foldable Ultra Thin Glass with a layer of protective plastic. There's just enough friction within the hinges to enable different views when propped up in tabletop mode.The Pixel Fold has a total of five cameras: an 8-megapixel inner camera, a 9.5MP selfie cam on the front screen, and three cameras across the rear bar, including a telephoto lens, an ultrawide lens and a 48MP camera with a half-inch sensor. The multiple screens and cameras will enable features like split screen productivity, tripod-free astrophotography and real-time translation during face-to-face conversations.We'll have full reviews of the foldable soon. In the meantime our senior reviewer, Sam Rutherford, was able to do a quick hands-on with the Pixel Fold and thinks it's a fitting rival for Samsung's foldables. Our comparison post compares the Pixel Fold specs with the competition. You can get it in either black or white and pre-orders placed now should ship in June.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/how-to-pre-order-the-google-pixel-fold-190517124.html?src=rss
Google's announced the Pixel 7a — and made it available for immediate purchase — during its annual I/O conference. Like other A-model Pixel phones, this is a budget version of what came before, namely the Pixel 7 and 7 Pro. At $499, it's $100 cheaper than either of its siblings but manages to meet or exceed many of their specs. It has a similar design, uses the same Tensor G2 processing chip, and offers 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage like the base model Pixel 7. The 7a also matches the water resistance and display refresh rate of that phone, but has a larger battery and higher-res cameras. One key difference is the smaller screen, measuring 6.1 inches versus the Pixel 7's 6.3-inch display.We know it stacks up nicely against other current-model Pixels, but how does it compare to other budget-model phones? It's a little pricier than either the iPhone SE or the Galaxy A54 and falls between the two on battery capacity, screen size and number of cameras. The Pixel 7a beats both of its competitors on base-level memory and is also the only budget model to use the same processor as its top-end, flagship counterpart. Here are the specs for each phone side-by-side so you can see which one makes the most sense for you.Google Pixel 7a vs. Apple iPhone SE vs. Samsung Galaxy A54 Google Pixel 7aApple iPhone SE (3rd gen)Samsung Galaxy A54PricingStarts at $499Starts at $429Starts at $450Release dateMay 10, 2023March 18, 2022March 24,2023Dimensions6.0 x 2.87 x 0.35 in(152.4 x 72.9 x 9.0 mm)5.45 x 2.65 x 0.29 in(138.4 x 67.3 x 7.3 mm)6.23 x 3.02 x 0.32 in(158.2 x 76.7 x 8.2 mm)Weight6.81 oz(193 g)5.09 oz(144 g)7.13 oz(202 g)Operating systemAndroidiOSAndroidScreen size6.1 in4.7 in6.4 inScreen resolution1080 x 2400 at 429ppi1334 x 750 at 326ppi2340 x 1080 at 403ppiScreen typeOLED (90Hz)Retina HD LCD (60 Hz)Super AMOLED (120Hz)ProcessorTensor G2A15 Bionic chipExynos 1380Water and dust resistanceIP67IP67IP67Battery4385 mAh2018 mAh5000 mAhRAM8GB4GB6GB / 8GBInternal storage128GB64GB / 128GB / 256GB128GB / 256GBRear camera(s)Two cameras:Main: 64MP, ƒ/1.89 apertureWide: 13MP, ƒ/2.2 apertureOne camera:Main: 12MP, ƒ/1.8 apertureThree cameras:Main: 50MP, ƒ/1.8 apertureWide: 12MP, ƒ/2.2 apertureMacro: 5MP, ƒ/2.4 apertureVideo capture4K 60 fps4K at 60 fps4K at 30 fpsFront camera13MP, ƒ/2.2 aperture7MP, ƒ/2.2 aperture32MP, ƒ/2.2 apertureWiFiWiFi 6EWiFi 6WiFi 6Charging18W fast charging, 7.5W wireless20W fast charging, 7.5W wireless25W fast chargingConnectorUSB-CLightningUSB-CFollow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-pixel-7a-vs-the-competition-pushing-the-boundaries-of-a-budget-phone-190029045.html?src=rss
Android updates to its "Find My Device" network will alert users to unknown trackers, even if they aren't Google branded, the company announced during its I/O 2023 keynote on Wednesday. The updates will come in summer 2023, but the company did not give a specific date.Unknown tracker alerts happen when the network detects a Bluetooth tracker, such as an Apple AirTag or Tile device, registered to another user following you around. With this Android update, any tracker compatible with the Find My Device network will show up on your app.Other updates to the Find My Device app include a feature that pings compatible devices if you can't find them, ways to view location of those devices even if they're offline and new support for Tile, Chipolo, Pebblebee, Sony and JBL devices.The Android announcement comes after Google and Apple partnered up earlier this month to address unwanted tracking across devices. The companies submitted best practices and instructions to allow unauthorized tracking notifications across iOS and Android devices. Other brands like Tile and Samsung have shown support for the effort.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/android-findmy-bluetooth-tracker-google-airtag-tile-182832477.html?src=rss
