At one point in No Time to Die, Daniel Craig's final entry as James Bond, you can see a sleek supercar in the background. It's the Aston Martin Valhalla, a 937hp beast of a plug-in hybrid, and it's just sitting there, with nowhere to go. If you've seen a Bond film before, you can imagine it's holding a slew of killer gadgets (though hopefully not invisibility). Surely it would appear later in the film, perhaps just in time to save our hero before he sips a martini from a built-in fridge. But no—nobody drives the car throughout the film's 163-minute runtime. We never even see it in motion. (Though that's not stopping Rocket Leaguefrom pitching it as a Bond vehicle.)
Nicola Dove/DANJAQ, MGM
That undriven Chekhov's car makes one thing clear: No Time to Die, directed by Cary Joji-Fukunaga (True Detective, Beasts of No Nation), isn't your usual Bond movie. And as I watched the film, a momentous occasion after years of delays, I was struck by how few gadgets there were. Sure, Bond gets a cool watch, a classic bulletproof (and gun-equipped) Aston Martin and he rides in something called a gravity plane, but they come few and far in between. Instead, the film focuses on Bond's human drama: His inability to trust; his persistent death-wish; the danger he brings to others.
Craig's Bond was different from the beginning. In 2006's Casino Royale, he was a fledgling agent he hadn't yet earned his 00 status. He was gruff and dirty, more used to getting into Bourne-esque fights instead of wearing a tux. But the Bond writer's and producers could never quite settle on how they wanted to transform the character. 2008's Quantum of Solace was a disaster mired by the Hollywood writer's strike (not to mentioned completely incomprehensible action). Skyfall was a return to form, elevating the franchise with Roger Deakin's Oscar-nominated cinematography. But the series hit a new low with 2015's Spectre, a boring and regressive film I haven't had the heart to revisit.
Strangely, even though No Time to Die is Craig's final entry, it never tries to one-up the set pieces of its predecessors. There's a thrilling motorcycle chase early on, which features an astounding practical jump up a flight of stairs, a balletic shoot-out in Cuba, and a few smaller sequences later on. But the film cares less about spectacle than it does setting a mood. That may make it a divisive entry for some, but as someone fascinated by emotional action movies, like Michael Mann's much-maligned Miami Vice reboot, I found it endlessly compelling. (It helps that No Time to Die, like Casino Royale before it, actually makes you care about Bond and everyone in his orbit.)
When I chatted with No Time to Die's VFX supervisor, Charlie Noble, he had a hard time pointing to a specific whiz-bang set-piece. Unlike Tom Cruise's latest Mission Impossible movies, this Bond outing isn't built around a specific stunt or gadget. And after the emptiness of Spectre, I'm all for that. Noble says he's more concerned with subtle VFX work, like adding additional cars to the background of a chase, or removing wires from a dangerous stunt. Sometimes the best visual effects are the ones you don't even notice.
There's something genuinely refreshing about No Time to Die's practically lo-fi approach to action, especially after living through more than a decade of the Marvel Cinematic Universe's often weightless CG. Even something that's genuinely high-tech in the film, like a series of magnets the villains use to jump down an elevator shaft, aren't dwelled upon. Instead, the focus is on what that action means (in this case, it's a group of baddies stealing a potentially world-ending nanovirus from a high-security research facility.)
Nicola Dove/DANJAQ, MGM
Now don't get me wrong, I love a good Bond gadget or two. But for an aging franchise that seriously needs to reckon with its sexist and colonialist origins, I'm glad that No Time to Die decided to focus more on its characters. That includes Lashana Lynch's Nomi, who wastes no time taking up the 007 mantle when Bond disappears, as well as Paloma, a fresh spy recruit who joins for an action romp in Cuba.
Daniel Craig may no longer be Bond, but this is a fitting end for his tenure. And the toys aren't going anywhere—now anyone can use them.
If you had the opportunity, would you pay more in order to use an exercise bike less frequently? That is, give or take, the sales pitch for Carol’s at-home spin bike. It’s the anti-Peloton, designed to be used for just 8 minutes and 40 seconds per workout. At the end of its standard program, it even tells you that you can go to the gym if you want to, rather than because you need to. But stealing back all of those hours from the capricious gods of exercise comes at a price: $2,395, plus $12 per month after the first three months. It’s up to you to decide if that eye-watering fee is worth swerving all of those cardio sessions.
