Oakley Radar Pace review – CNET
The Good The Oakley Radar Pace is lightweight and comfortable to wear. It can provide real-time coaching and feedback while running or biking, and doubles as a pair of Bluetooth headphones.
The Bad It’s expensive. Your phone is required to workout. Battery life could be better. There were occasional software hiccups and missed voice commands.
The Bottom Line The Radar Pace delivers real-time fitness coaching via a voice-activated pair of headphone-enabled sunglasses, and does it better than anything else.
I had coaches for most of my running career, six over the course of 11 years to be exact. From junior high and through to college, I had someone creating weekly running plans for me and coaching me to become a faster and stronger runner. That’s a luxury not available to everyone, but to me, it matters.
In recent years, I’ve relied on basic training plans available on the web, but nothing satisfied my needs. While most of these programs would provide a weekly workout schedule, few offered actual coaching.
That’s why I was intrigued when I heard about Oakley’s new workout sunglasses. The Oakley Radar Pace offers real-time coaching and feedback during your runs and bike rides, via audio cues over embedded Bluetooth headphones. The software can even create a weekly training plan that is tailored to you and your athletic ability. This isn’t something that will replace your Fitbit. There’s no step tracking and you wouldn’t wear them throughout the day. These are used specifically to track running and cycling. And I really liked what it offered.
There are still some kinks that Oakley needs to work out, but the Radar Pace is still one of the most impressive devices I’ve tested in recent memory, and, at least for now, they’re the best fitness-coaching wearable device I’ve ever used.
Just keep in mind the Radar Pace costs $450, £400 or AU$640, which is more than double the price of Oakley’s normal, nonsmart Radar sunglasses. And it’s a very different proposition than your average fitness-tracking running watch.
How do they work?
First of all, these aren’t smart glasses, because they don’t have any display in them. Alternative gadgets like the Recon Jet and Garmin Varia Vision can display workout info in real time through a head-up-display, but the Radar Pace is all about audio. It relies on a voice assistant (like Siri or Amazon’s Alexa) to answer questions and provide coaching.
View full gallery Sarah Tew/CNET
They’re also excellent athletic sunglasses. They’re lightweight, comfortable to wear and didn’t bounce on my face during workouts. The frame is a little thicker than a normal pair of Oakleys, but that’s due to extra sensors for measuring movement and elevation. These glasses have an accelerometer, gyroscope, barometer and humidity and proximity sensors, along with Bluetooth and ANT+ for pairing a heart rate strap, footpod, cycling power meter and speed or cadence sensors. But there’s no GPS built-in, so you still have to workout with your phone.
On each side of the frame are Micro-USB ports. This is how you charge the Radar Pace and they’re also used to attach the included earphone pieces, which allow you to hear your “coach” and listen to music streamed from your phone. The headphones can’t be used without the glasses, but the glasses can be used without the headphones.
View full gallery Sarah Tew/CNET
A touchpad on the left side of the frame changes songs, adjusts the volume and accepts calls. You can even long-press it to activate Siri or Google Now, but Oakley’s voice assistant was more than adequate for all my midworkout questions.
Training with the Radar Pace
It’s time to go for a run.
I turn the sunglasses on, put them on my face and then say, “OK, Radar.” A small chime acknowledges that the Radar Pace is now listening. I ask, “What’s my workout for today?” A female voice responds, “We are going 4.5 miles and climbing 190 feet.” As my landlord watches me, I awkwardly respond, “OK, let’s go.”
View full gallery Sarah Tew/CNET
It didn’t take long for the feedback to come in. The music I was listening to softened, and the Radar Pace chimed in, “Your stride rate is low.” I was hitting about 78 steps per minute, but the glasses let me know I should get to 88 steps for optimal performance. “Smaller, quicker steps,” the voice told me. On another run, the glasses informed me that my pace was too fast and I should slow down since it was a recovery day.
Apple iPhone 8 Release Date, Price and Specs – CNET
The iPhone 7 is easily one of the best phones of 2016. It delivers peppy performance, more storage capacity than its predecessors, water resistance, a resilient battery, exceptional cameras (especially the iPhone 7 Plus model) and a host of other terrific features. But despite CEO Tim Cook’s prerelease promise that it would provide “things we can’t live without,” Apple’s iPhone 7 is an incremental upgrade. The 2016 phone is more of an evolutionary step rather than a revolutionary leap. In fact, with the omission of a headphone jack, one could argue that the iPhone 7 lacks a thing some of us can’t live without.
