iClever BoostCube 4-port USB Wall Charger review

Awhile back, I reviewed iClever’s 6-port USB desktop charger. While my review was generally positive, the device was not without its faults. This time, I had the opportunity to review

The best Android apps for March Madness 2016

The NCAA Tournament is in full swing. These apps will help you keep up with your bracket.

Game on. The 2016 NCAA Tournament (that’s college men’s basketball, in case you’re not into such things) is underway. That means countless work hours lost over the next couple weeks, but specifically in these early days as we all pore over our brackets, hoping to avoid the bust and advance to the next round.

Sadly, we don’t all have televisions in our offices. But seeing as how this is 2016, there’s more than one way to keep up with the tourney. A trusty web browser is one, of course. But you’re on the go. That’s where these handy Android apps come in.

We’ve updated our favorites for following this year’s big dance. And there’s a good chance if you’re a sports fan you’re already acquainted. Let’s take a look.

TheScore

This one’s a longtime sports staple on Android. Follow leagues, teams and players. Get all the latest news. But you’re here for basketball. It’s got a dedicated tournament section, with a smartly designed sort of bracket that’s using Android design guidelines instead of the sort of pan-and-zoom thing you’ll find elsewhere. It’s really well done.

TheScore is ad-supported, but it’s also one of those apps that can very well stick around once you try it. So try it.

Download: theScore (free)

NCAA March Madness Live

This one’s the official app from the folks putting on the tournament, so you know it’s good. It’s also very much sponsored by AT&T, Capital One and Infiniti, so you’ll be subjected to adds from those three throughout. But if you’ve got a cable subscription this is a great way to watch all the games live. And with Chromecast support built in, you can stream to a larger TV or monitor if you’re not in the same room as your cable box. Plus there are scores, info on every team in the tourney, and keep up with your bracket, at least until it gets busted. There’s a lot of webview going on there, but it’s not a bad choice by any stretch.

Download: NCAA March Madness Live (Free, TV subscriptions required for some games)

ESPN Tournament Challenge

This one’s less about following the tournament and more about a bracket challenge. Specifically, if you’re playing with ESPN’s brackets. (If you’re not, just move on.) You can follow up to 10 brackets and get alerts on the latest news. Following scores is fairly simply, but the app also is (unsurprisingly) pretty ad-heavy. Again, if you’re not actually doing ESPN’s bracket challenge, no need to stop here.

Download: ESPN Tournament Challenge (Free)

CBS Sports

CBS consistently has had some of the best sports apps out there, and that continues this year with the latest iteration of the CBS Sports app. At launch you’ll be asked if you want to use location services to follow local (or regional) teams. Do or do not, there is no try. You also can designate specific teams in any of the sports that you want to give special attention to.

From there, it’s all sports, all the time. That means you’ll see other events lumped with the basketball games. Just duck into the drawer on the left for quick links to scores and news, the full brackets, and expert pics. (And CBS has added the NIT tournament for good measure.)

If you’re looking for a really good all-around sports app, this is one to have. And it’s also excellent for this year’s dance.

Download: CBS Sports (Free)

Google Now

Don’t wanna go through any of that? Just ask your phone. “Show me NCAA basketball tournament scores” will pull up the recent games in Google Now. No having to install and wade through any other apps than that. It’s quick, it’s easy, and it’s probably already on your phone.

If not …

Download: Google (Free)

Those are still our favorite pics. Did we miss something that’s worth checking out? Let us know in the comments. And may your bracket live beyond the weekend.

My sister the luddite, and her Galaxy S7

Being the nerd in the family means you’re surprised when someone near you jumps up and buys a phone on day one.

I have always been the tech nerd in the family. It didn’t really matter what it was, I wanted to know everything about it. When phones started to get interesting for me — which was back in the days of the microPDA-esque LG enV2 — I started jumping from phone to phone every couple of months and never looked back. Most of my family has known me as the guy to talk to when it comes to smartphones for a while now, but my sister has never really cared about this stuff. She has owned her fair share of smartphones, but it was always based on price or convenience and usually had no research behind the purchase.