Science
Daniel Cooper
Carol leverages the principles of Reduced Exertion, High Intensity Interval Training (REHIIT), a variation on the Tabata method of HIIT. Put simply, you’re asked to exercise at a very high intensity for a very short period of time, rather than a long period of time in a steady state. In this example, Carol says that its standard sub-nine-minute workout gives you the equivalent workout to a 45-minute jog. This involves you going all-out for 20 seconds, but then having the better part of three minutes to recover.
That 20-second frenzy is designed to deplete your body’s stores of glycogen and pushes the heart rate through the roof. The long recovery time is designed to reset your body, enabling you to grind out far more from your muscles than you would in a standard Tabata workout. And studies have shown that, at least in male participants, a six-week REHIIT program can improve their insulin resistance and oxygen consumption.
“One of the things I like about REHIIT is the long length of the recovery periods,” says Stuart Moore, trainer and owner of Wheel Fitness, a specialist cycling practice. “This enables people without a lot of experience to recover properly between bouts of hard work and then go again with another round.” He added that “all interval training can be useful,” but stressed that would-be adopters “should get the important checks with your doctor” before trying this sort of thing. “I’d prefer complete beginners to interval training try something more mild than modified versions of HIIT,” he said, “this could help with developing a base before delving into the more intense exercise later.”
Andrea Speir, co-founder and lead trainer at Speir Pilates, added that the psychological benefits on neophyte exercisers were crucial. “Because it spikes the heart rate and improves VO2 Max, cardiac output and boosts the metabolism [...] without being too strenuous,” she said. “It’s not as daunting to commit to it three-to-five times a week, which is where you really see great results,” she added.
History
Daniel Cooper
It’s not often that a company founder announces that their product exists because of a BBC documentary, but Carol isn’t exactly a standard Silicon Valley story. Co-founder Ulrich Dempfle was a management consultant working with the UK’s National Health Service on behalf of firms like McKinsey and PWC. Part of his role was to look for ways to encourage people to exercise more, despite the fact they would often say they didn’t have enough time to become gym bunnies. It wasn’t until he watched 2012’s The Truth About Exercise that he became a convert to REHIIT.
The documentary was fronted by Dr. Michael Mosely, who is chiefly responsible for making intermittent fasting mainstream in the UK. One of Mosely’s gimmicks has always been to look for more efficient ways to feel healthy, and this was a love letter to REHIIT. Dempfle and his team contacted the academics whose research was featured in order to get a look at their equipment. Dempfle explained that the bikes featured had their intensity controlled by one of the academics while a person exercised on them, and that the price was astronomical. It was here that the idea of building an affordable REHIIT bike was more or less born. In fact, Carol would wind up being featured in a Mosley’s 2018 follow-up documentary, The Truth About Getting Fit, albeit not named because of the BBC’s rules against product placement.
Bike
Daniel Cooper
At first glance, Carol could be mistaken for pretty much any at-home exercise bike. It has a very large, rear-slung flywheel and a beefy drive unit, which houses the system to electronically control the resistance, the secret sauce behind the REHIIT program. A pair of short handles with the customary heart rate-monitoring electrodes sit below the display housing, which holds a 10.1-inch screen. The seat height and distance is adjustable, as well as the height of the handlebars, and there are toe cages and clips on the pedals, for pro cyclists.
After you’ve registered, you can then log in to the bike, which is a process you’ll have to do every time you want to use it. After the first attempt, you can just tap on your initials on a list of stored users, but there’s no way to stay logged in by default. Given how beefy the bike is, and that it’s designed for both at-home and professional use, I feel as if this makes it well-suited to offices and gyms, more so than people’s homes. You could easily see this in the corner of a small business, with staff members getting their 10 minutes each day as they take a break from their work.
Display
Daniel Cooper
When it comes to screens, there are two schools of thought dominating the at-home fitness market. Peloton’s ubiquity means that consumers may soon expect all machines to have a glossy, massive HD display as the default. Companies like Wattbike, Concept2 and others, however, are happy pushing out machines that still leverage old-school LCD head units. (On a personal note, the Polar View offered by the Wattbike PMB is one of the best training tools I’ve ever encountered).
