To whom it may concern at The Walt Disney Company and / or Lucasfilm:
Show me the damn lightsaber. I know you have a real one now. And it’s time to fess up.
Let’s backtrack a bit. Yesterday, at a seemingly routine press event for the upcoming launch of Disneyland’s new Avengers Campus area on June 4th, Josh D’Amaro, the chairman of Disney parks, ended his presentation with a surprise reveal of a new lightsaber.
According to tweets from theme park reporter Carlye Wisel, who attended the press conference, the lightsaber was not the typical IRL lightsaber of “a giant light up stick attached to a neat-looking hilt.” In fact, it was the holy grail of replica sabers: one that can fully extend and retract its blade, just like the “real” lightsabers in the films.
I just attended a virtual press conference and Josh D’Amaro had a lightsaber and it worked like a LIGHTSABER not a “im carrying around this long stick” lightsaber like a FUCKING LIGHTSABER LIGHTSABER
— carlye wisel hosts Very Amusing! ✨ (@carlyewisel) April 8, 2021
There’s plenty of evidence that a better toy saber has been on Disney’s mind for a while. The company’s current crop of replica props and customized Galaxy’s Edge sabers are already hugely popular, to start.
The company is clearly aware of the fact that the large plastic blades are a cumbersome annoyance — both Disney and plenty of third-party sellers offer carrying bags. And a truly retractable saber that lights up and looks good (and no, those lame plastic ones of stacked tubes don’t count) would be a huge upgrade for park fans and cosplayers.
More illuminating is a patent that Disney filed in 2018 for a “Sword Device with Retractable, Internally Illuminated Blade” — a lightsaber hilt with a motorized retractable blade that can extend out of the hilt, complete with lighting and sound effects.
To be clear, given that Disney’s new model almost certainly lacks the ability to coalesce a beam of pure energy that can slice through any object, it’s still not a real lightsaber. Plus, I’m not sure where Disney would be able to source kyber crystals. Hacksmith Industries’ retractable 4,000-degree plasma blade is still the closest to achieving that, but that build required a massive power pack and is almost certainly not safe to sell as a children’s toy at a theme park.
But to return to my original point: after teasing this fantastic upgraded saber… DISNEY DIDN’T RELEASE THE VIDEO.
There are probably a few reasons for this. Wisel’s report notes that the new saber “*zhooped*” out of a “little box (like a hilt but much wider),” suggesting that the retractable saber is still in the design stage and that there’s probably some work that needs to be done before it’s ready for primetime. Disney may also be planning to save the new sabers for its upcoming immersive Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser hotel, where the more realistic sabers would fit right in.
But I don’t really care about all those very logical business reasons. I just want to see the cool new lightsaber. Ball’s in your court, Disney.
(Pocket-lint) – Ceiling and in-wall speakers give you all the benefits of room-filling sound while remaining out of the way of your furniture and out of sight.
Whether you’re looking to install them as part of a home cinema surround sound setup, or you just want to discreetly have music filtered in all around you, these speakers have the potential to provide a more immersive and tidy experience.
Naturally, though, there are some things to consider before you jump in. Installing architectural speakers requires precision and a layout that both matches the room size, your furniture and perhaps your TV setup, too.
Plus, like every area of the industry, these kinds of speakers vary dramatically in their asking price and audio quality.
To help you navigate the niche realm of ceiling speakers, we’ve compiled this list of some of the very best to consider.
Best ceiling speakers you can buy today
Polk Audio
Polk Audio RC80i
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Polk is a solid name when it comes to home audio, and the RC80i is a great example of how you don’t have to break the bank to install a household name into your setup.
In this set of two speakers, you’ll find an 8-inch dynamic balance woofer and a 1-inch tweeter, with the polymer cone and composite driver baskets helping provide balanced output with superb detail.
Like other models on this list, the rubber seal also prevents moisture from sneaking in, while installation is relatively simple out of the box.
Sonos
Sonos In-Ceiling Speakers by Sonance
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Sonos provides an intriguing high-end option, joining forces with architectural speaker brand Sonance to give users all the benefits of its multi-room audio in a ceiling speaker.
Designed to work with the Sonos Amp for Trueplay – which takes into account the size, construction and layout of the room and tunes the sound accordingly – and also with the wider Sonos range, it’s a great solution for those already embedded in the company’s ecosystem.
For those who want a more basic experience, or simply don’t care too much about the Amp and Trueplay integration, there are definitely other excellent-sounding options to consider.
Goldwood
Acoustic Audio by Goldwood CS-IC83
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For those who want to fill out their ceiling with these flush-mounting speakers, Goldwood’s CS-IC83 set is definitely one to consider.
Five speakers are included in the set, each featuring an 8-inch woofer, 13mm dome tweeters and three-way passive crossovers in order to improve fidelity.
As they go, this Acoustic Audio set is also relatively straightforward to install. You receive a handy cutting template in the box, with the speaker’s four clamping clips sitting on the edge helping it stay locked in place once it’s all set up.
Those who want to remain on the entry-level end of ceiling speakers should keep this Amazon Basics pair in mind – the sound is respectable and the flush design is a breeze to install.
Packed inside each speaker (there’s also an 8-inch pair to consider) is a two-way system featuring a 6.5-inch composite woofer and a 1-inch tweeter, helping provide detailed audio reproduction and clear stereo separation between the two.
In the box, much like other models, you’ll also receive a template for your ceiling cut-out, as well as painting masks in case you want to spray them a different colour.
Micca
Micca M-6C
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Like other budget options, Micca’s M-6C comes with very strong sound capabilities, proving that you don’t need to spend wild amounts to bolster your home audio setup.
It offers two-way sound, with the 6.5-inch woofer and 1-inch tweeter assisted by a 6dB crossover and compensation network. This makes them a perfect complement to your home cinema setup, with the low-end frequency response proving excellent.
They can also easily be painted, giving you a bit more flexibility when it comes to blending them into the room.
Klipsch
Klipsch R-1650-C
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Klipsch has plenty of in-wall and ceiling speakers for you to consider, but the R-1650-C is a great place to start looking.
It’s by no means the cheapest speaker on this list, but it is one of the most well-rounded in terms of audio output. It packs in a 6.5-inch woofer, 1-inch tweeter – both helping to provide clear, room-filling treble and midrange sound.
The mounting clamps on the underside also make it a very simple install, while the grill can be painted to match the space, too.
(Pocket-lint) – Owning a top waterproof speaker allows you to take your tunes near the pool, in the shower or on expeditions in the great outdoors – all while remaining free from damage.
While all speakers offer some level of Ingress Protection, the dedicated water-resistant and weatherproof options we’ll be detailing below are a different kettle of fish. These picks are the absolute best bet for those who plan to use their speaker around water, since they can handle everything from splashes to complete submersion.
Still, not all are created equally. Some are designed to act as clip-on devices for your clothing, bags or bicycle, while others are pill-shaped units that can easily rest on tables or the floor.
Below, we’ll take you through everything you need to know about some of the top waterproof speakers.
Best waterproof speakers you can buy
JBL
JBL Clip 3
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If you need a carabiner-like design that you can take anywhere, JBL’s Clip range is one to consider.
The IPX7 waterproof rating of the Clip 3 means the device can survive water submersion of up to 3ft for 30 minutes, while the 10 hours of playtime ensures you’ll get plenty of on-the-go tunes, come rain or shine.
It’s not the newest device in the Clip range, but it’s both affordable and beautifully designed, with the built-in clip, manual control and colour varieties all great touches.
Bose
Bose SoundLink Micro
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Bose’s pedigree is well-known and well deserved within the audio space, and that extends to its more portable gadgets.
The SoundLink Micro is a little long in the tooth nowadays, but it punches above its weight in the sound department and has an excellent design that’s easy to transport.
With the IPX7 rating, it’s able to handle 3ft of water submersion for up to 30 minutes, and the design – aside from being easy to hook onto things – is surprisingly rugged.
There’s also six hours of runtime on the battery, while two SoundLink Micro devices can be paired together for left-right stereo sound.
Anker
Anker Soundcore 2
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Anker built its name by providing excellent devices at an entry-level price, and the water-resistant Soundcore 2 is no different.
With a 12W speaker, enhanced bass drivers and a digital signal processor packed inside the 6.5-inch rectangular design, it’s able to deliver some excellent, punchy sound – especially considering its size.
And with IPX7 protection, it can also handle basic water submersion, as well as splashes, dust and rain. If that’s not enough, the 24 hours of battery life is enough to make it an elite pick.
iFox
iFox iF012 Bluetooth Shower Speaker
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If you’re looking to sing in the shower without a hint of irony, you may as well get a speaker to help you listen along in time. With iFox’s tiny dedicated option, you can do just that.