This year my sister not only purchased a Samsung Galaxy S7, but she woke herself up at 4am to make sure she was one of the first to pre-order it. Somehow, Samsung’s marketing machine had shifted my fairly tech illiterate sister from a disinterested consumer to an early adopter.

As a mother of two little ones and the wife of a Naval officer — on top of actively pursuing her own career — my sister has plenty of things to care about that aren’t smartphones. It’s easy to look at her doing things like buying an LG G3 weeks before the G4 was launched and wanting to scream, but the truth is that’s how a lot of people shop for phones. The stuff that has been recently marked down and maybe comes with a free car charger or some kind of buy-one-get-one deal — those are the phones a significant chunk of the U.S. smartphone buyers go for. It’s inconceivable to smartphone nerds, especially when the person doing the shopping has a history of breaking her screen or drowning her phone in pools and toilets. I love my sister to death, but she is absolutely the Snapchat-wielding, Facebook-browsing, texting-while-driving smartphone user I don’t hesitate to look down on as I grip whatever shiny new phone I’m using this week. That probably says more about me than anything else, and I accept that.

She didn’t get bogged down by things like a launcher that doesn’t sort alphabetically by default or how many pre-installed Verizon apps she was never going to use.

My sister’s excitement for the Galaxy S7 started with Samsung Pay. She’d seen the commercials, and any excuse to leave her wallet locked in the car while she and the kids wandered around town sounded like a dream. If all she needed was the phone in her back pocket — yeah, she does that too — how cool would that be?

On the verge of an upgrade, she was already leaning towards Samsung. Days away from pulling the trigger on a Galaxy S6, Mobile World Congress happened. She saw Verizon announce a pre-order for this new phone, with Samsung Pay and an even better camera, and was sold. She saw the offer for a free Gear VR if she pre-ordered, and that was all it took to set her schedule to wake up early to make the purchase.

Verizon Wireless was one of two carriers that decided to start shipping the Galaxy S7 before the street date, so she got the phone early and had some time to dive in and get to know it before she saw me again. In fact, as of this writing she’s spent more time with the Galaxy S7 than I have. She has already discovered things like double-tapping the home button to launch the camera, set up Samsung Pay and used it anywhere and everywhere she could, and can’t get enough of how well the display works in direct sunlight. She didn’t get bogged down by things like a launcher that doesn’t sort alphabetically by default or how many Verizon apps were pre-installed that she was never going to use. When I asked, she told me she just put those apps in a folder and never used them, just like she did with every other phone she’s ever had. All she really cared about was how fast it was, how nice the screen was, and how well the camera worked, all of which routinely impressed her.

The only thing she wasn’t totally thrilled with was the accessories. Her local Verizon Wireless store didn’t stock anything for the Galaxy S7 before the street date, and was downright aggressive about how she got the phone early and why she was allowed to use it in public. After getting over this shock, the store associate told her they had no cases for her and then sold her a screen protector for the Galaxy S6. They even applied it for her in the store, and as you can imagine it looks absolutely terrible. Knowing she needed something to protect this phone, she didn’t ask a ton of questions until I saw how awful the thing looked on her phone. Fortunately, it’s much easier now to get a hold of some decent screen protectors and cases for the Galaxy S7.

It never occurred to me that my sister, who I have watched more than once huddle in shade to read a text message on an iPhone 4S with a broken screen, could teach me something about the phones I use every day. There’s a whole world of people using things differently from the way the nerds use them, and that’s okay. In fact, many companies are counting on it. I always knew that Samsung’s ads weren’t aimed at me, but I’d never seen those ads convert a user right in front of me.

Between the VR experiences she can share with her kids through the Gear VR, the availability of Samsung Pay, and the incredible quality of the display and camera, my sister isn’t likely to leave Samsung anytime soon. In fact, she’s already got her husband looking at his phone, wondering if it’s time to upgrade.

Samsung Galaxy S7 and S7 edge

• Galaxy S7 review
• Galaxy S7 edge review
• Galaxy S7 edge with Exynos: A Canadian perspective
• Here are all four Galaxy S7 colors
• Details on the Galaxy S7’s camera
• The SD card is back on the GS7
• Join our Galaxy S7 forums

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Grab the Back to the Future Trilogy for $22 at Google Play

If you are a fan of the Back to the Future movies, you’ll be excited to see that you can grab all three right now in SD for just $22 at Google Play. The HD versions are priced at $30. That’s right, for the rather low price of $22 you get Back to the Future I, Back to the Future II and Back to the Future III.

