It looks like Amazon is rolling a new app icon on iOS, and unlike countless other recent app redesigns, it isn’t just a logo dropped inside a white background! Rejoice! The new icon cleverly takes cues from perhaps Amazon’s most recognizable “product” — its shipping boxes and their bright blue tape.
Here it is — in the app’s listing on Apple’s UK App Store. (There are a few other reports of others seeing the icon on their devices as well.)
Whoever worked on this new app design, which will be instantly recognizable on your home screen, deserves a raise.
Apple’s hardware team is getting its biggest shakeup in nearly a decade, as Dan Riccio — who served as the company’s senior vice president of hardware engineering since 2012 — transitions to “a new role” at the company. He’ll be replaced as Apple’s head hardware engineer by John Ternus, who led the hardware team designing the iPhone 12 and 12 Pro, in addition to working on Apple’s M1 chips. Ternus has been vice president of hardware engineering at Apple since 2013.
The role of senior vice president of hardware engineering at Apple is a key one: the position reports directly to CEO Tim Cook and is responsible for leading the Mac, iPhone, iPad, and iPod engineering teams. Ternus’ new role will put him in charge of the company’s hardware efforts, much in the same way that Craig Federighi — Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering — runs the development of iOS and macOS.
Riccio won’t be leaving Apple, though: he’ll be working on an unspecified “new project” for the company in a role directly reporting to Cook. “Next up, I’m looking forward to doing what I love most — focusing all my time and energy at Apple on creating something new and wonderful that I couldn’t be more excited about,” explains Riccio in Apple’s announcement.
Dan Riccio, Apple’s now-former SVP of hardware engineering.Photo: Apple
If that language sounds familiar, it’s because it’s almost the exact same description that Apple provided for Riccio’s predecessor, Bob Mansfield, when he stepped down as SVP of hardware engineering in 2012. Like Riccio, Mansfield transitioned to “work on future projects” in an unnamed role that reported directly to Cook — which Bloomberg notes included leading Apple’s self-driving car team until December 2020, when Mansfield fully retired from Apple.
Apple’s future automotive ambitions are currently being led by artificial intelligence executive John Giannandrea. But following Mansfield’s departure, there would appear to be a vacancy in senior hardware engineers on that project.
Riccio’s move is the latest departure from Apple’s executive leadership team in recent years, following legendary product designer Jony Ive (who stepped down to form his own design firm, LoveFrom, in November 2019) and Phil Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of worldwide marketing, who was replaced by Greg Joswiak in 2020 as Schiller refocused on running the App Store and Apple Events.
Sony is reportedly set to bring back its “Compact” line of phones in 2021 with a new Xperia Compact model. It will offer a 5.5-inch display and dimensions more in line with Apple’s (relatively) diminutive iPhone 12 mini rather than the increasingly large phones that Sony has offered for the last few years.
The new device, according to noted phone leaker OnLeaks, who has also posted renders of the upcoming phone over at Voice, would feature dimensions of 140 x 68.9 x 8.9 mm (5.5 x 2.71 x 0.35 inches), making it just a bit bigger than the iPhone 12 mini (which measures 131.5 x 64.2 x 7.4 mm or 5.18 x 2.53 x 0.29 inches).
The new Xperia Compact is also said to offer an 8-megapixel selfie camera in a teardrop notch, a dual-camera setup with a 13-megapixel main camera on the back, a 3.5mm headphone jack, and a side-mounted fingerprint reader integrated into the power button. Notably absent are any details on specs, however.
Image: OnLeaks / Voice
The (as-yet-unnamed) 2021 Xperia Compact would be Sony’s first phone to bear the “Compact” name since 2018’s Xperia XZ2 Compact, which had similar dimensions as the leaked specs of the new 2021 device (although the display on the 2018 model was a bit smaller at 5 inches, thanks to its larger bezels). But it’s still a far smaller piece of hardware than other recent attempts like the Xperia 5.
The biggest question, though, is whether the new Xperia Compact will offer flagship-level specifications or if it’ll fall into the same pitfall of other shrunken-down Android devices and offer downgraded specs to match its smaller size. Sony has avoided this issue before — the aforementioned XZ2 Compact offered nearly comparable specifications to its larger sibling — but it remains an open question whether Sony will actually deliver on a 2021 Android phone with flagship-class specifications that doesn’t also require a massive display.
It’s also unclear whether there’s actually a market for smaller flagships. Apple’s iPhone 12 mini, while offering virtually identical specifications to the larger iPhone 12, has reportedly seen lackluster sales compared to the larger models on offer (despite its lower price tag). There are additional reports that Apple is shifting production away from the smaller model to focus more on the full-sized phones.
Apple is adding celebrity-guided walking workouts to Fitness Plus today, with new walks to be added every Monday through the end of April. The new feature, called “Time to Walk,” pairs music and inspirational monologues from famous musicians, athletes, and actors with the exercise tracking that Apple Watch and Fitness Plus are known for.
Today’s launch includes walks with Shawn Mendes, Dolly Parton, Draymond Green, and Uzo Aduba. Apple says each Time to Walk episode features “personal, life shaping moments” from each influential person’s life and career, along with lessons, memories, and moments of levity. The celebrities will also introduce a playlist of songs after their talk to keep the motivation going for the rest of your walk and beyond. Also interesting to note, Apple says each episode was recorded as the celebrity guests walked in a place that was personally meaningful to them.
An example of the kind of photos that can appear during a Time to Walk workout.Image: Apple
On the technical side of things, Time to Walk episodes will be automatically downloaded to Fitness Plus subscribers’ Apple Watches and will play over Bluetooth headphones. Walkers will have access to the usual exercise metrics like time, pace, heart rate, and distance, and Apple says Time to Walk will display photos on your Apple Watch timed to moments in each guest’s story. Time to Walk is called Time to Push for wheelchair users, and it relies on watchOS’s wheelchair workout tracking to provide fitness information.