With an IP67 rating, it’s able to withstand splashes and even submersion in water up to 3ft. Weighing just under 200g and measuring 6cm, too, it’s great for clipping onto your shower caddy or sticking to the wall and blaring out sound through the 5W speaker.
You’ll also get plenty of mileage per charge, with the Bluetooth device able to deliver around 10 hours of battery life.
Comiso
Comiso Waterproof Bluetooth Speaker
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If you want a standing, cylindrical speaker that still boasts waterproofing powers – and remains affordable – Comiso’s option is one to put on your wish list.
The sound is surprisingly strong for an entry-level device, while the IPX5 rating means it can survive splashes (but not submersion).
It’s a great device for taking to the beach or on trips, since the 6.5-inch height is very portable, and two Comiso speakers can even pair together to provide stereo sound. With 36 hours of battery life, as well, you’ll struggle to find a more long-lasting device.
Aomais
Aomais GO Bluetooth Speaker
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If you want a speaker that’s designed more for pool parties than backpacks, Aomais’ IPX7 waterproof option is the one for you.
It’s able to defend itself against basic submersion (up to 3ft for around 30 minutes) like other devices on this list, with both Bluetooth and 3.5mm support for playing your music.
As far as waterproof speakers are concerned, it’s also one of the better sounding picks. Two 15W drivers are and a pair of 10W tweeters are backed up by two passive radiators, with pairing support allowing you to double the sound.
With 40 hours of battery, too, it’s a real powerhouse pick for those who don’t want to compromise on sound or water resistance.
Huawei has once again teamed up with French audio specialists Devialet, this time to provide the sound for a range of flatscreen 4K TVs. The two companies previously collaborated on a smart speaker, while Devialet also lent its expertise to the Sky Soundbox soundbar back in 2017.
The Vision V-Series sets feature up to nine speakers with models delivering up to 75W of power. The speaker systems also boast ultra-thin subwoofers and an intelligent bass algorithm designed to achieve deeper bass and a higher pitch.
The V-Series’ passive bass radiator is powered by Devialet’s iconic Push-Push symmetrical structure, which claims to ensure high-fidelity smooth sound with no background noise.
Huawei’s new range also has an exclusive Devialet mode, which claims to strike a balance between power and subtlety to deliver an impactful but balanced sound experience. This mode is suitable for both music and movies.
Certain models in the line-up come with a vertical, 3D-surrounding sound field, described in the press release as “sky sound”. It’s supposed to appear as though sound is coming from the ceiling. How? The TV sends left and right surround sound channels to the full-range speakers at the top of the smart screen, which supposedly creates the 3D surround effect.
Extra audio assistance is brought by sound field modelling, a system that uses sound waves to map the shape of your room before the virtual spatial sound field is adjusted to match.
In terms of picture technologies, Huawei’s new TV range boasts a refresh rate of 120Hz, with an HDR peak brightness of up to 1000 nits. Special light control technology claims to improve contrast on the TVs too.
And finally, Huawei and Devialet have also created a new classification system for sound quality in televisions, in what is described as an industry first.
This is based on both “scientific evaluation methods”, and on subjective sound listening judgments for power, balance, fidelity and immersion.
TVs will fall into three categories:
Dream level: Score of 90 or more across categories
Expert level: Score of 60-90 across categories
Premier/Elite level: Score under 60
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Huawei’s new 65-, 75- and 85-inch TVs all score higher than 90, while the 55-inch set has Expert level certification.
The Huawei Vision V-Series TVs will be available in 55-, 65-, 75- and 85-inch sizes when they go on sale next week exclusively in China. Prices start at RMB 5499 (£610, $839, AU$1096).
MORE:
These are the best TVs for all budgets
Check out the best OLED TVs around
Looking for a bargain? Consult our list of the best cheap TVs
(Pocket-lint) – The gaming phone market shows no signs of slowing down. Indeed, just 20 hours prior to revealing our verdict on this very device, the Red Magic 6, Lenovo revealed its next-gen Legion Duel gaming monster.
Except, interestingly, the Red Magic 6 has a bit of a headline feature that the Lenovo lacks: there’s a 165Hz screen refresh rate, which, at the time of writing, is the fastest you’ll find in a gaming phone – or, indeed, any phone to date – to make for super smooth visuals.
The Red Magic 6 is all about its gaming focus elsewhere, too, thanks to a top tier processor, stacks of RAM, plus a built-in cooling fan. So does all that make it a case of game on, or should you go game elsewhere?
Design & Display
6.8-inch OLED panel, 1080 x 2400 resolution, 20:9 aspect ratio
165Hz refresh rate, 500Hz touch sampling rate
Dimensions: 170 x 77 x 9.7mm / Weight: 220g
Finish options: Eclipse Black, Aurora
Dedicated switch for Game Space
Under-display fingerprint scanner
Built-in shoulder triggers
3.5mm headphone jack
Visually speaking the Red Magic 6 looks much like the Red Magic 5G and 5S devices that came before it. Except it’s actually a little bit bigger. Yup, as if those aforementioned slabs weren’t substantial enough, Nubia has gone and installed a yet bigger screen – up from 6.65-inches to 6.8-inches – making for a slightly wider overall package (although, thankfully, it’s a slither thinner than its predecessors).
Pocket-lint
In this Eclipse Black finish it’s also approaching subdued for a gaming phone. Perhaps that’s because the 5S we had came in a so-called ‘Pulse’ colourway. Which was loud to say the least. Not that the Red Magic 6 lacks some flashy “look at me” moments – helped along for the most part by rear lighting that can be set to various colours and patterns based on notifications, calls, gameplay and more (or switched off entirely, if you prefer).
The principal attraction of the Red Magic 6, we think, is its screen. This 6.8-inch OLED panel is quite the monster, plus it’s equipped with some headline-grabbing features. First, it’s flat, not curved, which makes it very practical for gaming (and anything, really, which is why we see curved screens on the decline). Second, it’s got a 165Hz refresh rate, meaning it can refresh that many times every second if you want – or select from 60Hz, 90Hz, 120Hz from the settings instead to conserve battery. It’s bright, too, with a 630 nits peak brightness claimed.
We’re always a little on the fence about fast-refresh panels, though, as the Red Magic 6’s sell over the 5S is basically 144Hz vs 165Hz. Will your eyes notice those extra 21 cycles per second? No, it’s not humanly possible. But it’s there, so it’s “one better” on paper nonetheless. You’ll most certainly see a big jump from the base 60Hz, though, so there’s obvious benefit to having a higher refresh rate panel. Plus, with 500Hz sampling rate, it’s super responsive to finger taps.
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Not that you have to just tap the screen. Being a gaming phone, Red Magic continues with its gaming focus, which includes integrated shoulder triggers to one edge, which you can programme for certain games. You can even adjust the screen’s responsiveness in zones using the Game Space application.
Activating Game Space is a simple case of flicking the red switch to the upper left side (facing) of the device. It’s a nice touch, able to transport you into a games carousel, along with the ability to select various key options – such as do not disturb (DND), permitting specific apps to notify (such as Discord in a pop-up overlay), controlling lighting, the cooling fan, and screen refresh rate.
We just wish that switching into Game Space would automatically apply selected presets. For example, we’d (perhaps) activate 165Hz when in the space, but drop that to 90Hz once done and flicking the switch back to ‘normal’ for our everyday activities. But that doesn’t happen – the selected refresh rate remains in play, so you have to manually adjust it.
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Elsewhere in terms of design, the Red Magic 6, rather unusually, features a 3.5mm headphone jack. So you can plug in your wired headphones. That’s an increasing rarity for high-end devices, although we suspect most will just use Bluetooth anyway.
Performance & Battery
Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 platform, 12GB LPDDR5 RAM
128GB UFS 3.1 storage, no microSD card slot
5050mAh battery capacity, 66W fast-charge
Turbofan and liquid cooling system
Dual-Core Cooler accessory
Wi-Fi 6E (802.11 a/b/g/n/ac)
5G connectivity
So why is the Red Magic 6 so chunky, at almost a full centimetre wide? There’s a number of reasons: the massive battery capacity (5,050mAh), the integrated physical cooling fan, the spatial capacity to ensure airflow won’t overheat the processor inside. And that’s just three reasons.
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There’s no doubting the Red Magic 6 has got the goods when it comes to power. Utilising Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 888 platform, alongside 12GB RAM, there’s nothing more powerful inside phones right now. Which makes the asking price of this phone all the more phenomenal.
Motorola’s new Moto G9 Plus is a stunner of a phone – find out why, right here
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For most people the difference between a Snapdragon 888 and, say, 870 isn’t going to make much difference for casual use. But the Red Magic 6 is all about gaming – so it has a processor that can put in the extra work to eke out those extra frame-rates and graphical options that you might otherwise not get elsewhere.