Carol splits this difference by offering a 10.1-inch color touchscreen that offers the same sort of data you’d find on an LCD set, but cleaner and more colorful. The UI flashes an angry red when you hit the high intensity phase, and the visualizations showing your power output are great. A software update, too, came through during my review that has made the UI a lot cleaner and smoother than it was before. And, even better, you can use the display to live stream classes from Peloton’s own app, although you’ll need to subscribe to them separately.
Boot the bike up for the first time and you’ll be greeted by a Lenovo splash screen because Carol’s display is quite literally a Lenovo tablet in a housing. On paper, this is genius: An Android tablet should last longer, is more affordable and should be easier to replace than a custom solution. Plus, you can (and Carol does) leverage Google’s pre-built accessibility features for adjusting screen fonts and voice overs that it would take time and money to copy for little-to-no upside.
Not to mention that, because it is an Android tablet, you can run third-party apps through the Play Store, albeit only ones that have been sanctioned by Carol’s makers. So far, that’s just Peloton, but there’s no technical reason that your favorite fitness, or entertainment, app couldn’t wind up on this screen as well. But, for all of those positives, slamming an Android tablet onto a bike and calling it quits still feels a bit lackluster for a bike costing two thousand four hundred dollars.
In use
Daniel Cooper
Once you’ve answered the medical questionnaire, you have to go through six taster sessions for the bike to gauge your overall fitness level. After that point, you’re free to sample the delights that the bike has to offer, including four different REHIIT workouts. I pretty much stuck to the standard program — the reason anyone would buy a Carol bike — but there are other options available. This includes an Energiser ride, which offers shorter, 10-second sprints, as well as 15-minute or 25 minute Fat Burn program, with 30 or 60 sprints, respectively. You also get the option for a Free Ride, with power controlled by yourself, or an Endurance ride with the resistance slowly ramping up beyond your ability to cope with it.
Once you’ve chosen a program, you’re asked to choose from a series of generic audio options but, again, I was advised by the company’s representatives to stick with the default. (This was probably for the best, because the other options are essentially musak.) In it, a calm voiceover talks about how neanderthal man never jogged, they either walked slowly, or ran like their lives depended on it. At the same time, the on-screen coaching tells you to breathe in for four seconds, hold for a beat, and then exhale over six seconds, which is hard to coordinate if you’re bad at multitasking. All the while you’re asked to cycle at a very low level, never exceeding an output of 20 watts or so.
There’s a countdown timer on screen (and a timeline), so it’s not as if you’re not told when the sprints are about to begin. But the narration treats it more like a surprise, talking about the vista when, suddenly, she tells you that there’s a tiger leaping out at you!, and you have to pedal for your life. The screen turns red three seconds before the sprint begins, letting you spool up as you prepare to go hell for leather to escape your predator. Because the resistance is calibrated to your fitness level, it continues to go up after your initial burst of energy to ensure that you’re nicely wiped out by the end of the sprint. Hell, I found that I was flagging at the 10-second mark, and could never get back to my first output peak no matter what I tried.
You may scoff at the idea that biking for just 20 seconds can wipe you out and make any positive impact on your fitness. You begin to feel your legs go as your body suddenly starts to wuss out, and the final quarter of the sprints have you running on fumes. As effective exercises go, the system makes good upon its promises, and you need that long recovery time to restore any sense of humanity you may have had. The screen will graph your output (and compare it to your output on the second sprint, when you hit it) and let you see how far you’ve dropped between runs. Although the on-screen display’s promise that you won’t sweat is mostly true, it’s not entirely fair for sweaty, sweaty boys like me.
Wrap-up
Daniel Cooper
In the period in which I was using Carol, I think my fitness did improve, as did my mood when I was trying to complete one of these more or less every single day. (The bike repeatedly advises you, as does its representatives, to only do a single sprint session in a 24 hour period and only three times a week to avoid injury.) You certainly start the day feeling more energized, and I can’t complain that this has eaten a big chunk of my day when it hasn’t.
But I’m finding myself hamstrung by the price, especially given the fact that it’s designed to do one job, one fitness program, to the exclusion of most others. Do I want to spend $2,399 plus an additional $12 a month on an appliance I’d use for 30 or 40 minutes a week? Yes, that’s less than you can spend on a Wattbike Atom or Peloton Bike+, but it’s still a lot. In that philistinic sense of knowing the cost of something but not its value, the numbers make my eyes water.
