Starting in 2022, Universal's movies will be available on Peacock first instead of on HBO. That means the next Jurassic World and the new Halloween movie will make their TV debut on the streaming service also owned by its parent company Comcast. According to Variety and The Wall Street Journal, Universal's films will appear exclusively on Peacock for streaming within four months after their theatrical release, as well as within the final four months of an 18-month window. 

Those 10 months in between, the films will be licensed to around two to three additional partners, though none of them will have exclusive rights to the movies. Universal has yet to release the list of additional partners, and it's unclear if HBO is one of them. Variety says that by adopting the segmented TV release schedule, Universal is hoping to avoid over-saturation or making its films seem stale. In addition, streaming platforms are apparently willing to pay top dollar for popular movies these days in an effort to stand out from their ever-increasing number of rivals out there. 

Whether the move leads to a boost in subscriber numbers for Peacock remains to be seen. Comcast made the streaming service available to more potential viewers just a month ago by releasing apps for the Amazon Fire TV and tablets and Samsung's smart TVs. Peacock also grew its live sports portfolio recently and announced that it's streaming 44 Premier Lacrosse League games for the season that started on June 4th. 

Smart grill maker Traeger has bought wireless meat thermometer company Meater, which it says marks the next step in creating the "ultimate connected grilling experience." Traeger allows users to monitor and control connected grills through a smartphone or Apple Watch. Bringing Meater on board will help people to get an accurate temperature reading for their food from just about anywhere, Traeger said.

Meater makes several Bluetooth and WiFi-enabled thermometers, while Traeger currently only sells wired thermometers. Traeger said the acquisition will enable it to "accelerate entry into the adjacent accessories market with a highly complementary technology-enabled product." It's unclear whether Traeger plans to bundle Meater products with its grills or sell them separately — Meater will continue to run as a standalone company. Still, it wouldn't be surprising to see Traeger integrate Meater readings into its own apps for a more seamless outdoor cooking experience.

Just when you think Sony doesn’t have any more weird and fanciful designs left in it, the company surprises you. Building on devices like the SRS-WS1, it announced the SRS-NB10 on Tuesday. It's a neckband speaker the company says it designed with remote workers in mind. Set to cost $150 when it goes on sale later this year, the NB10 promises up to 20 hours of audio playback “optimized for your ears alone” with drivers that are angled upward.

Sony

As long as you’re listening to something at a relatively low volume, Sony says you “don’t need to worry about distracting colleagues, roommates or family.” But let’s be real here, you’re wearing a speaker on your shoulders. That’s the kind of energy that’s matched only by the co-worker who insists on bringing their mechanical keyboard to work.

The SRS-NB10 isn't only a speaker, however. You can also use it for voice and video calls. Thanks to two beamforming microphones and its built-in voice processing technology, Sony claims the NB10 will make it easy for people on the other end of a call to hear you. What’s more, the “open-ear” design makes it so that you can hear what’s going on around you.

Sony

The NB10 can connect to two Bluetooth-capable devices simultaneously, allowing you to switch between them as needed. Should you have the courage to wear the NB10 to say the gym, they’re also IPX4-certified water-resistant. And thanks to USB-C charging, you can get an additional hour of playback after 10 minutes at the outlet.

The SRS-NB10 will be available in two colors — charcoal grey and white — when it goes on sale in September.

Four years after unleashing the Switch upon the world, Nintendo is releasing an upgraded version of its phenomenally successful console. After years of rumors, the company has at last confirmed the existence of a new Switch model with an OLED display. It'll cost $349.99 and arrive on October 10th.

As expected, the latest model has a larger, seven-inch screen. The 720p OLED display is a step up from the 6.2-inch LCD screen on the original Switch, and has significantly reduced bezels, as well. It also comes with 64 GB of storage and a wired LAN port, and it works with all existing Joy-Con controllers. Nintendo is offering it in the traditional neon red/blue color scheme with a black dock, or in a white/black color scheme with a white dock.

The new Switch also has what looks like a massively improved kickstand that spans the entire width of the back of the console. It can be propped up at any angle and looks far sturdier than the tiny, fragile piece of plastic that propped up the old Switch.

The original Switch is still selling like hot cakes, so there’s a case to be made that Nintendo didn't need to upgrade the console just yet. But the original Switch's display and huge bezels are starting to look a little bit dated in 2021; this OLED screen should modernize the experience significantly. That said, for people who want to save some cash, Nintendo will continue selling the original Switch, at least for now.