That said, only so many games are able to really tuck in. The same goes with the refresh rate debate: which games will genuinely benefit from 165Hz? Not many, perhaps none at all. Running Red Magic’s own FPS checker in real-time showed that many of our favourites – South Park: Phone Destroyer being the main, PUBG Mobile being the other – apparently max out at 31fps. Surely an error on Red Magic’s software? Because PUBG Mobile can run at 90fps.
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That self administered punch to the face aside, however, and the Red Magic 6 does a darn good job when it comes to playing games. There’s no delay, no fuss with fidelity, no issues with graphics textures, and so forth. It’s about as good as it gets.
However, that cooling fan doesn’t half make a lot of noise. It’s whirring sound whistles quite irritatingly. Having it on will undoubtedly use up power, too, so we’ve opted for leaving the standard cooling system minus the additional fans to take care of things. It’s a good job you can manually adjust this from the settings shade – because the fan also activates when fast-charging kicks in, unless you tell it not to.
The reason for that is the fast-charging, at 66W, is really quick. You can fill it from dead in under 40 minutes, assuming you have the correct plug at the wall, which is borderline ridiculous. Pop it on a slower recharge and you’ll be kinder to the battery’s health, but it’ll take a fair lot longer.
As for realistic longevity per charge. With this phone, more than most, that’s going to depend on how much you game. We’ve found the battery life a little unpredictable in general, with a day of ‘normal use’ (at 90Hz, note) and some gaming thrown in delivering close to 15 hours. That’s fine for a single day, except there are some moments when the battery will bomb and that’ll leave you reaching for the charger when you might not usually expect so – and that can render the 165Hz plus cooling fan as limited time options.
It would also be remiss to not speak on software, which here is Red Magic OS (V4.0), built over Google’s Android 11 operating system. It’s fairly harmless, in that it has various obtuse Themes, but there are some fundamentals that are just broken.
Notifications, for one, are scruffy, filling up layers per app in a not-too-useful format. But at least, unlike with the Poco X3 Pro, we get consistent notifications, eh?
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The home screen also can’t accept new apps being dragged from the app drawer and onto it as icons – they just vanish, unless you load multiple apps into a folder and drag them from there. It’s a ridiculous and irksome bug. That, in a sense, is indicative of what to expect when it comes to software experience: a unique yet unpredictable one.
Cameras
Triple rear system:
Main (26mm): 64-megapixel, f/1.8 aperture, 0.8µm pixel size
Wide (13mm): 8 MP, f/2.0, 1.12µm
Macro: 2MP
Selfie camera: 8MP, f/2.0
One area where we’ve been critical of previous Red Magic devices is with the cameras. Although the Red Magic 6 doesn’t get away Scot-free by any means, its main camera is fairly decent – outshining the likes of the Moto G100, that’s for sure.
Thankfully the rear of this phone is slightly curved so it slots into the hand pretty elegantly. There’s no giant camera bump in the way. No unwarranted protrusions or oddities. But that’s because the cameras here simply aren’t as high-end as you’ll find in some devices.
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According to the specification, the Red Magic 6 has a 64-megapixel main sensor (a S5KGW3 – which is Samsung’s GW3 sensor) that squeezes images down to 16-megapixels by using one-in-four processing. Then there’s an 8MP wide-angle (a HI846, so a typical Hynix sensor). Lastly there’s a 2MP macro for close-ups (the OV02A10, supplied by OmniVision).
Thing is, the camera app doesn’t offer any wide-angle shooting. It’s not to be found anywhere. So you can already forget about getting any ultra-wides out of this device. Yet another problem of the software, perhaps?
The macro, given that it’s just 2-megapixels, is also of really poor quality – so we doubt you’ll ever want to use it. At least the system does prompt you to use it when very close to a subject, though, and the magnifying glass-style focus symbol on the screen is particularly useful to get in-focus shots. Not that they’ll be all that sharp, given the limit in quality.
So it all falls to the main lens to sell the camera system. Think of the Red Magic 6 as a single camera and it’s reasonably successful. The real-time phase-detection autofocus is snappy at showing what it’s focusing onto. The quality of images is fairly decent in a variety of conditions, too. Oversharpened, sure, but there’s detail here that could easily be negated by a lesser setup.
Just make sure you turn off the watermark feature (as you can see from the gallery above, we didn’t) – because it’s on by default, will plaster your images with unwanted words that you can’t remove, and it’s still beyond perplexing to us that this is an acceptable practice. Kill the watermark default already.
Not that you’ll be taking pictures, right? You’ll be playing games. Because, ultimately, that’s what the Red Magic 6 is all about.
Verdict
If you’re in the market for a gaming phone then the Red Magic 6 has a lot going for it: it’s well priced, it’s seriously powerful, and it has a faster screen refresh rate than you’ll find on any other phone right now.
Thing is, whether you’ll get genuine use from 165Hz is a whole other matter. And with it active the cooling fan’s whining drone sound isn’t delicate on the ears. Plus it rather affects the battery life for the worse.
That there is physical fan-based cooling, however, is testament to how gaming-focused this phone is. With its Game Space dedicated switch, too, there’s quick-access to controls and gaming-specific settings.
Just like its predecessors, the Red Magic 6 does what it sets out to achieve: being an alluring gaming phone. But while it’s “game on” in that regard, it’s “game off” for everyday use – where the software comes up short, the sheer size approaches unwieldy, and the cameras are way off their billing.
Also consider
Pocket-lint
Lenovo Legion Phone Duel
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Ok, so it’s the first-gen model – the second-gen has just been announced – and it’s pricier than the Red Magic. But with the Lenovo’s side-positioned pop-up camera and dual charging facility, it’s a super-powered gaming device unlike anything else on the market.
As a Freeview PVR, the Humax Aura is hard to beat , but its incomplete smart platform requires a pause for thought
For
Excellent recording and playback
Full-bodied, exciting sound
Useful Aura mobile app
Against
No Netflix app
HDR picture could be better
User interface a touch convoluted
Even without an Oxbridge education, the Humax Aura PVR has managed to achieve a double first. It’s the first Freeview set-top box from Humax to use the Android TV operating system and also the first to be 4K HDR-enabled. How could we not be intrigued?
The Humax Aura can be a number of things to different people and it feels as though it has been priced to interest everyone. The most obvious use is as a Freeview Play recorder, with enough internal storage options to capture hours of live Full HD and standard-definition television.
With its Android TV platform, you can also use it as a Chromecast with benefits – a way of adding over 5000 apps and streaming services to feed your television or projector with plenty of 4K fun. With its USB sockets, hi-res audio and 3D home cinema codec support, there’s an option to use it for local film file playback too – it’s quite the box of tricks.
Pricing
The Humax Aura costs £249 for the 1TB model, which can store up to 250 hours of HD (or 500 of SD) programming, and £279 for the 2TB model, which can store up to 500 hours of Full HD (1000 of SD) programming.
If you’re serious enough about live TV to want to record it on a regular basis, then the extra £30 for double the amount of space feels like a no-brainer.
Features
(Image credit: Humax)
Humax has had great success with its What Hi-Fi? Award-winning FVP-5000T set-top box and, four years down the line, a replacement has been long overdue. For both specs and looks, the Aura is the upgrade we’ve been waiting for.
Stand the two next to one another and the sculpted lines of the low slung Aura more easily fit into the category of contemporary industrial design.
The Aura is a tidy 26cm by 20cm box that takes up about the same space as your wi-fi router. Its gloss black body is accented by an LED strip on the underside, which changes from red to blue to violet to orange depending on whether it’s off, on, recording or recording in standby. It’s a useful indicator and reminiscent of K.I.T.T from Knight Rider in standby mode.
But if it’s a party at the front of the Aura, then around the back is the serious business. Here you’ll find the single HDMI 2.1-out along with USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 (Type A) sockets for local media. There’s also an optical audio-out and a LAN connection if you’d rather leave the 2.4/5GHz wi-fi alone.
The Aura remote is fully featured, with dedicated buttons for just about everything you could need, including shortcuts to streaming services, recordings, the guide, the Freeview Play platform and the Android TV homepage too. You’ll need to pair the remote with the Aura box using Bluetooth for the Google Assistant voice system to work.
Humax Aura tech specs
(Image credit: Humax)
Tuners x3
Ports HDMI 2.1, USB 3.0, USB 2.0, optical-out
OS Android TV 9
Freeview Play Yes
Storage 1TB/2TB
Dimensions (hwd) 4.3 x 26 x 20cm
Weight 764g
The Humax Aura’s three Freeview Play tuners bring access to over 70 non-subscription live TV channels and over 20,000 hours of on-demand entertainment through the catch-up services, with BBC iPlayer, ITV Hub, All 4 and My5 all present. Those tuners allow you to pause and rewind TV, as well as record up to four channels while watching a fifth one live.