It’s a bike that does one thing, really, and it does it well, but I feel in my gut that I’d have an easier time singing this thing’s praises if its price was just below the $2,000 mark. It’s a weird psychological barrier for sure, and maybe you’re scoffing at my imaginary parsimony. But as much as this thing is designed for a mainstream audience, right now, it’s priced at the level where only enthusiasts can buy it.
The weather is starting to get cooler, but that doesn’t mean it’s time to head indoors for winter just yet. There’s ample time to enjoy the backyard, porch or balcony before the first snowfall. We’ve rounded up the best outdoor gear for cooking, relaxing and imbibing this fall, from a pizza oven, to a uniquely designed fire pit and a smart outlet for your outdoor lighting.
Ooni Karu 16
Ooni
If you’ve opened Instagram in the last several months, chances are you’ve seen someone firing up an Ooni pizza oven in their backyard. The company has become even more popular during the pandemic, and rightfully so. Its line of wood- and gas-fired pizza ovens allow you to make restaurant-quality pies at home. The Karu 16 is the company’s latest offering, with a larger stone for bigger pizzas, an easier to access fuel chamber and a built-in thermometer. The door is also attached so it’s simpler to use and has a glass window so you can keep an eye on things without losing heat. Like commercial Neapolitan-style ovens, the Karu 16 can reach temperatures of up to 950 degrees Fahrenheit, and does so in just 15 minutes. This model runs on wood chunks out of the box, but the company offers an optional gas burner for $100.
Cooler weather is a perfect time to tune up your backyard pitmaster skills. Even if you’re a beginner, Traeger’s line of WiFi-connected pellet grills can guide you through the entire cooking process. The company’s app, which allows you to control and monitor its grills remotely, is also packed with recipes and step-by-step guidance.
Personally, I like the Ironwood series, which comes in two sizes with 650 and 885 square inches of grilling space. They sit in the middle of Traeger’s lineup, and offer the best bang for your buck. Low and slow smoking? Yep. Hot and fast searing? They do that too. And with the company’s pellet sensor, you don’t have to worry about running out of fuel halfway through a 10-hour brisket sesh.
Weber is best known for its charcoal kettle grills, but its gas models aren’t too far behind. Following up on the smart grilling tech it built into its SmokeFire pellet grills in 2020, the company brought the Weber Connect system to its gas lineup earlier this year. There are a number of options here, but the Genesis II EX-315 is a great mid-range choice. Thanks to the Connect tech, you get real-time food doneness updates, estimated completion times and fuel level monitoring.
Weber Connect also offers step-by-step guidance based on the food you're cooking and the LED display on the grill shows both meat and ambient temperatures. Of course, the grill is WiFi-enabled, so all of this info can be sent to your phone. And if you get caught in the dark, a handle-mounted light and backlit control knobs are there to help.
The Thermapen is the grilling tool I use most often. It’s handy for making sure I’m not serving undercooked chicken or overcooking a pricey steak I’ve had in the sous vide for hours. It’s also great to have in the kitchen to instantly check temps of things like bread. Thermoworks unveiled the successor to its wildly popular Thermapen Mk4 earlier this year with the Thermapen One. The device is super fast, giving you a reading in one second. It’s also more accurate and has a brighter display than the previous model. The screen automatically rotates depending on how you hold it, plus an auto-wake and sleep feature and IP67 rating keep things running smoothly.
I’ll admit it: when I first saw Meater’s wireless food probes I was skeptical that they would work well. The Meater Plus has all of the convenience of the company’s original wireless probe, but with extended Bluetooth range. Each one has two sensors, so it can monitor both internal food temperature and the ambient temp of your grill. All of the info is sent to the company’s app where you can set target temperature, get estimated completion times and follow step-by-step directions if you need them. What’s more, you don’t have to worry about routing wires since the Meater Plus is completely wireless and stays out of your way. Not having to fight food probe cords is a grilling innovation I’m sure a lot of people can get behind.
Last year, the Thermacell Patio Shield kept us mosquito-free for socially-distanced outdoor activities. For 2021, the company is back with the E-55 that offers a 20-foot coverage area and is fully rechargeable. This slightly larger unit runs on a Li-Ion battery instead of burning fuel to keep the biting bugs at bay for up to 12 hours. If you need more protection for you and the fam, you can buy refills for up to 40 hours of use. Also, like other Thermacell products, the E-55 doesn’t give off any odor, so you’ll barely notice it’s there.
