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Smart fridges, washing machines, and more can connect to the smart grid to adjust energy use based on demand and save you cash. | Image: HCA The question Why does my fridge / washing machine / dryer need an internet connection?" is a good one: a phone notification that your wash is done is far from life-changing. But if adding smarts to your white goods could save you some cash, it might be another story.With a connection to the internet, appliances can automatically shift and reduce their energy use through demand response programs to save you money. But today, this can be fiddly and confusing to set up; it's also not widely available.This is a problem the Home Connectivity Alliance (HCA) is trying to solve with a new Energy Management Interface specification it launched at CES this week - and it could be a big step toward expanding demand response adoption.HCA members... Continue reading...

Illustration by Grayson Blackmon / The Verge Thread Group is finally fixing one of the biggest problems facing the adoption of the Matter smart home standard. Soon, when you have, say, a Google Nest Hub, an Apple TV, and an Eero Wi-Fi router, instead of each creating its own proprietary Thread network and messing up the communication between all of your Thread devices, they should all join together to form a big happy, meshy Thread network.Thread is one of the two main wireless protocols that Matter works over. It's a dedicated smart home wireless protocol designed to create a mesh network that reduces latency, eliminates points of failure, and improves battery life in smart home devices like sensors, locks, and lights.Thread Group's plan to fix the multi-network problem is... Continue reading...

Imagine this, but gamerified. | Image: Savant If you had install gamer lights in the kitchen" on your list of New Year's resolutions, well, you're in luck - GE Lighting is introducing its first full-color under-cabinet smart lights. The Cync Reveal HD Plus fixtures and pucks are arriving soon, starting at $59.99.Not looking for that RGB gamer vibe? The Cync under-cabinet lights offer a full range of whites, and you can connect up to 10 fixtures together to give your countertops an ethereal glow that just screams Architectural Digest. They can be plugged in or hardwired, and they're Matter compatible - helpful for futureproofing in the event that Matter sorts itself out.We had the chance to check out a prototype of Cync's under-cabinet lights at last year's CES, and they looked... Continue reading...

Image: Mophie Mophie is reviving the Juice Pack battery case for iPhones. As part of its announcements for CES, the company (which is owned by Zagg) announced that it will be releasing a new version of the Juice Pack for the iPhone 15, iPhone 15 Pro, and iPhone 15 Pro Max.Each version of the case has a different-sized battery that can be used to help give your phone a little extra, well, juice. The iPhone 15 version has a 2,400mAh internal battery, the iPhone 15 Pro version has a 2,600mAh internal battery, and the iPhone 15 Pro Max version has a 2,800mAh internal battery.Mophie's last Juice Pack case was the Juice Pack Access, which introduced for the iPhone X, XS, XS Max, and XR in 2019. But with this new lineup, you may have noticed that there... Continue reading...

The Omen Transcend 14 looks like a normal laptop, and that's the point. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Gaming laptops, as a rule, look like gaming laptops. They usually have RGB lighting, a splash of vibrant color, and a hyper-stylized design. At a glance, you can almost always tell a gaming laptop from a regular one - and that's before you even consider less visible but crucial features like discrete GPUs and superfast displays. But many of us, as much as we love to game, do not need to announce that we love to game every time we crack open our laptop, and HP's new Omen Transcend 14 is supposed to cater to us.This new 14-inch laptop is designed to bridge the gap between gaming and normal usage. That means more subtle flashes of color and RBG lighting that can switch from bright colors to all white in a few clicks.The new laptop comes... Continue reading...

The Find X7 Ultra in black, blue, and brown. | Image: Oppo Oppo's latest flagship, the Find X7 Ultra, is the first smartphone to include two periscope cameras, the company announced today as it launched the device in China. One offers a 3x zoom and uses a 1/1.56-inch sensor that Oppo says is the biggest telephoto sensor in any smartphone." Large sensors typically make for better low-light photographs, which can be an issue for some phones' secondary cameras. The second periscope lens offers a 6x optical zoom with a 1/2.51-inch sensor.The zoom lenses make up two of the four 50-megapixel cameras Oppo has built into the rear of the phone. These also include a main camera that's the first in the market to use Sony's second-generation 1-inch-type sensor (the LYT-900), alongside an ultrawide camera... Continue reading...