Still, this is just small fries compared to the early rumors that point to next year’s iPhone — the one marking the 10th anniversary of the very first iPhone ever — as the revolutionary, no-holds-barred model that will once again push the boundaries of what your phone can do for you. Expect the big reveal in the fall of 2017 (early September, if Apple sticks to its usual cycle). Until then, we’ll keep track of the rumor frenzy below.
Announcement and release dates
For years, Apple stuck to a pretty regular schedule, reserving major design changes for even-numbered years and leaving lesser “S phone” refreshes for odd-numbered years. So we were due for a total redesign in 2016 but instead we got the iPhone SE — a minor, midcycle update with particularly modest refinements on the iPhone 5S design — and the iPhone 7 — a meaty update under the hood, but with no real redesign.
The iPhone 7.
James Martin/CNET
Except for the missing headphone jack, it looks identical to an iPhone 6 and 6S. All of this has fueled widespread expectation that Apple will forgo the midcycle “S” refresh in 2017, and offer up a major update — the “iPhone 8,” presumably — in September 2017.
What’s in store
After a series of new iPhone devices featuring only minor external tweaks, it’s reasonable to wonder if Apple’s designers have hit a wall. Have we reached the boundaries of smartphone design, with future innovations confined to bumps in processor speed and battery efficiency? Or do the designers in Cupertino have a dramatic redesign up their collective sleeve for the iPhone 8?
Other companies have taken their phones in some novel directions. Apple’s archrival, Samsung, which builds its phones around Google’s Android mobile software, has started using curved glass in its designs, giving users an “Edge” where they can read quick notifications. Motorola’s Moto Z and Moto Z Force phones have magnetic connections for attachable back plates, cases and modules. LG has toyed with a modular phone concept; its G5 features add-on modules that boost audio and extend battery life.
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Chassis
Business Insider has reported that Apple is already developing hardware for the iPhone 8 at an office in Israel, with the focus on a design that’s “different.”
Since the run-up to the introduction of the iPhone 7, there have been rumors about the possibility of an edge-to-edge display. And in November 2016, The Wall Street Journal reported that the next generation could include a curved OLED screen — a possibility raised by many others as well.
The WSJ also reported that Apple is considering multiple variations of the next model, so anything is possible. Case in point: there have been murmurs about a ceramic body, already seen on the premium Apple Watch Series 2, which the company says is four times tougher than stainless steel.
Apple’s ceramic Watch Series 2.
Home button
Apple is already making changes to its signature home button. On the iPhone 7, that meant a new, solid-state button that you don’t click down. Instead, you rest your finger on top and the phone shivers with haptic feedback to let you know the button’s working. (If it stops working, iOS 10 surfaces a temporary on-screen Home button.)
Apple could very well experiment with this in future devices. There are rumors (like by Japanese Mac blog Macotakara) that its new iPad tablets could ditch the home button and become almost bezel-less when they hit, possibly in early 2017.
Maybe it’ll even become invisible. In 2015, Apple filed a patent for a transparent fingerprint sensor embedded into a smartphone display. Maybe that’s something we’ll see in 2017. With the iPhone 7’s new solid-state button, that pressure-sensitive screen and more Siri skills, Apple could decide we just don’t need a physical home button anymore. Removing it would also let Apple slim down the top and bottom bezels as well as squeeze a larger screen into the same size body — so long as it could integrate that Touch ID sensor.
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Wireless charging?
Samsung does it, and Apple is starting to, too. The wireless AirPods headphones may have been just the beginning. Next year’s iPhone could do away with the last physical wire: the Lightning cable needed for charging. Earlier this year, Barclays analyst Mark Moskowitz predicted that Apple would reserve this innovation for the iPhone 8; The Verge reported that Apple has been staffing up on wireless-charging experts; and in November, Nikkei Asian Review reported that Foxconn, one of Apple’s main manufacturing partners, is making wireless charging modules for the 2017 iPhone. Most recently, veteran Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo has suggested that the forthcoming 4.7-inch iPhone will come equipped with wireless charging.
The Apple Watch already uses a form of wireless charging. And the Qi standard, embraced by the likes of Samsung, already drives wireless charging stations in thousands of public spaces and 50 models of cars. Those stations are just waiting for an iPhone.