As the temperatures drop, a fire pit is a cozy place to spend your time. However, most of the cheap options you’ll find at your local big box store aren’t really designed to channel smoke away from you or to maximize airflow. Solo Stove’s stainless steel fire pits do both, creating a roaring fire that won’t smoke you out. Each of the three models, ranging from $269 to $599, are portable(ish) and burn whatever variety of wood you happen to have. I’ve been testing the Ranger, the smallest and most portable option. While you can certainly set these right on the ground or concrete patio, I highly recommend splurging for a stand and a weather-proof cover which cost around $80 for the Ranger and Bonfire models.
I tested the Kasa Outdoor Smart Plug for our first backyard guide and I was immediately hooked. TP-Link recently announced a new model of the smart plug in addition to a dimmable single-outlet version. Both are waterproof and plug into your existing outside outlet to give you one or two spots for lights and other gear. With the two-plug option, you can control each one independently. The Kasa app allows you to set a schedule, timer, runtime and more for each plug, so you can automate when those string lights over the deck turn on. Additionally, they work with Alexa and Google Assistant, so you don’t even need to pick up your phone most of the time. Plus, 300 feet of WiFi range means you shouldn’t have trouble connecting these to your home network for use.
When you need tunes outside, whether that’s at home or on the go, Sony’s tiny XB13 speaker is a great option. Its small size makes it insanely portable, but it still manages big sound thanks to Sony's Extra Bass feature and Sound Diffusion Processor. It’s rated IP67 for dust- and water-proofing so taking it outside shouldn’t incite anxiety. What’s more, it has a UV coating for protection from the sun. You can use the XB13 for hands-free calls and employ two of them at once for a stereo pair. It lasts up to 16 hours on a charge and will only set you back $60.
I’ve been a big fan of Brumate’s beverageware since I bought myself a Hopsulator Trio for a beach vacation a few years ago. I still use it all the time, during both warm and cool months. However, when the temperatures begin to dip, I tend to reach for hot beverages more often, so Brumate’s Toddy insulated mug is a better option. The cup works well to keep drinks hot or cold and the trademark feature is the spill-proof lid. That thing has saved me from massive cleanup more times than I can count. The regular Toddy can hold 16 ounces while the Toddy XL doubles the capacity to 32 ounces.
Those on the hunt for the next gaming laptop should check out the discounts on Razer Blade machines that Amazon has right now. Most notable among them is the 2020 Razer Blade Stealth, which is down to a record low of $1,400. That's $600 off its normal price and, given that one of our biggest complaints about the laptop was its high price tag, a great deal if you're looking for a powerful gaming machine in an ultra-portable shell.
We were impressed by the Blade Stealth's versatility — it's a gaming laptop that's powerful enough to run Overwatch in 1080p 70fps, but light enough to slip into a backpack and take to a coffee shop to do some work. It has a sleek yet sturdy design and weighs just three pounds, which is much lighter than most gaming machines. The particular model on sale has a 10th-generation Core i7 processor, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 Ti Max-Q graphics, 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. All of that should provide plenty of power in most situations, and the package is made better by the 13-inch 4K touchscreen that comes with it. Depending on how you use it, you should get around eight hours of battery life with the Stealth, too.
A few other 2020 models are on sale at Amazon, and they appear to be different sales than those available on Razer's own site right now. There's the Razer Blade Pro 17, which is $900 off and down to a record-low of $2,300. That's for a model with a 10th-gen Core i7 octa-core processor, NVIDIA RTX 2080 Super Max-Q graphics, 16GB of RAM, a 512GB SSD and a 17.3-inch 1080p display with a 300Hz refresh rate. The Razer Blade 15 Advanced with 10th-gen Core i7 octa-core processor, RTX 2070 Super Max-Q graphics, 16GB of RAM, a 512GB SSD and a 15.6-inch 1080p 300Hz display is down to just under $1,800 as well. We have seen it drop lower in the past, but that's still a good deal at over $800 off.
It’s not too often we get a new version of Windows and a new Android release! This week, Engadget Editor-in-Chief Dana Wollman joins Cherlynn and Devindra to chat about her Surface Pro 8 review, Windows 11, as well as the Surface Laptop Studio and Go. Also, Senior Editor Karissa Bell joins to talk about the latest news from Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen.