In terms of subject matter and tone, Time to Walk episodes sound like they’re more in the TED Talk school of inspirational audio than something you might hear on a laidback podcast, but for fans of each star or influential guest, they might be worth a listen and stroll.
When it comes to whether MagSafe-enabled iPhones are safe around pacemakers or other implanted medical devices, Apple and medical device makers have the same advice: it should be okay, but it’s best not to risk it.
MacRumors spotted an update to one of Apple’s support documents, where the company advises that iPhones should be kept at least six inches away from a pacemaker or implanted defibrillator during normal use and a foot away if the device is actively using wireless charging (via 9to5Mac).
This advice isn’t specific to the MagSafe phones. Apple says the additional magnets shouldn’t make the phones any more likely to turn off your implanted medical device than any other phone, a sentiment Medtronic, the manufacturer of such devices, seems to agree with. The company released the following statement:
Medtronic has analyzed iPhone technology and found that it presents no increased risk of interference with Medtronic implantable cardiac rhythm devices, such as pacemakers, implantable defibrillators (ICDs), and cardiac resynchronization therapy defibrillators (CRT-Ds), when used according to labeling.
Both Apple’s update and Medtronic’s statement come after a recently released study in which a researcher was able to deactivate a patient’s implanted defibrillator by holding an iPhone 12 directly over the device. It’s worth noting that the study was only carried out on one person and didn’t show if the same results would have occurred with a non-MagSafe device.
Implanted medical devices deactivating when magnets are held over them isn’t anything new. In fact, it’s expected behavior. The devices are built to deactivate when a magnet is held over them, and doctors should always inform patients about the risks and necessary precautions when they’re using an implanted medical device. Apple’s documentation advises you to “consult with your physician and your device manufacturer for specific guidelines.”
But in case it’s been a while since you talked to your doctor, here’s your reminder: it’s best to keep any electronic devices away from your implanted medical devices, whether or not they explicitly include magnets. There’s never a good time for your heart to stop beating like it should.
A consumer advocacy group in Europe has filed the latest class action lawsuit against Apple saying the company intentionally throttled older iPhones in Italy. First reported by TechCrunch, the new lawsuit seeks €60 million (roughly $73 million) in compensation — or about €60 per device — for owners of iPhone 6, 6 Plus, 6S, and 6S Plus models sold in Italy between 2014 and 2020. Euroconsumers, an umbrella advocacy organization in the EU that includes Italy’s Altroconsumo, says the €60 compensation is the average amount consumers paid to replace their devices’ batteries.
“When consumers buy Apple iPhones, they expect sustainable quality products. Unfortunately, that is not what happened with the iPhone 6 series” Els Bruggeman, head of policy and enforcement at Euroconsumers, said in a statement. “Not only were consumers defrauded, and did they have to face frustration and financial harm, from an environmental point of view it is also utterly irresponsible.”
Euroconsumers filed two similar lawsuits in December on behalf of member orgs Test-Achats in Belgium and OCU in Spain. The group said in a press release that it plans a fourth lawsuit in Portugal.
“We have never — and would never — do anything to intentionally shorten the life of any Apple product, or degrade the user experience to drive customer upgrades,” an Apple spokesperson said in an email to The Verge. “Our goal has always been to create products that our customers love, and making iPhones last as long as possible is an important part of that.”
Apple agreed to a $500 million settlement in the US last March, after it admitted slowing down older iPhones. It compensated consumers who bought an iPhone 6 or 7, which were throttled to preserve battery life. The case grew out of the tech giant’s “Batterygate” controversy, when iPhone users discovered in 2017 that iOS limited processor speeds as iPhone batteries aged. Apple didn’t reveal to consumers that the feature — meant to address problems with phones’ performance — existed. Users said if they had known about the slowdown feature they would have simply replaced the battery rather than buying an all-new phone, as many did.
The company agreed to a second settlement in November — this time, with 34 US states —for an additional $113 million. The state attorneys general said Apple “fully understood” that by concealing the intentional slowing down of older phones, the company could profit from people buying new phones rather than replacing the batteries. Apple did not admit to any of the allegations in that settlement.
Update January 25th, 10:45AM ET: Adds comment from Apple spokesperson.
For every household streamer — Netflix, Hulu, Disney Plus — there are a dozen that few users would likely recognize. How many people can explain what Xumo, Tubi, Vudu, and Pluto TV are? How about Acorn TV, Ovid, and Popcornflix?
But all of these obscure services may play a vital role in how the streaming business looks in the future — or at least media conglomerates believe that enough to spend hundreds of millions to billions to acquire them.
Crunchyroll, a streamer dedicated exclusively to anime, has more than 3 million paying customers. Shudder, which is dedicated to horror and thriller content, passed 1 million paying subscribers last year. BritBox, which is focused on British TV, also passed the 1 million paying subscriber mark last year, doubling its North American customer base in just 14 months, according to the company.
But these numbers aren’t exactly meaningful in a world where Netflix boasts 203 million global subscribers. Instead, some companies see owning a portfolio of these smaller streamers as a way to compete indirectly with larger platforms. Crunchyroll was owned by WarnerMedia (which also owns HBO Max) until recently, when it was sold to Sony for $1.175 billion. (The sale has not closed yet at the time of this writing.) Shudder is owned by AMC Networks, and BritBox is co-owned by BBC and ITV. They’ve become niche plays for sizable audiences.
potential growth is key — not every niche streamer has it
If Netflix and Amazon Prime Video want a massive, general audience, their bet is that people will pay for more specific genres of stuff (or endure ads) to watch. Want nothing but wrestling content? WWE has a streamer. The Criterion Channel indulges cinephiles, while Boomerang hosts nothing but old-school cartoons. The idea is that there’s a specific streamer for everyone, and executives operate under the assumption that there’s just enough of a hungry audience to turn those niche interests into recurring revenue.
“What we’ve seen over the years is that there has always been a home for content that caters to a particular area of interest,” Alden Budill, head of global partnerships and content strategy at Crunchyroll, tells The Verge. “Our user base craves community inclusion in one place, and we really think that we have an opportunity to be that place.”