Project Tailwind is Google's latest foray into AI and it's aimed at helping students organize their notes. Google describes it as "your AI-first notebook," and the toolset is able to distill information from a personal set of notes, making it all searchable, suggesting questions and main themes, and otherwise organizing the subject matter in an interactive way. Project Tailwind is an experiment at the moment and it's available only in the US. The waitlist to try it out is accessible via Google Labs.Google revealed Project Tailwind during today's I/O developer conference, showing off a few minutes of the program in action. After selecting a subject — computer science history — and pulling up a few paragraphs of notes from Google Drive, the developer had Project Tailwind summarize the content, generate a specific glossary, and offer a quiz or study guide on the information, among other actions. Tailwind shows its work as it goes, with footnotes and citations pulled directly from the document.Project Tailwind has a wider potential audience than students alone, but Google is focusing on classroom-level note enhancement with its initial pitch.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/googles-project-tailwind-is-an-ai-infused-personal-notebook-182728079.html?src=rss
For the first time, WhatApp is coming to smartwatches. At its I/O 2023 keynote on Wednesday, Google announced that the chat app will be available this summer on Wear OS 3 devices, including Samsung's Galaxy Watch 5 and the Pixel Watch. Among other features, the smartwatch version of WhatsApp allows you to record and send voice messages. You can also use the app to send text messages and see a list of your favorite contacts.A beta version of the software was spotted earlier in the week by 9to5Google. From that preview, we know adding a Wear OS device to your account will involve typing an eight-digit alphanumeric code provided to you through your phone. Additionally, the beta release features a circular complication that shows unread messages on your watch’s home screen. The complication also has two tiles for contacts and voice messages, allowing you to quickly send messages to your friends and family.The news that WhatsApp is heading to Wear OS devices comes after Meta announced at the end of last month it had redesigned WhatsApp’s multi-device functionality to make it possible to use one account on more than one phone.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/whatsapp-arrives-on-wear-os-this-summer-182644527.html?src=rss
It’s Google I/O time, which means the company is about to host a keynote that will likely be packed with announcements and updates. We’ll be covering all the news as it happens on our liveblog and Google I/O 2023 hub, but you can watch the event in full below. The livestream starts at 1PM ET.In terms of what to expect from the keynote, one thing that's for certain is we'll get more official details on Google's first foldable phone. The company finally announced the Pixel Fold last week after months of leaks and rumors. More information on Android 14 is also a dead cert. Get ready to hear the term "AI" a lot too, as Google is widely expected to make a ton of announcements on that front, perhaps including updates on its Bard AI chatbot.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/watch-googles-io-keynote-here-at-1pm-et-160030971.html?src=rss
Google has stood at the forefront at many of the tech industry's AI breakthroughs in recent years, Zoubin Ghahramani, Vice President of Google DeepMind, declared in a blog post while asserting that the company's work in foundation models, are "the bedrock for the industry and the AI-powered products that billions of people use daily." On Wednesday, Ghahramani and other Google executives took the Shoreline Amphitheater stage to show off its latest and greatest large language model, PaLM 2, which now comes in four sizes able to run locally on everything from mobile devices to server farms.PaLM 2, obviously, is the successor to Google's existing PaLM model that, until recently, powered its experimental Bard AI. "Think of PaLM as a general model that then can be fine tuned to achieve particular tasks," he explained during a reporters call earlier in the week. "For example: health research teams have fine tuned PaLM with with medical knowledge to help answer questions and summarize insights from a variety of dense medical texts." Ghahramani also notes that PaLM was "the first large language model to perform an expert level on the US medical