Listen below, or subscribe on your podcast app of choice. If you've got suggestions or topics you'd like covered on the show, be sure to email us or drop a note in the comments! And be sure to check out our other podcasts, the Morning After and Engadget News!
Sustainability data is going to be a bigger thing in Google products soon – 36:17
Android 12 release / Pixel event announced for October 19 – 47:06
Twitch was hacked revealing lots of information – 48:57
OLED Switch review is up! – 50:03
Canon made a huge VR fish eye lens – 52:15
Catching up on the fallout from the Facebook whistleblower interview – 55:10
Picks – 1:18:23
Video livestream
Credits Hosts: Cherlynn Low and Devindra Hardawar Guests: Dana Wollman and Karissa Bell Producer: Ben Ellman Livestream producers: Julio Barrientos,Luke Brooks Graphics artists: Luke Brooks, Kyle Maack Music: Dale North and Terrence O'Brien
Unlike the latest iPads and iPhones, the Apple Watch Series 7 didn't immediately open up for pre-orders after it was announced in mid September. Apple only said the wearable would be coming "later this fall," and it seems that time is now. The Apple Watch Series 7 is available for pre-order today starting at 5am PT / 8am ET from Apple as well as Amazon and other retailers, and it will be widely available starting October 15. The wearable starts at $399 and comes in two sizes, 41mm and 45mm, as well as five colors: green, blue, midnight, starlight and Product Red.
The biggest changes come in the Apple Watch's screen this year, which is 20 percent larger with bezels surrounding it that are 40 percent smaller than those on the Series 6. The always-on Retina display is also 70 percent brighter, which should make it easier to see even when your wrist is turned downward. The Series 7 is also the first Apple Watch to have an IPX6 certification for resistance to dust, and it remains water-resistant as well. Battery life remains the same — roughly 18 hours — but the Series 7 will charge up to 33 percent faster than the Series 6 thanks to its new magnetic charger with USB-C connector.
As usual, Apple's bringing a lot of updates to multiple Watch models with watchOS 8. The software update will include a new mindfulness app, sleep respiratory rate tracking, fall detection updates and new workouts like Tai Chi. Series 7 users will be able to access a new QWERTY keyboard on the Watch as well, so you can more easily type (or swipe) a message.
We have yet to give the Series 7 the full review treatment, so be sure to check Engadget in the coming weeks for all of our thoughts on Apple's latest smartwatch.
Smartphones have made it easier than ever to tune your guitar. All you have to do these days is find a decent tuning app or ask Google Assistant to tune your instrument. Now Google has made the process even more painless by launching a chromatic tuner right within Search. The tech giant has told Android Police that it has just rolled out the new Search feature, which can be accessed on pretty much any device.
Unlike the Assistant function that needs, well, a device that can access the voice assistant, you can summon this tuner simply by doing a query in Search on mobile or desktop. Just type in "google tuner" to see it right on top of the results page. Of course, the device you're using must have a functional microphone to be able to hear your instrument, and you'll need to give the feature permission to access it.
This is what the tuner looks like on desktop:
Engadget
According to Android Police, its effectiveness depends on the microphone of your device. Some devices might need you to play loudly or really, really close to them, and smartphones might work better than computers for this particular purpose. After you get it to work, the tuner will let you know whether your instrument is in tune or if you need to adjust it with the help of a visual indicator. This built-in Google tuner joins other music-related features in the tech giant's search engine, including "Hum to Search," which can help you identify songs stuck in your head.
Browsing the internet has gotten better in many ways. Richer design, more interactivity, embedded media, faster speeds for doing everything. But the internet is also worse in places: more attempts to illegally steal your personal information or legally track your footprints through the web. I click on one Pokémon plushie an Engadget colleague shared with me (guess who), and my embedded ads across sites are now mired in Pokémon detritus.
The Internet Archive has concocted a thought experiment to celebrate its 25th anniversary, imagining how the web might look another 25 years from now. Paste a site’s URL into the Wayforward Machine and you'll see a version of that page covered in pop-ups. The messages include one reading "Classified content. The website you are trying to access features information that the owner(s) have opted to restrict to users that have not shared their personal information."
Another, in Orwellian wording, says: "This site contains information that is currently classified as Thought Crime in your region." The Internet Archive created a subsite that features a timeline of fictional changes, including a law allowing corporations to copyright facts, leading to Wikipedia moving to the Dark Web, which would be pretty incredible.