Samsung has made phones with slightly curved faces before, but we haven’t seen anything like the Samsung Galaxy Round, which bends the actual AMOLED display technology lengthwise beneath the glass.
Sarah Tew/CNET
Cameras
Dual-lens cameras like the one found in the iPhone 7 Plus and other phones aren’t just for zoom photos. Two cameras mean depth sensing, 3D and a lot more — like enabling cool things with augmented reality.
Apple CEO Tim Cook keeps talking up the feature, which can place virtual things in your real-world view, saying it’s more important than virtual reality, which immerses you completely in a digital world. It’s possible that the next iPhone (or maybe an “iPhone 8 Plus”) might have a dual-lens camera that could scan the world and overlay 3D objects onto it with high accuracy.
Display
For a long time, rumors suggested that Apple would give the iPhone a sapphire display, which would offer a higher degree of scratch- and shatter-resistance than the current models’ Gorilla Glass. Makes sense, since Apple already uses the material on the higher-end Apple Watch. Sapphire is expensive, though, and Apple won’t want to tremendously raise prices in its base model phone. There’s definitely a question mark hanging over this one.
It’s also being said that the iPhone will become curved. Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo at KGI Securities has predicted that Apple will introduce a new curved AMOLED display in 2017. That’d be a big change from the LCD screens in today’s iPhones — AMOLED is thinner, lighter, more flexible, and more power efficient. And in November, Sharp President Tai Jeng-wu mentioned that the next iPhone would have this OLED screen; of course, Apple hasn’t confirmed it.
With months to go before an official announcement, we’ll keep an eye on how the iPhone 7’s static “button,” dual-lens Plus camera and absent headphone jack may have set the stage for even bigger changes ahead.
Scroll down for a reverse-chronological look at the latest rumors.
November 28, 2016
Rumor: New iPads may finally ditch the home button
Apple is rumored to release new iPad tablets in the spring, and a Japanese report claims they will be nearly bezel-less.
November 28, 2016
Is an iPhone with a curved OLED screen on the way?
Reports say the tech giant is asking its Asia-based suppliers for increased production of OLED screens.
November 2, 2016
The iPhone 8 could have wireless charging
Apple manufacturing partner Foxconn is reportedly testing wireless charging for the next iPhone.
September 28, 2016
Apple ‘iPhone 8’ already in the works, report says
The next iPhone is being developed at offices in Israel and will feature a “radical redesign,” reports Business Insider.
September 17, 2016
iPhone Next: How iPhone 7 hints at next year’s breakthrough
Apple has shown that a series of little upgrades over time adds up to big changes in the future. So what’s on tap for the iPhone’s 10th anniversary?
Android is not iOS, December 2016 edition
Marshmallow rises while KitKat slowly melts.
December’s Android distribution numbers are out, and they’re boring. Android is still not iOS, and things don’t change in large increments, so haters will still hate and defenders will still hate.
Impressively, Android 6.0 Marshmallow now holds the single version crown with 26.3% share. That takes over Android 4.4 KitKat, the previous leader, which dropped 1.2% to 24% even. Lollipop cumulatively holds the lead with 34%, divided between versions 5.0 and 5.1.
Android distribution numbers, December 2016
Nougat rose a modest 0.1% in the month to 0.4% total, which seems small but with the total Android install base is actually quite a big number. That should increase more quickly when devices like the Galaxy S6, Note 5, and Galaxy S7 begin receiving Nougat en masse in 2017.
Meanwhile versions under KitKat — Jelly Bean, Ice Cream Sandwich, Gingerbread and Froyo — still comprise a ridiculous 15.3% of the install base, and that number is ever-so-slowly dropping as people upgrade their phones and tablets.
Here at AC, the user traffic numbers are very different, with the vast majority of people on either Android 6.0 Marshmallow or 7.0 Nougat. Very few people hold anything below Lollipop.
What version of Android is your phone or tablet running?
Android Nougat
- Android 7.0 Nougat: Everything you need to know
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- Google Pixel + Pixel XL review
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36 geeky wrapping papers to use on Christmas gifts this year
Part of the joy behind the gift-giving experience is finding an awesome present that’s tailored to one person. But did you realise wrapping paper can further bring that present to a whole new (and geekier) level?
Surprising a person with a Christmas gift doesn’t have to be all about the gift. From the moment they see the present, you can make their face light up. Just wrap the gift in a unique wrapping paper. There are tonnes of styles available.