licensing exam."Bard now runs on PaLM 2, which offers improved multilingual, reasoning, and coding capabilities, according to the company. The language model has been trained far more heavily on multilingual texts than its predecessor, covering more than 100 languages with improved understanding of cultural idioms and turns of phrase.It is equally adept at generating programming code in Python and JavaScript. The model has also reportedly demonstrated "improved capabilities in logic, common sense reasoning, and mathematics," thanks to extensive training data from "scientific papers and web pages that contain mathematical expressions."Even more impressive is that Google was able to spin off application-specific versions of the base PaLM system dubbed Gecko, Otter, Bison and Unicorn."We built PaLM to to be smaller, faster and more efficient, while increasing its capability," Ghahramani said. "We then distilled this into a family of models in a wide range of sizes so the lightest model can run as an interactive application on mobile devices on the latest Samsung Galaxy." In all, Google is announcing more than two dozen products that will feature PaLM capabilities at Wednesday's I/O eventThis is a developing story. Please check back for updates.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-unveils-its-multilingual-code-generating-palm-2-language-model-180805304.html?src=rss
Google is adding some new features to its image search function to make it easier to spot altered content, the company announced at its I/O 2023 keynote Wednesday. Photos shown in search results will soon include an "about this image" option that tells users when the image and ones like it were first indexed by Google. You can also learn where it may have appeared first and see other places where the image has been posted online. That information could help users figure out whether something they're seeing was generated by AI, according to Google.For example, you'll be able to see if the image has been on fact-checking websites that point out whether an image is real or altered. Vice President of search Cathy Edwards told Engadget that the tool doesn't currently tell you directly if an image has been edited or manipulated, though the company is researching effective ways of detecting such tweaks.The new feature will show up by clicking the three dots on an image in Google Image results. Google did not say exactly when the new feature will be available, besides that it will launch first in the United States sometime in the "coming months." Those images will include a markup in the original file to add context about its creation wherever its used. Image publishers like Midjourney and Shutterstock will also include the markup.Google Search seems to be going all-in on AI. The company announced its Search Generative Experience that gives an AI summary of results and other information on search, upcoming products like the "Perspectives" tab in search that highlights forum and social media posts and other developments that you can test out in Google's Search Labs. Google's efforts to clarify to users where its search results come from started earlier this year with efforts like "about this result."Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/generative-ai-google-image-search-context-175311217.html?src=rss
It's fair to say that Google was caught flat-footed by Microsoft's launch of Bing search powered by ChatGPT, as it didn't have anything similar when it unveiled its own conversational AI, Bard. Now, Google has announced Search Labs, a new way for consumers to test "bold new ideas and ideas we're exploring" in search, the company said at its I/O 2023 keynote.There are three key features available for a limited time. The first is called Search Generative Experience (SGE), bringing generative AI directly into Google Search. "The new Search experience helps you quickly find and make sense of information," Google's Direct of Search wrote. "As you search, you can get the gist of a topic with AI-powered overviews, pointers to explore more, and ways to naturally follow up."GoogleAlso available from the Search prompt are Code Tips, that use large language models to provide snippets and "pointers for writing code faster and smarter," according to Google. You can get reponses about languages including Java, Go, Python, Javascript, C++, Kotlin, shell, Docker and Git.Finally, "Add to Sheets" lets you insert search results directly into a spreadsheet. For example, if you're planning a vacation on a Sheets document, you can easily add a link straight from Google Search.Google's Bard could potentially improve all of Google's products ranging from Maps to Drive. Search, however, is the company's core function and principal moneymaker, and was one of the first things it mentioned when announcing Bard. To that end, it will be interesting to see how it compares with what Microsoft's ChatGPT-powered Bing can do.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/googles-search-labs-lets-you-test-its-ai-powered-products-and-ideas-175254478.html?src=rss
