Cricket will sell the Alcatel Idol 4 on Aug. 5 for $200 with free VR goggles

AT&T’s no-contract subsidiary Cricket Wireless will begin selling the Alcatel Idol 4 on August 5 for $199.99. It will be bundled with free VR goggles.

Here’s a quick look at the features of the Alcatel Idol 4:

• Brilliant 5.2″ Full HD display gives users clear viewing from any angle – even in direct sunlight
• Octa-core processing power and 4G LTE speed
• Powerful dual cameras, with flash and wide-angle imaging
• Dual 3.6-watt multi-directional speakers, enhanced by Waves Audio Technology
• Bundled with free exclusive Virtual Reality Goggles for 360° viewing and gaming
• OS: Android 6.0 (Marshmallow)
• Battery: 2610 mAh
• Memory: Up to 16GB internal storage (microSD card slot up to 512 GB)
• Camera: Rear 13MP with flash and 1080p video recording, front: 8 MP with flash & wide-angle lens

Owners can access VR content with the goggles via the phone’s Alcatel VR Store or from VR content pioneer Littlstar. The Alcatel Idol 4 is available with all of Cricket’s smartphone plans.

Watch Phil tonight on TWiT.tv’s ‘All About Android’

Our own fearless leader Phil Nickinson will be the special guest on TWiT.TV’s live video podcast “All About Android” tonight at 8 p.m. EDT (5 p.m. PDT).

Phil will likely be discussing a ton of Android news that has come up in the past few days with the shows’s hosts Jason Howell, Florence Ion, and Ron Richards, including the release of the fifth and final Developer Preview of Android 7.0 Nougat, more rumors about the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 and more.

Check out All About Android at TWiT.tv

Check out the live streaming of the show tonight

Introducing Go Time — a Pokémon Go podcast!

Sure on a technical level Pokemon Go is neat, but on a personal level it’s something entirely new.

We’ve talked a lot about Pokémon Go recently. Some of you love it, a lot of you wish we’d be a little less excited about it, but the fact is there’s a ton of people playing this game and many of us are actually enjoying the game. We’ve made new friends, had new adventures, explored parts of our cities we otherwise never would have, and in some ways become healthier human beings. Outside of the technical merits to the game or the explosive popularity, it’s just plain fun to get out and enjoy something with new people.

It’s a fun conversation to have, and we’re going to keep having it in a slightly different format. Welcome to Go Time — a Pokémon Go Podcast!

Go Time is a weekly podcast featuring one person from Instinct, Mystic, and Valor sharing their experiences, talking about adventures in the Pokémon Go community, and of course any strategies or tips we encounter along the way. If that’s something you’re interested in, here’s where you can find us!

• Google Play
• Soundcloud
• iTunes
• Or add us to your podcatcher of choice!

You can also join our Facebook page to keep up on all things Pokémon Go. See you in the world!

Pokémon Go

• Join our Pokémon Go forums!
• How to deal with GPS errors in-game
• Which team should you choose?
• How to play without killing your battery
• The Ultimate Pokémon Go Game Guide!
• Listen to the Pokémon Go podcast!

We’re giving away a Huawei Watch and an assortment of bands from StrapsCo!

Smart watches are cool, and they’re even better when you can customize them to make them fit your lifestyle and personality. Leather, nylon, mesh, or rubber, thick or thin, sporty, vintage, or classy; there are styles to suit every imaginable taste. We’ve teamed up with StrapsCo to give one of you a new Huawei Watch and an assortment of bands! Read on and see how to get yourself entered!

THE PRIZE One grand prize winning Android Central reader will be taking home a brand new Huawei Watch plus selection of StrapsCo bands for it! Two runners-up will receive a selection of StrapsCo bands for the android wear watch of their choice.