Unlike the older FVP-5000T, there’s no built-in app for streaming live TV or your recordings from the box to other devices around your home, though Humax says the same DLNA support will be added to the Aura in a forthcoming firmware update. The Aura mobile app will detect any DLNA or Chromecast-enabled devices on the same network as your box and allow you to play recordings or live channels to those, sourcing it from the Aura as a server.
For the time being, the Aura mobile app is a handy tool in its own right. It brings a full view of the electronic programme guide (EPG) to your small screen and allows users to schedule recordings, watch recordings and even enjoy live TV on mobile – just the ticket for keeping track of Countdown while you put the kettle on.
The Aura’s big-screen offering is also bolstered by Android TV, and that means another 5000 or so apps from Google Play are at your disposal, with subscription services such as Disney+ and Amazon Prime Video, alongside more UK-specific apps, such as BT Sport and UKTV Play.
(Image credit: Humax)
There are significant gaps, though, including Britbox, Now TV and the Netflix app. Somewhat ironically, Netflix is actually one of the few non-catch-up apps available on the older FVP-5000T. Fortunately, the Aura’s built-in Chromecast functionality allows users to cast these missing apps from mobile, tablet or browser instead, but that solution won’t suit everyone. It’s also worth noting that casting won’t work for either Apple TV or Apple Music, which are also missing from the Aura.
Away from the video side, the hi-res audio support is a welcome addition. It means those connecting the Aura to a decent external speaker system can get a strong performance from locally stored or streamed audio files, even if connecting through the HDMI, which can handle up to 24-bit/192 kHz levels.
You’ll need to download a third-party app such as VLC to play local media and Plex if you want to connect a NAS drive or similar from your home network. The Aura’s support for 4K HDR (HDR10 and HLG) and 3D audio codecs offers the potential to do justice to any high-quality movie files you own.
Thanks to the quad-core 1.8GHz CPU and 3GB RAM combo, the whole experience feels snappy and well put together. From the remote to the on-screen navigation, the user experience will bend to your bidding without complaint.
The twinning of Freeview Play and Android TV 9.0 doesn’t make for the easiest of combinations, though. Each offers its own home page experience, leaving the user unsure as to which one to use. You’ll find some apps on both, but others just on one, and both home pages have their own settings menus. Fortunately, the shortcuts on the remote mean that you can sometimes go straight to whatever it is that you’re looking for, but that doesn’t really excuse the poor integration of the two interfaces.
Each interface is good in its own right, at least. We particularly like Freeview Play’s Kids’ Zone – a brightly coloured area with TV programmes specially selected for younger viewers. Content can be searched according to duration and timeslot, and parents can use this to block certain apps and channels from appearing.
Picture
(Image credit: Humax)
The picture quality through the Freeview Play tuners in both SD and Full HD is every bit as good as that of the FVP-5000T. Watching Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is on BBC2, we get some inviting shots of a French antiques market on a cloudless summer’s day. The cobbled streets and stalls are bright and colourful, but with a realistic sense of tonality and texture.
The Aura trades a touch of detail for this better blending and, while some might prefer harder edges to stone walls, it feels like a well-judged decision from Humax. There’s a proper sense of complexity to the bright blue TV shelf as one of the bargain hunters haggles over a few Euros. It makes for a more natural aesthetic to the picture and feels believable when upscaled to 4K.
That arrangement is justified even further when switching to SD on the BBC News channel. Low-res content can seem particularly harsh and blocky when upscaled, but the Aura’s slightly softer approach smooths out a few more of those unwanted edges than its predecessor and adds some much-needed subtlety to clothing colours and skin tones.
However, the app platform is not quite as adept. Compared with a budget streaming stick, the Aura’s skill with a 4K HDR app is a little less assured than it might be. We watch The Boys on Prime Video and while the picture is punchy and dynamic, some of the finer detail is lost, particularly at the brightest and darkest extremes of the contrast spectrum. Viewing a scene set in the White House, the backlit silk curtains are missing folds in the material and the Aura doesn’t reveal the number of freckles on ex-CIA Deputy Director Grace Mallory’s skin that we might expect.
The other slight drawback is that not all users will find the dynamic range and refresh rate content matching system easy to use. There are a few options and, without the right ones selected, app TV shows and films are often displayed incorrectly; motion is juddery and streams are often jumpy. It can be fixed using the remote while viewing, but it isn’t easy to do. Quality standalone streamers have options to automatically match the dynamic range and refresh rate of the source material, and the Aura should really have the same.
Sound
(Image credit: Humax)
The Aura’s hi-res music support offers an excellent opportunity to get good quality sound from this box through both locally stored files and streamed music services. Plugging it into our reference system, we fire up the Tidal Masters version of Fortunate Son by Creedence Clearwater Revival and, by the standards of PVRs and video streamers, we’re struck by how well it captures the recording.
There’s a spacious sound to the vocals and guitars that gives a fabulous feel to the acoustics of the room where the recording was made. Compared with other, similarly priced streaming products, there is an added dimension to the track. There’s a good dose of dynamics that brings excitement and character to all of the instruments. We can visualise the drums at the start of the track and every time the first snare of each bar is hit with an accent.
The back and forth between the guitar and the vocals is like listening to a conversation. It’s a cohesive sound from top to bottom and we feel confident that there’s little we’re missing in the music. Some streamers at this level might offer a touch more crispness to the rhythm, but not without some loss of the excitement we get with the Aura.
All of that translates to an enjoyably emotional feel for home cinema as we switch to AV with the Live Aid scene at the end of Bohemian Rhapsody on Prime Video. The thuds of the kick drum are wonderfully solid and offer a genuine sense of timbre and resonance as the pedal first hits the skin at the beginning of the set.
When Brian May plays his solo at the end of the piece, it’s like he’s making his guitar sing. Again, the sense of place is captured brilliantly in a credible rendition of the sound of the old Wembley Stadium full of 72,000 people clapping in time and singing along to Radio Ga Ga.
Sound such as this is a huge leg up for any home cinema device. Whether capturing the atmosphere of a rock concert or the special effects of an action scene, the Aura really delivers on this front.
Verdict
The Humax Aura does its main job well. It’s an excellent Freeview recorder for both Full HD and standard definition with an easy-to-use TV guide, plenty of space and handy remote recording features. The problem is that Humax has offered – and is charging – more this time around and this box doesn’t deliver these extras quite so well.
If you’re going to promise more apps, then the omission of the most popular one of all is an issue. You also need to make sure your handling of streamed TV and film content is up to the same high standards as the competition, and that isn’t quite the case with the Aura. Tacking on the Android TV platform also means that the overall user interface loses a little focus.
While the Aura is spot on for sound, opting for the cheaper but still brilliant Humax FVP-5000T and buying a Google Chromecast with Google TV as well is a better option in terms of overall performance. The experience won’t feel much more split than the Aura already does but, more importantly, the smart offering will be more complete and a little better for picture quality too.
That said, if you have your heart set on a single box solution for your TV recording and video streaming, the Aura is a solid choice.
According to a tweet by leaker @momomo_us, Intel is refreshing its Xeon D lineup with the Ice Lake architecture. These parts are known as Ice Lake-D and will be replacing older Xeon D architectures with several major upgrades.
Xeon D is a branch of Xeon processors aimed towards the ‘microserver’ market, these chips are optimized for ultra-low power consumption while maintaining decent performance. These chips are categorized between the Atom and Xeon E3 families of CPUs and designed for low-end server workloads. Xeon D competes directly with ARM server processors from competing chip fabs.
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(Image credit: Twitter)
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The biggest upgrade coming to Ice Lake-D is memory support, current Xeon D processors are limited to 512GB on the higher core count variants, while the lower core count models are limited to just 128GB of memory. This might sound like a lot of RAM, but in the server space, 128GB-512GB of memory can be quite limiting depending on the workload.
Ice Lake-D upgrades the memory capacity for higher core count variants to 1TB of memory capacity, as well as 2933MT/s memory speeds (up from 2667MT/s). We don’t know how much memory capacity the lower core count Ice Lake-D CPUs will have, but according to an ASRock board layout for these chips, they will be limited to triple channel memory support like the last generation. So expect RAM capacity to be below 1TB.
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(Image credit: Twitter)
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For core counts, Ice Lake-D will be upgraded to a maximum of 20 cores on the top-end models, compared to just 16 for the current-gen chips. Plus these new CPUs will be built on the modern Ice Lake 10nm process, so expect a nice jump in efficiency with the new architecture.
TDPs remain the same, with configurations ranging from 25W to 110W.
The biggest mystery remaining for Ice Lake-D is its actual performance and performance per watt, we’ll have to wait until later this year for Intel to share details on the actual performance of these processors.