The sale, which was first spotted by Ausdroid, is a single purchase for all three movies, and it currently saves you around $8 over buying them individually. Hit the link below to grab the Back to the Future Trilogy for yourself!

See at Google Play

Alphabet reportedly trying to sell its robotics company Boston Dynamics

The robots of Boston Dynamics may be huge stars on YouTube, but that apparently is not enough for its current parent company Alphabet, which also owns Google. A new report says that Boston Dynamics is now up for sale.

Google acquired the company in December 2013, but even before then Boston Dynamics’ robot creations like Big Dog, PETMAN and Wildcat had become Internet sensations thanks to videos showing off their movements that looked very much like how real animals moved. However, it looks like getting lots of views online won’t cut it. According to Bloomberg:

Executives at Google parent Alphabet Inc., absorbed with making sure all the various companies under its corporate umbrella have plans to generate real revenue, concluded that Boston Dynamics isn’t likely to produce a marketable product in the next few years and have put the unit up for sale, according to two people familiar with the company’s plans.

The article also cites reported issues between the executives at Boston Dynamics in working with Google’s robot efforts, which are under the name Replicant. It adds that possible buyers include Toyota and Amazon.

College athletes in EA lawsuit will receive an average of $1,600

Back in July, a judge approved a $60 million settlement between Electronic Arts and a number of college athletes over the use of their likeness in games. Athletes with a valid claim, all 24,819 of them, will finally get their share of the settlement. The average player will receive $1,600 after lawyers for the class action take their 30-percent cut. Of course, the lead plaintiffs (Ed O’Bannon, Ryan Hart and Sam Keller) will get the most at approximately $15,000 each. A group of 21 players will receive $5,000 each for their role as representatives in the class action.

To determine the amount for each player, funds were awarded based on which games each athlete appeared in and how their likeness was used. Older EA NCAA titles are worth less, but if photos or an avatar of one of the plaintiffs was used, they’ll receive more than those who are referenced by name or body description in a game. The lawsuit caused EA Sports to shelve its NCAA games entirely, including the popular NCAA Football franchise.

Via: Geek

Source: ESPN

Want VR on a budget? Homido Mini clip-ons onto your phone and costs £15

There’s been an explosion of virtual reality – better known as VR – in recent months. But if the idea of PlayStation VR, Vive or Oculus sounds like an over-expensive pipe-dream then here’s a budget option: the Homido Mini.

It’s not the first time we’ve seen a budget entry point into VR. There’s Google Cardboard, the literally cardboard-made viewers that offer a way to utilise your phone with various 3D-VR apps.

READ: Google Cardboard review

Which is, in many respects, why the Homido Mini does such a good job: because VR apps are available in abundance on the Appstore and Google Play, so no need to pay a bunch of cash for fun gaming experiences.

The plastic contraption, which costs £15 and clips onto the side of a phone (we tried it with the iPhone 6S), doesn’t add the faff of additional layers – so, unlike Cardboard viewers, you’re not locked away from the phone’s touchscreen and controls to jump in and out of apps; you literally hold the phone and peer through the lenses and that’s it, job done.

Not that it’s a perfect product: it’s entirely exposed, so ambient light is all around you, but we actually found that rather freeing. Homido also makes a strapped-on overhead viewer, for £50, but after testing a rollercoaster title on that we felt sick as a dog – not so with the “open air” Mini experience.

So there we have it, in the year that promises to be the year virtual reality hits the big time, you might want to test the water first with the Homido Mini. It’s available from the company’s website only at present, until final packaged products hit store shelves later down the line.

Tag Heuer Connected doing well, new models reported for 2017

You might have up to eight different Tag Heuer Connected watches to choose from by this time next year.

Shortly after teasing Hublot would be the next Swiss watchmaker to get into connected watches, the CEO of France’s LVMH has announced that another subsidiary, Tag Heuer, is doing so well with its first Android Wear smartwatch that an entire collection of new models is due for 2017.