THE GIVEAWAY Head down to the widget at the bottom of this page. There are multiple ways to enter, each with varying point values. Complete all of the tasks for maximum entries and your best shot at winning! Keep in mind that all winning entries are verified and if the task was not completed or cannot be verified, a new winner will be chosen. The giveaway is open until August 2nd, and winners will be announced right here shortly after the close date. Good luck!

We’re giving away a Huawei Watch and an assortment of bands from StrapsCo!

The Kafon Drone clears minefields 20 times faster than people

The manufacture, dissemination and use of anti-personnel mines were effectively banned in the late 1990s when 133 nations signed the Ottawa Treaty. But despite that international agreement, an estimated 100 million mines remain buried beneath former war zones where they kill or maim an average of 10 people per day. Using conventional methods — whether that involves detector animals, human deminers or armored vehicles — we’d need more than millennium to deactivate them all. The creators of this mine-hunting UAV, however, figure they can get it done in a little over a decade.

It’s called the Mine Kafon Drone (MKD) and its creators have just launched a Kickstarter campaign for its production. The MKD is a hexcopter with three interchangeable arms: a high resolution camera, a metal detector and a robotic arm. The drone first flies over the field and uses its camera to both create a 3D aerial map and mark potentially dangerous areas with GPS waypoints. Then, using its metal detector attachment, the MKD rescans the field looking for actual mines. It uses the 3D map it made in the previous step to keep the detector just 4 cm from the ground as it flies by. Any mines that it finds are geotagged for removal. To actually do that, the MKD attaches its gripper arm to drop a small, timed detonator atop the mine. Once the drone is safely out of range, the detonator explodes, setting off the mine underneath. Overall, the MKD’s creators estimate that this process can clear a minefield up to 20 times faster — and for 200 times less cost — than conventional methods.

The MKD team is trying to raise €90,000 to get the project going. A €17 donation will allow you to sponsor 7,500 square meter of mine field mapping. €75 earns you a miniature replica of the drone. €5,000 will get you an MKD of your very own, complete with robo-arm. That’s not a bad deal given that the final version of the drone is expected to retail for 4 times that amount — a whopping €20,000. Should the campaign reach its funding goal, MKDs could begin demining the world’s war zones as early as next June.

Source: Kickstarter

How to make your basement smart

Downstairs, in the basement, can be a great place to escape to. Your den can be full of fun, from a great TV to video games to the newest entertainment kid on the block – virtual reality.

The latter needs some space and perhaps the basement is the best for that, where there’s no dining table in the way. Your desk needs a bit of tech love too though, so there’s also a desk light that will never run out of light. Here are some excellent gadgets for making your basement smart.

Jake Dyson CSYS task light

Jake Dyson

Few things are more annoying in the basement than a bulb blowing when you’re in the middle of working on something urgent. And where did you put the spare bulb for that particular light, because it’s not with all the others? So why not choose a desk lamp that should never need this attention.

This lamp, also available in a floor-standing version, uses LED bulbs. These are long-lasting anyway, but according to Jake, son of the inventor Sir James Dyson, because of clever heat sink technology to keep them cool, the ones on this light will last 144,000 hours. Which is enough for anyone, surely? The arm pivots, slides and rotates cleverly so the light is exactly where you need it.

dyson.com

Tesla Powerwall

Tesla

Solar panels can be a great way to generate electricity, but you can’t always rely on the sun when you need it. This is a battery which is charged from solar panels ready for when you need it.

It can also be connected to the regular power supply, to be charged when utility rates are low, so you can use the power in the evening, say. It can also be used to power your house, or select appliances, in the event of a power outage.

teslamotors.com

Honeywell Lyric Wireless

Honeywell

Honeywell’s house protection has many features, including a camera. That’s handy for a room like the basement. Hear a noise late at night? The camera can snap a shot that you can see on your tablet or smartphone.