Crunchyroll was started in 2006 by a group of Berkeley grads as a place to host anime clips and provide a place for anime fans to congregate. It caught on quick. The more lucrative anime’s budding viewership in the United States became, the more attention it drew from larger organizations.
By 2017, Crunchyroll had more than 1 million paying subscribers. In 2018, AT&T bought all of Otter Media, including Crunchyroll, and rolled it into its new WarnerMedia division. The platform gained more than 2 million paid subscribers in that time, reiterating to WarnerMedia executives that anime was a massive potential growth area.
That potential growth is key — not every niche streamer has it. When AT&T acquired Otter Media alongside its Time Warner acquisition in 2018, the telecom giant shuttered a number of niche streamers. Korean drama streaming service DramaFever was shuttered, as was the art house-focused FilmStruck, with most of its library moved over to HBO Max. If the goal of streamers is to bring in and keep subscribers, finding niche genres of content that have ample opportunities to grow is crucial. Anime is a well-established and popular form of entertainment that Crunchyroll proved can continue to build an audience. It’s less clear if a service dedicated to K-dramas can do the same.
“It’s what fans want. It’s how you get it.”
“Whether it’s a 24/7 cable channel that’s dedicated to cooking, a mobile app that is dedicated to Pac 12 Sports scores, or a streaming service that is dedicated to anime, I wholeheartedly believe that there will continue to be an appetite for and a format for that kind of focused, deep dive-type of experience,” Budill says. “It’s what fans want. It’s how you get it.”
Figuring out the formula for a niche streamer or advertisement-supported platform’s worth comes down to its purpose. Fox bought Tubi (an ad-supported, free movie streaming service) for nearly $500 million because it wanted a streamer to carry its titles in an effort to grow its audience, alongside other licensed series and films, while selling better targeted advertising compared to its cable division. AMC effectively bought Acorn TV (a subscription service that carries British television shows and films) for $65 million because its CEO, Josh Sapan, believes it can grow to more than 10 million subscribers. WarnerMedia sold Crunchyroll to Sony likely because executives believe licensing certain titles is the more cost-effective way of providing anime to HBO Max subscribers without having to pay for the entire operation.
Certain bets on niche streamers are working. Crunchyroll, Shudder, BritBox, Acorn TV, and WWE Network are finding their audiences and continuously hitting subscriber milestones. But as more giant companies try to find ways to pivot to streaming, either launching their own or acquiring services with already impressive followings, is there still a place for niche independent streamers?
One example of continued independent perseverance in the face of an industry swept up by consolidation is Mubi. The European-based streamer has remained independent over the last 13 years, finding success by leaning into areas that gigantic entertainment streamers don’t. While Netflix spends about $90 per subscriber on content (the streamer notably has annual content budgets north of $15 billion, and in 2020, it would have reached $18.5 billion if not for the pandemic), Mubi spends about $18 per customer, according to Mubi CEO Efe Cakarel. Mubi can exist with a smaller subscriber base because it offers a smaller library — just 30 movies at any given time. Not having a massive selection suddenly becomes its appeal; Mubi is tightly curated, rather than being an ocean of content.
“In a world where Netflix really won the game, in order to survive in a world where Netflix exists — and now Amazon, Apple, and Disney — you need a very clear differentiation,” Cakarel said while speaking at TechCrunch Disrupt in 2019. “As a young startup, this is a very difficult industry to crack.”
streaming services are a dime and dozen, and many of them won’t survive
Mubi isn’t the only streamer leaning into catering to a smaller, specific audience to stay afloat and succeed. Kweli TV is a streaming service dedicated to carrying films by and about Black people. In August 2020, CEO DeShuna Spencer told Melan Magazine that it grew from 2,000 to 35,000 paid subscribers in under two years. Like Mubi, Kweli TV offers exclusives and a curated library built around directors. FloSports has more than 500,000 subscribers (avid fans of cycling, rowing, and other non-major sports) across its 25 channels, according to Bloomberg.
People subscribe to the platform to watch specific things, a different experience than signing up for Netflix to peruse a huge catalog. The best way to compete with the giants is by simply finding the places where they are too big to compete. Still, streaming services are a dime and dozen, and many of them won’t survive.
Like many stories out of Silicon Valley over the last several years, it’s David versus Goliath — or at least, David gets acquired by Goliath. Smaller companies doing clever things for an engaged audience are being swallowed up by bigger conglomerates. AT&T did the same thing with Otter Media and Crunchyroll before selling it off to Sony Pictures, whose executives also saw a way it could fit into the greater Sony ecosystem. AMC bought Acorn TV, Fox bought Tubi, Comcast bought Xumo and purchased Vudu from Walmart, ViacomCBS bought Pluto TV, and Sony Pictures bought a Christian streaming service called Pure Flix. This morning, NBCUniversal’s announced its service, Peacock, would be the new “exclusive home” for WWE Network content.
One study from August 2020 found that nearly half of US households subscribe to three or four video streaming entertainment platforms, which means there’s space in the market for niche streaming platforms to find their footing with smaller, specific libraries for smaller, specific audiences — but only if they don’t get swallowed up by media conglomerates first.
Disclosure: Comcast, which owns NBCUniversal, is also an investor in Vox Media, The Verge’s parent company.
Microsoft has a habit of reigniting the Mac vs. PC conflict for its Surface ads, and this time it’s going after Apple’s Touch Bar. In a new TV commercial, aired during Sunday night’s NFL championship games, Microsoft pits Apple’s MacBook Pro against the company’s Surface Pro 7. It’s a chance for Microsoft to mock Apple’s Touch Bar in a TV commercial for the first time.
“Mac gave me this little bar, but why can’t they just give me a whole touchscreen?” asks a boy comparing the two laptops. That’s something that some MacBook Pro users have been calling for, or just the removal of the Touch Bar altogether. Apple is now reportedly planning a redesign for the MacBook Pro later this year, with the Touch Bar rumored to be replaced by physical function keys.