Some people spent the pandemic writing the next King Lear, others lamenting the fact that they weren’t. It doesn’t really matter. There are plenty of inspiring pandemic projects to go around, but one of the most striking (and brain-breaking) has to be this model train video created by Jason Shron of the YouTube channel Rapido Trains.
Shron is a devoted train enthusiast and talented model maker. But his model train project re-creating the Canadian VIA rail line connecting Toronto to Montreal is really a treasure only a lot of time (due to COVID-19 lockdowns) and passion (from a lifetime appreciation of the rail) can create. Just look at this video:
That’s footage shot from one of Shron’s model trains, superimposed over the window of a human-scale VIA train model. It looks, concerningly, like a rail train ride. But you might now be wondering: where did Shron get a human-sized model train? Well, he built that, too — in his basement:
You have to commend the attention to detail here. Not only do the models look great — Shron sourced real train seats and other equipment for his human-sized re-creation — but the sound design really sells it. The last time I rode a train was over a year ago now, but the gentle air-conditioned hum, soft creak as the train rides the tracks, white noise of other people talking, and sudden whoosh of another train passing is unmistakable.
It’s almost too real.
Consider the implications: if Shron can re-create a train line to almost perfect scale (and a human-sized train car for that matter), where does it stop? Why not a model home with a model train set inside? Or a model town containing the same?
I’m not talking Welcome to Marwen; I’m more thinking Synecdoche, New York. Maybe we were so focused on wringing our hands about the frankly ridiculous popularity of simulation theory that we ignored the other kind of simulation theory. That a kind man with a deep respect for one of the greatest forms of human transportation (don’t text airplanes, my phone is off), could have built a perfect, fake world around us without us ever knowing. Because then, what’s really real, you know? Am I? Are you?
The smiling face of a brilliant hobbyist OR the man who runs our small model world? You be the judge.Photo: The Toronto Star
Anyway, the video is very relaxing. You should give it a watch.
A newly announced “Crypto Climate Accord” aims to erase cryptocurrencies’ legacy of climate pollution. That’s a tall order considering the enormous amounts of energy that the most popular cryptocurrencies — bitcoin and Ethereum — consume. The loose goals laid out in the plan so far face potentially insurmountable challenges.
The “accord” is led by the private sector — not governments — and outlines a few preliminary objectives. It seeks to transition all blockchains to renewable energy by 2030 or sooner. It sets a 2040 target for the crypto industry to reach “net zero” emissions, which would involve reducing pollution and turning to strategies that might be able to suck the industry’s historical carbon dioxide emissions out of the atmosphere.
Lastly and perhaps most realistically, it aims to develop an open-source accounting standard that can be used to consistently measure emissions generated by the crypto industry. They also want to develop software that can verify how much renewable energy a blockchain uses.
If achieved, those goals would solve a very real problem. Bitcoin alone has roughly the same carbon footprint annually as Hong Kong, while Ethereum’s annual carbon emissions rival Lithuania’s. Their climate pollution is growing even as scientists’ research warns that global emissions need to be cut almost in half this decade to avoid the worst effects of climate change.
The accord has support from some influential names in climate action and the crypto industry — including cryptocurrency company Ripple, blockchain technology conglomerate Consensys, billionaire climate crusader Tom Steyer, and the United Nations-appointed “climate champions.”
While tackling the environmental damage done by the crypto industry might be a worthy challenge, critics say the broad goals are unlikely to result in meaningful change.
“Some things just can’t be fixed,” says economist Alex de Vries.
Unfortunately for the Crypto Climate Accord, bitcoin is the biggest player in the game, and it’s likely to cause the accord the most trouble because of how much energy it uses. Bitcoin is purposely inefficient — which is a problem renewables can’t fix. It uses a model called “proof of work” to keep its ledgers secure. “Miners” who verify transactions to get new coins do so by using energy-guzzling machines to solve increasingly difficult puzzles. (Ethereum also uses proof of work but has said for years that it will eventually transition to another model.)
Those machines will continue to compete for renewable energy with arguably more essential needs, like keeping the power on in people’s homes. And if cryptocurrencies increase electricity demand beyond available renewable resources, utilities might turn to fossil fuels. That’s why cleaning up energy sources and increasing energy efficiency are two sides of the same coin when it comes to tackling climate change.
Regardless, the accord’s founders are optimistic about a greener future for bitcoin. “I’ve been in conversation with folks from the bitcoin ecosystem, it’s a pretty simple pitch,” says Jesse Morris, chief commercial officer of the nonprofit Energy Web Foundation, which is spearheading the initiative. “If we can make bitcoin green, it will be much easier and lower risk for other organizations to come in and buy more Bitcoin.”
Bitcoin still accounts for more than half of the entire cryptocurrency market capitalization. But it is facing competition from newer cryptocurrencies that have found ways to be greener. Other cryptocurrencies use different blockchain technology than bitcoin and consume very little energy in comparison as a result. For those cryptocurrencies, like Ripple’s XRP, running on renewables could be more feasible.
And while renewable energy costs have fallen dramatically, luring bitcoin miners to places with abundant renewable energy would likely require heavy subsidies to keep them from turning to cheaper, dirtier fuel sources, de Vries says. “Just the sound of that — It sounds really wrong,” he says. “Why would you want to subsidize an industry that uses energy just because it is set up to waste resources?”
The new crypto accord, however, is “not about coming together and asking for subsidy by any means,” says Morris. “We just want to get everybody together and start nailing the action here.” Many blockchains, like bitcoin, were designed to be a decentralized system with no top-down oversight. So getting everyone on board, even within a single blockchain, will be a huge task.
The accord’s objectives are supposed to be fleshed out and finalized by the time a big United Nations climate conference rolls around in November. But Morris admits that the initial plans chase big aspirations rather than fine details. “So many of these other decarbonization efforts are very much thinking their way into acting,” Morris says. “Whereas in Crypto, because it’s kind of the Wild West, it’s about acting our way into new thinking.”
The 3rd Generation Fire TV Stick is a capable video streamer, but it drops at an awkward price point
For
Strong app offering
Improved UI
Excellent HDR performance
Against
SDR picture could be more subtle
4K model only costs a little more
What’s grey and sticky? The Amazon Fire TV Stick (3rd Generation), of course. Far from being simply another streaming stick, this third version is the first of Amazon’s media streaming devices to feature the company’s all-new Fire TV Experience user interface, which is intended as a game-changer for streaming service integration.
The Amazon Fire TV Stick (3rd Generation) replaces the 2nd generation of the device that was once called the Amazon Fire TV Stick with Alexa Voice Remote. Back in those simpler days, the first-gen model didn’t have voice control.
Since then, Amazon has added several more branches to the Fire TV Stick family tree. Higher up that tree is the Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K (launched in 2018), and below it, there’s now the Amazon Fire TV Stick Lite, the only other Fire TV device to come pre-loaded with the new UI.
Pricing
The Amazon Fire TV Stick (3rd Generation) costs £40 ($40, AU$79) at the time of writing. That’s £10 ($10, AU$20) cheaper than the Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K that launched in 2018 and, of course, has the added benefit of 4K content.
It’s also £10 ($10, AU$20) more expensive than the simultaneously released Amazon Fire TV Stick Lite, which lacks TV volume control and can only pass-through Dolby Atmos, rather than decode it.
Somewhat confusingly, you’ll find the Amazon Fire TV Stick (3rd Generation) listed as the ‘2020 release’ in the UK, but the ‘2021 release’ in the US and Australia.
Features
(Image credit: Amazon)
From a design perspective, the Fire TV Stick (3rd Gen) is hardly a departure for Amazon. It’s a gunmetal grey rectangular prism with an HDMI plug on the end and a micro-USB power socket halfway up one side. There’s a good chance that the power cable or simply the Stick’s girth will get in the way of your TV’s other HDMI sockets, so, as ever, Amazon has included an HDMI extender to take your stick clear of the rest of the ports.
The Stick itself is a little shorter than the 4K model but houses the same 1.7GHz quad-core chip. Bluetooth 5.0 and BLE are onboard for pairing with Bluetooth speakers, headphones or video game controllers, and there’s the standard 8GB of internal storage for your app collection.
The included remote is as handy and compact as ever. It’s the same second-generation Fire TV remote that comes with the 4K Stick. There are volume buttons that will work for your TV, playback controls and general navigation, plus a button at the top that turns the remote into an Alexa microphone for voice search.
Amazon Fire TV Stick (3rd Gen) tech specs
(Image credit: Amazon)
Bluetooth version 5.0
HDR support HDR10, HDR10+, HLG
Max resolution 1080p
Dolby Atmos Yes
Storage 8GB
Finishes x1
Dimensions (hwd) 13 x 30 x 86mm
Weight 32g
Those looking for 4K and Dolby Vision support will have to look elsewhere. The Amazon Fire TV Stick (3rd Generation) maxes out at 1080p HD, but can still process HDR metadata in the shape of HDR10, HLG and even Samsung’s HDR10+. Dolby Vision isn’t supported, though Dolby Atmos is.