Sony Pictures has provided a taste of what's in store with the first trailer. Writer and director Johannes Roberts (47 Meters Down) said earlier this year he was taking the franchise back to its horror roots, and well, the trailer backs up those comments. Expect lickers, zombie dogs and plenty of good old-fashioned zombies.
Automatic captions are now available for streams of any size, too.
YouTube is expanding video accessibility for viewers with sight issues and those beyond the English-speaking world. It’s currently testing the option of adding multiple audio tracks to videos. While this will help international viewers — if you have the ability to add other language dubs — it should also enable descriptive audio for people with little-to-no vision. YouTube said the feature will land in the next few quarters.
In more good news, YouTube has confirmed its annual Rewind video won’t be returning. Rewind debuted in 2010 but struggled in recent years. In particular, with Rewind 2018, many felt the video ignored major creators on the platform, like Pewdiepie, while elevating people who were famous outside of YouTube. Never forget that Will Smith, er, moment.
Microsoft plans to celebrate the birthday of its first-ever home system by putting out a handful of translucent accessories, including the Xbox Series X/S controller you see here.
According to Microsoft, the translucent design is a reference to the see-through controllers it shipped with the original Xbox debug kit. I have all the time in the world for translucent gadgets, having already installed see-through cases for my Switch’s Joy-Cons. This is a good way to celebrate a console’s milestone.
In 2020, Panasonic announced the BGH1, its first-ever box-style camera. This was pretty much its GH5S rehoused in a body better suited for video production. Now, it’s time for an upgrade. Panasonic has announced the DC-BS1H. It’s the full-frame S1H in a new body.
Specifications include a 24.2-megapixel CMOS sensor that can capture footage up to a 6K resolution. Panasonic claims the BS1H’s sensor features more than 14 stops of dynamic range and includes an optical low-pass filter along with dual native ISO, all aimed at reducing moiré and noise.
Installing Windows 11 might make the apps on your AMD-powered computer slower, the chipmaker has warned. AMD has published documentation on a couple of Windows 11 bugs affecting its Ryzen processors, one of which can slow down its CPUs by up to 15 percent. That particular bug can increase L3 cache latency by three times, which in turn can affect apps that need quick access to memory.
Most affected applications could slow down by three to five percent. If you play games "commonly used for eSports," though, you might be feeling the bug's impact a lot more, since it could slow down those games by around 10 to 15 percent. The second bug, as Ars Technica explains, is related to the "preferred core" feature that allows a system to use the fastest individual CPU cores in a processor. AMD didn't mention any particular percentage for the second bug, but the company said its impact is more noticeable in chips with eight cores or more and with 65W Thermal Design Power (TDP) or higher. That includes most AMD chips released over the past few years.
In its announcement, AMD assured that it's investigating the issues with Microsoft and that they're working on a fix for them. A patch for the first bug will be released as Windows update, while a fix for the second will roll out as a software update sometime this month. For the latter, it could mean having to check AMD's website for the update and having to install new drivers manually.
Apple's 2020 iPad Air was a big improvement over the previous year's model, thanks to the nicer iPad Pro-like design, great performance and strong battery life. The main problem with it was the $599 price that's creeping up into iPad Pro territory. Now, you can pick up the 64GB and 256GB models at Amazon for the lowest prices we've seen yet, $489 and $639 respectively — $110 off the regular prices.
In our Engadget review, we called the 2020 iPad Air "the best tablet for almost everyone," and even the best high-end tablet. Apple transformed the design considerably with the flat edges used on the iPad Pro, while adding a 10.9-inch Liquid Retina Display, USB-C charging port and a side button with TouchID technology.
With the latest A14 Bionic chip, WiFi 6 technology and a16-core Neural Engine, it's delivers both strong performance and healthy battery life (10-12 hours). It also supports Apple's second-gen Pencil and accessories that essentially transform it into a laptop replacement, though those will obviously jot up the price.
The iPad Pro does offer some features not found on the iPad Air, like the M1 chipset and 120Hz screen that's slightly brighter (500 nits versus 600). If you've been taking a look at the Air model, though, act soon because the sale is on for today only. As a reminder, Amazon has several other deals on Apple products this week, particularly the Apple AirPods and AirPods Pro wireless earbuds — the latter are discounted 28 percent to $179.