After OpenAI’s ChatGPT caught the tech world off guard late last year, Google reportedly declared a “code red,” scrambling to plan a response to the new threat. The first fruit of that reorientation trickled out earlier this year with its Bard chatbot and some generative AI features baked into Google Workspace apps. Today at Google I/O 2023, we finally see a more fleshed-out picture of how the company views AI’s role in its cloud-based productivity suite. Google Duet AI is the company’s branding for its collection of AI tools across Workspace apps.Like Microsoft Copilot for Office apps, Duet AI is an umbrella term for a growing list of generative AI features across Google Workspace apps. (The industry seems to have settled on marketing language depicting generative AI as your workplace ally.) First, the Gmail mobile app will now draft full replies to your emails based on a prompt. In addition, the mobile Gmail app will soon add contextual assistance, “allowing you to create professional replies that automatically fill in names and other relevant information.”GoogleDuet AI also makes an appearance in Google Slides. Here, it takes the form of image generation for your presentations. Like Midjourney or DALL-E 2, Duet AI can now turn simple text prompts into AI-generated images to enhance Slides presentations. It could help save you the trouble of scouring the internet for the right slide image while spicing them up with something original.In Google Sheets, Duet AI can understand the context of a cell’s data and label it accordingly. The spreadsheet app also adds a new “help me organize” feature to create custom plans: describe what you want to do in plain language, and Duet AI will outline strategies and steps to accomplish it. “Whether you’re an event team planning an annual sales conference or a manager coordinating a team offsite, Duet AI helps you create organized plans with tools that give you a running start,” the company said.GoogleMeanwhile, Duet AI in Google Meet can generate custom background images for video calls with a text prompt. Google says the feature can help users “express themselves and deepen connections during video calls while protecting the privacy of their surroundings.” Like the Slides image generation, Duet’s Google Meet integration could be a shortcut to save you from searching for an image that conveys the right ambiance for your meeting (while hiding any unwanted objects or bystanders behind you).Duet also adds an “assisted writing experience” in Google Docs’ smart canvas. Entering a prompt describing what you want to write about will generate a Docs draft. The feature also works in Docs’ smart chips (automatic suggestions and info about things like documents and people mentioned in a project). Additionally, Google is upgrading Docs’ built-in Grammarly-style tools. A new proofread suggestion pane will offer tips about concise writing, avoiding repetition and using a more formal or active voice. The company adds that you can easily toggle the feature when you don’t want it to nag you about grammar.Initially, you’ll have to sign up for a waitlist to try the new Duet AI Workspace features. Google says you can enter your info here to be notified as it opens the generative AI features to more users and regions “in the weeks ahead.”This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/googles-duet-ai-brings-more-generative-features-to-workspace-apps-173944737.html?src=rss
For the past two months, anybody wanting to try out Google's new chatbot AI, Bard, had to first register their interest and join a waitlist before being granted access. On Wednesday, the company announced that those days are over. Bard will immediately be dropping the waitlist requirement as it expands to 180 additional countries and territories. What's more, this expanded Bard will be built atop Google's newest Large Language Model, PaLM 2, making it more capable than ever before.Google hurriedly released the first generation Bard back in February after OpenAI's ChatGPT came out of nowhere and began eating the industry's collective lunch like Gulliver in a Lilliputian cafeteria. Matters were made worse when Bard's initial performances proved less than impressive — especially given Google's generally accepted status at the forefront of AI development — which hurt both Google's public image and its bottom line. In the intervening months, the company has worked