In fact, Pocket-lint found 36 of the coolest wrapping papers you can buy online. But they’re not just any type of wrapping paper. We found geeky styles perfect for cloaking gadgets and delighting tech-savvy loved ones, friends, and family. Whether you’re interested in binary code or video game characters, you should be able find the exact paper you need.
And if not, you can always try Wrap.me. It lets you upload photos and create custom paper (starting at £4.99 a roll).
READ: Best geek Christmas jumpers: Star Wars, Sonic, Game of Thrones, and more
Prius plug-in drivers in Japan can earn real-world rewards for electric driving
Because saving money on gas just wasn’t incentive enough.Buyers of new plug-in Prius models in Japan (known as the Prius Prime in the US) will have another incentive, besides using less gas, to drive in EV mode as much as possible. Toyota has formed a partnership with five major electricity providers in Japan to offer a program that rewards points to drivers who maximize the electric mode. And these points aren’t arbitrary. They have actual monetary value and can be used to help pay electric bills or be exchanged for products. We’ve come a long way from adding leaves to a Ford Fusion hybrid’s digital tree.
According to Toyota, points are awarded using a few types of data. One component is how far drivers travel on electric power only, and since the program is meant to encourage electric driving, it’s safe to assume that longer distances earn more points. The other components include how much home charging is performed, and various other unnamed data collected by the car’s data communication module. Toyota tracks the data of people in the program, and provides it to the power companies that award points. Exactly how the other data affects points wasn’t given by Toyota.
This happens to be the second program Toyota has launched that gamifies driving. Just a few months ago, the company teamed up with coffee chain Komeda to create an app to keep people off their cell phones while driving. The app would recognize when the phone was face down and not being used, and when drivers reached a certain distance, they would receive a coupon for coffee at a Komeda shop. Toyota reported that the app was downloaded 37,000 times and drivers racked up over 1.6 million miles of phone-free motoring. It will be interesting to see how many people sign up for this new Prius program, and whether similar programs show up in different countries with different companies.
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Plume’s WiFi extending pods are now available
If you’re having WiFi issues in certain rooms and range extenders or powerline plugs aren’t doing the trick, there’s another option on the market. Plume’s mesh-based “pod” WiFi system is now on sale following a pre-order campaign earlier this year. Like Eero or Google WiFi, you place a pod in rooms where you want internet, and they’ll intelligently connect over multiple 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands, providing uniform coverage around your home.
There’s no central router per se — you just plug each Plume pod directly into a power jack, and connect one to your modem. At $179 for three pods, Plume’s system is significantly cheaper than both Google WiFi and Eero ($299 and $499 for three, respectively). However, you’ll likely need fewer pods with those systems, whereas Plume recommends you put a pod in each internet-connected room. Pods include a single internet jack should you need to go wired.
Plume says its “adaptive WiFi” is faster than most systems because the signal can jump across multiple “backhaul” channels between pods, rather than just one like a regular router and extender. It’s managed by a cloud-based system that can adjust traffic patterns for maximum efficiency and optimize speeds for, say, Netflix streaming. The cloud system also reduces the electronics required on each device, keeping costs down.
You can now order pods for $69 each, $179 for three or get a six-pack for $329 from Plume’s online store (in the three colors shown above). Shipping is three to four weeks, and as mentioned, the company recommends one pod per room.
Via: The Verge
Source: Plume
Android 7.1.1 is rolling out now
Google’s excellent Pixel phones launched with Android 7.1, a minor update to Nougat that nevertheless included a few handy features. Now, Google has announced that Android 7.1.1 has started rolling out to other Android phones and provide a lot of those features to more users. Specifically, the Nexus 6, Nexus 5X, Nexus 6P, Nexus 9, Pixel, Pixel XL, Nexus Player, Pixel C and General Mobile 4G (Android One) will all start getting the latest version of Android soon.
As for what you can find from a feature perspective, Google has added support for its “image keyboard” that lets you easily find and send pictures and GIFs without leaving your messaging app of choice. Google says it’ll work inside of Hangouts, Allo, and the default Messaging app. Ironically enough, the feature has been available in the Gboard iOS keyboard that Google launched in the spring, but it’s good to see it coming to more Android phones now.