It's highly likely that demand will far exceed supply. Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa told investors in a call in May that the company was still contending with shortages and production issues. The current global scarcity of semiconductors will also limit production capacity. So, the new Switch might be even harder to find than the current console has been at various points.

Since it released the original Switch in 2017, Nintendo has issued a revised model with a battery upgrade. It also released the handheld-only Switch Lite in 2019. Two years later, moving in the other direction with an upgraded Switch is a logical move. Good luck getting your hands on one any time soon, though.

If you have somehow not jumped on the Animal Crossing bandwagon yet, now's your chance to do so for less. Amazon and Best Buy have the popular Nintendo Switch title for $45, or $15 off its normal price. It's also a new low since we've only seen the game drop to $50 in the past. The only caveat is that the sale is only on the physical version of the game, not the digital download.

Buy Animal Crossing: New Horizons at Amazon - $45Buy Animal Crossing: New Horizons at Best Buy - $45

New Horizons came out in March 2020, which meant millions of players found an escape from the pandemic in its adorable animations, pleasant music, ASMR-like sound effects and its open-island gameplay. You're tasked with building your personal island from the ground up with seemingly endless customizations, while you spend your days fishing, catching bugs, making friends with your neighbors and more. And with online multiplayer mode, you can visit your friends' islands at your leisure.

If you've already devoted countless hours into your Animal Crossing island, there are a bunch of other Switch games on sale right now as well. Super Mario 3D World + Bower's Fury, Super Mario 3D All-Stars, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and Pokémon Snap are all down to $45. That's a record-low price for all of those titles, so it's a good time to stock up on new games if you've been waiting for a decent sale.

Buy Super Mario 3D World at Amazon - $45Buy Super Mario 3D World at Best Buy - $45

Buy Super Smash Bros. Ultimate at Amazon - $45Buy Super Smash Bros. Ultimate at Best Buy - $45

Buy Super Mario 3D All-Stars at Best Buy - $45Buy Pokémon Snap at Best Buy - $45

Follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter for the latest tech deals and buying advice.

It didn't take long for Porsche's rumored Taycan recall to become official. The German car maker has recalled about 43,000 Taycan and Taycan Cross Turismo EVs worldwide over a sudden power loss issue. You'll have to take your electric sports sedan to a workshop to receive an hour-long software update (over-the-air isn't an option this time), although Porsche said you could continue driving until the update is ready.

The bug has already been addressed for models rolling off the line, Porsche said.

The recall was prompted by an NHTSA investigation of nine incidents where power shut off while the cars were in motion, with six of the cars refusing to restart. Autoblognoted that Porsche found the problem in 130 cars after conducting its own investigation. There haven't been reports of collisions or injuries.

The recall is a blow (if minor) to Porsche, which has generally enjoyed strong sales for the Taycan. The EV is now popular enough in the US that it's outselling the 911, 718 and Panamera. While this isn't likely to tank sales, it comes as Porsche is still trying to persuade buyers that it's worth ditching the company's legendary gas engines for electric motors — it might face some hesitancy after this, even if EVs are likely to be more reliable.

Riot Games is no stranger to making music. With K/DA, the studio has one of the world’s most popular virtual bands, but it’s latest musical project is different. On Friday, Riot released Sessions: Vi, a 37-track album of instrumental beats with contributions from artists like Chromonicci and Junior State. What makes the release special is that streamers and content creators can use all the songs from Sessions: Vi for free.

Riot hopes the album and future ones like it will help ease some of the copyright headaches Twitch streamers have had to deal with for much of the past year. At the start of last June, Twitch got a “sudden influx” of DMCA takedown notices. The majority of those targeted archived broadcasts that had been up on the platform for years. The company has tried in a variety of ways to prevent more takedown notifications from coming in, but those efforts don’t seem to have addressed the problem. That's because in May Twitch said it received another batch of approximately 1,000 individual DMCA notifications. For some streamers, those notices represent a potential ban from the service.

You can stream Sessions: Vi on Apple Music, Spotify and YouTube. 