The headline addition, though, is the all-new Amazon Fire TV Experience. The reimagined UI design pares everything down to four main screens, Home, Find, Library and Live, for a more holistic approach to your entertainment. The platform pulls in content from other streaming services, including Netflix, Disney+ and iPlayer, and sits those suggestions alongside TV and films available on Prime Video. The end result is less of a shop window for Amazon and a more useful quick hit of recommendations from across the board instead.
It’s pretty well done too. The top row on the Home page is itself a mixture of content from your subscriptions, followed by lines of film and TV suggestions dedicated to what’s on specific services such as Netflix and iPlayer. It’s certainly an improvement on the previous iteration of the Fire TV OS, but still isn’t a match for what Google has done with the Google TV UI on Chromecast.
That first row of content on the new Fire TV experience never seems to be as much of a mix as it could be. It tends to start with too big a burst from a single source, whether that’s a few screens of animated Disney content or a slew of Amazon Originals. It’s also still too Prime Video-heavy as we scroll down the page with the rows dedicated to other services swamped by too much of what’s on Amazon.
The ‘Find’ section of the experience is far better, as it seems to give a more balanced approach, as well as plenty of handy suggestions of genres and sub-genres to drill down into. Fancy comedy horrors, action dramas or trending documentaries? This is the place to look.
If you have the right to watch a piece of content for free, the Fire TV OS will let you know. It also directs you to free versions on apps you might not already own, including those available through free trials. The only thing to watch out for is that the UI still encourages you to buy and rent 4K content, even if the Stick won’t allow you to play it back at UHD resolution.
Like all current Fire TV devices, Alexa is along for the ride and makes an easy way to navigate around the OS. The addition of six user profiles per household – each with its own preferences, apps, permissions, watchlists and settings – is also welcome.
All the major apps are present here, apart from Google Play Movies & TV and Rakuten. There’s HDR available on Netflix, Disney+, Prime Video and Apple TV, but there’s no Dolby Atmos material on Apple and no way of buying new content on Apple TV through the Fire Stick itself. You have to purchase or rent content via your computer or phone, at which point it will be available in the Apple TV library on the Stick.
Picture
(Image credit: Amazon)
Heading straight to the HDR sections of the popular streaming services, we’re delighted to see that this Stick’s performance is excellent. Watching I Care A Lot on Prime Video in HDR, it’s easy to spot how well this device puts that tonal metadata to good use.
The bright scene outside the courthouse in the first episode is full of potential pitfalls. There are textures to render and different blacks to produce all while under the glare of the midday sun that bounces off the pale stone steps and floods the picture with a harsh white light. Despite all this, the Fire TV Stick copes admirably.
Even at the maximum-supported 1080p resolution, we get a decent sense of the stone-washed jeans of a bystander and the layers of clothing material on the black-clad Eiza Gonzalez. The sky is a searing blue and Rosamund Pike’s dress an expensive red, while the nearby trees remain a natural green. It’s an enjoyable picture with an easy-to-watch balance between dynamism and subtlety.
Dropping to SDR content is certainly a different experience, but the picture still pleases. It’s a punchy effort with a lot of brightness and big contrast, which helps to keep that sense of zeal to the on-screen action. Watching the sitcom Flowers on Netflix in Full HD, there’s plenty of impact as Mrs Flowers walks down her ramshackle garden to flirt badly with the tradesmen. What could be quite a flat, overcast sky has a bold, foreboding look and works as a fantastic foil to the dark brown, gnarled trees and the thick, overgrown grass. You can’t fail to get a sense of the way the story is going to play out.
That dynamic approach isn’t without its drawbacks, though. The focus on punch can leave detail fairly scant without the benefits of HDR. The faces of the characters sometimes come off a little too uniform, missing the same wealth of tone that is available from the Fire TV Stick 4K, given the same source material. The push for high contrast can overpower black depth and white detail too, unless you keep a careful eye on your TV settings. Again, that’s something the more expensive Stick has a better handle on.
Sound
(Image credit: Amazon)
The differences in audio between the Fire TV Stick (3rd Generation) and the 4K model are far less marked than the picture performance. Their overall character is undeniably similar.
Listening to This is Me from The Greatest Showman soundtrack on Tidal, there’s a respectable sense of rhythm to the music in the build towards the first full chorus. The drum rolls are tight enough to pick out the individual beats of the sticks, the reverb on the guitar is clear and controlled, and all of the excellent diction on vocals is nicely clipped.
Switching to the cinema, we head to the freeway crash shoot-out at the beginning of Deadpool on Netflix with its wealth of surround sound action. The audio is just as spacious as we’d expect from a budget streaming stick. Ajax’s motorbike zips neatly from one side to another as he weaves his way through the traffic, and both the movement and detail of sound as the pin flies out from the hand grenade shows what an enjoyable experience this stick can deliver.
At the same time, the 4K model is just a touch better all over for sound. Dynamically, the more expensive model has a noticeable edge that is easy enough to pick up both with music and while watching video content. It’s also a little crisper, which gives it a shade more energy.
Playing This is Me via the third-gen Stick, there isn’t quite the same thrill as the chorus reaches its crescendo. The equivalent for Deadpool is a slight loss of dimension to the sound effects. The bullets are a little less impactful than through the 4K Stick, and it’s noticeable in more incidental noises, such as the opening of the electric car door window before the eponymous hero pops his head out to address the bad guys. There isn’t quite that same satisfaction to its clunk as the glass reaches its limits.
Verdict
The third generation of the original Amazon Fire TV Stick offers the kind of solid performance we’ve come to expect from the Stick family. It also features all of the most important apps and comes with an all-new interface that offers owners a genuine solution to the problem of what to watch next at short notice. HDR viewing is excellent and it’s hard to ask for much more sonically.
The trouble is that more is actually available and for only a little extra. For just a few extra pounds or dollars, you can buy the 4K version of the Fire Stick, which is slightly better performing with the same content and offers all of that 4K future-proofing too. And that leaves our third-generation model, although good, in a slightly sticky spot.
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I’m not old enough to have ever encountered an original IBM Model M in an office. But in my second year of university, after hearing about how amazing these old keyboards were to type on, I sought out an old model on eBay. For the next two years, every essay I wrote was hammered out on a vintage keyboard from 1985. I never took it to libraries or lectures (I’m not a monster), but my second-year roommate must have been pretty happy to see the back of me that summer.
As of this writing, you can still find plenty of decades-old IBM Model M keyboards for sale online, or you could buy a $104 New Model M from Unicomp, a company with its roots in the Lexington-based keyboard factory that produced many of the original Model Ms. The New Model M is big, bulky, and it’s got the same buckling spring switch mechanism that made its predecessor such a treat to type on. It’s not hard to imagine this board soaking up cigarette smoke and coffee on the desk of a 1980s office worker.
When people ask me what it is I like about mechanical keyboards, I usually respond by saying something about how timeless their designs are. IBM keyboards produced in the 1980s still feel great to type on today, and there’s a good chance many mechanical keyboards made nowadays will outlast the computers they’re plugged into. But feeling great to type on isn’t the only thing a modern keyboard needs to do, and that’s where the New Model M falls short.
The New Model M is available in a variety of different configurations. Although its case only comes in black, its keys are available in either gray or, like we have here, white and gray. It’s available with an old-fashioned PS2 connector or more modern USB. (The cable, unfortunately, isn’t detachable like many modern mechanical keyboards.) It’s available with layouts suitable for a variety of countries, including US, UK, Denmark, Finland / Sweden, France, Germany, Norway, and Spain. If you go for a US layout, there’s the option of getting the keyboard with a slightly longer space bar, and Unicomp will also ship the keyboard with a Mac layout. Some of these options come with customization fees. Unsurprisingly, there’s no option for wireless connectivity, just like there wouldn’t have been in the mid-1980s.
Even for a full-size keyboard, the New Model M is large. There’s a border of at least 2cm (0.78in) of plastic around the four sides of the keyboard, and even between the sections of keys themselves, there’s more empty space than you’ll find with most modern keyboards. It’s a tad narrower and shorter than my ’80s Model M, though not by much. It’s also a lot lighter and doesn’t feel quite as sturdy as my original model. It’s not flimsy; it’s just not built like a tank in the same way the old keyboards were.
There are obvious practical downsides to a keyboard this big, and space-constrained typists should look elsewhere (or perhaps at Unicomp’s more recent Mini M if you’re prepared to give up the Numpad and could use a detachable USB cable). But if you need a full-size keyboard and you’re even slightly space-constrained, then the New Model M isn’t a great choice.