Elsewhere in the ad, Microsoft tries to position the Surface Pro 7 as a gaming device. “It is a much better gaming device,” claims the ad, which is an unusual way to frame Microsoft’s popular Surface device. The Surface Pro 7 is barely capable of running the latest PC games at acceptable frame rates with its integrated Intel graphics, so it’s not the biggest selling point.
Microsoft has previously compared its Surface Pro to the MacBook Air, bashed Macs in general, and found a guy named Mac Book to tell people to get a Surface Laptop.
This latest ad also focuses on the older Surface Pro 7, which has now been replaced by the Surface Pro 7 Plus for businesses and schools at least. The new model includes a bigger battery, Intel’s 11th Gen processors, a removable SSD, and LTE.
(Pocket-lint) – The Philips Hue smart lighting system has grown dramatically in the last few years, in both popularity and the number of available products, further cementing its place at the top of the smart lighting pile.
It’s now pretty safe to say that Philips’ range of connected LED lighting has an option to fit just about every socket you could possibly think of.
Best smart plugs: Google, Alexa and Apple HomeKit control
That’s why we’ve put together a quick, handy list of the current Philips Hue bulb line-up to give you an idea of how you can add colour and ambiance into your life.
Bear in mind that we haven’t included the other Hue products and controllers from Philips, just the bulbs themselves.
Pocket-lint
What is Philips Hue?
Philips Hue is a lighting system that works in conjunction with iOS and Android applications and smart home hubs in order to change colour or white levels depending on your mood. It can also be linked to other Internet of Things devices to switch on, off or change the lighting style through your home network.
It works in conjunction with Amazon Alexa, Apple HomeKit, Google Home, Nest, Samsung SmartThings and many other smart home devices. You do not need any of them to use Philips Hue lighting though – all new Philips bulbs now come with Bluetooth on board, meaning you can control them from your phone when in range.
There are multiple bulbs and lighting products in the range, and they come into their full potential when linked to your network through a Philips Hue Bridge – a small, connected hub that is wired to your router and controls the lights wirelessly. This is often found as part of a starter kit.
You can also control Hue bulbs directly with a Zigbee controller, such as the Amazon Echo Plus.
There are different styles of bulbs, most of which fit into two lighting categories: white and colour ambiance, which can display millions of colours, and white ambiance, which can be set to a wide selection of warm or cool white lighting options. Now there are also great filament options, too.
If you’re looking for outdoor lighting, there are some Philips Hue lights that work in your garden, but we’ve concentrated on indoor options here.
What Philips Hue bulbs are available?
There are bulbs in the range for all manner of fittings and styles, that offer white ambiance or white and colour ambiance. Here is the range that you can get at present.
Remember, you will need the Philips Bridge to exert full control over these bulbs, although Bluetooth control will still give you a good taste for what they’re capable of.
Philips claims all its bulbs will last up to 25,000 hours each – around eight-and-a-half years if you have the bulb switched on eight hours a day every day of the year.
Philips
Philips Hue white ambiance E14 Candle
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One of Philip’s newer Hue bulbs, this candle comes with an E14 screw fitting and has a 6W LED output that is equivalent to 40W. The candle form factor is otherwise known as B39.
It is capable of more than 50,000 shades of white, from warm to cool white.
Philips Hue white and colour ambiance E14 Candle
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Also with an E14 screw fitting and B39 form factor, the colour version of the Candle has an LED power output of 6.5W. It has the same lumen output though, of 470lm at 4000K.
It is also capable of more than 50,000 shades of white, but adds 16 million colours to the mix.
Philips
Philips Hue white extension bulb A19/E27
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The most commonly used bulb in many households, this A19/E27 screw fitting light has a power output of 9.5W and A60 form factor.
Its light output is 806lm and is smart but doesn’t change colour or white tone. That means it will stay the same colour temperature of 2,700K (warm white), but can be dimmed and switched on and off remotely.
Philips
Philips Hue white ambiance extension bulb A19/E27
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Similar to the above but with a flatter form factor, the white ambiance version with A19/E17 screw fitting has a 10W power output. Its brightness is up to 800 lumens at 4000K.
It is capable of more than 50,000 shades of white and is dimmable via Hue compatible devices down to one per cent.
Philips
Philips Hue white and colour ambiance extension bulb A19/E27
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The exact same form factor as the white ambiance version, this A19/E27 screw fitting bulb is capable of slightly brighter output, at up to 806 lumens at 4000K. It is a 10W LED bulb.
It has all shades of white plus 16 million colours. A newer version was released in recent times, with a richer colour palette.
If you have an older Hue system you might find some of the colours do not match the first generation bulbs.
Philips
Philips Hue white ambiance extension bulb B22
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Commonly known as a bayonet fitting, this white only bulb is the same as the A19/E7 version although it is slightly brighter, capable of up to 806 lumens at 4000K.
It can be set at more than 50,000 shades of white.
Philips
Philips Hue white and colour ambiance extension bulb B22
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Again, similar to the A19/E17 version of the colour bulb above, the B22 comes with the bayonet fitting instead. It only goes up to 600 lumens at 4000K in brightness however.
It offers all shades of white and 16 million colours.
It is also a “richer colour” bulb so might not match older models.
Philips
Philips Hue white ambiance extension bulb GU10
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Designed for spot lights the GU10 form factor has two locking pins and generally sits recessed into a ceiling or spot lamp. This bulb has 5.5W of maximum power output and a brightness of up to 300 lumens at 4000K.
It too offers more than 50,000 shades of white, from warm to cold colour temperatures. And it can be dimmed through Hue compatible devices down to one per cent.
Philips
Philips Hue white and colour ambiance extension bulb GU10
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The exact same form factor as the GU10 above, but with 6.5W of maximum output power. It has less brightness though, at up to 250 lumens at 4000K.