Want to know what the dog gets up to while you’re out? The Lyric lets you watch live video remotely and a speaker means it’ll let you shout “Get off the armchair now!”. Sadly, it can’t force the dog to comply. That’s down to your tone of voice.

yourhome.honeywell.com

Amazon Fire TV Stick

Amazon

You might have snuck a TV into the basement to make it a bit more den-like, but the cable, the TV aerial and none of the wiring reaches. In this case, why not try a box like the tiny Fire TV Stick which plugs into your screen’s HDMI socket and uses the Wi-Fi network to stream content.

If you team it with an Amazon Prime subscription, you have access to a wealth of TV programmes and movies at no extra cost. There are also apps which let you access CNN, HBO Now and lots more. It’s entirely portable so you can take it to a friend’s house, or even to use in some hotel TVs while you’re away.

amazon.com

Sony PlayStation 4

Sony

Where better to play games than while you’re down in the basement? It’s not taking up the family TV when they want to be watching Game of Thrones, for a start and you can play for as long as you want without being disturbed.

The PlayStation 4 is an incredibly advanced games machine with a wide range of titles from full-on actioners with gore and realism to platform games that demand a greater dexterity than you might think. Plus, since you can download games over Wi-Fi, you may never leave your den again.

playstation.com

HTC Vive

HTC

If you’ve got a decent-sized floor space in your basement, why not get into the latest, most exciting way to play games? That’s virtual reality and this is the brilliant Vive from HTC. A helmet goes over your head, with screens just in front of your eyes. Cables connect the helmet to your PC, and you’ll need quite a powerful one to go with the Vive.

Some of the games and experiences are eye-poppingly beautiful and utterly immersive. There are also clever safeguards to prevent you from walking into the wall that you can’t see because you’re roaming a different world – a mesh of squares appears as you approach the edge of the safe zone.

htcvive.com

The Honeywell Lyric Water Leak and Freeze Detector is an early warning system that notifies you on your smartphone when a leak is detected or the temperature drops below a temperature of your choice. By catching it early, you may be able to avoid expensive repairs and loss of treasured items. To find out more visit Honeywell.com

This article was created in association with Honeywell.

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A month without bacon because my genes said so

If you’ve ever stumbled across the more inspirational corner of Instagram, you’ll find plenty of images pertaining to motivation. After all, very few of us are physically incapable of at least trying to be athletic, but not everyone will haul enough ass to actually make it happen. I’ve made a career of using technology to lose weight, although never quite reaching my target. I put that down to a crippling lack of motivation, but for the first time in my adult life, I’ve spent the last three weeks eating salads as a component of every meal. Why? Because I’d really rather not get Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s or cancer if I can avoid it.

A few weeks back, I had my DNA tested by DNAFit, a startup that analyzes your genetic makeup to improve your health and wellbeing. It’s primarily designed for elite athletes looking to slice a few extra milliseconds from their sprint times, as well as weekend warriors who’ve already bought some fancy sneakers. But maybe what I really needed to help me lose weight is professional-level diet counseling from a former Olympic athlete. It was worth a go, because at this point, the only option available to me after this is finding a way to get on Extreme Makeover: Ass Vacuuming Edition.

The results were deeply upsetting, mostly because it turned out that the fundamentals of my diet were all the things I shouldn’t be eating. It’s not even as if I live on a diet of non-stop junk food and sugary drinks either. My body can’t synthesize a big stack of chemicals necessary for healthy living, and so I have to supplement it with diet and pills. Even worse, I was advised to reduce my servings of smoked, fried and grilled meat to two portions a week, at most. Then there was the fact that bacon, the greatest foodstuff of them all, was now off the menu, essentially forever.

My task was made easier because DNAFit supplied me with a 43-page meal plan prepared by a pair of PhD students at Liverpool’s John Moores university. This low-carbohydrate plan was designed to cover a 12-week diet, with each meal packing the correct quantities of macro and micronutrients that my body doesn’t produce for itself. If there was an issue with this plan, it was that it was a shade too bougie for a regular slob like me. It didn’t help either that I’d rather die tomorrow than eat smoked salmon and cream cheese as a lunchtime snack.