The overall design of the New Model M I could take or leave. It has a kind of retro charm to it, but the Unicomp logo emblazoned on the top right is dated in an ugly way rather than a charming way, and the blue LEDs that light up when you’ve got caps lock or num lock turned on are an eyesore.
Overall, although build quality isn’t quite as good as an original Model M, Unicomp’s keyboard feels solidly built by modern standards. Its keycap legends are printed on using dye-sublimation, so they’re not going to wear away anytime soon, and they’ve got a slightly rough matte texture that feels nice under the fingers. They’re fairly tall and gradually increase in height from front to the back of the keyboard, with squared-off edges and a slight curvature from left to right. (I’d say they’re closer to OEM than Cherry profile keycaps overall.) There’s a pair of raised bars on the J and F keys to help touch typists find their home row, but they’re subtle and take a little getting used to.
Its keycaps are made of PBT plastic and have a slightly rough texture to them.
The quality and style of the keyboard’s PBT keycaps are important because alternatives aren’t nearly as easy to come by as they are for keyboards for Cherry-style switches. Unicomp does sell replacements via its online store, but if you’re someone who’s interested in buying any of the wildly designed keycaps available across the internet, then be aware that vanishingly few of them are compatible with the New Model M. I also found the keycaps weren’t as easy to remove and replace as the keycaps on Cherry MX-style switches.
It all means the New Model M isn’t the best keyboard for tinkerers. There are no Cherry MX-style switches for you to desolder and swap out, and you won’t be tempted by a seemingly never-ending supply of new keycaps to buy online. That won’t matter for the vast majority of typists, but it’s worth bearing in mind if you’re curious about the weird and wonderful world of custom keyboards.
If you’re buying a New Model M, you’re buying it for the typing experience it offers out of the box. Thankfully, that experience is one of the best around. The keyboard’s heavy keys take a little bit of getting used to (I find that typing with my wrists held in the air rather than resting on my desk helps a lot), and pretty soon, the tactile clack of each keypress guides you into a reassuring rhythm. The fact that each key is that little bit harder to press than most other keyboards meant that I mistyped less frequently, making it easy for me to get into a good flow and just enjoy the process. At its best, the New Model M sounds like a glorious cacophony of key-clacking, and it feels every bit as good as it sounds.
People like to give advice about what kind of switches you should buy a keyboard with based on what you’re going to use it for. If you’re a typist, Cherry MX Blues are said to be a good choice, while gamers might be better off with Cherry MX Reds. MX Browns are considered a mix of the two. For the most part, I think advice like this can be a little prescriptive. I know people who game on Blues and type on Reds.
The board is available with white and gray or just white keycaps.
But when it comes to buckling springs, I really do think these are switches for typing and typing alone. That pressure you have to use to press each key is fine when you’re typing, but it can get tiring if you’re holding down a key while playing a game.
Another downside to consider is their volume: buckling springs are loud. They’re so loud that it’s not just an issue if you’re planning on using the keyboard in a shared dorm or office, but their loudness also caused problems for me on Zoom calls. I had to mute myself while on a recent call to avoid disturbing everyone else with my clacking, and I had to turn up my speakers’ volume on other occasions to be able to hear a press conference while I typed up notes. Another time, I managed to completely ruin a recording of an interview because all you could hear was the sound of me clacking away while an interviewee spoke.
If all you do on your computer is type, then the New Model M does that brilliantly. But when you need to use your computer for other things, like playing games or making calls, the keyboard’s lack of versatility becomes obvious.
I loved using my IBM Model M, and there’s no way I’m going to part ways with it anytime soon. But soon after I was done with school, I switched to a more modern keyboard with much quieter Cherry MX Brown switches. Ultimately, I needed my computer’s main control peripheral to be good at things that weren’t just typing.
Like its predecessors, when you’re using the New Model M for what it’s designed for, typing, there are few other keyboards around that do it quite as well. People have been clacking away on buckling spring keyboards for decades for good reason. But Unicomp’s keyboard is just as uncompromising as any Model M from the ’80s. It’s too loud for any modern office or video calls, and its stiff switches aren’t great for gaming.
Still, if you’re after the best typing experience around at whatever cost, then the Unicomp New Model M is one of your best options. You just need to understand exactly what “whatever cost” is.
(Pocket-lint) – When out cycling it’s not just your eyes but also your ears that can be crucial in assessing what’s going on around you – it’s why we’d never put in headphones and listen to music while out on the road. But sometimes your own limited senses aren’t quite enough.
That’s where the Garmin Varia (RTL515) comes into play. Not only does it function as a rear bike light, it also has built-in radar that can detect when another vehicle or cyclist is on the approach and, through sync with your Garmin Edge cycling computer or mounted smartphone (via the Varia app) can alert you to what’s going on.
Thing is, the Varia RTL515 is rather a lot of money. But, having been solo cycling in the country for some months now, it’s proven its worth and our peace of mind time and again. Here’s why we recommend it.
Design & Mount
Syncs with Garmin Connect / Garmin Edge computers / Varia mobile app (iOS & Android)
Mount: Garmin twist-lock mount (adaptors included)
Dimensions: 98.6 x 19.7 x 39.6mm / Weight: 71g
ANT+ & Bluetooth connectivity
IPX7 weather-resistant design
While most bike lights are rather small, the Varia is a lot larger on account of its mount, internal battery and radar technology. It’s not big to the point of bothersome, but much of the product isn’t the actual light itself – as you can see from the extended black area in the elongated pill-shaped design.
To mount the light it’s a case of getting the included Garmin mount, fixed by O-ring bands, onto your rear seatpost. It fits fairly snug, although road vibrations can, to some degree, make the light/radar turn around the seat post slightly – and we cannot see any way to make it tighter. It’s never stopped the product functioning for us, though, so it’s no bother.
There are some adaptors included in the box, which you may find helpful, which pad out the mount. Our light, once mounted, has a fairly ‘downward’ facing position, so using the adaptors can be assistive in getting a better position overall.
Once it’s mounted up, there’s an on button, a press of which will see a small blue light show you that the light is active. From here it’ll want to find your relevant Garmin kit to sync. Through the Garmin Connect app it’s possible to sync with a bike computer, as we have with the Edge 1030 Plus, where the light’s presence shows as a little always-on-top symbol to the top right. If it’s deactivated this is red, if it’s in play then this is black. Nice and simple.
You don’t even really need to worry about turning the light itself off or on – a long press of the on/off switch can do this though – as the sync with your Garmin product means it’ll only be active when your cycling computer is also active. Very handy.
The connection is made through ANT+ or Bluetooth in the case of using a phone app instead of dedicated Garmin cycling computer. We’ve had no issues with the connection, but if the radar is blocked due to say, excess mud all over the light, then it’ll let you know that it’s not functioning – so you can stop and give it a wipe down as needed.
Performance
Radar: 140m range & 220 degree field of view
Modes: Solid, Peloton, Night Flash, Day Flash
Maximum lumens: 65 (in Day Flash mode)
Minimum lumens: 8 (in Peloton mode)
Up to 16 hours battery life
Micro-USB recharging
Once you’re out on the road, the only presence of the Varia is that little symbol to the top right corner of the Garmin Edge display. However, once a vehicle is detected on the approach the side of the display becomes an ‘approach bar’ showing a little dot (representing the vehicle) and how closely it’s approaching. There’s also an audible “de-dah, de-dah, de-dah” type alert, which will make you look – and is really useful, as it sounds even when the rest of your Garmin’s functions are muted.
That ‘approach bar’ is reasonably accurate, as you’ll tend to note a vehicle sits awaiting its sensible moment to overtake. At this point, the Varia will sound an alert again – as the radar can detect the wider movement, effectively giving you one alert for initial approach, and a second alert for overtake.
Once a vehicle has passed, the ‘approach bar’ will turn from red to green, to let you know there’s nothing else on the approach. If there is, however, the bar will remain red and show the next vehicle awaiting its turn to pass – and you might not get an approach alert in this instance. We don’t see that as a problem, but it’s something to be aware of.
There’s a similar minor issue we’ve found when riding with others: when riding chain gang style, in a bit of a peloton, the close proximity seems to make the Varia think nothing is in your near vicinity. This is how it’s supposed to function – a consistent speed follow within 30m is seen as a fellow cyclist, in effect – in order to free up the system to alert you for faster approaching vehicles.
Which is all well and good, but can’t you just use your ears? Well, yes and no. See, when we lived in London, cycling was a whole other experience compared to cycling country backroads. Our old London route was open, largely straight, with ample passing space and, frankly, enough traffic that it would rarely be faster than two legs a-pedalling. But in the country, with often concealed turns, dappled light, and rush of wind that can make hearing tricky, it’s very valuable.