Speaking to Reuters at the Baselworld watch and jewelry fair, Jean-Claude Biver said Tag Heuer “totally underestimated demand” and was “too cautious” with the watch at first. The brand has invested about 10 million Swiss francs into Tag Heuer Connected, and that resulted in 15,000 units selling out quickly. It expects to sell up to another 50,000 pieces this year – and those will be assembled by an Intel line in Switzerland.

Tag Heuer made headlines in the tech world last year when it partnered with Google and Intel to unveil the Tag Heuer Connected. The $1,500 smartwatch costs around five times what the Moto 360 goes for and double what the the gold Huawei Watch costs. When we reviewed it, we described the wearable as a connected watch “packed with confidence and it works”, making it the best Android Wear device we had seen thus far.

Ben Wood, an analyst and chief of research at CCS Insight, tweeted from Baselworld that over 20,000 Tag Heuer Connected units have been sold, with a further 60,000 expected in 2016. Also, he said a new model will debut in 2017, and that Tag has a 200,000-unit target.

Indeed. Due to the success of the Android Wear watch, Biver confirmed to Reuters that more versions are definitely on the way: “Next year, we’ll have a real collection, a new version with six to eight models,” he explained.

There’s no word on pricing, but we’re assuming the watches won’t be cheap.

Audeze Sine headphones: Lightning port listening never looked so good

There’s long been talk of Apple ditching the headphones jack on the iPhone in favour of delivering audio via the Lightning port. All bets are on for that to be the case with the iPhone 7, but we’ll have to wait and see.

Still, there’s nothing stopping you using the Lightning port for audio right now (at 24-bit high-resolution) – and an increasing number of headphone manufacturers are getting in on the act early. Of those, Audeze makes one of the most compelling products: the Audeze Sine planar magnetic over-ears.

You don’t have to use them with a Lightning cable, though, as a standard 3.5mm cable version is available too – so whatever phone or device you’re using, you’re covered – and can easily be swapped out.

Now the idea of planar magnetic headphones is that they have larger driver surface area than dynamic headphones (comparing class for class), resulting in more air movement and, therefore, better bass response.

Pocket-lint

All you really need to know is that the Audeze Sine cans sound really great. We’ve been sat in a photography studio at a CU Exclusive showcase event typing away with them wrapped to our ears for a good 20-minutes listening to Keeno’s latest album and we’re impressed.

There’s bass aplenty and lots of volume – even from a fairly standard MacBook Air source – for an all-encompassing listen that sits lightly and comfortably on the head.

As you can see from our pictures (and the £400 price point; the Lightning cable version may be more expensive (TBC)) these headphones aren’t scrimping on materials. The stitched leather headband and padded earcups see to that; we rather like the almost “pointy” earcups too, which add a lick of style to the otherwise uniformly black cans.

If you’re all about the Lightning port then the Audeze Sine headphones will be available from April, with an expected price of £400. Not cheap, but the quality of audio and finish is every bit in contention with Bang & Olufsen or Bowers & Wilkins products – clearly Audeze knows what it’s doing.

TalkTalk’s customer helpline now uses voice authentication

The days of digging out that grubby Post-it note with your telephone account password scrawled on are over for TalkTalk customers. From today, you’ll only need your vocal cords to prove you are who you say you are. That’s because TalkTalk has introduced biometric voice authentication on its customer services helpline, in what’s said to be the first implementation in the UK outside of the financial industry.

TalkSafe, as it’s called, uses Nuance’s fancy voice authentication tech, which HSBC recently announced it would adopt as part of a larger biometric banking plan. It can recognise over 100 unique identifiers in a person’s voice, from speed, emphasis and pronunciation to the shape of your larynx, vocal tract and nasal passage. TalkTalk customers can create their “voiceprint” the next time they call up, the idea being it’ll speed up future calls by verifying your identity immediately.

TalkTalk is also implementing this technology to try and make interactions with customers as secure as possible. As you may remember, the quad-play provider suffered a huge data breach last year, with hackers getting away with the sensitive and personal details of over 150,000 customers. Freebies weren’t enough to stop over 100,000 customers jumping ship, but since the cyberattack, TalkTalk has begun tightening up security and tried to be transparent about other threats to customer data.

Source: TalkTalk