I may be a picky eater, but I’m also a resilient one, and I’m perfectly content to eat the same meal over again if I like it. That proved to be a boon, because some of the meals in the planner I didn’t just like — I considered them treats. Homemade chicken fajitas were on the menu, and I happily packed in extra wilted cabbage and other veggies to make them even healthier. Same goes for lamb meatballs, a meal that I looked forward to, but never had on a regular basis — so long as they weren’t smoked or grilled. In fact, most of my meals have included some meat (cooked without charring) alongside a big pile of salad on one side and a single piece of toasted pita bread on the other.

Look at this sodding thing. pic.twitter.com/Wi0yV1MeIT

— Dan CoopEUr (@danielwcooper) July 13, 2016

I’ve had to learn how to embrace salad — salad! — as a key component of my daily diet. And it wasn’t as hard as I expected. For lunch I’ll have a small salad containing shredded carrot, cucumber, sweet pointed pepper and pomodorino tomato. At dinnertime, I’ll make the same again, adding fistfuls of fresh spinach leaves and massaged baby kale to bulk it out, drizzled with balsamic vinegar. The addition of cruciferous greens to my diet in massive quantities was a key tentpole of DNAFit’s advice, since I have a deleted GSTM1 gene. That, in plain English, means that my body has never, and can never, produce enzymes to deal with carcinogens. Any time something cancer-causing hits my insides, it’s given a red carpet welcome. That isn’t good.

On the bright side, I have low sensitivity to fat and salt, not to mention I’m free to drink as much milk as I care to, which is excellent news. But there’s always a kick in the gut, and for me it was a highly elevated risk of coeliac disease: up from 1 in 100 to 1 in 35 — although it’s not a definite medical diagnosis. That means that I need to cut down the amount of gluten in my diet, which kinda negates all of the time I’ve spent learning how to make fresh bread by hand.

One issue that a lot of recovering overeaters have is that it’s hard to find a sense of chemical joy in absence. After all, our brains are used to that endorphin rush that comes from stuffing our bodies full of crap. We’re also conditioned to tolerate that churning, gnawing sensation in our stomachs when we’ve gone too heavy on dinner and dessert. But when the bulk of your food is coming from plant matter, all of that goes, in favor of… nothing.

It takes a few days before the positives become obvious. Bending down to pick up a baby bath full of water no longer causes me to break a sweat. I’m suddenly a little clearer-headed. Writing is easier and I’m making fewer spelling mistakes, not to mention I’m sleeping better too. My weight hasn’t dropped substantially, though — at least not according to my scale. But my jeans are a lot more comfortable than they were a few weeks ago.

What have I become, my sweetest friend. pic.twitter.com/tobfEO3VN4

— Dan CoopEUr (@danielwcooper) July 9, 2016

I’ve also not stuck to the diet as slavishly as perhaps I should; one Sunday was spent eating two big meals with friends, one after the other. I regretted that the following day as I felt woozy from the influx of carbohydrates that I realized I shouldn’t have eaten. But lapses will always happen, and so long as I’m working towards better habits, then I don’t feel too bad.

My initial foray into “nutrigenetic” testing meant that I got to sit down with DNAFit’s Craig Pickering, who knows a thing or two about motivation. He was a world-class sprinter who, on the cusp of going to the 2012 London Olympics as a gold medal prospect. But, just months before the main event, his back gave out and required surgery to correct, rinsing his chances of representing his country. For most people, that would have been that, but not for Pickering. When his back was healed, he retrained as a bobsledder in the hopes of participating in the 2014 winter games. But again, just as he was starting to make waves, his back gave out. This time his career was over.

So I asked him, what tips could he give me to ensure that I would also be able to remain motivated? It came down to two things: balance, and social engineering. First, rather than giving himself “bans” for certain foods, he merely resolves to have them fewer times a week. Second, it’s about keeping temptation at bay. So, rather than walking home from work past a McDonald’s, he picks a different route. There’s no bulk-buying of bingeable foods in his refrigerator to force him to keep to good habits. But he has no specific restrictions either.