Pocket-lint
As one example: there are two sections of our daily country ride that are a bit tighter. It’s actually hard to hear anything on the approach in those sections, due to the rush of wind at relative speed. That said, it’s a national speed limit road, so a passing vehicle could, technically speaking, overtake at pace. What we do here is get alerted from the Varia that there’s a vehicle behind, then await a decent passing spot and sign for the vehicle to proceed safely. Not something we needed in London, massively useful in the country.
As for the brightness of the Varia, it’s pretty punchy. A flashing Day Flash mode is 65 lumens, with a battery life up to 16 hours. There’s also Solid (20 lumens, always on), Peloton (8 lumens to not distract nearby cyclists’ eyes), and Night Flash (29 lumens, to be seen). We’ve also seen that the sequence of flashing will change when the radar detects a vehicle in order to help you to be seen, which is a clever little feature.
As for battery life, the claimed time of 16 hours is perhaps a stretch. We’re probably poor at switching the light off properly, however, and it is at least easy to charge – although it uses older Micro-USB when we’d prefer USB-C and the possibility of wireless charging for a much simpler solution without the need for vulnerable ports and enclosing flaps to protect.
Pocket-lint
In terms of sensitivity, the Varia is very good at identifying a relevant approach. If your bike is stationary and you walk up to it from behind it’ll count that as an approach. And, as we’ve said, other vehicles – motorbikes, cars, vans and beyond – and cyclists are detected with ease. So if there’s a T-Rex on your tail, the Varia will let you know about it.
Verdict
Your eyes and ears are one thing, but adding radar to your cycles adds a layer of safety that’s very useful. In the case of the Varia RTL515 it’s expertly integrated into your Garmin setup, too, which makes it an easy-to-understand tool to act upon as necessary.
The only real question mark over whether to buy one is the simple fact that it costs an awful lot of money for what is, in effect, a fancy rear light. But it’s proven its worth and our peace of mind time and again. And for that we say it’s well worth it.
Cambridge Audio has just unleashed two beautiful beasts into the just-add-speakers streaming system market. The Evo 75 and Evo 150 are the first of their kind from the British brand, and oh boy don’t they look lovely?
Hopefully they sound just as lovely too – not least as they’re positioned in the firing line of the multi-Award-winning Naim Uniti Atom and five-star Arcam SA30.
Cambridge is hoping to continue its good run of form with this new product venture, which is naturally based on the company’s established StreamMagic streaming platform for playback over – deep breath – DLNA, AirPlay 2, Bluetooth, Chromecast, Spotify Connect, Tidal Connect, Qobuz, aptX HD Bluetooth and internet radio. The new Evo systems are also Roon Ready.
(Image credit: Cambridge Audio)
The Evo 75 and Evo 150 are powered by Hypex NCore Class D amplifiers (chosen by Cambridge for their, “clear advantages in clarity, resolution and musicality”) and rated at 75 and 150 watts per channel respectively.
The other discrepancy between the two models lies in physical connectivity: both have RCA, optical and coaxial inputs as well as HDMI ARC and 3.5mm headphone sockets, but the Evo 150 expands on that further with an MM phono stage, asynchronous USB and balanced XLR inputs, plus two sets of speaker terminals for running two pairs of speakers. The Evos are determined not to be out-featured.
That walnut wooden panel you see up top is a nod to Cambridge’s first-ever product, the 1968-released P40 amplifier, although owners can choose to dress the black anodised aluminium cabinet with black side panels made from Richlite (an innovative new material made primarily from recycled paper) instead. The side panels can also be switched out according to each customer’s taste.
Completing the look is a dual-concentric rotary dial and 6.8in LCD panel that hark back to the company’s flagship Edge products.
(Image credit: Cambridge Audio)
The Cambridge Audio Evo 75 and Evo 150 will be available from this month, priced £1799 ($2250) and £2249 ($3000) respectively.
A specifically designed Evo CD transport (£799, $950) and a pair of Evo S speakers (£649, $750) will join the Evo range later in the year, with further details on those promised nearer the time.
Whether or not the new Cambridge Evo systems have sonic appeal remains to be heard, but one thing’s for sure: they have plenty of visual appeal.
MORE:
Good news! Tidal Connect comes to Cambridge Audio music streamers
See our pick of the best hi-fi systems 2021: micro, hi-fi, vinyl
If portable audio has been shaped by anything other than advancing headphones technology in recent years, it’s the arrival of portable DACs – pocketable ‘middleman’ devices that connect between a phone or laptop and a pair of headphones to improve sound quality. We’ve had laptop-friendly AudioQuest DragonFlys and the more versatile Audiolab M-DAC nano, for example, and now THX (yes, that same firm famously behind cinema audio standards) is entering the consumer electronics market with a similar device.
The all-new THX Onyx ($200, €210) is a dongle designed to enhance the performance between your USB source and your headphones or desktop speakers. You can plug it into any PC, Mac or Android device toting a USB or USB-C port, with iOS devices requiring the slim Apple Lightning to USB Camera Adapter to be compatible. At the other end, the Onyx has been designed to drive all manner of headphones – those with impedances from 22ohms to 600 – via its 3.5mm jack, through which desktop speakers can also be connected.
It’s the first DAC of its kind to utilise THX’s AAA-78 amplifier technology, which is the highest-powered configuration within the company’s Achromatic Audio Amplifier design and promises the same power output as a desktop THX AAA DAC amp – just in a much smaller package. THX says this technology can “reduce harmonic, intermodulation, and crossover distortion by up to 40dB”, promising a performance with “infinitesimally low levels” of noise and distortion. It also claims this makes the Onyx up to five times more powerful than other similar USB DACs.
Our pick of the best DACs 2021: USB, portable and desktop DACs
(Image credit: THX)
That AAA technology is bolstered by an ESS ES9281PRO DAC chip, as well as a Master Quality Authenticated (MQA) renderer for playing back MQA hard files and (MQA-encoded) Tidal Masters in their native quality.
The Onyx has an all-metal body, with LED lights to signify the quality of file being played through it – blue denotes 44.1kHz or 48kHz PCM files, yellow signifies sample rates above that, while red and pink display DSD and MQA signals respectively. THX has incorporated cable management into the design so that wires from connected headphones are kept neat and tidy, too.
THX Onyx is now available in the United States and Europe for $200 and €210. Needless to say we look forward to taking it for a spin very soon.
MORE:
See all our DAC reviews
Astell & Kern AK USB-C Dual DAC cable promises to boost your portable listening
Ikea and Sonos are starting to tease the next products that the two companies have collaborated on. The furniture giant today posted an Instagram story that directly mentions the “Symfonisk” line and flashes the Sonos logo at the end, so there’s little doubt that new hardware is coming soon. Two fresh filings have also just appeared at the Federal Communications Commission.
The Verge can exclusively share details on what’s coming. The first new product, covered in this filing, is a revamped version of the Symfonisk table lamp. It’s expected to be sold for around the same price ($179) as the original product, which basically stuffed the sound quality of a Sonos Play:1 into the body of a lamp.
But from what The Verge understands, the $99 Symfonisk bookshelf speaker — the most affordable gateway into the Sonos platform — is not due for any major updates. Instead, the second product that Ikea and Sonos will announce in 2021 is completely new: a piece of wall art with an integrated speaker.
Ikea and Sonos are also preparing an updated table lamp speaker.Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
Companies like Soundwall have produced artwork speakers before, but it’s safe to assume that Ikea and Sonos are targeting a price point that’s dramatically lower than those expensive products.
The Verge has seen an early image of this product, codenamed “Titan,” but details about how it functions couldn’t yet be learned. Specifically, it’s unclear whether the entire artwork print is the product or if the speaker unit can be transferred between different exterior art housings. One of the two new FCC filings from Ikea and Sonos is for a “wireless module.” At a distance, it could look like any of Ikea’s wall prints, only with much more tech on the other side (and a power cord running down from the bottom).
All of the Symfonisk products so far have been designed with a dual purpose in mind. The lamp combines a speaker and light source; the bookshelf speaker can literally be used as a shelf when mounted to a wall. And they’re also meant to blend into home decor. From that angle, combining artwork and a music speaker seems like a natural progression for the Symfonisk series.
I’ve heard from a fair number of Sonos customers who use the Symfonisk bookshelf speakers as rear surrounds for Sonos’ Arc and Beam soundbars. They work very well for that purpose, but a stereo pair of wall art speakers could make for an even sleeker home theater setup.
Ikea and Sonos have not yet revealed exactly when they plan to announce their latest collaborative efforts. The Verge has reached out to Sonos for comment. In the immediate future, Sonos is gearing up for the launch of its new Sonos Roam, a product first leaked by The Verge, which starts shipping on April 20th. You can read my full review of that excellent portable speaker.
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