to further develop PaLM, the language model that essentially powers Bard, allowing it to produce better quality and higher-fidelity responses, as well as perform new tasks like generating programming code.As Google executives announced at the company's I/O 2023 keynote on Wednesday, Bard has been switched over to then new PaLM 2 platform. As such, users can expect a bevy of new features and functions to roll out in the coming days and weeks. Features like a higher degree of visual responses to your queries, so when you ask for "must see sights" in New Orleans, you'll be presented with images of the sites you'd see, more than just a bullet list or text-based description. Conversely, users will be able to more easily input images to Bard alongside their written queries, bringing Google Lens capabilities to Bard.Even as Google mixes and matches AI capabilities amongst its products — 25 new offerings running on PaLM 2 are being announced today alone — the company is looking to ally with other industry leaders to further augment Bard's abilities. Google announced on Wednesday that it is partnering with Adobe to bring its Firefly generative AI to Bard as a means to counter Microsoft's BingChat-DallE2 offering.Finally, Google shared that it will be implementing a number of changes and updates in response to feedback received from the community since launch. Clicking on a line of generated code or chatbot answer and Bard will provide a link to that specific bit's source. There will be a new Dark theme. And, the company is working to add an export feature so that users can easily run generated programming code on Replit or toss their generated works into Docs or Gmail.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-bard-transitions-to-palm-2-and-expands-to-180-countries-172908926.html?src=rss
Back in March, Adobe announced that it, too, would be jumping into the generative AI pool alongside the likes of Google, Meta, Microsoft and other tech industry heavyweights with the release of Adobe Firefly, a suite of AI features. Available across Adobe's product lineup including Photoshop, After Effects and Premiere Pro, Firefly is designed to eliminate much of the drudge work associated with modern photo and video editing. On Wednesday, Adobe and Google jointly announced during the 2023 I/O event that both Firefly and the Express graphics suite will soon be incorporated into Bard, allowing users to generate, edit and share AI images directly from the chatbot's command line.According to a release from the company, users will be able to generate an image with Firefly, then edit and modify it using Adobe Express assets, fonts and templates within the Bard platform directly — even post to social media once it's ready. Those generated images will reportedly be of the same high quality that Firefly beta users are already accustomed to as they are all being created from the same database of Adobe Stock images, openly licensed and public domain content.Additionally, Google and Adobe will leverage the latter's existing Content Authenticity Initiative to mitigate some of the threats to creators that generative AI poses. This includes a "do not train" list, which will preclude a piece of art's inclusion in Firefly's training data as well as persistent tags that will tell future viewers whether or not a work was generated and what model was used to make it. Bard users can expect to see the new features begin rolling out in the coming weeks ahead of a wider release.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-is-incorporating-adobes-firefly-ai-image-generator-into-bard-174525371.html?src=rss
Google is stuffing generative AI into seemingly all its products, and that now includes the photo app on your phone. The company has previewed an "experimental" Magic Editor tool in Google Photos that can not only fix photos, but outright change them to create the shot you wanted all along. You can move and resize subjects, stretch objects (such as the bench above), remove an unwanted bag strap or even replace an overcast sky with a sunnier version.Magic Editor will be available in early form to "select" Pixel phones later this year, Google says. The tech giant warns that output might be flawed, and that it will use feedback to improve the technology.Google is no stranger to AI-based image editing. Magic Eraser already lets you remove unwanted subjects, while Photo Unblur resharpens jittery pictures. Magic Editor, however, takes things a step further. The technology adds content that was never there, and effectively lets you retake snapshots that were less-than-perfectly composed. You can manipulate shots with editors like Adobe's Photoshop, of course, but this is both easier and included in your phone's photo management app.The addition may be helpful for salvaging photos that would otherwise be unusable. However, it also adds to the list of ethical questions surrounding generative AI. Google Photos' experiment will make it relatively simple to present a version of events that never existed. It may be that much harder to trust someone's social media snaps, even though they're not entirely fake.Follow all of the news from Google I/O 2023 right here.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/google-photos-will-use-generative-ai-to-straight-up-change-your-images-171014939.html?src=rss