We had a feeling Sony's tricked-out Xperia 1 III smartphone would be expensive. Turns out, we were right. Sony has revealed that the new handset (pcitured above), which packs a pro-grade camera, is available to pre-order for a cool $1,300 ahead of its August 19th release date. That means the new flagship is $100 more expensive than its predecessor, the Sony Xperia 1 ii, and fellow high-enders like the $1,200 Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra, the $1,099 Apple iPhone 12 Pro Max and the $969 OnePlus 9 Pro. 

As you'd expect at that price, the Xperia 1 III has some killer specs that should appeal to photography buffs. The 12-megapixel, 24mm equivalent Exmor RS sensor is accompanied by a 12-megapixel ultra-wide camera and a time-of-flight sensor that gathers depth data. Sony says the flagship is the first phone in the world with “true” optical zoom, which is achieved by actually moving the telephoto lens elements inside the phone. While the burst mode captures photos as fast as 20 times per second. 

Sony also claims that the phone's 6.5-inch OLED display is the world’s first mobile 4K screen with a 120Hz refresh rate. Inside, there's Qualcomm’s powerful Snapdragon 888 chipset combined with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of internal storage, along with a 4,500mAh battery that supports wireless charging.

Sony Xperia 5 III

If you find paying upwards of $1,000 is too steep, Sony is also releasing the cheaper Xperia 5 III (pictured above) a month later in September for £899 in the UK — we've reached out for US pricing. Here, you'll get a 6.1-inch Full HD OLED screen, slightly less RAM at 8GB and either 128GB or 256GB of internal storage. Sony also cut back on some of the camera software tricks available on its big brother like real-time object tracking and the time-of-flight sensor. Plus, you don't get support for wireless charging. Otherwise, it packs the same chipset, pro-grade camera setup, 3D Reality audio support and battery, making it more of a crowdpleaser compared to its pricey sibling.

To sweeten the deal, both phones will ship with Sony wireless headphones: the Xperia 1 III comes with the WF-1000XM3 earbuds and the Xperia 5 III with the WH-H910N over-ear headphones. Purchasing the flagship also gets you 43,200 Call of Duty: Mobile CP Points worth $540.

You're not losing access to digital games for the PSP just yet. When Sony reversed its decision to close the PS3 and the PS Vita storefronts back in April, it also said that the "PSP commerce functionality will retire on July 2nd, 2021 as planned." While that could be interpreted as Sony pulling the plug on all PSP downloads, new language that has popped up on both the US and the UK PlayStation websites (as spotted by Kotaku) shows that's not the case. 

The PSP game store shut down way back in 2016, but you can still get games for the console through the PS3 and the PS Vita stores. Now that those storefronts aren't shutting down, you'll still be able to download PSP games through them, though there will be some limitations going forward. Starting on July 6th, you will no longer be able to search for games on the PSP itself or make any in-game purchases. Kotaku says the information first appeared on the UK website on June 28th, and it makes no mention of the previous July 2nd timeline.

When Sony backtracked on its plans to shutdown the PS3 and Vita stores, Sony Interactive Entertainment's CEO Jim Ryan said that it was clear the company "made the wrong decision." It's unclear if limiting PSP users' capability to search for titles or make in-game purchases is what Sony had in mind when it said that it will retire the console's "commerce functionality," or if it also changed its decision like it did with the PS3 and PS Vita stores' closure. Either way, what matters is that the PSP's digital library will continue being available for now.

EA is reportedly working on a remake of Dead Space. You read that right. After more than eight years of the franchise collecting dust, VentureBeat reports EA has tasked its Motive studio to develop a Resident Evil 2-style remake of the first game in the series. According to writer Jeff Grubb, fans should expect an experience that uses the original game as a “strong foundation,” but features modern visuals and gameplay tweaks introduced in later Dead Space games.

Grubb first hinted at the possibility of the series coming back during an episode of the GamesBeat Decides podcast, saying EA would announce a revival at its upcoming Play event on July 22nd. Eurogamer and Gematsu later corroborated his claims, noting they had heard similar information. It’s also worth noting Grubb was the first person to report that EA was working on Mass Effect Legendary Edition. And while it’s always good to be skeptical, there have been other tantalizing hints that EA will resurrect Dead Space. Just yesterday, someone noticed the company had updated the official Dead Space YouTube page following years of inactivity to change the channel’s profile picture. With EA Play a mere three weeks away, we won’t have to wait long to see if the rumors are true.