Of course, it has to get FDA clearance first. | Image: Withings Withings always shows up to CES with a futuristic health tech device in tow, and this year is no different. The company's latest gadget is the $249.95 BeamO, a so-called multiscope that measures your temperature, takes electrocardiograms, reads blood oxygen levels, and works as a stethoscope to monitor heart and lung health.The device itself resembles some of Withings' other contactless thermometers, but it contains photoplethysmography (PPG) sensors, electrodes, a digital stethoscope, and a second-gen version of the infrared temperature sensor in the Withings Thermo. You're probably more familiar with PPG sensors as the green LED you find in most smartwatches that measures heart rate by shining light into the skin. The sides of the... Continue reading...

This kind of 3D effect is hard to capture in photos, but trust me, the astronaut was popping out of that screen. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge Despite the pictures, I solemnly swear that, in person, that astronaut on the new Acer Aspire 3D 15 SpatialLabs Edition was reaching their arms out to me. I've rolled my eyes at 3D displays before, but this time, it looked so realistic that I poked the astronaut's tummy like it was the Pillsbury Doughboy. I wasn't wearing glasses, and the whole thing was equal parts weird and cool. That's exactly the sort of thing you expect to see at CES 2024 on some far-out, high-end concept tech, but this 3D laptop is coming out next month for around the same price as a 15-inch M2 MacBook Air.To be fair, $1,399 for a laptop isn't nothing - especially when you consider that's the starting price. However, it's pretty dang affordable as far as Acer's... Continue reading...

Photo by James Bareham / The Verge Checks are apparently hitting the bank accounts of people affected by Apple's decision to slow down iPhones with older batteries back in 2017. MacRumors reported that readers of its site said they'd seen checks deposited to their accounts amounting to $92.17, later updating the story with an embedded post from one of the readers. Indeed, the website set up for the settlement was updated in December to say the payments were expected to go out this month.So ends the batterygate saga. It began in 2017 when a developer showed that certain iOS 10 updates throttled performance for older phones like the iPhone 6S and iPhone 7. The company wasn't upfront about the purpose of the slowdown before this, but later said the goal was to keep phones... Continue reading...

Image: Apple Catch up on all of The Verge's Monarch: Legacy of Monsters news updates, reviews, and interviews. Continue reading...

Google's Nest Wifi Pro are Wi-Fi 6E-capable mesh routers that come in a range of colors. | Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge When you're in the middle of a task, there's nothing more frustrating than suddenly losing your internet connection - take it from somebody who lost their Wi-Fi signal while writing this very sentence. Thankfully, Google's Nest Wifi Pro is currently on sale in select colors at Amazon and Best Buy, where a single unit is going for an all-time low of $139.99 ($60 off). Other shades are on sale for $20 more, or you can pick up a set of two or three for around $239.99 ($60 off) and $319.99 ($80 off), respectively.With its resemblance to a Nest Audio speaker, Google's mesh router is an attractive gadget that'll blend in with the rest of your home. At the same time, it's highly capable, with support for Wi-Fi 6E as well as Thread and... Continue reading...

A simulated" image from Samsung showing what the Tesla connections in the SmartThings app may look like. | Image: Samsung Ahead of CES 2024, Tesla and Samsung announced today that they're teaming up on energy management for smart homes. Users of Samsung's SmartThings platform will be able to connect to Tesla products like the Powerwall home battery so that you can keep track of things like energy production and your usage.When connected to the Powerwall, SmartThings Energy can sync with the Storm Watch" feature so that you're notified of heavy weather on a Samsung phone or TV, for example. In addition to the Powerwall, SmartThings Energy will be able to connect to other Tesla products, including its electric vehicles, Solar Inverter, and Wall Connector charging solutions.The collaboration is possible thanks to Tesla's API, which Samsung claims... Continue reading...

Samsung notes that the features shown here are examples of Home-to-Car and Car-to Home services to be developed," so don't take this image as a final representation of what the experience will be like. | Image: Samsung Samsung is teaming up with Hyundai to add Samsung's SmartThings smart home platform to Hyundai and Kia's connected car services, according to a blog post from Samsung and a press release from Hyundai. (Hyundai is the parent company of Kia.) As part of the collaboration, the two companies are going to work on home-to-car" and car-to-home" services and as an integrated home energy management service," Samsung says.In practice, that means at home you'll be able to do things like use SmartThings to control your car's air conditioning or windows, and when you're in your car, you'll be able to control your TV or your home's air conditioning. You'll also be able to plug your car into your SmartThings routines.Here's an example from Samsung... Continue reading...