Hollow Knight: Silksong, the long-awaited sequel to 2017’s indie blockbuster Hollow Knight, has been delayed, as announced by Team Cherry developer Matthew Griffin on Twitter. The sidescrolling metroidvania platformer was scheduled for release in the first half of 2023, but, well, it’s May, so that isn’t happening. Additionally, the company hasn’t provided an updated release window.“Development is still continuing. We're excited by how the game is shaping up, and it's gotten quite big, so we want to take the time to make the game as good as we can,” wrote Matthew Griffin.Silksong was originally announced in early 2019 and hands-on gameplay demos followed in June, so folks naturally assumed that the game was close to launch. Time marched on with no real updates until last year when it was announced that Silksong would launch on Xbox Game Pass, in addition to just about every other platform. At that time, Xbox corporate vice president Sarah Bond said that the sequel would release by June of this year.Like another long-delayed sequel, Silksong was originally conceived as a simple expansion to Hollow Knight with the game’s occasional antagonist Hornet acting as the main character. Since then, the game has apparently gotten much more ambitious. Team Cherry says it’ll release more details as we get closer to release.Whenever it finally graces us with its presence, Hollow Knight: Silksong will launch on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows PC, Xbox One and Xbox Series X, with Game Pass availability from day one. In the meantime, there is no shortage of metroidvania games out there to hold you over.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/hollow-knight-silksong-delayed-and-theres-no-updated-release-window-164549946.html?src=rss
If your charging gear is in need of a refresh, now might be a decent time to upgrade, as Anker has once again discounted a range of wall chargers, cables and power banks on Amazon. For more heavy-duty needs, a number of the company's portable power stations are also on sale.Among the noteworthy deals here, the Anker 735 Charger is down to $38.41, which is within a dollar of its all-time low. We've seen this discount a few times before, but normally, the wall charger retails closer to $50. This is a slightly older version of the "best 65-watt charger" pick in our guide to the best fast chargers. The newer device is also called the 735 Charger, confusingly, and features smarter temperature monitoring and power distribution, but the old model delivers the same 65W of power in a similarly travel-friendly frame. Generally speaking, that's enough power to charge many smartphones and tablets around full speed and refill some smaller laptops.Both of the charger's USB-C ports can reach that max charging rate, plus there's a USB-A port for topping up lower-power devices. Just note that the each port will output less power if you use multiple ports at once. The updated model is also on sale for $48 with an on-page coupon.A couple of hybrid chargers are discounted as well, with the 45W, 5,000 mAh Anker 521 Power Bank down to $42 and the 65W, 10,000 mAh Anker 733 Power Bank down to $70. (Clip the on-page coupon in both cases to see the discount.) These devices are on the larger side, but they can serve as both a portable power bank and a wall charger with fold-up plugs. The 733's discount matches the lowest price we've seen, while the 521 is about $18 below its usual street price.Beyond that, the company's six-foot PowerLine II USB-C to Lightning cable is down to a low of $9, while the ultracompact 20W Anker 511 Charger is within a dollar of its best price $12. Anker runs these kind of discounts fairly often, but we've found their charging gear to provide good value in severalbuyingguides, so this is a good chance to save.Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter and subscribe to the Engadget Deals newsletter for the latest tech deals and buying advice.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/anker-charging-accessories-are-up-to-42-percent-off-on-amazon-153043864.html?src=rss
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