So what motivates me? I think, in honesty, it’s not about being thinner, healthier and happier. I’ve tried that — the idea that I’d somehow become handsome and attractive and more confident if I just put down the bag of chips. It didn’t work. But the motivation to change, for me, came in stark black and white: My body is broken and I need to fix it — fast. That sense of youthful invulnerability that we all have has left me, replaced with an inconvenient truth. Which just reminds me about how many good things I have to live for, even if it does mean having to eat shitloads of kale.

Republican party embraces next-gen wireless and IoT

In 2012 the GOP’s official platform didn’t say much about broadband. In fact, in the 62-page, roughly 30,000-word document detailing the party’s various policy stances, the word “broadband” only appeared once. In 2016, things are a little different. The platform dedicates far more space to talk of expanding internet access. It even calls for reforms that would help the Internet of Things “thrive.”

There is little in the way of specific policy proposals, which is to be expected of a document that attempts to encompass the party’s position on almost every issue imaginable. Not surprisingly the platform focuses on market reforms and private business solutions. Republicans are not calling for massive investments from the government, subsidies for the poor or the expansion of municipal broadband programs. Instead, the party is focusing on increasing access to wireless spectrum for wireless providers and encouraging competition in a “open market.”

The document chastises the current administration for failing to do enough to “advance our goal of universal broadband coverage.” And cites in particular the failure to cover rural areas which have had traditionally had trouble attracting service from landline internet providers. It also claims that 10 million Americans have ditched wired broadband over the last 10 years as we’ve begun to rely more on mobile broadband. Which makes its calls for opening up spectrum in order to pave “the way for high-speed, next-generation broadband” all the more critical for the party’s plans to connect the entire country to the web.

One phrase you will not find in the document is “net neutrality.” That’s hardly a shock considering almost every Republican has come out swinging hard against the regulation. While the platform does not explicitly call for repealing neutrality rules, it does call for “competition on the internet and for internet services,” which could indicate that net neutrality’s days could be numbered under a Trump administration if the GOP maintains control of both the House and the Senate.

Source: GOP Party Platform (PDF)

The best ice cream maker

By Lesley Stockton

This post was done in partnership with The Sweethome, a buyer’s guide to the best things for your home. Read the full article here.

When the mercury starts climbing, nothing screams “summertime” quite like homemade ice cream. After researching for 85 hours, testing 14 makers, talking with pro ice cream makers and a food scientist, and churning gallons of the frozen stuff over the past two years, we think the Whynter ICM-15LS is your best bet for making consistently great ice cream at home. At its current price of around $250, it’s not cheap. But because it’s so easy to use and essentially guarantees success, it’ll likely get a lot more play in your kitchen than cheaper, more finicky machines.

How we tested

Samples from our first testing. Photo: Lesley Stockton

For a previous version of this guide, we tested the machines using a relatively low-fat recipe from Ample Hills Creamery in Brooklyn, and I tasted them for texture and flavor with friend Sara Bonisteel, staff editor for the food section of The New York Times. For this update, we wanted to see how the machines handled different recipes. We ran a higher-fat vanilla ice cream base through each machine; it contains more cream and egg yolks than the Ample Hills recipe, which has more milk than cream. Higher-fat ice cream bases are more forgiving because there’s a lower percentage of water to crystallize and ruin the creamy texture. If a machine made icy ice cream from this luxurious base, we figured it wouldn’t be worth buying.

We also made a simple lemon sorbet without added glucose or corn syrup to smooth out the texture. We thought an unforgiving sorbet recipe that didn’t have any aid from fruit fiber or special sugars would show us the differences between these machines. But we were wrong. All the ice cream makers made the same sorbet. After the initial two tests, we dismissed the lowest-performing machine and made chocolate ice cream in the remaining four makers. (If you’re curious, we used David Lebovitz recipes.)