It adds 16 million colours to the numerous shades of white that can be achieved.
Philips Hue Lightstrips
Many people wanting to add a little colour lighting to their home will be looking at Lightstrips. This is a strip of LED lighting that works with the Hue system (so it’s also Alexa and Google Home compatible), but there are two different versions of Lightstrips, the original and Plus. Both are white and colour and both can be cut to length, but the Plus can also be extended, making it much more flexible, the original is less widely available, but be sure you’re buying the right version.
Philips
Philips Hue Lightstrip Plus
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The Hue Lightstrip is designed to add mood lighting to your room, with an adhesive back so it can be stuck under worktops or furniture, or behind your TV, to provide warm or cool white light and up to 16 million colours.
It comes at a length of 2m, but with Lightstrip Plus, you add extension cables, or extend the run of LED lights themselves, so it’s very flexible.
Philips Hue Filament Bulbs
Amazon
Philips Hue white filament bulb A19/E27
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One of Phililps’ latest additions to the Hue range is its new filament bulb offering. These bulbs have a beautiful retro feel to them, shining at what looks like a lower wattage to give you a bit of hipster chic.
They’re a great decorative option and really lend character to a room or environment.
Amazon
Philips Hue white filament bulb B22
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If you need a different fitting, the filament bulbs can also be bought with B22 bayonet cap. Because of the filament design, though, don’t expect any colour control. You’re sacrificing that power by choosing this stylish sort of bulb.
What Philips Hue starter kits are available?
As we say above, you will need a Philips Hue Bridge to connected your Hue bulbs to a home network. These often come as part of a starter kit with two or three bulbs included.
Here are the starter kits we recommend if you don’t already have Philips Hue lighting in your home.
Philips
Philips Hue white starter kit A19/E27
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This comes with the Philips Bridge 2.0 and two 9.5W white bulbs with A19/E27 screw fittings as detailed above. They have a fixed white colour but it is the cheapest way to get into Philips Hue.
Philips
Philips Hue white ambiance starter kit A19/E27
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This contains the Philips Hue Bridge 2.0, two A19/E27 white ambiance bulbs capable of more than 50,000 shades of white and a wireless dimming switch.
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Philips Hue white and colour ambiance starter kit A19/E27
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In this pack you get the Philips Hue Bridge 2.0 and three A19/E27 white and colour ambiance bulbs capable of 16 million colours. They are the richer colour variants.
Philips
Philips Hue white and colour ambiance starter kit B22
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Essentially exactly the same as the kit above, except you get three B22 bayonet fitting versions of the bulbs with the Philips Hue Bridge 2.0.
Philips
Philips Hue white and colour ambiance starter kit GU10
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Another kit that offers three of the multicolour connected bulbs, except in the spot light GU10 form factor. You also get the Philips Bridge 2.0 hub with this set.
ESPN Plus says it will issue partial refunds to customers who paid for a UFC pay-per-view event Saturday only to run into technical problems.
Conor McGregor vs Dustin Poirier was the headline match of the UFC 257 main card, which was set to get underway at about 10PM ET Saturday. To watch, ESPN Plus subscribers, who pay $59.99 per year for the streaming service, also paid $69.99 for Saturday’s event. But users in the US began reporting a blackout on the ESPN Plus app Saturday evening that lasted through some of the earlier fights on the main card.
A spokesperson for Disney, which owns ESPN, said in an email to The Verge on Sunday that the company was “aware that a technical issue prevented a portion of users from accessing the early part of the ESPN+ pay-per-view event, and we apologize for that experience. We worked as quickly as possible to identify and resolve the issue.”
The spokesperson didn’t say what the specific issue was, but it affected some users in the western US and was resolved by 11PM ET, according to the company, in time to see the signature fights. Users were affected between a few minutes to more than an hour.
The company says it will provide partial refunds to users affected by the outage. Customers who paid for the fight through a third-party platform like Apple, Roku, Google, or Amazon, will need to seek refunds from the platform, but Disney/ESPN says it will work with those companies on the refund process.
The first alleged independent benchmark results of AMD’s recently introduced eight-core Ryzen 9 5980HS “Cezanne” laptop processors have been published. AMD’s Zen 3-based chip uses integrated Radeon graphics, and, according to the new numbers, beats its predecessor and Intel 10th Gen Comet Lake in single- and multi-core workloads, as well as 11th Gen intel Tiger Lake in single-core. However, there is a processor that still beats AMD’s Cezanne.
Hardware enthusiast @Tum_Apisak found two Geekbench 5 results from the Asus ROG Flow X13. The gaming notebook runs the eight-core Ryzen 9 5980HS at a 3.30 GHz default clock speed and can boost it all the way to a 4.53 GHz. In one case, AMD’s Cezanne APU hit a 1,532 single-core score and 8,219 multi-core score. In another case, the processor finished with 1,541 single-core points and 8,224 multi-core points.
CPU
Single-Core
Multi-Core
Cores/Threads, uArch
Cache
Clocks
TDP
Link
AMD Ryzen 9 5980HS
1540
8,225
8C/16T, Zen 3
16MB
3.30 ~ 4.53 GHz
35W
https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/6027200
AMD Ryzen 9 4900H
1230
7,125
8C/16T, Zen 2
8MB
3.30 ~ 4.44 GHz
35~54W
https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/6028856
Intel Core i9-10885H
1335
7,900
8C/16T, Skylake
16MB
2.40 ~ 5.08 GHz
45W
https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/6006773
Intel Core i7-1185G7
1550
5,600
4C/8T, Willow Cove
12MB
3.0 ~ 4.80 GHz
28W
https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/5644005
Apple M1
1710
7,660
4C Firestorm + 4C Icestorm
12MB + 4MB
3.20 GHz
20~24W
https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/6038094
Typically, Cezanne looks very good compared to previous-generation AMD and Intel architectures. The most interesting comparison we can make with a Zen 3 APU is with an Intel Willow Cove processor. Since Intel hasn’t launched its eight-core Tiger Lake-H chips yet, quad-core Core i7 1100-series “Tiger Lake-U” processors are the only available CPUs featuring the Willow Cove microarchitecture. These CPUs are not quite meant for gaming machines and, therefore, come inside notebooks with less sophisticated cooling.