Android 7.1.1 also includes Google’s latest set of more diverse emoji, specifically focused on showing a “wider range of professions” for women. And it also contains the excellent app shortcut feature that originally launched on the Pixel — if you press and hold on an app’s icon, a sub-menu of shortcuts will show up. You’ll be able to quickly send a message to a specific contact or navigate to a saved location using these shortcuts, for example. They’re very much like the “force touch” shortcuts found on the iPhone, but that doesn’t make them any less useful.
As usual with Android rollouts, this won’t hit all phones at once. Google says it’ll become available “over the next several weeks.” But if you don’t want to wait, you can enroll your device in the Android Beta preview program and receive the update much quicker.
Source: Google
Disney can digitally recreate your teeth
Digital models of humans can be uncannily accurate these days, but there’s at least one area where they fall short: teeth. Unless you’re willing to scan the inside of someone’s mouth, you aren’t going to get a very faithful representation of someone’s pearly whites. Disney Research and ETH Zurich, however, have a far easier solution. They’ve just developed a technique to digitally recreate teeth beyond the gum line using little more than source data and everyday imagery. The team used 86 3D scans to create a model for an “average” set of teeth, and wrote an algorithm that adapts that model based on what it sees in the contours of teeth in photos and videos.
The technology doesn’t require any special capture equipment outside of the initial scans (the camera on your phone will do). Also, you don’t have to purposefully bare your teeth: it can work with the incomplete information from a smile or grimace. A movie crew could generate models based on a brief, natural motion capture session.
This being Disney, the most obvious use is for digital actor models in animated movies and video games. You could see uncannily realistic characters whose details pass muster even in close-up shots. However, there are plenty of medical uses as well. The scientists see dentists using the tech to previsualize a patient’s mouth before they sit in the operating chair, and it’s easy to imagine this leading to more authentic-looking dentures. As silly as the notion of accurately rendered teeth may be, they could be important for your well-being.
Source: Disney Research, EurekAlert
Microsoft’s second try at social chat bots arrives in Kik
Microsoft’s first foray into social chat bots didn’t go so well given that propensity for racist diatribes. It’s giving the concept another try, however, and this time it promises to be more successful. Twitter user Tom Hounsell has noticed the existence of Zo, a Microsoft chat bot currently being tested in the messaging app Kik. Effectively, Zo looks like an English-language version of Microsoft’s existing Chinese bot, Xiaoce. After briefly gauging your personality, it’ll participate in conversations like an overexcited teenager. The bot is far from perfect, but that’s what’s testing is for, isn’t it?
Notably, the bot steers clear of topics that could land it in the headlines, like you saw with Tay. Ask Zo about politics or Hitler, for example, and it will not-so-subtly try to guide you away from the subject. It’s also uncannily knowledgeable about Microsoft products, and will profess to being a Windows phone fan.
Kik is an unusual proving ground for Microsoft — you’d expect it to try the bot on Skype or a very large third-party service like WhatsApp. A mid-sized service like Kik makes sense, mind you. It limits testers to those who are genuinely interested in what Zo can do (you can request an invitation if you’d like to try), and reduces the chances that gaffes will reflect badly on Microsoft. If Zo branches out to other platforms, it’ll likely happen only after the crew in Redmond is confident that its bot will behave.
Via: MSPowerUser, The Verge
Source: Zo, Tom Hounsell (Twitter)
AT&T starts testing 5G wireless with Intel in Austin
Verizon may have beat AT&T to the punch, but no matter — the second-biggest US carrier has started testing 5G wireless technology that promises to bring gigabit bandwidth to our mobile devices in the coming years. In a blog post, AT&T says that it is taking the 5G bandwidth tests it was making in labs out into the field, with Intel and Ericsson serving as partners in this venture. Like Verizon, AT&T is using millimeter wave technology; in this case, the 5G technology is working inside of one of Intel’s Austin offices.
AT&T appears to be right on schedule — earlier this year, the carrier said that it was planning to run these Austin test by the end of the year. Specifically, AT&T says it is interested in how this new network will stand up to streaming 4K video, but it’ll also be testing a wide variety of office use cases including VPN, VoIP, “unified communications applications” and good old internet access. But 4K video is of particular interest, given how important video is to the mobile landscape.
It’s worth noting that this test does not mean we’re going to see 5G wireless technology any time soon. The standard hasn’t been decided yet, which means we might get a repeat of the nonsense back-and-forth over what exactly “4G” means that we lived through in 2010 and 2011. The more things change, the more they stay the same, right?
Source: AT&T
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