Instead of the informal tasting we held for the previous guide, we held a blind taste test with six tasters. From our two years of testing, we’ve learned that with ice cream makers, you truly do get what you pay for. The prices of the machines we tested directly reflected the resulting quality of ice cream.

Our pick

Ice cream churning in the Whynter ICM-15LS. Photo: Lesley Stockton

We like the Whynter ICM-15LS because it made smoother ice cream in a shorter amount of time than most of the other models. Although it didn’t create the absolute smoothest texture, it does hit the sweet spot of great results at a reasonable price. It’s also one of the quieter machines we tested, and its simple, compact design makes it easy to store. It’s also one of the simplest models to use, scoop from, and clean. And because the Whynter is a self-refrigerating compressor machine, you won’t have to deal with freezing an insert bowl or futzing with messy ice and salt.

Runner-up

The Breville Smart Scoop is loaded with automatic settings. Photo: Lesley Stockton

If the Whynter ICM-15LS sells out, or you just want more bells and whistles, the Breville Smart Scoop is a great alternative. Although it made slightly creamier ice cream than our top pick, the difference was so subtle that we don’t think it’s worth the extra $150 for most people. It has an auto function with 12 hardness settings and a “keep cool” function so you can set your ice cream and walk away. And its brightly lit LCD display and control panel with big buttons make it easy to use—even for kids.

If you take your ice cream craft seriously

Checking the consistency of the ice cream in the Lello 4080 Musso Lussino. Photo: Lesley Stockton

The Lello 4080 Musso Lussino is the crème de la crème of home ice cream makers. The large, sleek machine churned out smooth and creamy batches of ice cream in less than 30 minutes, the fastest of any model we tested. And our tasters unanimously voted its ice cream the smoothest and best-flavored. But its jaw-dropping price makes the Musso Lussino too expensive for casual dessert-making. If you plan on making more than one quart of ice cream a week, this might be the machine for you.

For KitchenAid users

The lowest speed of the KitchenAid stand mixer is faster than the churn speed on any other ice cream maker we tested. Photo: Lesley Stockton

If you own a KitchenAid stand mixer, we really like the KitchenAid Ice Cream Maker Stand Mixer Attachment as well. This is a bowl that requires pre-freezing, which necessitates more planning ahead than our main pick. It made the absolute fluffiest ice cream of the machines we tested, because the lowest setting on the KitchenAid stand mixer is still faster than the speed at which ice cream makers spin. We didn’t mind the texture at all; in fact, it was quite pleasant.

Ice-cream-making tips

Scraping out finished ice cream from the Whynter ICM-15LS. Photo: Katie Hausenbauer-Koster

To minimize the size of ice crystals, temperature matters. Everything needs to be as cold as possible. Before you spin your base, thoroughly chill it down in an ice bath. The colder the base, the sooner it starts to freeze. Sometimes I’ll even put my base in the freezer until ice crystals just begin to form on the edges, then I’ll give it a vigorous stir before pouring it into the machine.

Once the ice cream is spun, it’s soft like soft serve. It’s completely edible but definitely not scoopable. This is the point where you “ripen” the ice cream, which means transferring it to a container to freeze for at least a few hours. Additional freezing is an important step because it reduces the formation of ice crystals; the colder your freezer, the quicker your ice cream sets, and the smaller those ice cream crystals will be. And that’s it! It really is one of the simplest things to make. Once you get your technique down, you can play around with flavors, fat content, and maybe even some stabilizers like xanthan gum to tweak texture.

If you’re interested in adding mix-ins, you’ll do this before ripening the ice cream. Ice cream base expands as the dasher whips air into the mixture. In our own testing, we found that once the quart of base increased in size, there was little room for much else, and we had to add mix-ins slowly and periodically. Also, if you are adding mix-ins, chill them in the freezer so they don’t melt your freshly spun ice cream.

This guide may have been updated by The Sweethome. To see the current recommendation, please go here.