Generally, Intel Core i7-1185G7-based machines score 1,350-1450 single-core points on Geekbench 5. A well-cooled example can hit around 1,550 on a single core and about 5,600 on multi-cores.
Therefore, it looks like mobile CPUs featuring AMD’s Zen 3 and Intel’s Willow Cove cores have comparable single-core performance (assuming that both are cooled properly). Naturally, AMD’s eight-core gaming APU naturally beats Intel’s quad-core CPU in workloads leveraging multiple cores.
As far as Geekbench 5 results go, AMD’s Ryzen 9 5980HS looks like a very potent mobile APU with a 35W TDP. Yet, it’s not unbeatable.
Apple’s tiny M1 system-on-chip (SoC) running at 3.20 GHz scored 11% better than the Ryzen 9 5980HS in single-core workloads and 7% worse in multi-core workloads while consuming about 30% less power, assuming that its TDP is up to 24W.
AMD’s eight-core Ryzen 9 4900H “Renoir” APUs, based on the Zen 2 microarchitecture, scores about 1,230 single-core points and around 7,100 multi-core points when running at 3.30 / 4.44 GHz clocks in Geekbench 5. Therefore, the new Cezanne APU is apparently 25% faster than its Renoir predecessor in single-core tasks and about 15% faster in multi-core workloads.
Cezanne’s noticeably higher performance compared to its predecessor can be explained by microarchitectural improvements, as well as a two times larger L2 cache. The Ryzen 94900H is rated for up to a 54W TDP, whereas the new one has a default TDP of 35W.
A comparison of the new numbers for the Ryzen 9 5980HS to Intel’s eight-core Core i9-10885H, Intel’s fastest mobile Comet Lake CPU with a locked multiplier, suggests the Ryzen 9 5980HS is 15% faster in single-core workloads and 4% faster in multi-core tasks.
It should be noted that the Ryzen 9 5980HS numbers haven’t been confirmed, so you should take them with a grain of salt.
Apple’s next-generation MacBook Air is going to be thinner and lighter than the current model, but will retain a 13.3-inch display, according to a new report from Bloomberg. The new notebooks will also reportedly go back to using MagSafe chargers.
Apple’s MacBook Air has undergone three major iterations since its introduction in 2008 that made the laptop significantly sleeker. The latest generation MacBook Air running Apple’s M1 system-on-chip inherited design from its Intel-based predecessor launched in late 2018 retaining its dimensions and weight. But the new version of MacBook Air featuring the company’s upcoming SoC will finally get a highly-anticipated new design.
The next-generation Apple MacBook Air will preserve a 13.3-inch screen size, but will feature narrower borders around the display, which will make the laptop smaller. The machine is also said to be thinner and lighter, the report says citing two sources with knowledge of the matter.
Another innovation the new MacBook Air is going to have is a new MagSafe-like magnetic charging connector, the same one that is expected to be used with the upcoming revamped MacBook Pro notebooks. Apple previously used the MagSafe name for magnetic chargers prior to moving to USB Type-C for power.
The next-generation Apple MacBook Air is projected to be launched in the second half of 2021 or even in 2022, about a year after the company released its first MacBook Air and MacBook Pro 13 laptops powered by its own M1 SoC.
(Image credit: Apple)
It is noteworthy that Bloomberg’s sources claim that the new MacBook Air will sit above the current model, which will remain in Apple’s fleet as an entry-level machine. Meanwhile, it is unclear whether Apple plans to slash price of the current M1 MacBook Air once it launches the all-new version, or will just price the new one higher. Default configurations of Apple’s current MacBook Airs cost $999 or $1,249. By contrast, Apple’s existing pre-configured M1-based MacBook Pro 13 are priced at $1,299 and $1,499.
Apple is reportedly preparing to completely reinvent its PCs this year. Along with all-new MacBook Air, the company is said to be working on revamped 14 and 16-inch MacBook Pro laptops, redesigned iMac all-in-one desktops, and a smaller version of its Mac Pro workstation powered by an in-house developed SoC.
Q Acoustics bravely enters uncharted waters, but out-of-character sonic shortfalls let down an otherwise decent first effort
For
Thoughtfully designed
Vast hub connectivity
Punchy, room-filling sound
Against
Lacks dynamic and rhythmic expression
No dedicated control app
Stands are expensive extras
It’s a simple fact of life that the more there is to do, the more there is to prioritise. For Q Acoustics’ first all-in-one streaming speaker system, the Q Active 200, the British speaker specialist could have focused most of its attention on the streaming side of things – that is the unchartered territory here, after all. While the brand has some degree of experience in powered speaker design, this is its first proper active streaming proposition.
But the Q Acoustics Q Active 200 appear to be a speaker-first design, given the ambitious acoustic engineering on show here. Get the speaker part right, as you’d hope a firm with such plaudits in the field would, and you’re halfway there.
Build
(Image credit: Q Acoustics)
If you were expecting an active set of speakers resembling Q Acoustics’ current range of standmounters, then the Q Active 200’s design may raise a few eyebrows.
The boxes are narrow, deep and in a beautifully finished matte white – so far, so Q Acoustics. But instead of the usual tweeter and mid/bass woofer decorating each façade, there is a rectangular grille in the top corner that hides two round, 58mm BMR (balanced mode radiator) drive units.
Q Acoustics Q Active 200 tech specs
(Image credit: Q Acoustics)
Transmission 24-bit/96kHz
Spotify Connect Yes
AirPlay 2 Yes
UPnP Yes
Bluetooth Yes
Inputs Line-level/phono, optical, HDMI
Drivers 114mm woofer, 2x 58mm BMR
Voice control Google Chromecast, Amazon Alexa
Power 100W per channel
It gives the classy cabinets a unique, neatly minimalist look that might sit well in contemporary designed living spaces – but the design is likely to divide opinion.
Q Acoustics has chosen to use a pair of BMR drivers in each cabinet in preference to conventional cone units. BMRs have two big advantages: they deliver both midrange and treble (and a bit of bass) from their modestly sized forms, so avoiding the need for a separate tweeter and mid/bass combination and the distortion generating crossover that goes along with it. And they also radiate sound uniformly across a 180-degree plane, reducing the usual tendency for speakers to create a listening ‘sweet spot’.
The drivers’ diminutive size, extended frequency response and wide-dispersion talents make it a practical choice for a product such as the Q Active 200.
Their positioning on the speaker – the dual BMR configuration can sit either on the inside top corner or outside top corner, depending on which way round the speakers are placed – brings some benefits too. According to Q Acoustics, the asymmetry in the acoustic path lengths from the BMRs to the baffle edges improves diffraction characteristics. It also offers flexibility in positioning: for far-field listening (further away or to the sides) they should be positioned to the inside, or for near-field listening, on the outside.
Of course, there’s only so much quantity and depth of bass a 58mm driver can dig up, which is why Q Acoustics has integrated a ported 11.4cm woofer into the rear of each cabinet. This brings driver cooperation and crossovers back into the mix, but Q Acoustics has carefully considered that.
The upper BMR (each BMR has its own DSP and amplification channel) operates the full frequency band from the crossover point with the woofer to 20kHz, whereas the lower BMR is designed to only work up to 5kHz. The woofer fires onto a rear baffle, its output guided through vents at the side of the cabinet, with sophisticated DSP keeping the sound from all the drive units time aligned.
Whereas the floorstanders in the Q Active range, the Q Active 400, use the P2P bracing as primarily engineered for the company’s Concept 300, these standmounts adopt a ‘dart bracing’ technique, which fixes the rear-firing woofer directly to the front of the cabinet to provide it with mechanical stability.
Q Acoustics has designed a pair of dedicated stands for the Q Active 200, the Q FS75, more modest evolutions of the innovative stands designed for the Concept 300. For an extra £350 ($499) per pair, they feature a skeletal, highly rigid ‘space’ frame made up of rods in compression, stabilised by cables in tension, and have fixings that enable them to be bolted to the standmounters.
Features
(Image credit: Q Acoustics)
Q Acoustics has taken the decision not to house the streaming architecture and connectivity inside the speakers, but instead in a separate connectivity hub. There are two hub options to choose from, depending on where your voice control loyalties lie. The Google Home box (which we have on test) offers Google Assistant voice control, plus built-in Google Chromecast, while the Amazon Alexa box variant works with Alexa.
It’s a shame one box doesn’t cover both bases – there must be plenty of people who use Alexa, for example, but also stream music via Chromecast. And what if your allegiance changes down the line? Q Acoustics says it’s looking into making each hub individually available, though hasn’t yet confirmed its plans.
Whichever hub you choose, you get the same physical inputs – HDMI (ARC), optical, and an analogue input that is switchable between line level and moving magnet. Essentially, that means everything from a CD player to a TV to a turntable can be connected to the hub and streamed to the speakers. Digital signals from the HDMI and optical inputs are all converted to 24-bit/96kHz, as are analogue signals through the 24-bit analogue to digital converter (ADC).
Rather than the hub streaming these converted signals to a master speaker that passes the other audio channel to the slave speaker, it sends the two channels of audio directly to the speakers over a 5GHz wireless connection, helping ensure accurate syncing between them.
The hub is also a streaming gateway to AirPlay 2 for iOS users, Spotify Connect for Spotify Premium and Family subscribers, and Bluetooth. Support for the Roon music platform is on the way via a future firmware update, too.
If you own a NAS drive with music, UPnP support is onboard for playing networked music files up to 32-bit/192kHz (which subsequently gets down-sampled to 24-bit/96kHz for the transmission to the speakers). Q Acoustics will soon release its dedicated Q Active app for helping owners with registration and set-up, control hub customisation, software updates and basic controls, however it won’t be an all-encompassing music control app from which to browse networked or local music libraries and access streaming services.
That’s a shame, but third-party UPnP control apps aren’t hard to come by, and those using Tidal (via Chromecast) or Spotify (via Connect) may well choose to use the native apps anyway. For accessing our NAS device, we use the free MConnect and BubbleUPnP apps on an Apple iPad and Samsung Galaxy S20 phone during our testing and both work fine.
Alternatively, there’s the compact RF remote control for adjusting volume, pause/play, skipping tracks and changing inputs. A strip of touch buttons across the rear of each speaker’s top panel more or less mirrors remote control, too. They’re nicely responsive – sometimes more so than the UPnP apps we use – although as there’s a short delay in the call and action, we would have liked visual confirmation of the communication from, say, a visible LED. There is an LED by the controls on the top panel that flashes to signify this, but unless you’re standing you won’t be able to see it.
Sound
(Image credit: Q Acoustics)
Q Acoustics has successfully built a reputation for excellent passive speakers in its 15-year history – especially in the budget market. Its products have consistently included class-leading clarity and entertaining punch, and those talents have predictably found their way into the Q Active 200 too.
We play Radical Face’s The Missing Road from Tidal via Chromecast, and the melodic acoustic strums, cello and vocal humming come through with an eager lucidity, the presentation startlingly clear and direct, not to mention room-filling. You shouldn’t necessarily expect Q Acoustics’ typical richness and warmth here, but the active speakers’ leaner, more forward tonal stance gives them a likeable sense of snappiness.
We stream over Bluetooth and, though we expect the usual drop in quality, the Q Active 200 keep things surprisingly tight, losing a bit of solidity and space compared with UPnP and Google Chromecast playback, but largely proving a worthwhile method of playback.
The BMR drivers keep their end up, spreading sound generously and evenly around our test room and ensuring the speakers produce an impressively big presence for their compact footprint. They have the volume and punch to make easy work of John Williams’s climactic compositions, and while that rear-firing woofer is limited in terms of absolute bass depth, it proves taut and terse as the bassline in SBTRKT’s Wildfire (played over UPnP) comes into play. Bass blends in nicely with the rest of the frequencies, too, proving Q Acoustics has done a good job with the crossover between the BMRs and low-frequency driver.
To help optimise positioning, each Q Active 200 has three settings selected by a manual switch at its rear. There is ‘Positioned close to a corner’, ‘Positioned close to a wall’, and our preferred ‘Free-space’, which we find works best not only when the speakers were out in the room, but also near the back wall – possibly because the speakers’ bass output isn’t overbearing and the midrange is a little forward. As always, we’d recommend experimenting to see which setting works best in your listening room.
We switch from Q Acoustics’ dedicated stands to a pair of Custom Design FS104 Signatures and the presentation sheds some clarity – from both a sonic and aesthetic point of view, we’d recommend the custom-built accessory. But, while the Q FS75 extracts more from the speakers, the overall differences aren’t huge. Just note that due to the rubber strips beneath the speaker, secure placement on a third-party pair of stands may be a little fiddly.
(Image credit: Q Acoustics)
There’s a bit of harshness in the upper mids, which remains audible even after a week of use. It’s not the end of the world, but it does mean higher-pitched voices can start to grate after a while. It does nothing for a dense, cymbal-heavy track like Touché Amore’s I’ll Be Your Host either.
But our biggest issue with the Q Active 200 is their combined lack of dynamic and rhythmic expression. With Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds’ Galleon Ship, the piano and vocal pairing comes through clear and solid, yet is bereft of real feel.
Everything seems to ride along one audio plane, lacking forward momentum and dynamic tiers. It doesn’t help that the sound staging isn’t particularly well layered either. Together, these things mean the track isn’t all that interesting or emotionally grabbing.
Whether trying to grasp the grooves that underpin Thundercat’s Them Changes, or nail the rhythmic logistics integral to the SBTRKT track, the Q Active 200 don’t quite tie the musical strands together with the coordination necessary for them to thoroughly entertain. They conduct themselves in a startlingly clear and upfront manner, but beyond that they fail to captivate.
Offering an entire audio system inside such a compact and convenient concept is no easy task, but those such as the KEF LSX and KEF LS50 Wireless II, which sandwich the Q Acoustics in price, show it can be done. The Q Active 200 ultimately fall well below those standards, delivering a cruder listen than we’d expect at this not-insignificant price.
Verdict
It’s rare, if ever, that we publish sentences featuring both ‘Q Acoustics’ and ‘disappointing’, but here the Q Active 200 cannot hide behind their thoughtfully considered spec sheet and speaker engineering. It’s a shame because the brand has done a lot right – there’s vast connectivity on offer, a whole lot of speaker engineering, and dedicated stands for those who want them. But performance-wise, they simply aren’t entertaining enough to recommend.
It’s often the case that first efforts are followed by better second ones, and we very much hope that turns out to be the case here.
SCORES
Sound 3
Features 4
Build 5
MORE:
Read our guide to the best all-in-one streaming systems
Apple may finally be bringing an integrated SD card slot to its upcoming 2021 models of its MacBook Pro laptops, according to a new report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, in a move that would restore the popular port standard to the company’s computers.
The MacBook Pro lineup hasn’t offered an SD card slot since Apple removed the feature in its 2016 redesign, which excised all the ports from the laptops in favor of four universal USB-C ports. This forced many professional users — who rely on the popular memory card format to import photos and videos to their computers for editing — to turn to much-reviled dongles to get the same functionality.
The news comes after an earlier report from Gurman that originally detailed some of the changes that Apple was planning for the upcoming 14-inch and 16-inch designs. These changes include removing the controversial Touch Bar interface in exchange for physical function keys; offering a more squared-off design that’s in line with the recent iPad Pro, iPad Air, and iPhone 12 lineups; adding brighter displays; and bringing back Apple’s magnetic MagSafe chargers. That’s all in addition to the biggest change, which will see the high-end laptops move from Intel’s processors to a more powerful version of Apple’s in-house, ARM-based M1 chipset.
Noted Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo corroborated those reports by claiming that the new laptops would offer additional ports, but today marks the first confirmation of the SD card slot specifically.
The news of the SD card slot’s return actually comes as an aside in a larger report on Apple’s planned refresh for a “high-end” MacBook Air model, which is said to offer similar MagSafe and processor benefits as the new MacBook Pros. Unfortunately, though, there’s no mention of the SD card slot being offered on the upcoming Air refresh — just a pair of USB-C ports.
Apple is reportedly working on a new design for its MacBook Air that will include the return of MagSafe charging. Bloomberg News reports that the updated MacBook Air may appear later this year or in 2022, and is designed to be thinner and lighter than the existing model.
Apple may make the MacBook Air smaller thanks to reduced bezels on the 13-inch screen, and will reportedly include two USB 4 ports on the laptop. Apple is also likely to include the next generation of its ARM-based processors inside this new MacBook Air, after introducing the M1 on the existing MacBook Air in November.
The old MagSafe charger.
Apple’s magnetic charging system, MagSafe, is also supposed to return with this MacBook Air redesign. Bloomberg News previously reported that the updated MagSafe for the MacBook Pro will be similar to the old pill-shaped design.
Bloomberg News also notes that Apple did consider a larger 15-inch version of the MacBook Air, but has scrapped those plans. This new MacBook Air design is reportedly a “higher-end version” of the existing laptop, and Apple is expected to continue selling the M1 version.
Rumors of a new MacBook Air design come just a week after TF International Securities analyst Ming-chi Kuo revealed Apple is also planning a major MacBook Pro redesign with squared-off sides like the iPad Pro. Apple is also rumored to be bringing back its MagSafe magnetic charging connector to the MacBook Pro.
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